on making friends
building community, making friends as an adult, and self-belonging
I’m one of those rare creatures that can make friends quite easily just about everywhere I go.
What’s my secret?
I’m myself.
Passionately so. Determinedly so. Abrasively so.
It’s been a winding journey finding my way. And I’ve still got a long way to go.
When I was younger I was plagued by insecurity. I fixated on and hated my body. While I was generally treated with kindness and friendliness, I constantly fretted about my likeability, doggedly self-scrutinized, and found myself second- or third-tier in most social groups.
I wasn’t in the inner circle. I didn’t really belong.
This isn’t to say that I didn’t have a few lasting, authentic, true relationships… I did. Some of which still feature beautifully in my life today.
Being too much, too loud, or too intense quietly lost me connections and left me feeling fundamentally unloveable. Or - more preferably - it blew up in my face months later. Preferable in the sense that at least I knew what I’d done to cause or contribute to the ending.
Invisible social cues often went over my head and navigating cliques was - and remains - mystifying to me. Sometimes I got it right, but often I was left sifting through best guesses of what it was about me that didn’t work for other people.
Beneath it all was a deep-seated fear of myself.
If I really took a good look at who I was at my core, would I find someone who was neither likable nor loveable?
I certainly feared so. This combined with the loneliness of living inside a constant monologue of self-critique finally backed me into a hard look inwards.
I can’t remember all the steps that led me to self-acceptance. There have been - and will be - so many, but under the cliche guises of “personal development” and “self-help” I began communing with the hitherto unexplored mysteries of my inner-most self.
I discovered many places I didn’t want to look for fear of what I’d find. Tender, neglected, yearning places.
Most surprisingly to me, I unearthed countless hidden corners brimming with ferocious, herculean reservoirs of self-love.
I found the sweet and audacious inclination to want to like myself.
To choose myself. Honor myself. Stand by myself. Be compassionate with myself. Raise myself into a version of me that I was proud of and enjoyed being around.
Once I began to really like Me, it became almost easy not to seek the approval of others. Especially people with whom I did not have valued relationships.
It even empowered me to divest from friendships and familial relationships and professional connections that were no longer helping me become a better, more expressed, more at peace Me.
This is not about hyper-individualization because meaningful interconnectedness and community reliance are beautifully essential to our well-being together and apart.
The reward that I didn’t anticipate was that the vacuums these people left in my life left open relational seats for new, more mutually adoring and admiring connections to find their way into my world.
Being who you are is not convenient for other people.
It is often unpleasant for others.
In fact, being wholly you will alienate people.
Guaranteed
But what I can also promise you is that:
The things about yourself that you think make you hard to love are the very things that will make you the most magnetic to your people.
This doesn’t mean you don’t work on yourself. That you don’t examine where you are falling short of who you want to be in the world.
But the you beneath all the noise of who you “should” or “are supposed to be” is your most valuable calling card when it comes to finding incredible friendships.
At some point, I hope that you realize that you only have so much energy and time to give.
That you’ll come face-to-face with the realization that you want to spend that time exclusively with people who nourish you, encourage you, and leave you wanting more of their vibrancy in your life after you’ve hugged and bid each other goodnight.
You’ll recognize that diluting yourself will not help your people find you in a room full of other people trying to dilute themselves.
Making yourself less weird will not help people find you who love your flavor of weird.
Trying to nip and tuck and trim yourself down into what you imagine other people like, will draw you into relationships where people benefit from a nipped, tucked, and trimmed-down shadow of who you really are.
And this is the crux of my secret.
I’m not everyone’s cup of tea.
And THAT makes me some people’s favorite kind of tea.
There are folks that I turn off, friendships I’ve lost, friend groups I’ve been quietly excluded from, and entire communities I’ve chosen to leave behind.
Rejection and loss have been painful. But I’m more resilient to rejection than ever before because of the rewards those losses afford me.
The community and friends I have around me now are my people.
They like me not in spite of my traditionally unlikeable qualities but because of them.
I am too loud, too sensitive, too opinionated, and too intense.
For my humans…
My loudness is what makes me the life of the party.
My sensitivity is what makes me the person they can call with dark hurts knowing they will be held with fierce love, compassion, and understanding.
My outspokenness makes me someone they can trust to speak her mind so they don’t find themselves in the scary position of trying to guess where we stand.
My intensity is what makes me vivacious, challenging, and captivating to be around and learn alongside.
The secret to building a robust, rooted community full of enlivening friendships is becoming immensely proud of who you are and your values.
Rejection resilience isn’t so hard to cultivate when you realize that if people don’t like and value what you passionately like and value… then you were never going to be a fit for them anyhow - or more importantly - them for you.
Let your freak flag fly dear one.
If you don’t know what it looks like, it’s time to dive inwards and find out.
Dive Deeper:
“I know who I am; I’m clear about that, and I’m not going to negotiate that with you… I may fit in for you, but I no longer belong to myself, and that is a betrayal I’m not willing to do that anymore.” — Brené Brown
The book Braving the Wilderness by Brené Brown* is an incredible foray into the importance of belonging and what people need in their connections in order to cultivate trust so that they can experience belonging. There is a clear template of what relationships need to have in order to invite the people involved into real, honest intimacy. (*Her research will feature in the workshop I am teaching later this month!)
Invitations/Promotions:
WORKSHOP on making friends as an adult!!
This month I am offering a workshop on making friends and building community as an adult.
What we’ll cover:
the importance of belonging and how to cultivate it
discernment and determining which people are the right fit for you
how to build trust with others (and yourself)
how to make sense of friendship loss or difficulties
and real-world strategies that foster new connections in meaningful ways
Click here to learn more and sign up!
Individual Coaching Sessions:
For the foreseeable future, I will be offering no more than 4 coaching sessions a week. Here is a link to learn more and book one.
Little List:
I deleted social media from my phone and turned off ALL notifications (including texts!). My days feel slower and more peaceful. The pace of my thinking is less erratic and less plagued with urgency. My attention span has been re-lengthening and I no longer feel crushed by a sense of impending doom. If you think you can’t… do it anyway. Because you probably can!
I have been finding solace in making things with my hands - food, knitting, sewing. There is an uncomplicated, meditative quality to it that calms my mind. I ironed napkins today while listening to a mystery novel. Such sweet, small pleasures.
I miss Arlo. I miss having a dog as a daily companion. I miss his neediness and little snores. I miss having more to take care of than just myself. And I am also grateful to only be looking after myself for a while. My heart is finding some rest.
This week’s song for me has been:
Happy New Year sweet humans! May it be full of a million moments that pull you into the beauty of the present.