- I received a question recently on the Patreon livestream
and there was so much conversation around it
that I wanted to share it here.
And the question had to do with working on ourselves
and then realizing that the relationships we have
in our life maybe aren't the right ones anymore,
or that the dynamic between people in our lives
isn't what we want.
And the person who has the question was saying that
they're doing all this work on themselves in therapy
and then they went out to a dinner for their birthday
and they realized that in all of their friendships,
they have made it okay for them to not be the center
of attention ever.
Like that everybody else always cuts them off, takes
the floor and talks about themselves and even when they try
to tell people how they're doing, the other people
in their lives bring it right back to them.
And we've all had relationships like that
but, today instead of just telling you like the therapy kind
of reasons why this can happen and how we can make
it better, I want to share more of a personal story.
Now when I was probably between the ages of like 28
and like 32, I ended three really close friendships.
And, it was really hard for me I'm gonna be honest.
It was a really difficult time and I kept thinking like
maybe something's wrong with me.
I was going in to see my therapist I'm like,
what's my role in this?
Like why is this so frustrating and why why do I feel
so hurt by this?
And anyway, going around and run around about
what I was going through and why this was happening in such
a short period of time losing three I mean, these
are like super, super close friends of mine.
And my therapist brought my attention to something
and she'd asked me when those relationships started.
And it was important for me because these relationships
began when I wasn't the best version of myself.
Now you guys know I've been in and out of therapy since I
was 15 but my first therapist from ages 15 till I went away
to college at 18, wasn't a really good fit.
I grew up in a super small town, she was like one
of maybe three options and she was super religious.
As you guys know I was raised in church
but don't go any more personally and it just wasn't
what I needed, it wasn't a good fit.
And so I didn't really start making personal progress
until I saw my therapist, Rebecca at Pepperdine
cause most universities offer therapy for free, thank God.
And I started seeing her at least once a week
when my dad started getting sick I went twice
a week for awhile.
But in that time I realized how much have of
a people pleaser I was.
And for those of you who've been following me for
a long time you know I'm a recovering people pleaser.
And I bring that up because the friendships that ended
in this time in my late twenties to early thirties,
were friendships that began before I was 19 years old.
Maybe 19 to 20, maybe one of them I met I think I met her
when I was 19 And we became really close friends by like 20.
So all those friendships began when I was barely even aware
of the fact that I was a people pleaser and that,
that was a bad thing in all the ways that had played out
in my life.
Now flash forward, like 10 years
into my late twenties I finally realized that that this
wasn't something that I wanted and that
when I wasn't serving them first, we had issues
and there were arguments and disagreements.
And I remember even meeting one of my friends before
the friendship just kind of faded away.
I remember meeting her and thinking that it went well
and coming back home to tell Sean
like I think we really repaired things, I really apologized
and like we're both gonna do better and he asked me he's
like did she say sorry for, you know all the other things
like talking behind your back and being really judgmental
and being so negative.
Did she apologize for any of that?
And I was quiet because I was like, no.
No she didn't.
He's like well, didn't sound like it went very well.
And I was like, shit it didn't.
Oh, and I had that realization again I didn't see it myself.
I don't want any of you to think
that like I knew I know better and I was do better
and going to therapy just means that like oh, I know things
and I can change it right away.
It's still hard and when that happened I
was like crap I thought this was, this was good
and we were gonna be able to repair this.
And then the more I thought about it, the more I realized
that I don't think she had ever apologized for anything.
I was always the one that
was super apologetic hello people pleaser, right.
I apologize for apologizing.
I apologize to strangers for being in their way.
I apologize for everything, right.
And so, realizing that dynamic and that I had let
that happen again, made me see it it was like I dunno,
it's like a slap in the face, right.
And so I realized at that point that that relationship
couldn't continue unless things changed.
And I just wanted to bring this up
because I think sometimes we assume that friendships
and relationships in general last forever.
However, a lot of times we meet people at a time
in our lives like in my experience
when I wasn't healthy, I didn't have good boundaries.
I was people pleasing, I was doing everything
for everybody else and leaving nothing for myself.
If I meet people at that time in my life, they may
be like me and wanna be friends with me for all
of the wrong reasons essentially maybe
for some of the behaviors that I wanna change.
Obviously there's probably some good reasons too, right.
It's not like we're all good or all bad,
but some of the things that then if I get into therapy
like I did and start working to change
and to better communicate and better uphold boundaries
and put myself first, that sometimes those relationships
don't work anymore.
And for me it wasn't so much like they're wrong
and I'm right I mean, sure when I was angry and upset
and like grieving I went through that phase of like oh,
they're such jerks and blah, blah, blah.
But the truth is that they weren't all wrong
and I wasn't all right.
It was more that like I had changed, I'd like shed a skin
of a past self.
And the things that they liked about me
didn't exist anymore and so then those relationships
just didn't work.
I found like another relationship
I'll give you another example
that my therapist challenged me to recognize where I
was putting in so much more effort in relationships
than the other person.
And I'll give you another example I had this friendship
that I'd had for probably one of my longest friendships.
And my therapist had challenged me
to recognize relationships where I was putting in
a ton more effort than the other person.
And I recognize this relationship as one that could possibly
be that way.
And so I had talked to this friend
and I had said yeah, I've been working in therapy,
and I'm just trying to put in the same amount of effort
in my relationships as I'm getting out of it.
And she was like, yeah of course
that makes sense sounds super helpful, healthy and hopeful.
And so I did that with her and I stopped being the only one
to reach out.
If she would call me, then I would always call her.
And it would, that was kind of the give and take
and if she was gonna ask me how my day was, I was gonna ask
how her day was.
Now I know this sounds really contrived
but just hang with me.
So I started just doing this
and I'm not gonna lie you guys, we have that one call
where I told her I was going to work on this
and I started planning and preparing on how I would enact
that in my life.
And I never talked to her again,
because she never called me I always called her to check
in and to see how she was doing.
And then probably about six
or eight months later, she reached out to me as she
would do just to ask me for favors.
And she was always in dire need, it was always
this huge event and she left me this message
being like, oh my God I need your help and I need you
to do this for me and blah, blah, blah.
Do you think I called her back?
I didn't, and I know you could say Kati you're being
a friend but that's not a friendship.
In my mind that's not a healthy friendship
and that isn't what I want to cultivate.
And that's not what I wanna develop.
And I also don't want people to think that I'm saying
that friendships can't last forever because I have a lot
of good friends in my life have been around forever
like my friend Kim, my friend Rosio, my friend Joanna.
And then I have new friendships I've made time
for like Dr. Alexa Altman you guys know her I love her.
My friend, Christina P .
But in all of those relationships, we have grown
in the same direction or I feel that we are going
in the same direction.
And that doesn't mean that my friendships aren't varied
and people can't be different, but when it comes
to priorities and focuses in relationships
and give and take just that natural ebb and flow,
they all have that.
And the one way that I know now that relationships
are healthy and good and things that I should put
more effort into, is that I get super excited to see them.
And I know you might be thinking well, that's obvious
of course they're your friends.
But if we're honest with ourselves if I'm honest
with myself, I wasn't excited to see those other friends.
It was actually very draining for me.
And again, I'm not right and they're not wrong
it just didn't work anymore, right.
They wanted to take, because that's
what I'd always done right, I'd always been the giver
so that they could take and when I stopped giving,
it was like they were trying to steal from me
and it was just exhausting to try to fight that off.
It was like putting boundaries up while they're still trying
to cross over them and it was just draining.
And so now all of my relationships and the friendships
that I make time for, cause I think we all could agree
that like as we get older our time gets smaller and smaller
to be able to see friends and catch up and all of
that becomes something we have to organize and schedule.
And it's just not as easy as it was maybe, in college
or in our early twenties.
And so really, I just wanna talk about this because
the person who asked the question it clearly resonated
with a lot of you on Patreon.
And some of the questions that she had at the end were like,
how do I let them know that these things are happening
and also lamenting and wishing that we could go back to
a time when we didn't know and I feel that sometimes
do you ever feel like you have these realizations
in your life or your therapist notice patterns?
And you're like, I wish I could go back to when I
didn't know about that cause now I can't un-see it.
It's almost like when someone tells you
this photo looks like two people kissing
or something like Sean recently sent me this meme where
it's like Wolverine looks like two Batman's kissing
and now I can't on see it.
It's like that in therapy you're like, I can't unsee
that I can't un-know that and now it's affecting everything,
but it is for the better.
And the one thing I did do with all of these friendships
is because I didn't feel it didn't make sense to me
to directly be like hey, can you let me talk for a bit?
Like I don't think that's
what I wanna cultivate either, right.
I don't want to be pushy and feel too aggressive I wanna
be assertive and clear.
And so what I said to each of these friends
in different ways was like hey, you know I've been working
on myself cause they knew I'd been in therapy
for a long time and they knew I was doing this
and I'm like, I'm trying to find a way to better communicate
and advocate for myself.
So if you find me like letting you know I'm upset
really early on or be more communicative
about how I'm feeling, it's just because I'm trying
to be better and do better.
And all of them were like yeah, awesome of course, you know.
And even my friend Joanna actually when I told her
about this she was like yeah, of course how can I help?
Is there a way, you know like going to give you
more time to talk.
You know, real friends will we'll try to assist
and be there and support.
So I let all these friends know I was making these changes
and trying to be better.
And then, I gave them opportunities to meet me where I was
at and to kind of go in the direction that I was trying
to make my life go and the way
that I wanted my relationships to continue.
And I'm gonna be honest here all three of
those relationships just fell off.
So there was no big fight, there
was no big we're not friends anymore conversation.
It was more like hey, you're going your way
and I'm going my way.
And again, their ways not wrong and my way is not right
it was just this time of my life where I realized hey,
these aren't relationships that are serving me anymore.
They're not breath in, they're not filling me up.
And I don't know if you're going through that I hope that
this kind of helps sometimes I think personal stories are
a little more, it's easier to hear and learn.
I know that for myself and yeah.
Right now I feel pretty good.
I definitely feel like I'm in a time of transition
or in a time of transformation in life
and maybe I'll go through another layer of this.
I don't know for any of you have you been
through many rounds of this?
I've only been through I mean, there were three friendships
but it was like kind of like a four or five-year period
where it all happened.
And that's why I was looking inside
because I'm like oh my God, am I like a totally person?
Is this why my friendships are ending?
And then I realized no, it's because we're not
the same people we were when we met each other
and decided to be friends.
I don't know if anybody ever watched the "New Girl"
but I think it was like season two maybe one.
Where the main character, I think her name is Jess
and then Cece her best friend they're like, would we
be friends if we met now.
And they kind of the answer was no.
And sometimes I think if we wouldn't be friends
with someone now, maybe we shouldn't be friends
with them now.
Like if we'd met, just because we've known each other for
a long time, doesn't mean the relationships have
to continue they can if we grow together but sometimes
and in my case and those three relationships,
it was best just to let it go.
So, anyway that's just a little story time from me
and something that we talked about
on the Patreon livestream that just got a lot of chatter
and I hope that's helpful.
At the very least I hope hearing some
of my own personal stories just gives
a little more, I don't know it gives a deeper understanding
maybe is helpful to you in some way.
If you like these kinds of videos I'm happy
to share more like this I just never really have
so, it's just a little bit different.
But give it a like, let me know in those comments
if you enjoy this and I will see you next time, bye.