Speaker 1: There's no such thing as one size fits all advice.
Speaker 1: Just because it works for this one person doesn't mean
Speaker 1: it's going to work for everybody.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the one you feed. Throughout time, great thinkers
Speaker 2: have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes
Speaker 2: like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you
Speaker 2: think ring true, and yet for many of us, our
Speaker 2: thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity,
Speaker 2: self pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't
Speaker 2: have instead of what we do. We think things that
Speaker 2: hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not
Speaker 2: just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent,
Speaker 2: and creative effort to make a life worth living. This
Speaker 2: podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in
Speaker 2: the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. Thanks
Speaker 2: for joining us. Our guests on this episode are Jolenta
Speaker 2: Greenberg and Kristin Meinzer. They are both hosts of the
Speaker 2: podcasts How to Be Fine with Friends and their previous
Speaker 2: podcast By the Book. More specifically, Jolenta is a New
Speaker 2: York based comedian, podcaster, pop culture commentator, and self proclaimed
Speaker 2: reality television historian. Kristen is a longtime audio producer and
Speaker 2: host and head of nonfiction Programming at Panopley. She also
Speaker 2: co hosts When Megan Met Harry, a royal wedding cast.
Speaker 3: Hi Jolenta, Hi Kristen, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 1: Hey, Hi, thanks for having us.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm excited to have you guys on. I have
Speaker 3: been fans of your work for a long time. You
Speaker 3: had a great podcast called By the Book, where you
Speaker 3: tried to live by self help books, which is a
Speaker 3: great idea. I love the way you did it. Then
Speaker 3: you change to a podcast called How to Be Fine,
Speaker 3: and now you have how to Be Fine with Friends,
Speaker 3: and so we'll be talking about all of those things.
Speaker 3: But before we do, let's start like we always do
Speaker 3: with the parable. In the parable, there's a grandparent who's
Speaker 3: talking with their grandchild and they say, in life, there
Speaker 3: are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle.
Speaker 3: When it's a good wolf, which represents things like kindness
Speaker 3: and bravery and love, and the other's a bad wolf,
Speaker 3: which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And
Speaker 3: the grandchild stops and thinks about it for a second.
Speaker 3: They look up at their grandparents they say which one wins,
Speaker 3: and the grandparent says the one you feed. So I'd
Speaker 3: like to start off by asking you what that parable
Speaker 3: means to you and your life and in the work
Speaker 3: that you do well.
Speaker 1: I think for me, a lot of it also comes
Speaker 1: down to not just feeding the good wolf, but knowing
Speaker 1: that sometimes feeding the good wolf initially might feel like
Speaker 1: more work until become second nature. Something I used to
Speaker 1: always say is bitterness is easy, and being happy is
Speaker 1: what's hard. It's so easy to just be a complainer.
Speaker 1: It's so easy to look at what's wrong in life.
Speaker 1: It's so easy to be mad at things because there's
Speaker 1: so much to be mad about, and I'm not in
Speaker 1: denial about any of that. There's a lot of crap
Speaker 1: in this world, and I think it's so easy to
Speaker 1: give into that. I think that's one reason why it
Speaker 1: can almost feel like to just go on to angry
Speaker 1: message boards. It can be so addictive to just complain
Speaker 1: online and complain to others because it's easy. I think
Speaker 1: it's much harder to actually do the work of saying no,
Speaker 1: I'm going to look for what's decent in the world
Speaker 1: and in other people. I'm going to try to spread
Speaker 1: that decency. I'm going to try to make things more kind,
Speaker 1: but at least you know, what I have found in
Speaker 1: life is that after the initial hurdles of doing that
Speaker 1: which seem hard, that actually eventually becomes easy too. And
Speaker 1: so to me, that's what feeding the good Wolf is about.
Speaker 1: Is maybe feeding the good wolf initially feels like it's hard,
Speaker 1: but eventually that wolf will feed me back.
Speaker 3: Yeah, how about you.
Speaker 4: Julenta, I would say it's similar to Kristen, where you
Speaker 4: try and put your focus where it can be most useful,
Speaker 4: not like because something's like calling for your attention. Essentially, Yeah,
Speaker 4: the loud, flashy thing might not always be like the
Speaker 4: best use of your time.
Speaker 3: There are a lot of loud, flashy things that are
Speaker 3: not the best use of our time.
Speaker 4: Or that they can be so distracting and like appealing
Speaker 4: sometimes really urgent, you.
Speaker 3: Know, yes, yes, yes, So we'll get into How to
Speaker 3: Be Fine with Friends, which is your latest I don't
Speaker 3: know if you want to call it series or endeavor,
Speaker 3: which is really about how do we create and sustain
Speaker 3: friendships as adults. So we'll get into that in a second,
Speaker 3: but I'd like to go back first and talk a
Speaker 3: little bit about buy the book because the first time
Speaker 3: that I heard about what you're doing and listened, I
Speaker 3: loved it because I think I have interviewed many of
Speaker 3: the people who've written some of the books that you
Speaker 3: guys have had on and so there's a little element
Speaker 3: of crossover. But you guys take it a step further
Speaker 3: in which you read the book and then you really
Speaker 3: pick out, like, Okay, here are some of the key
Speaker 3: things this book says we should do, and then you
Speaker 3: try and do those things for a period of time,
Speaker 3: and then you come back and do a podcast about
Speaker 3: those things, which is such a great idea. What I'd
Speaker 3: love to know is this, I mean, you started that
Speaker 3: a long time ago. We've all been in this business
Speaker 3: for a while, and this question may be impossible, but
Speaker 3: I'm going to put it out there anyway, and you
Speaker 3: guys can modify it in whatever way you want, which is,
Speaker 3: what do you think doing that for that long caused?
Speaker 3: In what way are you fundamentally Maybe you're not, but
Speaker 3: different than before you started on that endeavor.
Speaker 4: Wow? Good question. I feel like we're different in lots
Speaker 4: of ways. Speaking for myself, I've become less trusting over
Speaker 4: the years of people claiming to be experts about certain things.
Speaker 4: You know, there are lots of self help books that
Speaker 4: are written by actual doctors and practitioners who have like
Speaker 4: sound advice based on research, But there are lots of
Speaker 4: people who are self proclaimed experts who want to tell
Speaker 4: you how to live and where to spend your money.
Speaker 4: It's surprising how many of those types of authors there
Speaker 4: are in the self help world. So I feel like
Speaker 4: my view has become a bit more skeptical, if I'm
Speaker 4: being honest.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I would say the flip is true for
Speaker 1: me because when we first embarked on this show, which
Speaker 1: you know, was about eight years ago, Joe Blenta was
Speaker 1: the one who was like, I really want to believe
Speaker 1: these promises. Oh my gosh, look I can do this
Speaker 1: in six easy steps. And I was exactly the opposite.
Speaker 1: I'm like, these people are all Charlatan's. They're trying to
Speaker 1: sell us stuff. Yeah, most of them are not legit experts,
Speaker 1: And the people who read these books are frankly pathetic
Speaker 1: that they're falling for people who are so clearly not
Speaker 1: real sources, not real scientists. And I was very judgmental
Speaker 1: about the books in the beginning, and also embarrassed to
Speaker 1: even be seen in public reading them. I remember going
Speaker 1: to a bar with the Secret and thinking, Oh God,
Speaker 1: what if somebody sees what I'm reading? What are they
Speaker 1: going to think about me? And as time went on,
Speaker 1: I really came to change my tune where I started
Speaker 1: to develop a lot more empathy for the people who
Speaker 1: turn to these books. Because we live in a culture,
Speaker 1: the US is really a pull yourself up by your
Speaker 1: bootstraps culture, and shouldn't we all be aiming to be better,
Speaker 1: to be stronger, faster, to optimize ourselves in some way,
Speaker 1: And of course some people are going to as part
Speaker 1: of our American culture, try to do those things, and
Speaker 1: it doesn't mean that they're stupid people or bad people
Speaker 1: for falling for these books that are calling to them.
Speaker 1: And also, our healthcare system is designed where we're not
Speaker 1: always especially as women, in getting all of the help
Speaker 1: and answers we need. Women historically have been so dismissed
Speaker 1: in the world of medicine and wellness and been treated
Speaker 1: as a secondary Men are the default. These studies are
Speaker 1: done on boys who are eighteen to twenty five, who
Speaker 1: are white, who are this tall. It's very rare that
Speaker 1: women are the center of these studies. Up until recently,
Speaker 1: we didn't even know what heart attacks looked like in women,
Speaker 1: and to a certain extent, we still don't know. And
Speaker 1: so it makes sense that a lot of women would
Speaker 1: turn to these books, women in particular, because most self
Speaker 1: help readers are actually women. And so I think over
Speaker 1: time I became a lot less judgmental of the people
Speaker 1: who read the books. In the beginning, I was very judgmental,
Speaker 1: and now I'm like, I get it. I totally get
Speaker 1: the idea of wanting to get answers or wanting to
Speaker 1: make ourselves better. But I also get that for some
Speaker 1: people it's just a little dose of hope when things
Speaker 1: are feeling hopeless, and I get that.
Speaker 3: I relate with what you both said. I'm pretty particular
Speaker 3: in what people I interview on the show, Like I
Speaker 3: tend to have people on that I think have something
Speaker 3: that's useful to say, and I don't think a lot
Speaker 3: of what's in self help is useful necessarily. And christ
Speaker 3: and I really relate with the desire to be better,
Speaker 3: whether that be a striving to be better or that
Speaker 3: I'm in a lot of pain and I just don't
Speaker 3: want to be so how might I not be. I
Speaker 3: think that is a noble impulse. I think that this
Speaker 3: distinction between expert and non experts is an interesting one
Speaker 3: because I come from my sort of first introduction to
Speaker 3: this sort of world was in twelve step programs, and
Speaker 3: there are not experts, right, it's pointedly non expert. It's
Speaker 3: the fact that, like, I've been through this, I've had
Speaker 3: the same problems you have, so I have something to
Speaker 3: share with you. And experts are almost sometimes dis missed
Speaker 3: in that culture, which is not good. I actually don't
Speaker 3: think that's good. I think there's a place for both.
Speaker 3: I think there's a place for people who have studied
Speaker 3: these things and have some quote unquote credibility. And I
Speaker 3: think there's a place for people who've been through these
Speaker 3: things and have personal experience. And like you, I think
Speaker 3: that a healthy dose of skepticism is useful in both cases. Right,
Speaker 3: Experts have done all kinds of harm over the years. Right,
Speaker 3: It's not like just because you've got a PhD after
Speaker 3: your name, you're not completely full of it. Also, it
Speaker 3: doesn't mean that, but we do need to be sort
Speaker 3: of careful. So I really relate with what both of
Speaker 3: you guys said. So that was sort of how your
Speaker 3: orientation to the self help world changed. In what ways
Speaker 3: do you think that you might have changed for the
Speaker 3: better besides the way you viewed the self help world?
Speaker 3: Like are there any ways you look back and you're like,
Speaker 3: you know what, year three, we did this book and
Speaker 3: I started doing this one thing, and boy, I still
Speaker 3: do that and that's been really helpful, or if anything
Speaker 3: like that stands out, I mean, questions like that are
Speaker 3: really hard. It's like asking like, well, what's your favorite
Speaker 3: episode and you're like, well, I did three hundred. I
Speaker 3: loved like one hundred and fifty of them. So I
Speaker 3: may be, you know, asking you to go with too
Speaker 3: narrow of a comb here, but anything come to mind.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for me, there was a season that we lived
Speaker 1: by the best selling self help books by decade in
Speaker 1: American history, and I believe you started with the nineteen thirties, thirties, forties,
Speaker 1: fifties and so on, and we lived by Dale Carnegie's
Speaker 1: original version of How to Win Friends and Influence people.
Speaker 1: And one thing from that book jumped out at me
Speaker 1: and I still continue to do it to this day,
Speaker 1: and it is to be the dog when you see
Speaker 1: the dog, the dog is excited to see you. It
Speaker 1: doesn't matter if you haven't seen the dog in five
Speaker 1: minutes or five hours. It meets you at the door
Speaker 1: and says, Eric, it's so good to see you. You
Speaker 1: are the best. I love you the most. You're fantastic,
Speaker 1: and I'm so lucky that I get to have you
Speaker 1: in my life. And if we greet people with that
Speaker 1: spirit in mind of being the dog, not the first
Speaker 1: thing out of my mouth is a complaint. The first
Speaker 1: thing out of my mouth is something that shows love
Speaker 1: or gratitude. It makes me happier, I've found, and it
Speaker 1: makes my relationships better because I do think that in
Speaker 1: the past, it would sometimes be easy for me to
Speaker 1: lead with a complaint or lead with the whole home
Speaker 1: or you know, barely notice like oh, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: a roommate or a partner or whatever is coming home
Speaker 1: after a long day. And it's just nicer for me
Speaker 1: at least when I try to feel like that dog,
Speaker 1: when I try to be the.
Speaker 4: Dog, Just be the dog, dog, I'd say last, I
Speaker 4: would love it if I had a talking dog that
Speaker 4: was really like, hey, Eric, great to see you. Let's
Speaker 4: stray where my mind went when you described that Qrisdin. Sorry.
Speaker 4: I would say for me one thing that stuck with
Speaker 4: me almost reluctantly, because I thought it was super hokey
Speaker 4: when I read it. I think it was from the
Speaker 4: book Why Good Things Happen to Good People, where the
Speaker 4: author recommend you played the glad game where you just
Speaker 4: list things you're glad for along with another person. And
Speaker 4: I was in a horrible mood and I was like,
Speaker 4: I'll do this with my husband while we walked the dog,
Speaker 4: and I was like this is bullshit whatever, and then
Speaker 4: by the end, I was like smiling and laughing and
Speaker 4: reluctantly having a good time. So that's always stuck with
Speaker 4: me that you can shift your focus and your mood
Speaker 4: a little bit with you know, some effort.
Speaker 3: Have your partners been largely excited to be involved in
Speaker 3: these adventures with you? And have they been like, oh,
Speaker 3: for crying out loud? Not not another one.
Speaker 4: I'd say they, at least for mine, started excited. Got
Speaker 4: a little a little run down at certain points, especially
Speaker 4: books that have to do with relationships or how I'm
Speaker 4: interacting with my partner. Uh huh, Like he got confused
Speaker 4: when we were living by Why Men Love Bitches? And
Speaker 4: I would like ask him for a favor and then
Speaker 4: remind him. I'm like, I don't need you, you.
Speaker 1: Know, yeah, i'd say that. For my husband, it's pretty
Speaker 1: much the same. There have been times where he's been
Speaker 1: really excited about it and other times like, oh god,
Speaker 1: are you recording this? Yes?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, you guys are always recording little audio diaries
Speaker 3: of things. I'm always impressed when people remember to actually
Speaker 3: do that. I guess that's just part of your job, though,
Speaker 3: you kind of get used to it.
Speaker 4: Get used to it, and our husbands are almost trained
Speaker 4: at this point where sometimes they'll be like, you might
Speaker 4: want to get your phone out for this.
Speaker 3: Comeo, is there a again? I'm asking you to pick
Speaker 3: one out of I'm sure you could give me a
Speaker 3: very long list, but like the worst advice that you've
Speaker 3: come across, Like I mean what I mean. I'm sure
Speaker 3: you've read, Oh there's so much of mountains of garbage,
Speaker 3: mountains of it. But maybe we could phrase it as like,
Speaker 3: what is something that most people might think is good
Speaker 3: advice that you guys have and learned, like hang on
Speaker 3: a second, Like everybody sort of accepts that at face value,
Speaker 3: but that's really a dumb idea.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, one thing that is the case for me
Speaker 1: at least is everyone should meditate, and the idea that
Speaker 1: if it works for me, it should work for everyone.
Speaker 1: So almost every self help author that we've read, whether
Speaker 1: they're an expert with a PhD or whether they're speaking
Speaker 1: experientially from their lives, one of the most popular phrases
Speaker 1: is if it worked for me, it can work for you.
Speaker 1: And it's like, first of all, that's not true, and
Speaker 1: a lot of the people saying that are very pro meditation,
Speaker 1: and not everybody likes to meditate, and not everybody gets
Speaker 1: a sense of enlightenment out of laying still in one
Speaker 1: spot or sitting in one uncomfortable position for thirty minutes,
Speaker 1: or in the case of one of our authors, I
Speaker 1: think it was four hours a day. Maybe he did it.
Speaker 1: And we don't think that everybody should sit still and
Speaker 1: be quiet for four hours a day. We don't think
Speaker 1: that works for everyone. I think we're all wired different.
Speaker 1: We all have different things that can help us feel
Speaker 1: happy and in the moment. But it doesn't have to
Speaker 1: be meditation that does that for us. For some of us,
Speaker 1: it's just going on a nice walk every day or
Speaker 1: spending a half hour in the kitchen making a beautiful dinner.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of different ways to feel in
Speaker 1: the moment, and it doesn't have to be sitting still
Speaker 1: and being quiet. And as a woman of color, I
Speaker 1: particularly feel uncomfortable when so many of the authors are
Speaker 1: white men telling me a woman of color to sit
Speaker 1: down and shut up. It just does not feel good
Speaker 1: to me. And so, yeah, that's one example for me.
Speaker 1: The list is much longer, but that's just one.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a good one. Another thing we encountered, not
Speaker 4: a ton, but a surprising amount of time is the
Speaker 4: idea that you can forego sleep for productivity's sake, or
Speaker 4: you don't need as much as you think. And for
Speaker 4: some people it just doesn't work. I always would get
Speaker 4: sick when we live by books that told you to
Speaker 4: limit sleep. Turns out I had an autoimmune disease. It was,
Speaker 4: you know, egging it on. And it is surprising that
Speaker 4: so many people are like, yeah, I'm no expert in this,
Speaker 4: but also like, deprioritize sleeping, wake up.
Speaker 1: Four hours earlier each day, and start the following twelve steps, which.
Speaker 4: Are like Randy Zuckerberg. Her book Pick three is just
Speaker 4: like you know, have a certain number of categories in
Speaker 4: your life and only pick three to focus on each day,
Speaker 4: and one of them is sleep or like rest, And
Speaker 4: I'm like, you need that daily. So I don't know
Speaker 4: how we're like not prioritizing it on some days.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, I have been guilty of the probably overly
Speaker 3: pushing meditation thing in my life. I think it was
Speaker 3: really helpful to me, but over time, I've certainly come
Speaker 3: to believe it's not helpful for everybody. And I've even
Speaker 3: gone back and really questioned myself on it, like, oh, okay,
Speaker 3: is this true. Is it just that you were influenced
Speaker 3: strongly by people who believe this is true? And it
Speaker 3: turns out by having to where I did and didn't,
Speaker 3: it actually turns out, I think to be a useful
Speaker 3: practice for me. But yeah, I think you're right, it's
Speaker 3: certainly not for everybody. And it's interesting because maybe you
Speaker 3: guys have noticed this trend. I think there was a
Speaker 3: period of time where sleep was sort of deep prioritized,
Speaker 3: and then it has felt like the last couple of years,
Speaker 3: the sleep police have come to town, whereas like, if
Speaker 3: you're not given eight hours of sleep, you will die
Speaker 3: in three days.
Speaker 4: Which I also good smoking back a day or something.
Speaker 3: And I'm always you know, I get what you're saying,
Speaker 3: but what about people who are like having trouble sleeping
Speaker 3: and now you're making them so stressed about getting enough.
Speaker 4: Sleep, putting the pressure on you.
Speaker 3: Now, Yeah, I always think things like that are the
Speaker 3: same thing as with loneliness. And you guys are tackling
Speaker 3: loneliness and friendship in your new series, and you know
Speaker 3: that's the new one, like it's the new terrible thing,
Speaker 3: And I'm like, I think that's useful to know that
Speaker 3: being isolated is not great. And there are a lot
Speaker 3: of people who are isolated and it's not necessarily for
Speaker 3: want of trying, and I feel like we stress those
Speaker 3: people out. And so it's always this strange thing I
Speaker 3: think of like pointing out like, whoever it is, here's
Speaker 3: a healthy thing, and here's the data that supports that
Speaker 3: it's healthy. But how do we also not then turn
Speaker 3: it into something that you freak out about?
Speaker 4: Right? And we encounter that too with like books that
Speaker 4: talk about going into nature, like there are so many
Speaker 4: studies that say it's good for you, but then they
Speaker 4: also go so far as to be like yeah, like
Speaker 4: kids don't need ADHD meds if you like make sure
Speaker 4: they hike enough where it's like that may not be
Speaker 4: the case, and like no longer like yeah, you're not
Speaker 4: going to be depressed anymore. It's like someone with clinical
Speaker 4: depression could still be depressed after spending men and much
Speaker 4: time outside like.
Speaker 3: One hundred percent. I mean, I think all of these
Speaker 3: things are This is a personal it's a wiring in me.
Speaker 3: But when anybody is too certain of anything, I want
Speaker 3: to rebel against it. Right. I can even agree with you,
Speaker 3: but if you we're too certain, I'm going to feel
Speaker 3: inclined to argue with you. Because life isn't that simple.
Speaker 1: And that's one reason why Jolenta and I try to
Speaker 1: be the guinea pigs for everybody out there to show
Speaker 1: like Jolent and I are just a sample size of
Speaker 1: two people, and just between the two of us, we
Speaker 1: don't always agree on is a book or is advice
Speaker 1: helpful for us? You know, one book, even if it
Speaker 1: looks like malarkey, might help one of us quite a
Speaker 1: bit and then not help the other. And you can
Speaker 1: actually hear the audio diaries of us fighting with our
Speaker 1: husbands over one thing that the other person is getting
Speaker 1: closer with their husband over or with our current season.
Speaker 1: You mentioned our current season of How to Be Fine,
Speaker 1: which is about loneliness. We have guests on and every
Speaker 1: other episode we have the guest on, and then the
Speaker 1: next episode, Jolent and I do the same thing as
Speaker 1: by the book, We try that advice on for size.
Speaker 1: We record ourselves trying to make friends, We record ourselves
Speaker 1: trying to grapple with solitude and loneliness in all of
Speaker 1: these things, and in some cases a piece of advice
Speaker 1: might work really well for Joe Luna, but not for me,
Speaker 1: and vice versa. And we think it's important for listeners
Speaker 1: to hear like there's no such thing as one size
Speaker 1: fits all advice. Just because it works for this one
Speaker 1: person doesn't mean it's going to work for everybody.
Speaker 3: That is such an important idea. I think there are
Speaker 3: some things principles that are useful that we can look
Speaker 3: at and go in general. These things are, you know,
Speaker 3: like nature. It seems to be probably a good idea
Speaker 3: that if you can to get a little bit of
Speaker 3: time and nature. But my partner and I are very
Speaker 3: different on this, Like I get a lot out of
Speaker 3: it and She's like, I don't know. I mean, I
Speaker 3: guess fine, I went, but like writing like, it's just
Speaker 3: you know, I love the way you guys sort of.
Speaker 3: You can see that just in a sample size of two, right,
Speaker 3: and two people that are different, but also a lot
Speaker 3: of similarities too. Right, So even within like two women
Speaker 3: who live in New York who are in a similar
Speaker 3: age range, even in that there's these big differences. So
Speaker 3: what about the difference between somebody who's thirty and lives
Speaker 3: in a small town in Iowa and somebody who's seventy
Speaker 3: who lives in Seattle, Washington, Like very different?
Speaker 1: Right, exactly?
Speaker 3: Yes, I want to pause for a quick good Wolf reminder.
Speaker 3: This one's about a habit change and a mistake I
Speaker 3: see people making. And that's really that we don't think
Speaker 3: about these new habits that we want to add in
Speaker 3: the context of our entire life.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: Habits don't happen in a vacuum. They have to fit
Speaker 3: in the life that we have. So when we just
Speaker 3: keep adding I should do this, I should do that,
Speaker 3: I should do this, we get discouraged because we haven't
Speaker 3: really thought about what we're not going to do in
Speaker 3: order to make that happen. So it's really helpful for
Speaker 3: you to think about where is this going to fit
Speaker 3: and what in my life might I need to remove.
Speaker 3: If you want to step by step guide for how
Speaker 3: you can easily build new habits that feed your good Wolf,
Speaker 3: go to Goodwolf dot me, slash change and join the
Speaker 3: free masterclass. So let's turn our attention to the latest
Speaker 3: work that you guys are doing around friendship. But before
Speaker 3: we get into the tips that you have gotten around
Speaker 3: different areas, I'd first like to just explore your friendship
Speaker 3: with each other. All right, were you guys friends before
Speaker 3: you guys started by the book? Yeah, tell me kind
Speaker 3: of how you guys got into doing this.
Speaker 4: We were work friends. We were both working for a
Speaker 4: news radio show. Kristin was a producer and I was
Speaker 4: like the administrative assistant, catch all person on the show,
Speaker 4: and Kristin was the person that reported on most of
Speaker 4: the sort of pop culture books, movies, things I was
Speaker 4: interested in because I have a background in theater. I'm
Speaker 4: a comedian, and so you know, Christ's the only person
Speaker 4: who'd seen like the latest blockbuster that it came out,
Speaker 4: or like she knew who the real housewives of hers were,
Speaker 4: so I could talk to her about them, and we
Speaker 4: just sort of slowly bonded at work. And actually, at
Speaker 4: that job, one of my duties was to get all
Speaker 4: the mail for the news show, and I'm sure you
Speaker 4: probably get a lot of press mail. At this point,
Speaker 4: we used to get sent lots of books to cover,
Speaker 4: and for the most part, a hard news show is
Speaker 4: not going to cover like the latest self help book.
Speaker 4: So I would hoard all of those self help books
Speaker 4: and be like, someday, I'm gonna get my shit together
Speaker 4: and change my life. Because I was also working like
Speaker 4: three other part time jobs at that point, I was
Speaker 4: a struggling actor. I had no idea what I was
Speaker 4: doing with my life. And Kristen was always a friend
Speaker 4: I had who like had her shit together. You know,
Speaker 4: she has a retirement plan, owns property, she you know,
Speaker 4: knows lawyers. And because I'm an exhibitionist and you know,
Speaker 4: a performer by trade, I was like, what if I
Speaker 4: recorded myself trying to change my life living by these books.
Speaker 4: And then I brought it up with Kristian because I'm like,
Speaker 4: you could be someone fun to do this with. Also,
Speaker 4: you're the opposite of me. You're going to be like
Speaker 4: this advice is bs where I'm like, I don't know,
Speaker 4: maybe it'll change my whole life. So that's how this
Speaker 4: all sort of came about.
Speaker 3: So I assume, I mean, it sounds like you guys
Speaker 3: get along well, so it sounds like you have a
Speaker 3: good chemistry on air. I assume that is sort of
Speaker 3: off air. Have there been challenges? Working together is a
Speaker 3: challenge in its own, and then friendship can be a
Speaker 3: challenge in its own. Have there been periods that were
Speaker 3: difficult where you felt like the friendship was challenged by
Speaker 3: work or work adversity or things like that.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, we have an episode of How to Be
Speaker 1: Fine where we actually talk about the challenge of the
Speaker 1: work why relationship. And we have two workwives on who
Speaker 1: we adore, Liz Craft and Sarah Fane. They host a
Speaker 1: show called Happier in Hollywood. They've been best friends since
Speaker 1: high school, but they also work together. They are screenwriters,
Speaker 1: they're co authors of novels. They co host this podcast together,
Speaker 1: and we talked with them about, you know, sometimes things
Speaker 1: can be stressful sometimes when work is tough, how does
Speaker 1: that come out between you and your work wife and
Speaker 1: so on, and how do you talk about things and
Speaker 1: Gilent and I have definitely had times where we're working
Speaker 1: on a project that's different or new to us, and
Speaker 1: it means that we have to rejigger how we schedule things,
Speaker 1: how we talk to each other. If we're getting frustrated
Speaker 1: with something, what is the best way to express that frustration?
Speaker 1: And you know, I can say for myself, I've definitely
Speaker 1: had to learn to put the brakes on sometimes where
Speaker 1: I'm like sending late night emails at two in the
Speaker 1: morning about something that's making me tense, and I think, oh,
Speaker 1: I convent to Jolenta, and Gelenta is receiving those emails
Speaker 1: and she's like, oh my god, is everything burning down?
Speaker 4: Is it okay? Well I need to do to fix this?
Speaker 1: And I just feel like, oh, thank goodness, I can
Speaker 1: just go to Jolenta for comfort and just dump all
Speaker 1: of this on her. And Jolenta is not accepting my
Speaker 1: dumping on her as comfort. She's feeling like she just
Speaker 1: got drowned in an avalanche and holy crap, what are
Speaker 1: we supposed to do now? Oh my god, is Kristin
Speaker 1: having a nervous breakdown? And so that's just one example of,
Speaker 1: you know, what we've had to learn at different points
Speaker 1: to communicate about things in a different way, or approach
Speaker 1: different projects in different ways, and so on, Because at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, I no matter what Jolenta
Speaker 1: and I make together, it's going to be fine. But
Speaker 1: I don't want it to result in Jolenta and I
Speaker 1: resenting each other over it. I don't want it to
Speaker 1: result in The shows we make together should be collaborative
Speaker 1: and cooperative, just as our friendship is.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. As listeners know,
Speaker 3: Chris is the editor of this show. So we've been
Speaker 3: working together for a decade and our roles are very clear, Like,
Speaker 3: I mean, I do this part, he does that part
Speaker 3: where you guys are kind of, you know, far more
Speaker 3: like both sitting in the same seat to some extent.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we are.
Speaker 3: So let's explore some of what you're learning about friendship.
Speaker 3: Why did you guys choose to dedicate I don't know
Speaker 3: what to call it. I don't it's more than a season,
Speaker 3: but probably not the rest of your life of you know,
Speaker 3: dealing with topics of friendship and connection and loneliness. What
Speaker 3: was the impetus that sort of made you guys decide
Speaker 3: we really want to focus on this for a while.
Speaker 1: Well, our listeners really came to us with this topic
Speaker 1: because Joelent and I we lived by self help books
Speaker 1: for ten seasons. We still do, by the way on
Speaker 1: our Patreon feed, but in our regular feed we were
Speaker 1: living by self help books for ten seasons. And then
Speaker 1: new topics were coming out faster than books were through
Speaker 1: social media TikTok and so on, and so we're like,
Speaker 1: we're going to be behind the times if we only
Speaker 1: love myself he books forever. We want to talk about
Speaker 1: the topics while they're hot. So we started shifting to
Speaker 1: what are our listeners bringing to us? And over the
Speaker 1: past year, it would range from what is Ilaria Baldwin's story?
Speaker 1: She is a yoga wellness mommy influencer. What's the doo y?
Speaker 1: Are people mad about that? From that all the way
Speaker 1: to simpler things like ice baths, you know. And we
Speaker 1: would explore these topics because our listeners would ask us to.
Speaker 1: And one topic that they kept on asking us again
Speaker 1: and again and again to discuss was the Surgeon General's
Speaker 1: loneliness epidemic and their own challenges making friends as adults
Speaker 1: and feeling lonely, especially since COVID loneliness went through the
Speaker 1: roof and dealing with socializing with people in the current
Speaker 1: social media age, and question after question after question about friendships,
Speaker 1: and we just collected so many questions that eventually Joelent
Speaker 1: and I are like, we just need to do a
Speaker 1: whole season about friendship. And we have hundreds of questions
Speaker 1: piled up from listeners about this topic in particular that
Speaker 1: means a lot to them, and there are so many
Speaker 1: directions to go with it, and so we're just trying
Speaker 1: to honor what our listeners want, and we are trying to,
Speaker 1: once again, as I said, be the guinea pigs. We
Speaker 1: talk to people, get their expertise, their advice, their experiences,
Speaker 1: and then Joelent and I try their advice on for size,
Speaker 1: so people can hear us out in the world trying
Speaker 1: to make friends and in some cases not doing very
Speaker 1: good at it, in some cases doing great. Yeah.
Speaker 4: And I'd also have to add like our own lives
Speaker 4: played a major part in this too, where we both
Speaker 4: are at a point where we feel like we are
Speaker 4: losing friends left and right as people move out of
Speaker 4: the city or have babies and have to reprioritize or
Speaker 4: get new super demanding jobs, and we just feel like
Speaker 4: we're at a sort of a time in our lives
Speaker 4: where friends are sort of falling away. So it's like,
Speaker 4: how do I either work on keeping these relationships better
Speaker 4: or like get some more people in my life. I
Speaker 4: guess we were going through the same thing as our listeners.
Speaker 3: Yes, you've talked about a variety of different things, geographic friendships.
Speaker 3: You know how to maintain friendships over a distance. You've
Speaker 3: explored what does it even mean to have a social network?
Speaker 3: What is a social network? How do you grow it?
Speaker 3: You've talked about best friend breakups. You've talked about tips
Speaker 3: in general for loneliness. So we're not going to walk
Speaker 3: through every one of those individually and get the tips
Speaker 3: from each of them, but let's start by thinking around
Speaker 3: in general. I'm not connected enough. I've noticed that either
Speaker 3: a friends have moved away and I don't have as many,
Speaker 3: or I noticed in my own life. And it's been
Speaker 3: a few years now, but when I had two boys
Speaker 3: that were growing up in high school, and that took
Speaker 3: a lot of attention, and I also had a full
Speaker 3: time job and I was doing the podcast, so basically
Speaker 3: I just was kind of heads down for a long time,
Speaker 3: and then I was fortunate enough to sort of do
Speaker 3: the podcast full time. So the full time job went away,
Speaker 3: the other full time job went away, right, and the
Speaker 3: kids went off to school, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, well, now there's space, and you
Speaker 3: know what, there's not a whole lot to do with
Speaker 3: it around here as far as like lots of other people.
Speaker 3: And so I think there's a variety of different reasons
Speaker 3: why we find ourselves in a spot where we're suddenly like,
Speaker 3: I don't have as much connection as I want. I
Speaker 3: me know, Kristin, you've talked a lot about how so
Speaker 3: many of your friends have left the city and how
Speaker 3: hard that's been for you. So, by whatever means we
Speaker 3: find ourselves there, what do we do when we go, Hey,
Speaker 3: I don't think there's enough connection in my life. Actually,
Speaker 3: I'm even going to back that question up for a
Speaker 3: second and I'm going to ask how do you know?
Speaker 3: And you guys address this a little bit, because, as
Speaker 3: we said, the Surgeon General is saying there's a loneliness epidemic,
Speaker 3: and we have this tendency, at least many of us do,
Speaker 3: to always think that if it's good, should be more
Speaker 3: of it. I need more, more and more. So how
Speaker 3: do I know even do I need more connection? Do
Speaker 3: I need more friendships? Do I have enough?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 3: How do we even start to think about that question?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Well, one of our experts, doctor Nobel, actually said
Speaker 1: to maybe sit with yourself and consider what are you
Speaker 1: actually going through. Is it some sort of existential loneliness.
Speaker 1: Is it a loneliness that is predicated on the fact
Speaker 1: that society is leaving you out in some way due
Speaker 1: to a minoritized status like disability or race, Or is
Speaker 1: it that you're lacking real connection with people? So he
Speaker 1: urged us to sit down and really look at if
Speaker 1: we are feeling lonely, what is this loneliness about? And
Speaker 1: then once we know what kind of loneliness we're experiencing,
Speaker 1: it makes it easier to actually address that kind of loneliness. So,
Speaker 1: if it is a sense of being left out of
Speaker 1: society because of a minoritized status, one way we can
Speaker 1: work beyond that is to connect with other people who
Speaker 1: are of the same status as us, people who understand
Speaker 1: our story, people who live through what we do every day,
Speaker 1: people who maybe can help us feel less alone and
Speaker 1: feel a greater sense of hope in life. So it's
Speaker 1: not just I'm alone here, it's miserable. I have no choices,
Speaker 1: I'm trapped in this situation, but to connect with other
Speaker 1: people who can help lift us up and understand us.
Speaker 1: So that's an example of that. But let's say we're
Speaker 1: feeling a lack of genuine connection. There are small ways
Speaker 1: we can go out into the world every day and
Speaker 1: get more of that connection. One way I loved Jolanta
Speaker 1: has a dog. I love her dog. Frank I'm definitely
Speaker 1: allergic to it. But one thing that doctor Nobel suggested
Speaker 1: is be active. Go out into the world and walk
Speaker 1: your dog. Just walk around the block and smile at
Speaker 1: people and maybe have tiny little micro conversations. Get to
Speaker 1: know your neighbors. Maybe the first time you are walking
Speaker 1: around the block with your dog, you might just nod
Speaker 1: at a neighbor with a similar read dog. Maybe the
Speaker 1: next time you'll actually say hello to that person, maybe
Speaker 1: the time after that. Eventually you'll get to know each
Speaker 1: other's dogs and you'll be like, oh, that's Fido's mom,
Speaker 1: and then you and Fido's mom might eventually, you know,
Speaker 1: have more connection. But just tiny little things we do
Speaker 1: every day to interact more with our world can make
Speaker 1: a big difference, but also relying on the tools that
Speaker 1: are already there. Most of us know somebody, for example,
Speaker 1: who is social connector themselves. You know that one person
Speaker 1: in your life who seems to have a million friends.
Speaker 1: For a lot of us, those are the inroads to
Speaker 1: making more friends. Is just connecting more with that one
Speaker 1: person you know who's social hub, you know that person,
Speaker 1: or joining a club or starting a club for something
Speaker 1: that you're really interested in, Like Eric, I know you're
Speaker 1: a big music buff. Like if you posted something saying
Speaker 1: I want to start a club, will you join me?
Speaker 1: And the more specific the club, the better. What we'll
Speaker 1: do is get together once a week and each of
Speaker 1: us will bring one record from the late eighties in
Speaker 1: the alternative or punk rock genre, and we'll each play
Speaker 1: records together and talk. And that way, it's not being
Speaker 1: general like it's a music club. It's being as specific
Speaker 1: as you can be. Like week one, we'll start with
Speaker 1: bad Brains, Week two it'll be bad religion. You know,
Speaker 1: whatever you want it to be, but be as specific
Speaker 1: as you can be. The more specific, the more likely
Speaker 1: people are to be invested into show up. So those
Speaker 1: are just a few examples of tips we've gotten.
Speaker 3: That was a deep cut on the eighties punk rock
Speaker 3: band Wow, look at that.
Speaker 1: I've listened enough to your show and I know what
Speaker 1: you're into. And I used to love that music too,
Speaker 1: So yeah, in another.
Speaker 3: Life, I like to explore this idea a little bit more,
Speaker 3: the difference between I think I get what you're saying
Speaker 3: by the sort of left out of society feeling. The
Speaker 3: age group that came to mind for me were older people, right,
Speaker 3: you know, I think as you get older, it seems
Speaker 3: like you can become less and less relevant. Right, So
Speaker 3: there's right, right, that's sort of jumped to mind. I know,
Speaker 3: you know, depending on whatever our sort of you know,
Speaker 3: for you, Julenta, it might be people who are dealing
Speaker 3: with autoimmune issues or you know, forced to still wear
Speaker 3: a mask right because of autoimmune issues and feeling ostracized
Speaker 3: because of that. The other was existential loneliness, which is
Speaker 3: a term that just sounds wonderful to me. What was that?
Speaker 3: What is a way of knowing whether what I'm feeling
Speaker 3: is existential loneliness versus I don't have enough friends.
Speaker 4: That's a tough one because that's sort of like, yeah,
Speaker 4: it's like the human condition versus like I need more
Speaker 4: companionship for that issue. Multiple experts have recommended cognitive behavioral
Speaker 4: therapy and just talk therapy in general can help you
Speaker 4: figure out like am I lonely or am I dealing
Speaker 4: with like an internal loneliness that isn't being changed by
Speaker 4: external factors when I try to make changes. And I
Speaker 4: think that's another like good litness test is if I'm
Speaker 4: trying to put myself out there, if I know, like
Speaker 4: I am making new connections but I'm still feeling that
Speaker 4: like deep angst and loneliness, then that could be a
Speaker 4: good indicator.
Speaker 3: At that point, you form a club for existential lonely
Speaker 3: people and you see what happens.
Speaker 4: Who like like eighties records? Right?
Speaker 3: Who like eighties? Yes, you have to be specific about.
Speaker 4: Your kind of existential exactly like.
Speaker 3: You feel like you have been turned into a roach
Speaker 3: like in Kafka versus to say what commercial was going
Speaker 3: through as an example versus standing cubistential weirdos. Okay, So
Speaker 3: I now I think about a sense of which of
Speaker 3: these things I might want to do. I think building
Speaker 3: friendships as adults is really challenging. I found it challenging,
Speaker 3: and I feel like I'm reasonably adept at that sort
Speaker 3: of thing, And I think part of what I found
Speaker 3: challenging is that it often is a slow or slower process, right,
Speaker 3: Like I want to go to the existential meeting and
Speaker 3: walk away with the best friend, right, And oftentimes that
Speaker 3: doesn't seem to be how it works. What have you
Speaker 3: learned about what are reasonable expectations?
Speaker 1: One expert we recently talked with at the time this
Speaker 1: episode comes up with you, I don't know if this
Speaker 1: episode will be out in our feet. Yeah, but we
Speaker 1: talked with an expert named Cat Bellows who said that
Speaker 1: sometimes as we get older, the reason it can feel
Speaker 1: like it takes longer to gel with people is because
Speaker 1: as adults, so many of us have gotten lax a
Speaker 1: daisical because we're not forced to see you every day
Speaker 1: at school or in the dorms, or.
Speaker 4: We don't have that like proximity and sort of like
Speaker 4: repetition of just seeing each other all the time.
Speaker 1: Yes, and so as a result, we'll fall into the
Speaker 1: pattern of just saying, oh, it was great to meet you.
Speaker 1: I hope we can see each other again sometime without
Speaker 1: creating a specific way to see them. In the past,
Speaker 1: we could do that because we would see them the
Speaker 1: next day in the food hall at the dorm, right,
Speaker 1: But we can't rely on that as adults, like, oh, okay,
Speaker 1: I hope I see you again sometime. We need to
Speaker 1: make plans. And the sooner we make the plans, and
Speaker 1: the more specific the plans are, the more likely we
Speaker 1: are to have those magic moments where we just gel
Speaker 1: with somebody quickly. Maybe we'll meet somebody and say, Hey,
Speaker 1: this has been so fun. I would love to grab
Speaker 1: coffee with you this week, or go on a walk
Speaker 1: with you this week, or do this activity with you
Speaker 1: this week. I'm free in the afternoons except for Thursday.
Speaker 1: Do you have an hour or so to spare? And
Speaker 1: if you get specific and do that repeatedly with people,
Speaker 1: that magic thing that seemed to come out of nowhere
Speaker 1: when we were younger, we can do that as adults.
Speaker 1: We just have to set it up that way because
Speaker 1: of the world isn't setting it up for us in
Speaker 1: the same way that it used to.
Speaker 3: I've done a fair amount of research looking at this,
Speaker 3: and there does seem to be a certain amount of
Speaker 3: time of spending with people that is indicative of a
Speaker 3: chance of becoming friendship. It's why we build friendships with
Speaker 3: people at work more often, just because there's the actual
Speaker 3: amount of time that you're talking about. I think one
Speaker 3: of the other things that's challenging, and I'm curious if
Speaker 3: you guys have seen this, is that sometimes you will
Speaker 3: meet another person that you would like to be friends
Speaker 3: with who is an adult, who is like, let's just
Speaker 3: say they were me five six years ago, Like, I
Speaker 3: really like you. I enjoyed hanging out with you, but
Speaker 3: if you ask me to do something with you, I'm
Speaker 3: probably just gonna be like, I don't know, I can't.
Speaker 3: It's going to seem like rejection to me because I
Speaker 3: have more friend space to fill up, and so I'm
Speaker 3: trying to put people in and I'm trying to grab
Speaker 3: a friend to put in there whose life is already
Speaker 3: full right with the things that they have. Do you
Speaker 3: guys encounter that, if you've got any tips for how
Speaker 3: to sort of work with that, how to not take
Speaker 3: that personally.
Speaker 4: Kristin, you're shaking your head, Yes, I don't remember whether
Speaker 4: tips are.
Speaker 1: Well. Something that our experts have said that we've had
Speaker 1: on the show is that that's Okay, it's part of life.
Speaker 1: You're not Eric necessarily going to want to hang out
Speaker 1: with everybody who wants to hang out with you, and
Speaker 1: vice versa, and that's okay. It doesn't mean that you
Speaker 1: are unlovable or that they're unlovable. But sometimes we're just
Speaker 1: going to not necessarily want that, and that is a
Speaker 1: good thing when people are forthright about it. So if
Speaker 1: someone says, h, I don't really think so, Eric, what's
Speaker 1: great about that is you're not wasting your time with
Speaker 1: somebody who doesn't want you. Why would any of us
Speaker 1: want to spend time with people who don't want to
Speaker 1: be with us. That's a waste of their time, that's
Speaker 1: a waste of your time. And in a way, it's
Speaker 1: a gift when somebody makes it clear like no, because
Speaker 1: you're not wasting your time than in a one sided
Speaker 1: courtship trying to make this friendship happen. So in a way,
Speaker 1: it's something to be grateful for because there are a
Speaker 1: million other people or on this planet one point five
Speaker 1: billion other people you can be friends with, and why
Speaker 1: waste your time on that one person who doesn't want
Speaker 1: to go to the other one point five billion. They're
Speaker 1: out there, and there are so many people who want
Speaker 1: to be friends, people who you could potentially click with,
Speaker 1: that you could laugh with, that you could connect with
Speaker 1: over music or anything else. Don't bother with the one
Speaker 1: who doesn't want to be with you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think what I've found is it's not that
Speaker 3: we don't click or want to be together, it's that
Speaker 3: our ability to spend time together is very different. Like
Speaker 3: they have a very busy life, and so it's like, well,
Speaker 3: you know, yeah, once in a while, they could get together,
Speaker 3: whereas I'm looking for friendships, you know, and I find
Speaker 3: those harder to sort out. The people that there's just
Speaker 3: like we don't connect or I try and connect and
Speaker 3: I don't receive it back. Is one thing. It's I
Speaker 3: found it it's harder with the people that you actually
Speaker 3: do kind of click with, and yet the contours of
Speaker 3: their life are very different from the contours of your life,
Speaker 3: and it ends up sort of being this weird sort
Speaker 3: of dance of who's more busy or less busy or
Speaker 3: that kind of thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And I think a good thing to remember in
Speaker 4: situations like that is like you don't need to write
Speaker 4: the person off entirely, like it is just like a
Speaker 4: timing issue. In time, perhaps things will be better. And
Speaker 4: it's sort of you know, relationships ebb and flow depending
Speaker 4: on like the phases of life that we're in. That's
Speaker 4: one thing we're definitely learning. And you probably aren't going
Speaker 4: to be as tight with your friend who just had
Speaker 4: a baby, but like in five years you could be
Speaker 4: just as tight again once that kids in kindergarten. So
Speaker 4: being able to sort of wait and like let things
Speaker 4: shift is hard, but it's it's something that can pay off.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's such an other interesting challenge of
Speaker 3: adults that we don't have necessarily as children or college
Speaker 3: age r. Like when your in college, your lives basically
Speaker 3: look the same more or less.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you're all juggling like a college workload, maybe a job,
Speaker 4: and then hanging out.
Speaker 3: When you get to be an adult, our lives can
Speaker 3: look very very different, right. You know, you could have
Speaker 3: a very demanding job and be a single mother. Your
Speaker 3: ability to take on friendship is very different than say,
Speaker 3: you know somebody who has no kids and has a
Speaker 3: pretty easy job. Right, So let's talk about geographic friendship tips.
Speaker 3: You know, Kristin, you've talked a lot about how many
Speaker 3: of your friends have left Brooklyn or New York, and
Speaker 3: so what did you learn and what's working for you
Speaker 3: in keeping these friendships alive where people are sort of
Speaker 3: geographically dispersed.
Speaker 4: One thing that has worked great that you know, it's
Speaker 4: sort of like duh when you hear it, but it's
Speaker 4: harder to like remember to do is try to recreate
Speaker 4: things that you would do if you were together. Like
Speaker 4: Kristen did this where she like had a movie night
Speaker 4: with a friend who lives far away, but they you know,
Speaker 4: sync up them movie, watch it at the same time
Speaker 4: and can talk to each other. And I know people
Speaker 4: that like go shopping on the phone with their mom
Speaker 4: when their mom lives across the country. You know, you
Speaker 4: can find ways with technology to include people that are
Speaker 4: far away. It's not always the same level of interaction
Speaker 4: and excitement, but like it keeps that tie connected.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And Jelentic just gave some great examples there.
Speaker 1: I go on a weekly walking date with one of
Speaker 1: my friends who no longer lives here. The movie date
Speaker 1: thing that I do with my one friend. It's now
Speaker 1: turned into something we do every three weeks together. It
Speaker 1: was initially like, oh, let's try to do this thing
Speaker 1: that we tried to do once at the beginning of COVID,
Speaker 1: but now we do it every three weeks and it's
Speaker 1: always a bad eighties movie, or it stars somebody who
Speaker 1: was a big starback in the eighties and is now
Speaker 1: like seventy years old, and it's just a little club
Speaker 1: of two people and we love it. And something else
Speaker 1: that some of our experts have suggested is to just
Speaker 1: make sure you're using technology to keep the conversation going.
Speaker 1: Instead of every once in a blue moon texting like
Speaker 1: how are you, you know, send them a meme of
Speaker 1: something that reminds you of the last time you talked
Speaker 1: with each other, like oh, this is just like that
Speaker 1: thing with your boss. You know. Keep the conversation going
Speaker 1: so it doesn't feel like every time it's a fresh start,
Speaker 1: even if it's two months passing since you last texted
Speaker 1: each other. Some something that keeps that conversation going.
Speaker 3: You guys know about my friend Chris, but I've also
Speaker 3: got a friend Joe who lives in San Francisco, and
Speaker 3: Steve who lives in Los Angeles, and we were all
Speaker 3: friends when we were young, and we have had a
Speaker 3: text thread going between the four of us for I
Speaker 3: mean probably at least a decade now, and rarely does
Speaker 3: a day go by where somebody's not putting something in there.
Speaker 3: And no one of those things is particularly important, but
Speaker 3: it's an accumulation over time that just keeps like some
Speaker 3: level of currency between the four of us that I
Speaker 3: have just found to be really effective. And I've heard
Speaker 3: this from lots of other people that's something like that
Speaker 3: with their family they you know, like four people in
Speaker 3: their family, or I mean, I think those sort of things.
Speaker 3: The other thing that I've been doing I try and
Speaker 3: remember to do more often is occasionally I'll sit down
Speaker 3: with my phone and I'll just start scrolling back through
Speaker 3: all my texts because it's amazing what gets buried, right,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, oh, wait a minute, we started a
Speaker 3: conversation with SO and so three weeks ago, and I've
Speaker 3: completely forgotten about it because there are currently eight hundred
Speaker 3: and seventy five fundraising requests from whatever your political party
Speaker 3: happens to be at the top of my text q
Speaker 3: at the current moment. But down underneath all that are
Speaker 3: some friendships that I'm trying to continue to sort of
Speaker 3: keep alive.
Speaker 4: That way, Yeah, I think that's a really good thing
Speaker 4: to do. I literally have a list, like in a
Speaker 4: notebook in my day planner of like people I should
Speaker 4: be keeping in touch with, because it's like easy to
Speaker 4: forget how many people you have in your life too.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, after listening to your Geographic Friendship episode, I
Speaker 3: think the main thing that I would like to ask
Speaker 3: is Jolenta, will you crochet me a teddy bear? That's
Speaker 3: kind of yeah, oh for sure.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I was amazed you were like, oh, I thought of
Speaker 3: my friend and I thought I would send her new
Speaker 3: booties for her baby, which you then whipped up in
Speaker 3: like an hour, And then the next thing I know,
Speaker 3: you're working on a teddy bear that it's by.
Speaker 4: The time, you know, it's only like a few inches
Speaker 4: it's like five inches high. But did you stuff it
Speaker 4: or is it just the teddy bear stuff stuffed it? Yeah, okay,
Speaker 4: it's a proper teddy bear.
Speaker 3: It's just you know, that's kind of a cool skill
Speaker 3: to have to be able to just make things for
Speaker 3: your friends like that. Like, if I made something for
Speaker 3: my friends, they would be like, why did you send
Speaker 3: me a teddy bear that looks like it was genetically
Speaker 3: crossed with a turkey? You know, or something that I'm
Speaker 3: not going to give that to my child that will
Speaker 3: be terrifying and considers them nature of animals for the
Speaker 3: next thirty years, they'll be confused. So all of your
Speaker 3: episodes are sort of two parters, right, you interviewed the
Speaker 3: expert and then you have your own conversation, and one
Speaker 3: was about best friend breakups. And I thought this was
Speaker 3: a good one to do, because friendships do end and
Speaker 3: they can be really painful when they happen. Yeah, what
Speaker 3: did you sort of learn from sort of going into
Speaker 3: that experience about the nature of friendships ending and how
Speaker 3: do we work through that?
Speaker 4: Well, I think it's super interesting because we don't really
Speaker 4: treat them this way, but they act this way, where,
Speaker 4: you know, friendships are our relationships almost like romantic ones.
Speaker 4: And one thing we've just sort of realized is like
Speaker 4: there is some stigma around friend breakups. You know, you
Speaker 4: feel like a failure you don't necessarily want to talk about,
Speaker 4: like how someone rejected you or is just like out
Speaker 4: in the world not liking you anymore, and just remembering
Speaker 4: that everyone goes through this, even though if you like
Speaker 4: you're totally alone and like no one talks about This
Speaker 4: is something that I've really taken away from our conversations
Speaker 4: about friendship breakups, where usually they're always done like in
Speaker 4: silence or not in silence. Usually they're always like sort
Speaker 4: of done in solitude. And you're not like getting calls
Speaker 4: from your friends about like their girlfriend breaking their heart
Speaker 4: as much. I'm not gonna say girlfriend because that sounds.
Speaker 3: Competing girl friend, boyfriend partner.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I would saying you're not getting calls from friends
Speaker 4: saying like as much as being like my friend I
Speaker 4: think ended it, but you will hear a call being
Speaker 4: like my romantic partner ended it and just giving yourself
Speaker 4: time to be upset and grieve like is okay, and
Speaker 4: it's normal and you're not alone in going through that.
Speaker 4: It's just something like good to remember about friendship breakups
Speaker 4: is they happen a lot, and they're super impactful. You know,
Speaker 4: a lot of times if you're not in a romantic relationship,
Speaker 4: your best friend, at least in my experience, is your
Speaker 4: plus one is or in case of emergency contact, like
Speaker 4: they act as a romantic partner and then they get
Speaker 4: sort of like replaced sometimes with a real romantic partner,
Speaker 4: and you know, it's difficult terrain that we don't always
Speaker 4: talk about.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And Chelsea Davants, who was the guest we
Speaker 1: had on to talk about that, she did some research
Speaker 1: on it and found that over eighty percent of people
Speaker 1: have gone through a best friend breakup. That's not even
Speaker 1: friend breakups more broadly, but a best friend breakup. Over
Speaker 1: eighty percent of us have gone through that. And on
Speaker 1: top of that, a lot of us have friends that
Speaker 1: we've just drifted from or that we felt ghosted by,
Speaker 1: and we don't necessarily know why things ended, or maybe
Speaker 1: we drifted a partner and we do kind of know
Speaker 1: why things ended, but it still is painful for us,
Speaker 1: and we shouldn't have to suffer alone. Just to echo
Speaker 1: what Joanta said there, it's like we're not alone in this.
Speaker 1: Most of us have gone through this. It doesn't make
Speaker 1: you a bad person. It's part of life, and it's
Speaker 1: something that gets stigmatized a lot. What happened to Beff?
Speaker 1: What happened to the second F? I thought best friends
Speaker 1: were forever and now you're not able to even sustain
Speaker 1: a friendship? What's wrong with you? And it's like nothing's
Speaker 1: wrong with you. Sometimes friendships end and sometimes they were
Speaker 1: not healthy to begin with. Maybe the roles we played
Speaker 1: within those friendships weren't necessarily the best roles for us
Speaker 1: to play long term. Maybe they were a good role
Speaker 1: for us at that moment when we first met, but
Speaker 1: you know, maybe that role is something that we grew
Speaker 1: out of, and let's make room for other friendships that
Speaker 1: are meeting us where we're at now. And one other
Speaker 1: thing about the best friend breakup episode that other guests
Speaker 1: have elaborated on is that we sometimes tend to really
Speaker 1: worship and valorize the lifelong friend, the best friend, the
Speaker 1: friend we've had since childhood. And we shouldn't necessarily do
Speaker 1: that because the new friends in our life are loving
Speaker 1: us for who we are now, not for the history,
Speaker 1: not because we've done certain things together. But they're loving
Speaker 1: us because they're meeting us as the fully formed human
Speaker 1: we are at this moment, and maybe we should be
Speaker 1: celebrating that a little bit more rather than constantly going
Speaker 1: back to what about your best friend? What about the BFF?
Speaker 1: That new friend could be just as beautiful and important
Speaker 1: and life changing in a different way, and let's celebrate
Speaker 1: that too.
Speaker 3: That's a really interesting perspective that I had not thought
Speaker 3: of which is, you know, have friends from way back,
Speaker 3: But I find this a lot of times my friendships
Speaker 3: from way back are we are friends because of that,
Speaker 3: not because of who we are today. To your point, like,
Speaker 3: if we were to meet today, I'm not certain that
Speaker 3: we would be friends, right, Like, I'm not really sure.
Speaker 3: I'd be like, you know, no, but but we've got
Speaker 3: a history that is valuable and means something and is good.
Speaker 3: But you're right, like the friends we make today or
Speaker 3: the people we connect with today are a better reflection
Speaker 3: in many ways of who we are today versus who
Speaker 3: we were when we were eighteen, which yeah, hopefully we're
Speaker 3: very different than then.
Speaker 4: One would like to think.
Speaker 3: So any last sort of thoughts on friendship or connection
Speaker 3: that we haven't hit, any any last thing we'd like
Speaker 3: to leave walking away, whether that be a tip or
Speaker 3: an experience that you've had as you've gone through this
Speaker 3: experiment over the last period of time.
Speaker 4: I think one thing that we heard from a lot
Speaker 4: of experts that was reassuring was the fact that, like,
Speaker 4: I know, a lot of us are like afraid to
Speaker 4: reach out or make that first step of like hey
Speaker 4: we should reconnect or hang out again, or like sorry,
Speaker 4: I dropped the ball. But most people want to hear
Speaker 4: from you, you know, if they're friends in your life,
Speaker 4: and that's something I think we forget or we're too
Speaker 4: ashamed because we dropped the ball, so like we don't
Speaker 4: want to like pop back up on their phone when
Speaker 4: it's like, most people who are in your life do
Speaker 4: value you and do want to hear from you, so
Speaker 4: you're not like putting them out when you reach out.
Speaker 3: Wonderful. Well, I think that is a great place to
Speaker 3: wrap up. And that's a great last tip, which is
Speaker 3: you know, reach out even when in doubt. So thank
Speaker 3: you both so much. I've enjoyed listening to the show,
Speaker 3: and there's a part of me I'm like, I want
Speaker 3: to go back and listen to every episode of Buy
Speaker 3: the Book Now because there's so many great books that
Speaker 3: you guys tried to live by, so all that stuff
Speaker 3: is in your feed, as well as the new episodes
Speaker 3: around friendship, which are also really excellent. We'll have links
Speaker 3: in the show notes for how to do that and
Speaker 3: do you want to tell people where they can find you.
Speaker 1: The name of our show is how to Be Fine.
Speaker 1: The season it's How to Be Fine with Friends We're
Speaker 1: available wherever you get your favorite podcasts and in that feed.
Speaker 1: In our main feed, you'll hear all ten original seasons
Speaker 1: of Buy the book as well. If you want new
Speaker 1: episodes of by the book, those are on our Patreon
Speaker 1: which is patreon dot com slash listen to buy the book.
Speaker 1: Included there is the Artist's Way, which all twelve weeks
Speaker 1: still want and I lived by if you want to
Speaker 1: hear us doing that, and you can also always find
Speaker 1: us on social media. We're on Instagram at how to
Speaker 1: Be Fine pod.
Speaker 3: Well, thank you both so much for coming on. I've
Speaker 3: really enjoyed this.
Speaker 4: This is that delight.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Eric. This has been great.
Speaker 2: If what you just heard was helpful to you, please
Speaker 2: consider making a monthly donation to support the One You
Speaker 2: Feed podcast. When you join our membership community with this
Speaker 2: monthly pledge, you get lots of exclusive members only benefits.
Speaker 2: It's our way of saying thank you for your support.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: We are so grateful for the members of our community.
Speaker 2: We wouldn't be able to do what we do without
Speaker 2: their support, and we don't take a single dollar for granted.
Speaker 2: To learn more, make a donation at any level and
Speaker 2: become a member of the one You Feed community, go
Speaker 2: to oneufeed dot net slash join The One You Feed
Speaker 2: podcast would like to sincerely thank our sponsors for supporting
Speaker 2: the show.