Flex and Frooms, Flex and Firms.
This is the Flex and Frooms catch.
Up podcast, Flex and Firms on Cada. I hate to say the R word recession, but I will because I want to know if we're in a friendship recession. You might say, well, what does that mean? It's this idea that resources are scarce, babe. The way that we even speak about friendships is from such a place of scarcity that it scares me. Either you don't have enough. I don't feel like they're strong enough. You feel like you're
on the out. You're scared about keeping them, making them, especially as people moving to different life stages and milestones change. So you go from high school to UNI? Is my friend group big enough? From UNI to those core romantic relationships? Do I have enough friends? Marriages?
Babies? Oh oh?
Red flag, red flag, red flag. We've got this grab here from TikTok by zaid Leppelin.
So we're in a friend recession right now, which is a term that I don't love. The Atlantic released a piece at the beginning of this year of how we Learned to be Lonely, and this idea of learned loneliness I think is a big contributor to this friendship recession, and the reason has hit me so hard was because this was me last year.
All of the emotional turmoil that was COVID, the pandemic, the social response to it all, it created this like deep rooted distrust in me of other people, and when coupled with the difficulty I was having as a twenty something trying to make friends as an adult, it just caused me to become hyper independent and ice out my support systems.
Pipes that music is doing well timed, well timed, little sonic introduction in a bit of the school it built.
It built.
This idea of learning how to be lonely is a very scary concept because I would say, and I'm not a scientist or anything, but I would say, the majority of the learning that we do is osmosis. We're sponging it, We're catching a vibe. We're observing our friends and saying, Okay, these are social norms. I'm gonna now copy them. We're observing our family, this is appropriate conduct, with how I speak with older people, this is what I'm gonna repeat
and whatever. And with the loneliness thing, it's crept up on people. People are convinced that they don't want to be in social spaces anymore.
Oh, I just hate when you go outside and there's people and it's like, that's.
Not it's not a great You're entitled to feel how you want to feel, you know, free.
The most speech.
However, you have so much more time to be alive and so little time to enjoy. I would hate for people to succumb to isolation when it can be remedied, right, Like I would hate for people to really not get to experience the joy of just connecting with people.
And it's really interesting.
Because as a self described and therapized lone wolf.
Yeah, now, I for so.
Long convinced myself that so much of connecting with people was going to be few because people can be so annoying and then they expect stuff from you or but if you can't rely on them, and what if you need them, they're not going to be there. Like why would I risk that when I can just do things on my own and like speak with myself and enjoy
my own company. And it's such a defense mechanism that in some ways is like no one's coming to save you from that mentality, right, nobody's gonna come and be like Hey, it's gonna be way fun if you hang out with me then on your own. But when you allow yourself to enjoy the reality of what is to interact with people, you see it differently, because like for me, I was like, well, what if I don't have fun?
What if you do have fun?
Yeah?
What if they get negative? But what if they do get you? Oh? But then like what if? Like what bags you?
And this like worrisome attitude is a self soothing technique often than not. And as my good friend Bobo said, and probably collective from someone else, the same walls that you like erect to protect you are the same walls that trap you from everything.
We don't want to be trapped, babe. So much of life sucks.
And another thing that I feel really strongly about is that you can't simulate connecting with people. There's nothing I can do that feels the same as laughing with someone, totally going on an adventure with someone, talking with someone.
Walking down the street, and you smile someone, they smile back. Nothing do that alone. It's impossible, Emode. You just don't cut it. They don't cut it.
And if you want to go a step further, one of those things I learned in therapy that stuck with me is this idea that when you get really used to being alone, you start to convince yourself that everything can be fixed on your own, right, like like I get to heal.
On my own.
It's like, No, a lot of the healing we need to do with people needs to happen with people, like being triggered by our environment and having to respond, or relying on other people, or seeking advice, commiserating, building like.
You need if you can.
I'm not gonna say what you need to do, but if you can, and try to learn to enjoy the ups and downs to the nuances of being around people and with people.
Hard to do, hard to start, But isn't being lonely or harder hard to start, is what I'll say. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but once you start, you can get on a roll.
Oh, swing of things, swing of things, beautiful, beautiful work Flex.
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