Kalyanamitta. In the scriptures, it was specifically talking about a wise spiritual friend in the tradition that we're trying to cultivate, the Buddhist Noble Eightfold Path. However, some of us are not so fortunate to have a close Kalyanamitta. And so, anyone who is trying to develop the Paramis and live a virtuous life is a better friend to be with than a person who is going in the completely opposite way, who doesn't have a basis of morality in their life, and who has a lot of wrong views.
However, if there is a clash of philosophy one still can feel a bit isolated and pressured by people who have different philosophies. So the best Kalyanamitta you can have, of course, is one who is cultivating the Noble Eightfold Path. Because of the different Buddhist and Judeo-Christian traditions that we grow up with, there's a lot of other worldly ideas mixed with both Buddhist and Judeo-Christian people. This often gets mixed up with their particular tradition.
For instance, in the Christian tradition, it's quite okay to drink alcohol. But in the Buddhist tradition, awareness is considered supremely important to protect us from harmful actions. So if we are trying to protect our mind and especially our awareness, a Buddhist may wish not to take intoxicants that confuse this precious awareness. These differences can be detrimental to our spiritual practices.
We have to be able to see the differences, so we can have enough courage and strength in ourselves to follow our own set of principles, and not be pressured by another set of principles which in that particular society is quite okay.
In the scriptural definition of a Kalyanamitta, it is a person who understands the basic Right View of Buddhist principles and also has some understanding of the techniques that help us along the way, who is going to be of most help to you. Because just following a moral path is not as refined as the fine mental work that some Buddhist practitioners are trying to do. The mind can get very tricky in wrong views which are quite okay with another tradition, but in the Buddhist tradition are considered quite harmful to ourselves.
The Buddhist tradition of a spiritual friend is a person who not only has a similar path to you but hopefully also has a similar understanding or a greater understanding. That's the ideal. But of course we can't always obtain the ideal in our life. So having another spiritual friend who is close to your understanding or who at least knows what you're doing and has respect for it is very helpful to have. When going down degrees, of course, spiritual friends are people who live a moral life and don't encourage you into harmful ways.