Maybe a different religion, or especially political beliefs seems to be a big deal-breaker. Do you still find it worthwhile to keep them in your life?
I do. I have e.g. Christian Conservative friends, and Atheist Liberal ones, etc. I enjoy each one for what they are. I mean, nobody is perfect! (like me 😁)
I live by the maxim that you choose your quality by the company you keep, but I’ve struggled to add new friends over the years.
I had a friend who went from being a Marxist to being a Trump voter who rants about Jews. He used to talk about doing a Luigi, before there was one, and I could hang with that. He rotted somehow, seems like too much 4chan. I had to cut things off. Best friend for about twenty years. Worst part is, as a kid I didn’t like that I had friends who made fun of him behind his back and I stopped talking to them entirely. I cut him off a few years ago after one day he said that my baby was a suicide risk because they were mixed race.
Now I’ve only got two or three friends, and only one in the same country. It’s no good having integrity, sometimes.
You WILL - without question - become more like the people that you surround yourself with. I am glad that you chose integrity, but also wish that the cost for that could be lower. :-|
I am mentally drafting a letter to those friends I dropped in his defense. We were like eleven years old and stupidity is par for the course at that age. I hope they found the right path in life. I should have stayed and stood up to them.
There is little use blaming yourself for much of anything you’ve done in the past - you can’t go back and change any of it, and perhaps you’ve thought about it since much more than they have even:-). The only thing to do is decide what way seems best to move forward to.