I can't tell you how many times I have heard this quasi-spiritual horseshit in the two decades I've been sober and active in recovery programs. It is one of the top-five red flags of someone who, a) is still working on getting his or her ego in check or, b) has bastardized the tools to reinflate it. At three years, I'd venture that you fall into the former group, likely influenced by those in the latter - I can almost "hear" them in your ear.
It is common that we will change who we associate with, especially in early recovery. But who is to say that those former friends need what you do? You? Are you now the diagnoser-in-chief, the expert on who needs to "grow" and who does not? While it is true that you have moved beyond the things that were causing you unmanageability, and while it is certainly appropriate to say that you, speaking about yourself for yourself, have "grown," maybe you have just grown up. Maybe they already were "grown." Where do you get off measuring your "growth" against your former friends - or anyone else, for that matter.
Look at where you are today compared to where you were yesterday, to where you were three years ago. Envision where you want to be tomorrow, three years, 10 years, from now. That is the only "growth" worth measuring, it is the only growth that matters. You might have changed interests, you might have changed circles, you might have changed locations - but you did not "outgrow" anyone. In fact, saying as much indicates just the opposite.
Sobriety goes hand-in-hand with ego-checking. Some even call it an "ego-smashing" program, though I wouldn't go that far. The point is that an unchecked ego will lead to the same places unchecked alcoholism and addiction will. Spiritual elitists are rampant in recovery programs - but, if you seek them, so are humble spiritual guides. Listen to them and stop listening to those who are assuaging your feelings of loss. You repeatedly state words to the effect of, "and that's okay," and it is, but not that you've "outgrown them," because that didn't happen. Not to you, not to me and certainly not to anyone who says they have.
