It's always hard to break out of the mold of expectations that people have of you. People get to know you, they figure out what category to place you in, whether it be well respected successful brain surgeon, or slacker loser pothead.
As soon as you try to break that mold, you will experience resistance from all sides. The losers want to keep you a loser, so they can continue to have a pal to keep losing with. As soon as you try to change, they are threatened, because their loser-ness is being challenged. They either have to face themselves, and take the high-road, like you are doing, or they have to go through the trouble of finding another loser-buddy...at which point, they will still have your absence to remind them of what a loser they are. The end result is for them to try pull you down, and hope if and once they are able to, you will 'come to your senses'. They will call you arrogant, and self-righteous, and use guilt to try to bring you back down.
Many of those who have been looking down upon you all this time, will, surprisingly, not usually pull you up, but push you down...at the very least, hope you will slide back down. This is because they will find this new person a bit threatening. They don't want to have to put in the work to re-classify you. They too will use guilt.
Both sides will test you.
When I quit smoking weed, I was sitting on a fat half ounce of some greasy bud. They would come over, I would pack them all bowls, and just watch them all get toasted. With me being sober, and them being stoned, I found that before very long, they would all just kind of wander off....and I'd get back to work on whatever I was doing.
Another old buddy, an alcoholic, wanted to hang out, so I took him to an A.A. meeting. Afterwards, he told me that he wasn't like those other alcoholics there (he was), so I took him to a cool coffeehouse, with quality chicks, live music, and sober people. I talked to people, and chicks, and had a decent time, while he sat there like some weird jackass. He never wanted to hang out again.
So, I suggest, if someone wants to do the same old thing, take them along into your new, quality thing. They will either decide to improve themselves, and decide to make their own way, or you will totally get rid of them.
