So much stickier than most people talk about. They're just like, oh, the social media, and I'm like, oh my god, not that easy. It's not that simple.
There are no girls on the Internet. As a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative, I'm Bridgie Todd, and this is there are no girls on the Internet. I don't think I have to tell you that social media and the Internet has changed the way our relationships work and
in turn, the way we feel about those relationships. Now, if you've ever been scrolling through social media feeling like everyone you know is out at brunch are going on a beautiful wine tour with their close knit group of girlfriends while you're home alone again, then you know exactly what I mean. But it's more than that too. The rising cost of everything can leave us feeling like we spend all of our time working, so that when we're not working, rather than spending time with friends, we just
want to be recovering from all that work. Not to mention the pandemic, When COVID happened, I kind of felt like I forgot how to make friends. Everything that's got so much harder, and on top of it, we're all exhausted, so yes, it's social media, but it's also everything. This is Lane Moore's domain. Laine is a comedian and author whose work examines how people's relationships are shaped by the Internet.
Her hit show Tinder Live recreates the chaos and calamity of swiping on a dating app irl in front of a live audience. Her book How to Be Alone is a bestseller, and her new book, You Will Find Your People examines the role meaningful relationships play in our lives. Because even though we're often told to build our whole selves and whole lives around romantic partnerships, what if you treated friendships as the center of our lives too? So, Lene, I have to sort of start by just generally where
the work began for you. You make live comedy and art, and you write about things like connection, particularly online. How did this come to be? How did you come to be someone who thought critically about how we are for being relationships?
Well, you know what they often say is true, which is that you know, there's that phrase. I don't know if you've heard it, but it's like the the healers wound is often their gift, and I feel like that's where it comes from. You know, there's no other way to sugarcoat it. It's not just like I always that connection was interesting. My relationships were always really easy and great. I never struggled. Ever. No, I was interested in it because you know, I had a really rough time growing up.
I was on my own for almost my entire life, and so you know, I really longed for that sense of community and connection and this like sense of family and friendships and all these things that I was seeing on TV that I didn't necessarily feel in my life. And I felt so alone through most of my life because I was like, oh, I'm seeing on TV and in media and all these things. Everyone has the best family ever, everyone has the best friends ever, and you know,
everybody has the best romantic partners. Of course I wasn't thinking about that maybe at six, but still, you know, you're seeing everybody has it but you And you know, I looked at it, fortunately from a place of curiosity as a kid, even where I was just like, hmm, how do other people's families work, How do marriages work? How do other people's friendships work. I just part of it, I think, was interested in just interested in how people connect, how they or they don't and you know, just wanting
that very deeply. Also, I'm sure that's where that curiosity came from. So now, I so much of this work that I do is because now that I'm an adult, and now that I've written several books and comedy shows and all these things, I know, oh, I'm not the only one who has struggled like this and who has felt like nobody gets this and might just must just be me struggle with that kind of shame that Oh, if I'm the only one struggling with this, I'm bad.
I'm unworthy all this stuff we do to ourselves that I've done to myself. Uh So, yeah, it really came from some real shit, so truly.
Yeah, I saw a picture on your Instagram that was like the balloons and it spelled out, You've got a funny personality. Thanks, it's all the trauma. Yeah, I think that's that's so spot on. So when you were young, maybe you felt like you didn't have the family connections
that you saw on TV. You know, as you got older, did you feel the same thing about kind of the friendship connections and the romantic connections that you were seeing kind of all around you that didn't match what you actually felt like you had in your life.
Absolutely for so long, I was just like and I wanted it so deeply. I was such a anesthetic, open person who just wanted these deep connections so much. So, you know, it was very strange for me, and especially too. You know. One of the things that I realized as well when I would go to school and I'd be like, oh, well, I'm gonna like make my chosen family here. Yeah, I've heard that's real. And then you go there and you're like, oh no, everybody kind of needs you to act a
certain way. There's all these unspoken ways that you're supposed to be a person. And I always felt like I was too too much. I was feeling like I was a little too much. I felt things very deeply, and I was very sensitive and very expressive. And uh, those people are not usually super popular at that age. That's not you know, you're supposed to be kind of cool and aloof and you know, never struggle with mental health. Stuff like that is not an age to be different
or way too mature for your age. None of that stuff is appreciated.
Yeah, I often think about how much time in my life I spent pretending to be like really chill or to even not have feelings, you know, both in my relationships with family and friends and then especially in romantic
relationships when you're like in your twenties. I don't know who out there is telling women like what men want is someone who is super aloof doesn't make attachments, is chill, and that's what you need to be, even if everything inside of you is screaming that how you're not chilled, and how you do want attachments, and how you do care a lot about this and so you want to you have expectations, you have needs. Heaven forbid you be a twenty year old woman looking for a man and
have needs that you have articulated. It's like the worst, Like you may as well climb into a graven die.
Yes no, and it's it's so so. I talk about this in my first book was called How to Be Alone If you want To and even if you don't, and explored so much of this, And there's a whole chapter where I literally go on a rant that is exactly in line with everything you're saying, because it is so correct. And the thing that I talk about is how ridiculous that is for multiple reasons. One, because we should be allowed to be the totality of ourselves and
be lovable. That's ridiculous, and we're tolding that we're told that that's true, but also be smaller, be less, be
less of you. But the other thing that's so crazy to me when I was writing that that rant with just as much justified passion, is I realized that we're showing women and people all these TV shows and movies where they're like swept away on this like romantic, super over the top, you know, vacations and flowers and courting, and yet we get to adulthood and so many men are just like what, I'm not gonna do that stuff. You're gonna come to my roof and you're gonna eat
an old burrito and you're gonna love it. And if you don't, I'm going to break up with you. Like what? No, Yeah, what about you? Crazy and needing? Sorry, I've been raised to believe that there would be courting and love like this is something I've been ranting about for so long because I was always a hopeless romantic. I think most people are, like, even when you're cynical, I think a lot of people are cynical because they were really romantic
and they got disappointed a lot. That's fair, But who doesn't want love. Who doesn't want somebody to gush and be excited and try to make you feel really loved and special. Like, it's so disgusting how many men have tried to make you feel like you're a demon for wanting basic care.
How much unrealistic expectation do you think that we absorb from media and the internet, and like, you know, all of that just out in the air, so much.
So much, And that's you know, that's so much of what that's so much of what I talk about, you know, in the first book, that's what that's so much of what I talk about, and when it comes to your family members, and also what it means to be alone, what it means to be a woman who is alone, because we see, know, we say two things. We're like, oh, she's so independent, and we're also like and a loser. Like it's it's like we're saying all these things. You
can't pretend we're not saying them. And then in the second book, you know, talking about friendship and all this stuff. So much of what I learned from friendship was from pop culture. I was told that, you know, we were all gonna Me and my friends were all gonna meet up every single day at the latest hot restaurant at noon and we never needed a calendar. Like on Sex and the City. I was told that, you know, we were all going to live together or at least really
close by, like in Living Single or New Girl. Like that doesn't happen. We live in different neighborhoods. It could take you an hour to get to your friends like there, And it's hard not to internalize that because you see that as a kid or as an a adult, and you're like, I want that. I'm sure I'll get that soon. And then it doesn't happen like that, and you're like, what did I do wrong? And I don't think we did anything wrong. I really don't. I think, you know,
there's always things you can do to improve that. But that's so much of Yeah, I've internalized a lot of shame about that stuff. And I would keep watching those shows. I still watch those shows. I love watching them because we love I love watching Friends. I love not the show Friends, but like I love watching shows about friends where they're they love each other and they support each other like, who doesn't love that? But it can get really hard when you're like, it's great to watch this,
but I want to live this. I want to experience it for real, not just through a TV.
Yeah.
I mean, let's talk about that so you will find your friends. As about making friends as an adult and how fraught hard it can be in some ways to sort of break out of that. Why do you think it can be so hard to make adult friends.
I think it's a lot of reasons, you know. One of them is that it can't be denied. Like, our current state of capitalism sucks, It really sucks. We're being asked to work like sixty hours a week maybe more, just to just to get by. That's really leaving us very little time to take care of ourselves, to find community to I mean, that's supposed to be that's supposed to be the point of life. I really think the point of life is to have these communities, to have
to feel like we have backup on backup. How can you do that when you're trying to work just to survive. I think that that can't be discounted. That is that is part of it. And also so many of us, you know, don't live as close to each other as maybe like previous generations did where you all lived in you know, maybe a little bit closer. I know, I don't live that close to a lot of my friends. A lot of my friends are long distance. That's harder.
And then you know, the other thing is is a lot of us have been hurt a lot by past friends, and so when we get older, it's like, you know, when you scrape your knee as a kid, it hurt, but like not necessarily as much as it hurts when you get older, because like I don't know, like your body's different, all these things, like it just that feel like that stuff hurts so much more and that lasts so much longer. And I think that that's true for like relational pain. So like we've had so many cuts
and scrapes. I guess essentially our in our friendships as well, where a lot of our past friendships have left us feeling really scared to try again and really hurt, and understandably we're like, yeah, I don't want to do that again. Whereas I think when you're you know, eight fifteen, you're like, I'll try again, Sure it'll get better. But then I don't know. After twenty thirty years of that, you're like, maybe I won't. Maybe this is you know, And so it's I think a lot of it is our culture.
I think a lot of it is, and also a lot of it is our own pain and our own healing that we have to kind of do around that and rewire how we choose people, what we allow. It's so much stickier than most people talk about. They're just like, oh, the social media, and I'm like, oh my god, it can't It's not that easy. It's not that simple.
Let's take a quick break at our back.
My parents were what you might call keep to themselves types. We didn't have a house full of friends, and it just wasn't something I saw a lot of growing up. You could have acquaintances, sure, but we weren't really encouraged to really let people in literally and metaphorically. It's something that still shapes the way I understand friendship today as
an adult. There are so many things that we have to unlearn, interrogate, baggage we have to put down that kind of keeps us from showing up the way that we want. I know, for me, I kind of was one of those like my parents. They were the kind of people who didn't have friends. They had family, and so we had family around a lot, but they didn't
really have any friends. They didn't really have people over that we were not blood relatives, and so I grew up on a household where the norm was keeping to yourself. It was unusual to have non blood people in your life popping over. And so that is the default that I always find myself going back to, and I have to really work to catch myself to unlearn it and say, you know, well, if somebody wants to come over, why
is my default being like, no, they can't. Or if if somebody wants to get a drink somebody I don't know very well. I just feel this, what feels familiar is saying no, and I have to really step out of myself to interrogate why that is and interrogate if that is getting me to what the life that I actually want or a life that just feels like what I deserve.
So that's you know, I'm so glad that you said that, because there's two things about that that are so important. One is, we're only for the most part, we're only going to have friendships that are what we're modeled for us. So, you know, for many of us, the only friendships we saw were on TV, which or we saw our friend our parents' friendships, if they had them or if they didn't, if they were good or if they were bad. So we're modeling that same thing if our if our parents
had weird friendships or didn't have a lot of friends. Yeah, that's going to feel harder for us to navigate that. You know, we talk about that a lot when it comes to romantic relationships, where we're like, oh, you learn what you know about romantic relationships from watching your parents' relationship. It's the same thing from friendships. It's the exact same thing.
And then the other thing about that is that you know, it's it's that's another part of those like old wounds, Like so much of the ways we interact with our friends are still reacting from that child place of like those wounds that we have around our attachment styles and the way that we were able to attach to our parents and the way that our parents interactive with us. We're still doing that. I wish it wasn't true because it feels rude, but it's true. I feel like such a really mad.
You mentioned earlier that it's very easy to be like, oh, the problem is social media, and I completely agree with you that it's so much more complicated than that. We're all living in we're all exhausted, we're all burnt out, there's just so much going on. It's just so hard to be a fucking person these days. But do you think that the Internet and social media complicates, you know, the way that people are building relationships or not building relationships right now?
I do absolutely, And so you know, I only reference that, and you probably already you know, knew this. But because so often when we talk about people struggling with things in our in our world, the people who are weighing in just make it like the simplest thing. They're not looking any deeper, and then it's just like, oh, just go do this. This is really easy. And I just hate that advice so much because there's all these pieces. You have to look at all of them. All I
have to look at all of them. So yeah, I mean, you know, social media is a double edged sword for friendships, I think, because on one hand, you can make friendships of people who live far away who you might not have met, which is particularly vital for marginalized people who might not meet a lot of other people who are like them. I mean, that's a huge, huge thing, so I can't discount that. I think that's also why I
hate when people are like social media is bad. I'm like, a lot of people don't know anyone like them in their areas. This is a huge tool. You can't say that it's all bad. But on the other side of that, I know social media can also be this horrible source for comparison, where we're constantly seeing people post their perfect, perfect friend group, having their perfect, perfect birthday parties and
their perfect perfect girls trips and all these things. And again that shame comes back in and I'm like, they have it too, everyone has it. Oh like it's and Nate. The thing is, they might not even have it. They might not their friendships might be full of resentment and gossip and backbiting and and unsaid things. It's very likely that they are. But if you're just scrolling through your phone, you're like, ugh, another reminder of what I want to have that I don't have, and they have it.
It exists, you know, Yeah, I think I hadn't really even thought about that. Of the way that that comparison aspect of social media really can make you feel more dug into your shame because you feel like you're alone. You feel like everybody else is hanging out without me, having brunch or on a girl's trip to roam or whatever. They're wrong on the boat and I'm in my apartment.
And yeah, it really keeps us dug into the experience that we are the only people like experiencing these painful feelings when everybody, it doesn't matter who you are, everybody feels alone. Sometimes everybody feels disconnected and disengaged.
Sometimes it's true, it's true. And it's also like, you know, the people who don't have that aren't going to post that, Like I'm not gonna, you know, post a photo of me with you know, the friends I wish I was hanging out with are just dead space. I'm like me with my best friends on this boat. It's just like me alone. Like people who struggle with that aren't going to do that because there's no way to really effectively
do that. And also, you know, some people feel their own shame from not having that that they don't want to necessarily broadcast it. But I think that's it too, you know, I always know that's the hardest thing, right. It's like the people who don't have something are not
going to post that they don't have it. But I think the other thing that's tough about it, too, is that so many people are posting it as sort of like a keeping up with the Joneses thing, where they're like, I have to post that I have really great friends. I have to do this. And it's so funny because when I did a TV appearance for this book, and my book publisher was like, was like, hey, like the this like morning show wants you to give us some photos of you and your friends so that we can
put them up there. And I was like, fun, fact, I have no photos of me with my friends. I don't even know where I would like I maybe have some, like after comedy shows or something like that. But when I'm hanging out with my friends, we don't take photos. I don't really do that, and so some people like to do it. I'm not saying that people who do that are it's like put upon, but I don't think to do that when I'm hanging out with a group of people. I'm like, all right, photo approved. This happened
like I I don't. But then when you don't have those photos and you don't have those posts, you're like, and I don't. I don't know if that one is if other people feel like that. But then you're like, oh, I don't have those photos? Are those friendships real? And it's like, of course they are, You're just not, do you know what I mean. It's it's a.
Absolutely yeah, I know. For and again I'm not knocking anybody who is someone who likes to document there, Yeah, it's fine.
And it's just not what I do. And I'm like, why do I Why don't I do that? And why don't I have those Why don't I have proof? Why can't I show this proof that I have friends?
Yeah, if I'm having a truly good time with friends, I'm probably my phone is probably deep in my bag and I'm not thinking about it. Like that's like to me, that is the marker of me that I'm really engaged is that I wasn't even thinking about at the document this. I'm just like fully present And so if there's ever an event where there's tons of photos taken by me, that's probably a signal that I maybe wasn't as engaged or as present. Yeah, otherwise again.
Yeah, no, absolutely, But again it's like, that's why I love talking about things like this, because I think there are a lot of us out there who feel like that. But if nobody talks about it, then you're just sitting there being like everyone's having fun with their friends, everyone remembers take photos. Everyone's having so much fun they can't
help but take photos. Like you tell yourself these stories and you're like, well, I had a lot of fun and I was very present, and I didn't take photos for I felt like it'd be awkward to take a photo, or I don't know, I overthought it in some way. And then you're like, was I not having enough fun
to necessitate photos? And why didn't like you? Again? Does this like trying to be this version of normal that doesn't really exist because you feel this way, I feel this, like other people feel this, but we're still holding ourselves up to like what we see.
Everyone feels lonely sometimes, and according to a twenty twenty survey from the insurance company Sigma, gen Z is lonelier than older generations, with seventy three percent of gen Z respondents reporting that they feel alone either sometimes or always the highest level of any generation. Now it's easy to blame smartphones and social media, and that might be part of it, but Lane says it's more complicated than that.
Your book is about making friends as an adult. But I often wonder the younger generation, like teenagers, how are they navigating this incredibly fraud dynamic that we navigate. I mean, I'll speak for myself, I navigate poorly as an adult. I wonder how the younger generation who has grown up seeped in this, this has been their reality for most of their lives. How are they navigating it? Do you think?
I think it's one of those things like from people that I've talked to, even just like on this book tour, like you know, having people's parents be like, hey, can you I bought this book for my daughter or my son who's really struggling with their friendships right now now, can you sign it to them? And I was like, oh God, yes, Like can I send a hug with this?
Because I just I think some things change and somethings stay very much the same, you know, where it's like they're still bullying, there's still people being too weird to have friends, too different to have friends, there's still and then I think you have the added thing that I truly can't imagine, which is social media. Of that I can't imagine being a teenager or around that age and feeling like I had to follow all the popular kids
on social media. Like when I think about it, I'm just like I would, and then like if one of your friends unfollowed you, like that feels bad now as an adult, but at fifteen, I think I would have
lost it. Like you know, we had our own versions of this stuff, but I think it's so added it And also, you know, filters, like if there's so many things that I just feel like can warp, you know, and it's I'm not it's not being like, oh, you're grasping at straws to say that filters are really affecting children, Like you know, we know that there are like more and more like kids like people under eighteen or like
getting classic surge and stuff. There's no way that's not because they're like, oh I look better with this filter, Like you know, there's just I feel like it's it's got to be really rough, but you know, I don't. I still feel like I understand it, Like as much as it's easy to be like, oh, it's probably so
different from when we were kids, I don't know. I've talked to teenagers and kids and stuff about their friendships and things like that, and a lot of the stuff that's not really what they necessarily bring up the most. I think it's a lot of the stuff just stays the same where it's like, you know, their friends were their friends and then they suddenly all turned on them and started bullying them. And I'm like, oh, yeah, I've been through that. Like, you know, a lot of this
stuff stays the same. You wish it didn't, you wish it would get better, But I don't know. So I feel like, yeah, if that makes sense, Like I feel like a lot of ways it's the same stuff. Yeah, that happened.
It speaks back to your point about how it's easy to cling to the simplistic answer of like, it's social media, that's what's doing it right. Yeah, more after a.
Quick break, let's get right back into it.
I was thinking back to a memory when I was in junior high at camp. But our version of following the popular people on social media was after somebody had a wild weekend out, they would bring like a like a stack of physical photos of like all the memories. I remember being on a lunch table and there was a girl doing that and she had like a stack of photos and all of her friends were sitting around her looking through these photos laughing thinking oh so great.
And I was like, oh, can I see And she said to me, if I wanted everybody to see, I would be passing them around. And so like it's like that. I think kids are probably having that same vibe on social media and it probably feels inflamed or heightened. But it's not new. You know, everybody's experienced that. It's just like social media makes you so much more hyper aware of it.
Yes, that's that's really all it is. You can see more tangible stuff because you know, when I was a kid and someone was like not talking to me or giving me the cold shoulder or whatever, Like I didn't need to see that they'd like unfollowed me or whatever. It was like, Oh you could feel that they'd unfollow you. Yeah, You're like, oh, you've this is wild cool, cool cool cool, like the irl unfollow Yeah, like you knew, you knew when you'd been unfollowed, and you're like, what did I,
and you like can't. You want to ask what you did, but you can't. And it's like, you know, when you look at it that way, you're like, you know, stuff at a basic human level, stuff hasn't changed that much, and you know, it's all the same, it's all the same stuff that it was. Where it's like those are people who have their own pain and they're trying to have power over somebody else and you know, whatever it is, and it's boringly human. Yeah, you know.
You touch on this in the book. But one of the things that I find so interesting is the ways that the way that we build friendships is really gendered. And so I think, you know, women are sort of told you can make friends, but this is just like a placeholder. You'll meet then you'll meet your romantic partner. Y'all will get married and that's the real prize. You know.
In what ways do you think that the way the way that like we that different genders are told to think about friendships in their life, how do you see this as as all a gendered thing that's playing out.
Yeah, I mean, it's just it's just the way that we're we're socialized, you know, I know, there are so many men out there who men men when it comes to their friendships, like they're they're told that, like, it can't be that emotional, it has to just be like watching the game together and all of that stuff and this like you know, you don't hug and you don't cry, and you don't we don't talk about our feelings. Oh like we don't do any of that stuff. And so
where what are men doing with those feelings? Because men have feelings, All genders experience emotions. Like it's just so so harmful, so unnecessary, you know, And so then a lot of those men are going and there they're trying to do that with their female partners because that's the only they know. Women understand that. But that's a lot of pressure to put on the women in your life. And then they don't really know how to be friends with a woman because they're told that women are not
your friends. They are supposed to be sex objects and in this way or romantic. I'm just all these things you can't women can't be people. So you know, there's all these conflicting messages that they're given and I really I really empathize with it because I empathize with the men who are doing their best to unlearn that shit, because it's not it's not anyone's fault that these ideas have been placed in the world, but it is our
responsibility to unlearn them. That's just the way it is. So, you know, I have a lot of empathy for men who are like, this is a really lonely existence. I want to have close friendships. I want to have friendships, like women are allowed to have friendships, and it's like, yeah,
this kind of thinking limits everybody. And then you know, women again, yeah exactly are told the same the same thing in a different way where it's like, oh, yeah, you can be like close and intimate, but like really, your partner should be your whole world and like he should get which if you think about what those two genders are being told, so like we're supposed to save all our energy for our male partner who doesn't know how to talk about his feelings, So like what is
this who doesn't know how to have a friendship outside of chest bumps, Like and you know, like what it's just all it's not working for us. And you know, that's why it was important for me to talk about things like this in the book, because to take it from this personal you know, this personal thing that we're making bad choices, this personal shame, and it's like, no, no, we have a bunch of things constructed here that are
really flawed and difficult to navigate. It makes sense that people are struggling.
In my other life, I do a lot of work around combating extremism and how people kind of like fall down dangerous rabbit holes online. Like that is definitely if you're an adult, like it is your responsibility to not
do that. But time and time again, the research indicates that loneliness when you combine men who are or even anybody really, but people who are lonely with the internet, people who don't have strong connections in their lives, that is like a recipe for people falling down dangerous ideologies online.
And so all of this is important not just for the people that you know want to have fulfilling, meaningful relationships and full lives, but it's important to all of us, Like it makes us less safe as a culture when people are social when men especially are socialized to not have those connections, because the research is just very clear that it opens up a pathway to much more dangerous and potentially harmful, violent ways of thinking and being in the world.
Yes, no, absolutely, I mean I think that's why we have to stop looking at it like, you know, it's everyone for themselves. I mean, and I that was something that had frustrated me my whole life because I think I just I as this like very soft hearted little kid. I was like, but aren't we like all supposed to like help each other. And like I look back at that, I'm like, oh, you're in for a rough throat. And then you're thinking like that at like seven, that's not
before thinking. But there is this idea of like that's your business and this is my business, and well, I don't know if you doesn't you know, have any help, that's not my problem. And it's like if we had a sense of community, no one would be left behind, no one would be ostracized, no one would be like you're different from me, you're bad. We wouldn't see each other as as a competition. We would see each other
as you know it It sounds kind of hippie. But does it sound kind of you know, hippie's had a lot of good points, I you know, I mean, it's like it's I'm not trying to sound too like WU, but I think it's it's really true. I think if we had more compassion and less limits and we know why those limits were put there, they were put there, and I think that's something I have to remind myself of.
I'm like, we know that you know all of these like, well, I'm different from this person, and this person's different and they're bad, and like all this stuff was not created by us and was created, you know, to sell us stuff to make people mad, to distract people from other issues. It's like, you know, I don't want to go down that rabbit hole either, but it's it's something that helps me when I think about it, because I'm just like, how did we get these ideas that like each other
are the problem? You know what I mean? And it's like the men you're talking about who go down this extremest place.
I'm like, oh, what if you could be angry at the systems that created this, how much more productive would that be and how much more community positive community would you have?
Like the men who are like women are the problem, I hate this, blah blah blah. It's like, oh my god, if you could see that, like the ways that you have been socialized that think that men have to be this way, women have to be like that. That's the problem. You're putting it on the wrong person. Man, you know, it's it's it's it's tough because we can't you know,
we can only do so much work on that. And again that that really is when it's like, hopefully everybody's doing that own work and gets to that realization as soon as they can, because like, more divisiveness, more hatred, more rage, more violence, it's never going to bring you more joy. It's never going to bring you more community, not in a not a good way.
Like, so, what tips do you have for folks listening on how to make friends as an adult?
Yeah, So one of the things that I talk a lot about in the book is things like attachment styles and love languages, which we talk so much about in romantic relationships, but we don't talk about it when it comes to our friendships because again, we have this idea that your romantic relationships should take work and your friendship should just be easy and have no communication, and that is garbage. So really looking at the ways that you give and receive love and the ways that your friends
give and receive love. Really just trying to understand people a little bit more, because your friendships are relationships. I know, it's really easy to want that friend who just gets you and you never have to explain it. I've wanted that my whole life, where I'm like, I want everyone to know what I need and I never want to
talk about it ever. But you know, part of growth is realizing like I could keep doing that and expecting that, or like, what are the ways I need to communicate a little bit more, What are the ways I need to say even if it sucks, even if I've done
it before and it didn't go well. I think a lot of it is trying things in new ways, trying to relate to people in new ways, trying to relate to the people in your life in new ways, trying to, you know, maybe meet different kinds of people than the ones that Going back to what we were talking about earlier, so many of us have this set pattern where we're like, oh, I'm always this friend and like, you know, I'm always
the one who gives more. I'm always the one who like takes care of them and they don't take care of me. And then we repeat these patterns to like prove it's true. It's not conscious I've done it's it's not coming from a place of like, oh you stupid, unhealed people do this. No, no, all, It's like it's extremely because that's how people talk about it, you know, like a lot of experts are like, well, if you're an idiot, then you're doing this, and I'm like, be quiet, Beth,
I don't want to hear it. But like it's just so lacks any empathy, Like, you know, everything I'm talking about is something I've like lived and struggled with and had to learn because I've done it. So it's you know, but we have to take a look at that and say, oh, okay, maybe there's more work that I have to do on myself. Maybe there's more boundaries that I have to set up.
So I think that, you know, obviously I could give the advice like people love to give the throwaway avice of like go to a bar or talk to somebody. I don't think the reason I don't give that advice other than I just think it's oversimplified and kind of worthless, is that is that I don't think people's problem is meeting people. I don't think that's it. I don't think the hard thing about making friends is that you're not meeting someone. I think the hard thing often comes with
finding people who are compatible. You want to be their friend, maybe they don't want to be yours, whatever, having better dynamics in that friendship, communicating better, having somebody who can meet your needs. I think it's all these things, and then growing and changing with that friend, knowing how to
let it go when it happens. So I think it really is just a lot of work that you're doing on yourself and then a lot of work you're doing with that other person, not necessarily bad work, but I just again, I don't think it stops as like, oh, you need to meet people. It's like, well, yes, but what do you do when you meet people? How do
you change what you do when you meet people? Because we all have our own little patterns, So like we can meet someone and then we still do the little thing that we do with them that might not be good for us, you know.
Yeah, it really comes back to like being curious and introspective about your patterns, how you show up if that's working for you, I.
Think, yes, I think that's so much of it, and it's like it sounds like we want the easy answer. I think that that is why so many of those experts who are like, oh, i'll tell you right now, go to a bar, go to this specific bar. That's why people love stuff like that, because people, so many people have been conditioned, because I don't blame them, have been conditioned to want the like, cheapest, simplest answer because we want something that's like, you know, we want to
be able to say I'm lonely. I want to be able to take something right now that'll make me stop being lonely. We want something that's easy and you know that's it and so, but that's not true. That's not real. And the real truth of it is that it's messier than that, it's more personal than that, and it's harder
than that. But I'd rather do the real, true healing around that to have better friendships than to do kind of like a band aid that covers up the wound and you just have to keep getting more band aids mm hmm.
Yeah, speaking of wounds I have about Tender Live. Yes, that was my first forrite into your work. Uh nice, I am obsessed with it. So here's my question for people who are on the apps like Tinder Live, it really shows you how horrible online meeting can be. The piece I mentioned, the piece about going on Tinder in San Francisco especially, or was like, oh, I lived there for a while. I know exactly that, you know, like I own a tech company, but I also go hiking up.
Yes, yes, I'm not like the other men.
I'm out, I'm out in nature. Honey. Yeah, what do you what advice do you have for someone who justlike cannot swipe past another bad tender or hinge profile. They're just fucking done. I know somebody out there is like that is me. What should that person do?
You don't have to, you don't have to. I mean, I think that's that's really so much of it. Like you know, I love I love doing Tender Live because it makes people feel less alone in that it makes people realize they're not the only one getting the bad messages. They're not the only one doing these things. But uh, if someone's not getting something out of that, they're allowed to stop. Like there's this idea that we have and and this is put on everybody, but it's put on
women especially where like you have to keep trying. If you stop, If you stop trying, You're never gonna find Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? And it's like there's so many of us out there. I've been there many times myself, where you know, I mean, it's funny, it's funny to say, but like I'm only on those apps for work. I'm only as for a Tender Live. I don't you know. I'm like, I do my comedy show,
that's it. But it is funny because like when I go on tour with Tinderlive, I'll be in like a coffee shop in like Chicago, and I'm like swiping ferociously and I feel like there's probably someone behind me being like wow, she's just like really horny this morning, and I'm like, no, I'm here, this is for work. And then but like how would I even explain what that work is with that? Like I don't even know. But you know, it's okay to be like maybe this isn't
for me, this doesn't feel good. I'm going to stop doing it. I can. It's it sounds simple and it doesn't mean it is simple to do. But yeah, I don't I don't agree with that, Like hustle harder mindset of like I don't know, just do it twice as much. It's like, what, No, it's someone doesn't feel good, so you should stop. You're allowed, I think knowing you're allowed to stop, and it doesn't mean you're gonna definitely die alone now because you stop doing something that didn't feel
good for you. I think that's such a toxic notion. And also, you know, if you're a romantic at all, or you believe in fate at all, which you know I do to some extent, Like I don't know, my stulmay can find me some other way then like figure something out, babe. I'm taking a break, maybe at a coffee shop. I don't know.
We are in what feels like a very weird time when it comes to the internet technology social media apps stating, what do you see as the future of connection as it pertains online, especially like we're in this in this weird moment, how do you think that's going to affect the way that people connect or don't connect?
I really don't know. I really don't know, because you know, I talked to a lot of gen X people, especially you haven't like been on dating apps and stuff. A lot you know a lot of them have, but people who've like never been on dating apps and only knew what it was like, because like, you know, I've been on like I've had the Internet my whole life, so
it's like, to me, like, that's not that strange. But if you didn't have the Internet your whole life and you only met people in person ever, Like I've had long distance friends as a child, So to me, it's not that weird. But when I talk to them, they're like, I don't understand. Why can't you just go talk to someone at a bar? If you see someone hot, just
go up to them. And I'm as someone who's grown up so much on the internet, I'm like, uh like, and I'm sure that's gonna be the future generation as well. It's just like, are you kidding me? No, you know, when you've grown up with that. So I don't know where it's going because do I think that they're right in that it is better to meet people in person, of course, but like I don't know, social anxiety, being tired again, the same kinds of problems. So I don't know.
I really don't know where it's gonna go. I hope it goes somewhere good. It probably will be some kind of return to something in person, because I don't know. Technology has made our lives better in a lot of ways, but it's also just like I think it makes it worse in others. It just does. It's like you can't I don't know that you can. Yeah, I don't know that you can make it easier necessarily, and I think even the ones that like promise to do that, it
still just feels exhausting to so many of us. So it's like, oh, no, this makes it better, And I'm like not if me and everyone I know feels really tired when they use it.
You know, yeah, everyone is so exhausted.
Yeah, other app is it? I don't think that's like it. I don't know. And also, you know, if it was, it wouldn't make any money because people would be like I found a friend, I'm.
Good, I'm done.
Yeah yeah, Like that's so it would have to be like some billionaire philanthropist who like made a really good app he didn't need to make money on, like yeah, and I don't know that we're going to get that anytime soon.
But yeah, the book is he will find your people. Where can folks pick up and learn more.
Yeah, so you can get it at any local bookstore. I have links on my website lanemore dot org and in all my social media links to at Hello Lane Moore. And then it's available on hardcover and also there's an audiobook that I read as well, so you can.
With great like impressions and stuff like, Yeah, a lot of the vocal flourishes in the audio book for you.
Yes, I love I love doing those little impressions of like being able to you know, if I had some in my past who was like kind of a dick, be like voice sounded, it feels like a little win, you know, like that is how you sounded to me.
I love it, Lane. Is there anything that I did not ask that you want to make sure it gets included?
I'll tell people because I always, uh, I was always forgetting to say this, and I'm like, no, for remember to say this. I have a podcast I do on Patreon called I Thought It Was Just Me where people can call in and ask questions and we answer them.
On the show, I do bits of Tinder Live where I review chaotic profiles, and we do a really cool segment called what are We where people can call in and tell me about all their weird situationships and I give you a very legally binding judges ruling about why you are just so fun. And I started it recently and I was like, you need to be telling people about this more because it's so great and there's a really great community of people on there, and we just like, Yeah, it's really wonderful.
Got a story about an interesting thing in tech. I just want to say Hi. You can reach just at Hello at tangodi dot com. You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tengody dot com. There Are No Girls on the Internet was created by me bridget Toad. It's a production of iHeartRadio, an unbossed creative Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer. Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Almado is our contributing producer. I'm your host,
bridget Toad. If you want to help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.