Lately I’ve been hearing about how the price of community is inconvenience.

You know what I’m talking about: those posts about how, if you want a village, you have to be a villager. You have to give the rides, buy the gifts, and drop off the meals. But I think these messages focusing on inconvenience are missing the point.

Yesterday, I was at a baby shower for a friend who has wanted to be a mom for so long that I could cry thinking about how excited I am for her. Sure, buying presents and wrapping gifts are not my favorite ways to support people. At the same time, I was so unbelievably happy to be part of this celebration for her.

Isn’t helping your friends also, in some way, beneficial for YOU too? The inconvenient tasks on the surface level can be a burden, but I think the long-term payoffs are so worth it.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Why I think these messages about the inconvenience of community is out there: we live in an individualistic society that focuses on self-improvement and achievement
• Finding ways to support your friends that are enjoyable but not burdensome; for me, this is cooking
• Why performing tasks to help our friends can be both burdensome AND joyful at the same time, and why I hate the idea of reciprocity

Resources & Links

Listen to Episode 74 about small intimacies.

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram and TikTok!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!

When putting yourself out there, rejection is inevitable. But here’s a reframe you might need to hear: YOU are not being rejected. It’s only your OFFER that is being rejected.

Tanesha Moody was, at one point, drowning in rejection from every direction, from job applications to dating apps to her own friendships. Instead of retreating, she got curious and discovered the transformative power of separating rejection from yourself.

Today, Tanesha is a speaker, writer, and founder of Full Out Coaching, and she’s got amazing insight about how this simple reframe can impact how you show up and live your life.

Honestly, this conversation came at exactly the right moment for me. Sure, sometimes friends do reject core parts of who we are, but more often, they just reject a dinner invitation or don’t respond how we hoped they would in a text message. In some cases, rejection can bring people together and should be celebrated; after all, rejection is evidence that we tried.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Tanesha’s experience facing rejection from multiple aspects of her life, including job applications, dating apps, and friendships
• Reframing rejections as a step not a stop; a rejection is not necessarily to you but to the offer you made
• How Tanesha seeks rejection daily, plus, the benefits of rejection, including building resilience and fostering growth
• Using rejection parties as a way to celebrate and learn from rejection and build community

Resources & Links

Learn more about Tanesha’s business, Full Out Coaching.

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram and TikTok!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!

Have you ever felt like everyone but you received some kind of friend-making manual?

Today’s guest, Lee Hopkins, is a social connections and business culture coach and CEO of Patterns of Possibility – but his journey to this work started with his own decades-long struggle.

In this episode, Lee shares about navigating friendship after recently learning that he has autism, and how this revelation has impacted his relationships with friends, family, and ultimately, his way of life.

Lee says what’s made all the difference for him in this journey of self-discovery has been boundaries, conscious conversations, and knowing himself. Once he stopped trying to fit into relationships that required him to mask who he was, it opened him up to the kinds of connection that actually nourished him.

If you're feeling stuck in surface level relationships or tired of feeling like you're always performing to be accepted, then maybe it's time to get curious about what authentic connection looks like for you.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Lee’s life-long struggle with making friends and how he discovered he had autism later in life through TikTok
• Common misconceptions about autism and how this diagnosis impacted how he communicated with the people around him
• The importance in understanding the communication gap between neurodivergent and neurotypical people
• Mentors, intentional conversations, and why we all need to stop comparing our relationships with other people’s

Resources & Links

Listen to other episodes about being a neurodivergent person looking for connection: Episode 40 and Episode 54.

Follow Coach Lee on Instagram, on his website, listen to his podcast, and see his free resource.

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram and TikTok!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!

It happens to all of us: you leave an interaction and realize the conversation was all about the other person. They didn’t ask a thing about you.

Today’s episode is about feeling ignored in conversations with friends. In these situations, it’s easy to play the blame game, but the truth is, we are all responsible for our half of the connection.

What do you say when a friend asks how you’re doing? Do you say “good” or “fine?” Or do you give an honest answer? How hard do we expect friends to work to extract information from us?

Here’s my challenge to you: in your next hangout, don’t deflect a question. Throw something out there you’ve never shared before. These details enrich relationships. Remember, your friends want to know you. Trust this, and take up a little space.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Why sharing the silly details matter: they help open up conversations and allow your friends to know you better
• The importance of BOTH parties in the relationship contributing to a conversation; don’t deflect questions or give generic answers!
• Common concerns about not wanting to dominate the conversation (or share TOO much information)
• How I navigate not feeling left out when I’m in a conversation with people who share common interests with each other (but not with me)

Resources & Links

Listen to Episode 12 about emotional intimacy roots.

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram and TikTok!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!

Sometimes to feel closer to our friends there’s this pressure to share our most vulnerable feelings or unearth some deep, dark secret.

But what if I told you there are more ways to feel connected to our friends that are actually simpler, easier, and more common? That in fact, there are DOZENS of ways we’re trying to open up to each other, but because they’re not “big” shares, they’re often overlooked?

I believe we are all missing out on small moments of connection with our friends, and in this episode, I’ll describe this concept that I’ve mentioned many times but never dug into: small intimacies.

My hope with this episode is to offer ways to shift the friendship culture and pay more attention to those small bids of connection, because as I’ve said before, friendship doesn’t have to be “all or nothing.” Sometimes those small intimacies are more than enough.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Definitions of vulnerability and rejection and the roles they play in whether or not we allow small intimacies
• Examples of small intimacies that are overlooked in friendship, from inviting somebody into your house to telling the truth when somebody asks how you are
• Topics that are vulnerable or considered big shares for some people but not for others, which can be both “positive” and “negative” shares
• The cycle of overthinking what we share to our friends and how we can open ourselves up to small intacies
• The Roots of Connection framework which I talk about more in Episode 12

Reflection Question:

Spend some time thinking about some of the ways you could let people into your life through small intimacies. What are some things you could offer? How can you offer this up more regularly?

Notable Quotes:

“We get this hyper-focus on the big things. And yes, those are great. It feels great to be let in on your friends’ big moments. We talk so much about wanting that. But while we're sitting here waiting for that and focused on that, and focused on what isn't there in our friendships, we are often missing what is there or holding back what could be there.”

“So often on this podcast we talk about what is enough in our friendships. We talk about not forcing everything to be all or nothing: letting things live in the gray, letting things live on a spectrum, letting things build up to have a cumulative impact. And at the end of the day, I really think that is the whole point of the concept of small intimacies.”

Resources & Links

Learn more about my roots framework! And be sure to listen to Episode 12 if you haven’t already.

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram and TikTok!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!

Your village is out there, waiting for you. It might even be knocking on your door, and you haven’t realized.

People often think they need to make enormous shifts to find community; they need to move to a tiny village on the other side of the world or into a compound in the woods. But that’s not true. Here’s what you actually need: subtle shifts and a willingness to be uncomfortable.

So many people talk about how they want a village, and yet, I see them rejecting the small changes they need to make to let their villages in. They won’t accept help – a ride to the airport, a babysitter, a pre-cooked meal – because they don’t want to put a person out or let go of control.

I can offer to pick up your groceries or watch your children over and over again. I am choosing that; I want to be in community with you. But at the end of the day, you have to want that, too. We need to co-create this relationship and support system together.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Community, which is cited as the answer for societal issues like childcare/elder care shortages, mental health issues, etc. – but rarely is there advice on how to find it
• The idea of “hiring” a village – a message families often hear – for grocery pick-ups, babysitting, Uber rides, etc.
• Rejecting help when you need it because you feel like you can’t accept unpaid help or are unwilling to let go of control
• The level of internal required to step off the hamster wheel and be willing to feel discomfort in either asking for help or offering it

Resources & Links

Listen to Episode 8 with my friend Adrienne about building a friendship community for her family.

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram and TikTok!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!

This whole podcast was only a dream a couple years ago, and here we are now with 100 episodes. Thank you for being here, for listening, and for sharing these conversations with your friends.

In this episode, I share some life updates and talk intensely about the Wheel of Connection (view this visual diagram!), which is a foundational concept to my work. I give an overview about each of the categories, and at the end of the episode, I talk about how to do a basic Wheel of Connection audit.

You deserve Level 10 support, and hopefully this helps you to take more intentional action to develop the connections you need for this season of life.

Want to go even deeper? Sign up for my newsletter to receive more information, including announcements about my forthcoming book and the Wheel of Connection audio guide.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Life updates regarding my health, two Taylor Swift concerts, and the major milestone of this episode
• The Wheel of Connection: why I made it, why it’s round, why it looks different for everyone
• How your own Wheel of Connection is constantly changing: people move between categories, and different categories grow and shrink depending on your needs
• Wheel of Connection components: family of origin; family of choice; formal community; acquaintance; and familiar/defined/present/historic friend
• How the Wheel of Connection and Roots Framework work together, and how to conduct a Wheel of Connection audit

Resources & Links:

Here are some visuals of the Wheel of Connection and my Roots framework. Want more? Sign up for my newsletter to receive more information, including announcements about my forthcoming book and the Wheel of Connection audio guide.

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram and TikTok!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!

About three years ago, many of my friends moved away within a six month period.

While I was excited for these friends, I also grieved; my friends are my main support system, my family. How would I keep these friendships alive? I invested a lot of energy into thinking about it, through which I developed what I’m tentatively calling the “Your People” framework.

The best way to think about this framework is to imagine a tree. Trees start as seeds, and then you provide them with nutrients and soil. Over time, trees grow roots. Some roots get really thick and strong; some grow deep. Some grow offshoots. The more roots that grow, the more stable the tree.

In my friendship theory, there are three kinds of roots, which I’ll dig into today. My hope is that this framework and language helps people think about these relationships and consider what actions to take to build better versions of our friendships.

Want more information? Visit my website!

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• SHARED EXPERIENCE ROOTS and their offshoot roots – i.e., when you’re doing something related to the shared experience root, but in a way you’re comfortable
• EMOTIONAL INTIMACY ROOTS – what we know about our friends and our shared memories – plus shared/overlapping history roots and big/small intimacies
• STORY ROOTS – the beliefs you have about your friendships, and how we come to develop those beliefs
• How letting roots (i.e., friendships) die is not a bad thing – we can’t be in high school geometry class forever – but it doesn’t mean it’s not a sad thing
• How to keep these friendships thriving as we grow and change, and how to replace dead story routes with simpler, more straightforward story roots
• One of the biggest problems when it comes to adult friendships – plus, the REAL foundations of these friendships

Resources & Links

Like what you hear? Visit my website, leave me a voicemail, and follow me on Instagram!

Want to take this conversation a step further? Send this episode to a friend. Tell them you found it interesting and use what we just talked about as a conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang out!