FRIENDSHIP GEMS: Best of Friendship Advice
December 14, 2022
Glennon Doyle:
Welcome to We Can Do Hard Things. Here we are. It’s just the two of us. We’re not the tripod right now. It’s just sister and me. Abby had to take our youngest to school. So we are here today with you to introduce a new idea we had. All right. So here’s why my teacher self has been stressed about the way we have unfolded this glorious podcast. Okay? You know this because I’ve been talking to you about this ad nauseum. I was a third grade teacher. Teaching was my life, was my love. I loved being in the classroom so much because every day I got to create the truest, most beautiful world in one little room with a group of small people.
Amanda Doyle:
Which is the only way you can create a true beautiful world, is in room with very small people.
Glennon Doyle:
Exactly. So here’s one thing that we learned as teachers, the idea with little minds and with all minds, what we’re trying to do with this podcast actually, is that when we introduce new ideas to brains, those brains get a little bit discombobulated. Okay? New information when it goes into a brain or is presented to a brain, causes the brain confusion, disequilibrium. That is good.
Amanda Doyle:
I must be always receiving new ideas because I am but always in disequilibrium in my brain.
Glennon Doyle:
But actually it is my deep belief that people who live in confusion, which also could be called awe, are the people who are truly paying attention and taking things in, because everything is a freaking miracle, that Einstein thing. You can either look at the world as if nothing’s a miracle or as if everything’s a miracle. And people who look at the world and see it for what it is, which is a bunch of miracles, are often freaking confused constantly.
Amanda Doyle:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
Confusion is a sign of awe or disequilibrium constantly taking in new information. Now here’s the thing. What we learn in teaching is that you do want to create that disequilibrium with new ideas and cause the scattering in the brain. But there’s a second step, which is that you have to let the scattering happen and then come back, circle back and present that new information again. And when you present that new information again, the brain settles into a new understanding.
Amanda Doyle:
I get it. So it’s like you’re blowing and everything gets unsettled, now it’s swirling around, but you just don’t want it still scattered all around you, you want to put those pieces back together in a different way.
Glennon Doyle:
Exactly.
Amanda Doyle:
It’s like you’re actually building a new thing out of the scatteredness.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. You remember that horrible game. It was called Perfection and you’d have a minute and all of the pieces would explode and then you’d put them all back together. It’s like when you’re teaching, you teach a lesson on a new math lesson or something, and you let everybody have their scattering and go and do their homework and whatever, and then in two weeks you come back to that exact idea that you presented and the scattering is ready to then gel into a new understanding, and you just keep doing that forever.
Amanda Doyle:
Okay, so we’re gelling. That’s what we’re doing.
Glennon Doyle:
We’re gelling.
Amanda Doyle:
We’re gelling.
Glennon Doyle:
So we are going to do that now because I feel like what we have done well on this podcast is to bring people on to have these conversations that really, if we’re taking the feedback of the podcast, the Pod Squad seriously, which we do, have created what we wanted, this brand new way of thinking about something. The scattering has happened, but what we haven’t done is come back around to these things and encourage the gelling. Okay?
Glennon Doyle:
So we’re going to start that today. We’ve decided to start with the concept of friendship, which has been a thread throughout so many of our conversations. Friendship has been something that Pod Squad wants us to talk about. It’s been something we’ve talked about in terms of how hard it is for kids to make friends, how hard it is for us as adults to make friends, and keep friends, and communicate with friends. It’s been a beautiful thread.
Glennon Doyle:
So today what we’ve done is we’ve gone back and looked at those conversations and pulled out the gems, the moments where our brains were scattered, where we thought, oh, that could change the way that I live. That could change the way that I relationship. And we’re coming back to them today. We’re all going to sit with them today knowing that as we revisit them, these ideas will gel further and deeper, and change us.
Amanda Doyle:
And that we are going to go from here with the next conversations about friendship. This is what we have until now, and then we’ll continue to revisit all of this. So please call in and tell us what else we need to scatter on friendship and where we take the thread next.
Glennon Doyle:
So our first clip is from episode 61, Are Your Friendships Draining or Charging You, with our dear friend, author, speaker, and bonafide friendship expert, Luvvie Ajayi Jones.
Amanda Doyle:
Luvvie.
Glennon Doyle:
Luvvie. Luvvie shared her wisdom on how to build a group of friends we can trust with our truth and our imperfections, and to take responsibility for our care and for whom’s care we take responsibility for. She also shares how to know when it’s time to let a friendship go and how to release one another without hard feelings.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
I think a friend is somebody who you do feel responsible for some of their care, but also who you can trust yourself with, trust your truth with, trust your imperfection with. I think friendship is a verb just like love, just like sisterhood, just like community, and friendship is an action. It doesn’t mean we talk every single day. Sometimes we’ll go a month without speaking, but friendship means that person is another charging station for me.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
I was actually having a conversation with one of my really good friends, Unique the other day, and she was reflecting friendship to me and she was like now more than ever, she understands the importance of that word friend and how it means we’re all getting older. We’re going to be losing parents soon. Friendship has to show up. The friend is not the person who just casually tells you on social media, Oh my God, I’m so sorry. Your friend is the person who says, Have you eaten today? The friend might be the person being like, Do you need their obituary written? Do you need me to help you write it? Actions that are substantive, which is why I’m very careful who I call and consider a friend because will I show up for you in the moment of crisis? If you are not somebody who I would show up for, I can’t call you a friend.
Glennon Doyle:
Wow, that’s good. It’s a boundary. It’s like the Brené episode, do I want to be accountable for this in the future?
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
Yeah. Do I want to be accountable for you? Correct. I have to vouch for you. I got to show up for you. So my friends, people know we’re friends, which means my name actually goes with them, so it becomes, Oh, that’s one of Luvvie’s friends, which actually means literally even when I’m not in the room, you represent me and I represent you.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
So who I also call a friend has to be aligned with my values, because if that person is not, people go, That doesn’t match. That’s Luvvie’s friend, but she’s a kind of terrible person. That doesn’t match. That doesn’t match. You can’t. I can’t. No. So I think all of that; values, care, love, and of course sharing joy with each other and serving as a soft place to land for each other. I know I can never fail truly in this world because my friends will be my soft place to land even if I fall. They won’t ever let me hit concrete. They’ll catch me right before the moment I do. So it also feels like safety.
Abby WambachL
I love that.
Amanda Doyle:
Comfort and challenge. Can you talk about knowing when a friendship needs to be released and how that works? Because where you say some people are ride or die and I’m more ride or surely you understand why I’m done here. Is that-
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
Why we got to die? Why we got to die, fam? Why we got to die? I just…
Amanda Doyle:
Nobody’s dying. We’re not dying.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
Nobody needs to die.
Amanda Doyle:
So we’re not asking you to ride or die. When you hit the surely, you understand why I’m done here phase, what does that look like to release a friend with love and how you know?
Glennon Doyle:
And how do you know?
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
So I’ve had friendship losses over the years and actually who I am as a friend today is partly because of some of the friendship losses I’ve had where people have not showed up for me in a way, or they weaponized something I did or said, and I’m, Woo. The type of friend I am, I give you extra grace because I’ve had friends who never gave grace. I give extra benefit of the doubt because you have to think the best of me for us to be in the community, because when I make mistakes, you have to understand it’s not malicious.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
So I’m the friend who is, I must give you grace. I must give you benefit of the doubt. I will not project my shit on you because I’m in a bad space. So when it’s time to let a friend go, how you know if you longer trust yourself with them, if you have to second guess everything you do because you’re not sure how they’ll receive it or how they’ll take it. If you do not trust your feelings with them, your very persona with them, it’s time to let them go because you can no longer lean on them in the way you really need to, nor would you be present for them because you’re going to feel resentful.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
So I always know when it’s time to let go of somebody is when I say you’ve either crossed a boundary that I can’t unsee, you broke something that I can’t figure out how to fix it, or ultimately, I start seeing you as somebody who is not in integrity. If I can’t vouch for you…
Glennon Doyle:
Do you have a conversation?
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
Yes, I have a conversation. Well, here’s the thing, I also will let friends know when they do something that hurts me in a way. So I don’t like when people will just pop up and be, Oh my god, I’ve been upset for the last two years. Oh, God, so you’ve been keeping that to yourself? I think we should honor each other and ourselves and be truly honest with each other and tell the truth, especially in those hard moments so repairs can happen or not. Give people a chance to repair and if they don’t repair, that’s a data point that you can be, well, I guess we’re done, right?
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
So I also will have conversations along the way and if we get to a point where I’m, Yeah, this person is not hearing, they’re not doing anything different, I really can’t trust them, then sometimes I fade. Not that I ghost, not that I even have a dramatic conversation, but I become less available. I become less available. And then if they ask me, Hey, this thing happened, I’ll tell you… or I’ll even say, let’s have a conversation, and it’s in that conversation that I’ll go, Yeah, see, this feels cruel. This does not feel kind. This does not feel gentle. I can’t do it.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
Multiple ways, but I don’t agree with the ghosting where you just like… Some people will block friends on social media randomly and that’s how they know that they’re not speaking anymore. No, don’t do that. Be a better person than that. Have conversations. I’ve had friends come back to me or ex-friends who have tried to argue with me and I go, I’m not sure what you want from me. We can have a real conversation, but I’m not doing a tit for tat. Let’s have a real conversation. But I’m not doing the back and forth. Sub posting on Instagram is great for people too and Facebook, because adults do that now, social media.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
I’ve seen people’s whose friendships have broken up and you can be like, Oh, snap, because that person’s posting. Sometimes friendships are for a season and a reason, and you’re, Oh, they must be mad. They must be mad at somebody right now. I’d be watching like hmm, take it up with the person.
Amanda Doyle:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
And I think sometimes we don’t end things or we end things wrong because we’re trying to control the narrative in terms of I’m the good guy and you’re the bad guy and I have to wait until I can prove that perfectly and until I can explain it in a way that makes it… But that’s not real. Sometimes it’s not you. It’s not me. It’s the energy between us. It’s the moment. I don’t have to be the same as-
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
It’s situations.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. It’s just not working. You can release each other in a way that’s not…
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
And I think you can release each other without even having hard feelings. You don’t have to be, Ooh, I hate that bitch. No, we not friends no more. You can just be, no, we drifted apart. And that’s fine. The person, you see them out in public, say hi. Every friendship breakup does not have to be this dramatic bomb that just went off and all of a sudden this person’s, I hate them so much. They’re horrific. No, sometimes people will drift apart and that’s natural. We’re adults, stuff happens, but I think all through it, try as much as you can to maintain your integrity.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. And I love your advice of you don’t always have to decide whether or not you like the other person or if they’re worthy, or if they’re honest or whatever, but you do have to decide if you like yourself around that person. And if you don’t like yourself, and trust yourself and feel calm and safe, then that’s enough information.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
It’s enough information. Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
There’s so many people in the world. We don’t have to stay ride or die with the wrong ones.
Luvvie Ajayi Jones:
Yeah. Are you in love with your friends? If you’re not, why are they your friends? In love where you’re just, Oh my God. Like The Care Bear stare. I Care Bear stare all my friends because I just think y’all are amazing. Are you in love with the person who is your friend, who you’re sharing space and energy with, who you’re going on vacations with sometimes, who you’re watching on Zoom or WhatsApp? Be in love with the people around you.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah. Do you feel safe enough to receive love too from your friends? One of my barometers of real friendship is, will I let them love me? Do I receive the gifts or love that they want to bring me? Do they have something to offer me that I actually will truly, deeply receive?
Glennon Doyle:
Yes. Are they a charging station?
Amanda Doyle:
Next, we have a woman known in the world as being a very good friend, Reese Witherspoon. She has figured out how to maintain and show up and have friendships be a life-giving force in her life. Even as busy and frenzied as her life is, you can tell she just really relies upon the sisterhood of friends that she has.
Amanda Doyle:
In episode 114 on Friendship, What? Like, It’s Hard, Reese describes her system for balancing deposits and withdrawals in friendship. That’s her way of determining whether the friendships are working for her and are soul giving to her as well as soul giving to them if she checks her deposits and withdrawals. And she gives us tips for making the first friendship move, which was scary and exciting to hear her talk about. She also gives good advice she received that she passed down to her kids about the three types of people you meet in your life and the ones to pay attention to among those three.
Glennon Doyle:
I’m going to ask you some questions, Reese, and I just want you to pretend like I’m an alien who’s just landed on the planet and you’re trying to explain friendship to me because that is in fact what’s happening right now. What is friendship, Reese?
Reese Witherspoon:
Friendship is so much, but it’s a deposit and a withdrawal system. I think about that a lot. You can’t take a withdrawal if you haven’t made a deposit.
Abby Wambach:
That’s really good.
Reese Witherspoon:
And I think about that a lot because I think people in my position, in y’all’s position, it’s like there’s a lot of people who want to withdraw. There is. And people who have bright light or energy or caregivers or are caretakers, they give, they give, they give, but you got to make sure someone’s putting a deposit into your friendship. And then every once in a while reevaluate. Is this more withdrawal than deposit? Where is the balance here?
Abby Wambach:
It’s so good. I think that this is what we’ve figured out over the last many years, our search for more friendship. We want to feel like friends are he helping us also learn more about and explore more about the world, and I think that we’ve found a couple of friends here that are doing that. And it feels so wonderful now that we live in LA. It feels so wonderful.
Glennon Doyle:
Reese, how do you identify a person that you want to be a friend?
Reese Witherspoon:
Oh, isn’t that interesting? Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
Because romantic love is different. It’s like, Oh I feel the butterflies. Something’s happening. What’s friendship butterflies?
Reese Witherspoon:
Gosh, I feel like it’s a very similar thing.
Glennon Doyle:
It is, right?
Reese Witherspoon:
I can look at a group of people and I just know the two or three people I’m supposed to get to know better. It doesn’t mean that we’re going to have this incredible connection, but I watch the way people interact with people, their use of language, I think it’s really important to me because I’m a words person. Looking at that, are they here to withdraw or deposit or stay neutral? This is a funny story, y’all, I trained for this movie where I played a NCAA championship softball player. Don’t laugh.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay.
Abby Wambach:
Nobody’s laughing.
Reese Witherspoon:
I had this really great coach and she was a 12 time NCAA champion coach. I thought, well, first of all, anybody who’s had coaching at that level, just the positivity that they put in these young athletes is incredible. I thought if I’d had that when I was 22, I wouldn’t have to read 100 self-help books. I read 100 self-help books when I was 22, 23. And she said something really smart about friendship. Her name’s Coach Enquist, Sue Enquist. Do you know Coach Enquist?
Abby Wambach:
Mm-hmm-
Reese Witherspoon:
Yeah. She’s amazing. And she said, “Reese, you’re going to meet three different kinds of people in life. A third of the people are going to lift you up. They’re going to believe in your dreams, they’re going to encourage you, you’re going to encourage them. And a third of the people are going to be totally neutral. They’re just neutral, and you don’t care about them, they don’t care about you. No harm, no foul. And then the other third are going to try and drag you down actively. Whether they know it consciously, unconsciously, they are here to pull people down, and they’re going to try and pull you down.”
Reese Witherspoon:
And she was like, “Avoid the bottom third.” And I talked to my kids about it all the time, about finding friendships that lift you up, see you, care about you, care about your children, care about your mom and your dad, and your family. Try and bring and attract those ton of people in your life and avoid those bottom third. Because they’re coming for you, man. They’re coming for your light and your energy.
Abby Wambach:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah.
Abby Wambach:
It’s really good.
Glennon Doyle:
Okay, so when you find somebody who’s in that top third and you get the friendship butterflies, what do you do to make the first move?
Reese Witherspoon:
I have to be brave. And for me being brave is just jumping. I imagine myself as a little kid jumping two feet in a cold pool and you know once you get in there, it’s not as cold as you thought it was.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s right.
Reese Witherspoon:
I also think about other people, must be terrifying to have to stand alone in a room or I think, Oh, I’m going to go say hi. Why not? What’s the worst thing that could happen? Or be vulnerable. I will tell you, when I had no friends in Los Angeles… So I moved right after college. I stopped out of Stanford because I got this job and I moved into this apartment. I didn’t know anybody. I was 19 years old, I had no friends. And my mom came to visit me. I go, “Mom, I have no friends,” and she’s, “Well, there’s a girl across the hallway.”
Reese Witherspoon:
I have to do it like Betty Witherspoon. “There is a girl across the hallway and she looks like she’s about your age, and I think you should just go over there and you should just ask her if she wants to have some coffee.” And I was like, “Really?” She said, “Yeah.” So I knocked on our door, and I was like, “Hi,” And she goes, “Hi.” I said, “Hi, I’m Reese. I’m 19.” She goes, “I’m 19 too. My name is Heather.” And I was like, “I don’t know anybody. I just stopped out of Stanford. I’m here by myself.” She goes, “I just stopped out of Berkeley.”
Reese Witherspoon:
I was like, “Oh, I’m working.” She’s like, “I’m working too.” I was like, “Do you want to get coffee?” She’s my best friend to this day. She’s my very best friend on planet earth. And also, y’all, don’t you feel like you have such limited time? Friendship is this very important thing, but you got to have friends who first of all, be able to put them on your speed dial, they’d show up if your kid was sick. And then you have to be able to hang up the phone immediately and they don’t get their feelings hurt. I go click. And literally when you call them three days later you just start talking about whatever you were talking about when you hung up the phone, right?
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah. Okay. Pod Squad, the next one is very special to Abby and to me too. This one got me. In episode 102, Abby’s former US national teammates, Ashlyn Harris and Allie Krieger joined us for a double date. Things got a bit teary as Ashlyn shared the story of her friendship with Abby and why she pulled Abby’s final game captain’s band out of the trash, and what she plans to do with it.
Glennon Doyle:
Ashlyn, you gave a toast at the wedding and during the toast you said so many beautiful things, but you actually during the toast talked about your friendship with Abby and I didn’t understand, I don’t think, the depth of all of your friendship until that toast. So tell us how you all became friends and what this is.
Abby Wambach:
Yeah, I can’t wait to hear your perspective.
Ashlyn Harris:
Oh my gosh, this is so good. It’s so interesting when I think back because I was so young and it was such a vulnerable time for me and I don’t know how we ended up connecting, but Abby’s ex-wife was one of my childhood friends. So that’s how the connection was made. So it was my first professional year in the league and I was making minimum contract, and I just suffered a ton of injuries in college, so I was just finding my way a little bit. And Abby and I hit it off. We were brothers from the moment we had our first conversation.
Ashlyn Harris:
And it was such a weird time in my life. I really believe people are placed in certain moments for certain reasons. When I was in that moment, when I was giving my speech, she would let me come to terms with my sexuality because I wasn’t comfortable at the time being like, I’m gay. It was, I have these weird feelings for friends, and I don’t know what’s going on and I’m super uncomfortable. And she just loved me through the journey and was a good friend to me, and showed me how to live life, because I came from nothing. I didn’t experience very much outside my bubble and my small world, and she just would take me on these freaking wild ass excursions.
Ashlyn Harris:
She would be like, “Hey, drive your car to 95. We’re doing a cross-country trip in an RV with seven people.” “Sure I’ll be there. I have no money.” “No problem. I got you.” And it’s just like we did life together. Some of my greatest memories are with you, and meeting Ali and coming to terms with my sexuality. I just remember sitting on your couch, folding your laundry, talking about-
Glennon Doyle:
That sounds familiar.
Ashlyn Harris:
What gay looked like for me. And it’s a really important moment in my life because she just took care of me. And I was super young, I was super naive. I really don’t think I had much to offer her at the time, but she just loved me unconditionally and took me under her wing. And in our friendship, we were always by each other’s side. From then on out, we had each other’s back, still to this day.
Abby Wambach:
So good. I just remember that time. You were young and I just remember seeing a kid who… It’s not that you needed any help because I knew you’d figure it out. You’re very strong and you had the kind of a moral compass that I in many ways wished to have. I feel like you knew a little bit more right from wrong than I did. I had a little bit of a wild streak in me and you did too, but I think that you had an ability to pull in the reins way better than me. And I think that what you just said it touches me so much, and the thing that you gave me was longevity.
Abby Wambach:
When a new kid who comes to a team is so open minded… And you weren’t filled with ego. You were like, Yes, whatever it takes, and as an older veteran player, it made my career last longer because first of all, it made me feel like I was doing something good. And second of all, your youthfulness made me feel like, Oh, you know what, this is something that I still want to keep doing, because you made it so easy every day in the locker room.
Ali Krieger:
Abby, you also knew how to get the best out of all of us younger players. I really appreciated that. And I know Ashlyn has an amazing connection with you and such a brilliant friendship story and throughout the years it’s obviously grown so much. But I don’t know if you realize, you obviously knew what you could get out of people and you always knew how to get the best out of us. And I just really appreciated that and I really value that about you and obviously, you’re one of the greatest leaders we’ve ever had.
Ashlyn Harris:
And I have to say, I know we’ve mentioned this story before, but I think it’s a really important story to share with everyone, is in your final game, your retirement game, I understood at the time you weren’t in a great place and it was a really difficult time for you and I’ll never forget, it like plays in slow motion like a movie in my mind, you came into the locker room and you were pissed because we lost, which you should be. And you took your captain band and you took it off and your shirt, and you just threw it into the dirty
Abby Wambach:
Oh, my God. Ashlyn, this story.
Ashlyn Harris:
And when no one was looking, I took out that captain band and I took off my jersey and I wrapped it and put it in my bag, and still to this day, I have your last captain band wrapped in my jersey that I wore because that is the impact you had on the people around you and maybe you didn’t know it. And I just knew there was going to be a time where you wanted that back, and I can’t wait to deliver that to you when I see you face-to-face because that’s the effect you had on people that you didn’t even know. And it was so powerful, and it was so moving. I need to give you back that last captain band. That’s important to me for you to have it because that’s the impact you had on the people around you.
Abby Wambach:
I’m not crying at all.
Glennon Doyle:
In this next one, Abby and I put our new commitment to figuring out what friendship is and to trying it out in real life to the test, with our new friend, standup comic, actor and writer Cameron Esposito. In episode 96, How to Save Your Damn Self, Cameron and I discussed the rule we each made to help us become better at friendship. It’s a good one.
Cameron Esposito:
I didn’t realize this until just a few years ago, but I think I was pretty badly bullied as a child. I thought that’s how everybody was treated. I had glasses and braces, and a bowl cut and something weird was going on with my gender, and I was gay and I had crossed eyes. This child, there was a lot going on. And so I think I just made the joke first to be like, I know what you’re going to say. Well, here’s an even funnier spin. And also to sort have value to people when I wasn’t able to play the game of being sort of a girl that might be valuable for some other stuff that women are valued for. That is all garbage by the way. It’s not like I think this should exist. But it was another way of making myself valuable as a friend or as a student. Those types of things.
Cameron Esposito:
So I got super funny and actually, I have in the last couple of years really wondered about the long-term viability of that skillset because I took it to its end. I was funny, funny, funny, and then I was funny for a living, and then I was having success in that area and then I was married and that marriage was ending, and it was the first time in my life that I was not… Well, for a while, it was private so I wasn’t able to talk about it on stage. And then it was really sad. I was sadder than I was funny about it. That’s actually a good thing because it changed how I make friends and how I overdeveloped that skill.
Cameron Esposito:
So I never really told anybody the truth about what was going on. I just told them, Here’s the saddest thing you’ve ever heard, but we’re all chuckling about it. It broke. My sense of humor broke for a while, which actually is one of the best things that ever happened to me.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s how we started trying to be friends with each other. I wanted to talk about this. I think it’s so important. It was like you and I figured out that, oh, we just take our trauma and pain, and then we spin it up and then we serve it to lots of people, but we don’t do the middle step, which other human beings do which is talk about it with other human beings, and have actual friends.
Cameron Esposito:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
You just perform it. And so we were trying to be like… You’ve recently reached out to me and said, “I’m having feelings and I would like to talk to you about it instead of the internet.” That was the text. Talk to us about that.
Cameron Esposito:
This is a rule I have now. It’s a rule I made for myself. And who knows if rules are good, but I actually think this one is pretty good, which is that I don’t bring something to the internet or to stage that I haven’t told someone else, interpersonally. And I think part of that is when you do standup since public speaking, and I’m sure you get this all the time too, Glennon, and actually I even feel like I know how hard this is for you a little bit just from knowing you, people will talk about public speaking as being the most… Like, Oh my God, I can’t believe you do standup. That’s so hard. And I’m like, I don’t know, different people have different skills. Some people are a brain surgeon. That’s the first thing I’ll say.
Cameron Esposito:
The next thing I’ll say is, That’s not hard for me. It’s not that the skill of standup isn’t hard. Any skill is something you can work on over time. But standing up in front of 2200… The largest audience I’ve ever performed for is 40,000 people. That is like-
Glennon Doyle:
Safe.
Cameron Esposito:
Exactly. You know what’s much worse? Talk to one person that you have to ever see again.
Glennon Doyle:
Oh, my God. No. Nope.
Cameron Esposito:
That is impossible. Talk to thousands of people that are going to leave? Great. Easy. Yeah, no problem. There’s no intimacy there. There’s some spiritual intimacy, but it’s not something that you’re going to have to grow. I’m not going to have to show up and have these people know me.
Glennon Doyle:
How is it going for you? The creating more friendships, the reaching out to human beings? Do you feel more tethered to the earth when you do that? Does it help? What are the challenges?
Cameron Esposito:
It really does help. I just said this, I’m repeating myself, but it’s very hard to be known. It’s very hard to be open to suggestion if you’re a certain type of person. I don’t want people to know. I don’t have it figured out. That feels embarrassing for some reason. We don’t know why that is. That’s not a healthy reaction to not having it figured out. And also, I want to move fast and loose and have sparky flame out relationships and do a completely wild job and fling my body around the country in a plane. That’s like what feels normal to me. Chaos feels calming.
Abby Wambach:
Ooh, that really hit me.
Cameron Esposito:
Yeah, did it?
Abby Wambach:
Yeah. That’s something.
Cameron Esposito:
Chaos is so in my experience, chill. Just like a, let’s go. Yeah. I just feel like I can relax. I’m, oh, thank God, finally the world feels like I feel. Finally, there’s not something I am not doing or something I could do better. Everything’s so impossible that it’s like, ugh, I can really chill out.
Glennon Doyle:
Wow, cool.
Cameron Esposito:
So anyway, that is what I’m trying to, instead have connection and friendship and have the ability to stay, the ability to not run toward or away, but just to hang. I’m finding that a lot in my romantic relationship, I’m finding that a lot in having friends that I go back to again and again.
Amanda Doyle:
We really hope you’ve enjoyed this deep dive of some of our favorite friendship moments. Let us know what other topics you’d like for us to deep dive on. We’re going to end this one with a laugh with our friend, the hilarious Samantha Irby. My God, if you have not listened to episode 109, do yourself a solid and listen to her. She is a genius and so funny. Episode 109 is How to Survive This Absurd Life. And in that we explore Sam’s friendship theory and why she doesn’t need a deep soul connection with every quote, lowercase F friend.
Samantha Irby:
I have the kind of personality that just, I don’t know, I can just get along with a lot of people. I think I have been fortunate enough that I haven’t ever tried to befriend someone who was so different from me politically that it’s been a problem. I don’t have any friends who hate gay people or trans people. I don’t have any friends who are hardcore conservatives. I have a lot of friends that I think you’d be like, hmm, what do y’all bond over? And then I’ll be, well, I watch wrestling. And then it explains that friendship, right? You’re like, oh, you have a very narrow way of connecting with this person. And sometimes for me that’s all it takes is we can have a shared interest in one thing and we don’t have to get into other things.
Abby Wambach:
That is so good.
Samantha Irby:
Yeah.
Glennon Doyle:
Don’t you wish-
Abby Wambach:
That is exactly how I feel.
Glennon Doyle:
I know babe. I know.
Abby Wambach:
And you have a barrier to entry that is so fucking long.
Glennon Doyle:
That’s why I asked Sam, okay, I’m trying to learn this.
Abby Wambach:
No, I think it’s so beautiful because I can connect with somebody on one thing and in a lot of ways I can ignore a bunch of the other shit that I’m seeing that I’m like, well, I like them in this way and this is fun.
Samantha Irby:
Me too. So I’m not going to guess Glennon, why you have your rules. So if this is kind of a guess, I’m going to say that I don’t need to have, and this is not shade, an intimate soul relationship with everybody, right? I don’t need to get to the depths of people if we are just having a laugh or we can talk about this one thing. Sometimes those narrow friendships branch out and grow. But I don’t go into things being like, okay, I’m going to meet this person and I’m going to hang out with them and then I want to know everything about them.
Samantha Irby:
Some people you don’t want to know. You don’t want them to know everything about you. So I think because I don’t look at everyone as a potential soul friend because I’m just like, well this is just my buddy who I do this with, then it’s easier to let some of that other stuff fall away. I feel like you want to have deep friendships with everyone.
Abby Wambach:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
I think that’s what I’m usually, if someone’s in my house watching wrestling, Sam, which wouldn’t happen, but okay, I am thinking, I’m side eyeing that person thinking, is this person one of my soulmates or not? And then when they roll their eyes at the wrong commercial, it’s over.
Abby Wambach:
It’s really something.
Samantha Irby:
I respect that because the quality of your friendships is probably really great because you like-
Glennon Doyle:
Yes, everyone I’m friends with is on this podcast, right?
Samantha Irby:
Well, so that’s the thing is and I think it feels like rude to call someone an acquaintance, but that’s essentially the difference, right? It’s, we are friends because I know you inside and out me inside and out. Our acquaintances who were just like, oh Bob, yeah, he’s a good time. We don’t need to know Bob’s soul. But it feels rude to call Bob an acquaintance because that just is a rude word. So we need a capital F friend and a lowercase F friend.
Glennon Doyle:
Yes. We need different words for friends.
Samantha Irby:
Yes.
Glennon Doyle:
We need different words for friends. Because I don’t want to say Bob’s my friend because I don’t want that to reflect. The next thing Bob says this and then you’re, wait, why are you friends with that dude? Different words.
Samantha Irby:
Right, yes.
Amanda Doyle:
Don’t you think it all goes back to your view of life. Sam, your view of life is, I want to find the absurd, I want to experience the absurd. I want to be part of being part of this, experiencing this. And so you intersect with people who can bring that out of you or share that experience with you. Glennon’s view of life is very different than that. She’s, I’m going to have a very narrow but deep experience of life and I don’t actually want to participate in any extracurriculars.
Samantha Irby:
Right. I do not want any depth whatsoever. I told you that’s where the lava is. We can only dip a toe in there before things get dangerous. So I try to stay near the top of the volcano where it’s smokey and sexy and fun, but I only get into the lava with a few people because, and I’ll tell you why.
Glennon Doyle:
Sam, that makes perfect sense.
Samantha Irby:
I’m not going to put it on them. I’m going to say that I have that fear of when people really get down and see what’s in there that they’re going to be, oh, bye. And that’s one of the hazards I think of being a funny person, not just in life but in my career, is that sometimes people don’t think that lower level exists and then they are surprised when they get a glimpse of it. And I’m, all I do is write about depression. How do you think that manifests itself for real?
Samantha Irby:
So I think having lowercase F friends, it feels good to the ego. It’s good to know people, it’s good to have people around, but also I’m not in danger of finding out any of their dark shit and they’re not in danger of finding out any of mine and thus rejecting me on account of that darkness. So-
Abby Wambach:
It’s good. It’s a safety measure.
Glennon Doyle:
So good. I get that.
Amanda Doyle:
That is so good.
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah, I get that. Do you sometimes feel responsibility to just always be funny and always be doing the thing with other people?
Samantha Irby:
No, I-
Glennon Doyle:
Yeah, like entertaining them.
Samantha Irby:
I do. It never bothers me until I have a problem and I talk about it to someone who wants funny Sam and they’re, oh, just laugh it off. And I’m, no, no, this is the part where you find out that I got to go to bed for three days about it. Sometimes it takes a little distance. I can always laugh at things. Maybe not in the moment or the next day. Eventually I’ll get there. There have been people who can’t deal with in the moment, I’m not over this yet. And then you know that’s never going to be your capital F friend. Always going to be a lower case. Never call that person when you have a problem. Never expect more from them than the surface that you’re getting.
Samantha Irby:
And I think sometimes people divide themselves into those categories for you. My friend, John, who I met on the internet forever ago. This was like 10 years ago, maybe. I had posted that I was in the hospital and we were just internet friends then. And he came and visited and was the only person who visited. And I was, oh, you want to be here during this stuff? Okay, yeah, we’re real friends. But I never put that pressure on anyone because I know not everybody wants that. I like do a little sorting of my own and then let people sort themselves into their capital F or lowercase F.
Glennon Doyle:
I love that. We Can Do Hard Things is produced in partnership with Cadence13 Studios. Be sure to rate, review and follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Odyssey or wherever you get your podcasts. Especially be sure to rate and review the podcast if you really liked it. If you didn’t, don’t worry about it, it’s fine.