It has been an uphill battle for Canadian singer Justin Bieber to shake off his negative image. While he still has many more things to do to improve his persona, he feels happy with the things that he has accomplished so far.
It all started when he let go of the people who have been a negative influence in his life and started surrounding himself with people who have his best interests at heart.
"I just want to be around people who I feel are supporting me, uplifting me, and making sure I'm the best version of myself because there are so many people in this industry who just want to keep seeing me fall," he said, according to Us Weekly.
It hasn't been easy for the young star to weed out the negative people in his life, especially since he was not fully ready to let go of his happy, carefree lifestyle.
"It has to be on you. You have to make the conscious effort, because for me, so many times it was good people coming in my life and tugging at me, but I wasn't ready," he explained. "They're like, 'Justin, come on.' But I wasn't ready to take that leap and be like, 'Okay, this is what I want to change, this is who I am, and this is not who I am.' It takes moments of clarity to be like, 'Oh, that's why I'm not like this. That's why I shouldn't do this.'"
He strongly believes that wisdom comes through experience, and given the chance to live his life out again, he would probably do everything the same way, with the exception of going to Miami, where he was arrested back in January 2014 due to careless driving and resisting arrest.
"I mean, maybe I'm a bad influence, but for me I was like, no, I'm going to do this until I feel like I shouldn't be doing this. Maybe I was wrong, but that's how I learn, and I feel like I'm much better for it," he reflected.
Bieber is a pretty sensitive guy, and he's now having a difficult time trusting people because of his past experiences. "Trusting people is hard, especially for me. I've trusted people who I probably shouldn't have trusted before, and they've hurt my heart," he admitted. "So now I'm figuring out there's certain people I can't do that with."
Still, it's nice to know that Bieber has developed a healthy perspective when it comes to relationships. Despite his struggles with trust, he has kept his heart open to people.
"Here's what I'll tell the people: Don't let someone who ruined your trust ruin that next person's chance to gain that trust. I think I let that affect me and change the way I looked at people for a while," he shared. "There's so many beautiful and amazing people who will encourage you, who will love you, who will not judge you. But I didn't see that because I completely put myself over here."
"I still have moments where I'm like, 'Yeah people (expletive).' And then I'll have those moments of like, 'No, people are awesome, and this is why I do what I do in the first place,'" he said.
