Human beings are social creatures. A society is a group of two or more in alignment. In a social group of any size there is always an influence that creates the alignment.

We can be influenced to start a behavoir or end a behavior. The start of a new behavior or the end of an old behavior can be influenced in many ways but the ultimate decision to change is individual and personal.

I don't like using my phone.
I have had a few people that try to make me use my phone by implying they will like me more or if I don't then they won't like me.
I do not change my own actions for approval of others.
It is MY decision.

Think back when you were in high school.
How many times did you do something you did not want to do because it gained someone else's approval?
Then think about those times when that action change resulted in someone else's disapproval.
How did you personally feel about it?
Who mattered more, you or someone else?

I was just thinking about this very subject a few days ago and almost posted a topic on it. I didn't because I felt others could not relate and the few that do, would not respond.

My thoughts were focused on the reasons why we do things.

The question I was going to offer was
"What do we really HAVE TO DO in life?"

When you think about it you realise there are really not many things we have to do.
** Be influenced by gravity
** Exist on this planet
** Die

Everything else is our own decision.

Some would argue things like
Work - I have to work
Breathe - I have to breathe
Be socially accepted
Be loved or liked
The list could go on forvever and still not name every example.

There are more things that we must agree to do than those that we have to do.
I have to live. Well, technically, you don't HAVE TO live.
I have to work so I can afford to live. Again technically you can live without money, you just don't want to.

When we change ourselves because we HAVE TO be liked or loved it is not an inevitablility, it is a decision we make within ourselves.
All the things we do, we do because we decide to do them. The things we don't do are not done because we decided not to do them.
If you are influenced by others, that influence only changes you if you allow it.

Acceptance is the continuity of a society. We choose which socieies we wish to align with and then take actions to make it so.