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Unveiling The Strength in Sisterhood: MJ Renshaw on Transforming Female Friendships and Cultivating Trust
Have you ever felt like an outsider among your own squad? Join me, Portia Chambers, alongside the remarkable MJ Renshaw, for a conversation that's as raw as it is enlightening. In this exploration of the intricate dynamics of female friendships, MJ, founder of the Being Method and an avid rock collector, shares her personal journey from a tomboyish upbringing to discovering the power of sisterhood in her adult life. We tackle the scars left by childhood bullying and how these experiences can shape our attempts at connection, trust, and building a circle of support.
Navigating the maze of women's relationships and self-worth can be daunting, but it's a path we all tread. This episode peels back the layers on how societal biases influence our personal growth and the way we view ourselves within our friendships. From the competitive undercurrents in female-centric work environments to the transformative nature of the yoga community, I reflect on the vital lessons learned about competition and camaraderie. We're celebrating the evolution of these bonds, emphasizing the importance of genuine connections and how to dismantle rivalry to reveal the empowering tapestry of women's relationships.
Adulting comes with its own set of friendship challenges, doesn't it? Whether it's feeling isolated in remote living situations or juggling the demands of motherhood, MJ and I share effective strategies for fostering and keeping those vital connections alive. We stress the importance of vulnerability, taking the initiative, and asking for what you need to nurture these relationships. Worried about facing resentment or trust issues? We've got you covered with a candid discussion on the importance of self-awareness, honesty, and setting healthy boundaries. Tune in as we provide you with a guide to creating and maintaining the meaningful, fulfilling friendships that we all crave and deserve.
Connect with MJ @beingmethod
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Join me, portia Chambers, as I sit down with women just like you, sharing moments in their lives that shape them into who they are today Stories of motherhood, betrayal, transformation, love and loss, vulnerable conversations, deep connection and collective healing. Welcome to the this Is we podcast. I am so excited to have our next guest here with us. Mj Renshaw is the founder of the being Method and an avid rock collector. She is a wifey, a mom and a business owner. Welcome, mj, thank you for having me. I'm so excited you're here. Me too, yeah, and I'm excited about the conversation that we're going to have. I think it's a conversation I know that has been brought up a lot over the last I want to say like month or two, and so I really felt like you had shared something on your stories and I had messaged you and I was like we need to talk about this and what we are actually going to be talking about is female friendships.
Speaker 2:Today, I'm like yeah, yeah, female friendships. It's hard, like it is hard. It's hard yeah.
Speaker 1:So let's start. I always like to start every podcast with a story, so share with us a story where you encounter maybe a little bit of difficulty with a female friendship, whether it's something from your childhood or something that maybe had recently happened.
Speaker 2:Okay, going back, like I grew up with an older brother. My best friend from preschool onwards all through elementary school, was a boy. So sisterhood, female friendship for me has always been something like off in the distance that I have not kind of partook in, like I had loose female friends but I didn't understand it at all, like I was very I guess you know I was a tomboy. I didn't know like I just didn't know how to relate to girls when I was younger. And then I went away to university and I wasn't really unsure of how to relate to women. I wasn't sure what those friendships looked like or how to cultivate them or how to be close to women. And I think when I started to attempt to cultivate them kind of in high school and in university in my early 20s, a lot of my own personal wounds were coming up in those relationships and you know I was choosing people who maybe weren't so aligned with me but I also wasn't showing up very well. I understood more the dynamic of being around a boyfriend or, you know, a guy friend, but I didn't really understand the dynamic of getting close to women and I think I had a lot of wounds there from, you know, being bullied when I was younger, like I have moments where things that someone said to me in like grade three still resonate with me, you know. Or I remember being bullied in preschool, like one girl it was. So I was so young and I don't remember the reason for it. Obviously it was I was so young. But I remember going to get my coat at the end and this girl like wouldn't let me pass and she wouldn't let me pass for so long. It's such a good thing.
Speaker 2:But I remember that and I didn't really know anything about girls. So I was like what is this? And you know, I had short hair. My mom, you know I didn't wear dresses so much. My mom wasn't really into that stuff either. So I just felt very I just didn't understand the culture of womanhood and being a girl is not that it's based on dresses or anything, but you know what I mean. And, yeah, I just didn't know how to connect and I had those micro stories of hurt and I think that those little stories and those feelings that came up with my first impressions of trying to get close to girls or close to women definitely created a shadow over, you know, my fears of getting close to them later on in life and that's something that even now in my 30s, I'm still working on is getting close to women and having sisterhood and friendship. And what is friendship?
Speaker 1:Yeah, when you said in preschool you know the girl was blocking you and you could go, the feelings that came up when you said that I was like oh, I've been there where you're like I don't understand why all of a sudden you don't like me.
Speaker 2:Or I'm like I was not. I was not. I was like the the kid to bully. Like I had braces, I have, like probably my clothes didn't fit I, you know, I just I was very bullyable, yeah, like I was not the cool kid. And you know, I grew into my own eventually and I remember like this is a good story.
Speaker 2:So I remember kind of in grade seven or eight I started to get more maybe cool and a bunch of the cool girls invited me for a sleepover and my mom dropped me off. I was so nervous, I was sweating, I was convinced it was a prank. I told my mom to wait outside in the car and I was like it's probably going to be a prank, like I don't think that they actually want to hang out with me, so please just wait here. And I remember that whole night like I couldn't sleep, like I was just, I was so sure that it was a joke that these people actually didn't want to hang out with me. And there was something else, like you know, the shoe was going to drop and I felt like that with people a lot, like I feel like even now I question people if they want to be friends. I'm like well, why? Like what's what do you want? I think there's going to be something mean. That's going to happen, yeah.
Speaker 1:I can relate to that and it's it's interesting that you had said like you were you know your closest friend was a boy, because I immediately, like when you were talking, I immediately think of my daughter. My daughter was is the person, the girl that didn't have a lot of girlfriends and any girlfriend that she did have their relationship dissolved relatively quickly and in the early years we really didn't understand why they were constantly dissolving and what was happening within those relationships and it never seemed like she was upset. But then as she got older, we started to realize that she just wasn't, like you had said, like a girl's girl. Like she just couldn't necessarily relate to what other girls necessarily wanted or were doing and anything Like now she's more into makeup and those things, but like at the time she's like I just like being with my guy friends.
Speaker 1:I think for her it was just less complicated, there was more, there wasn't as many things to be involved in.
Speaker 1:Like the guys were so simple, like let's just play our video games, let's just go hang out at the park, with no intention of finding boys or doing other things like that. Like it was very simplistic in a way, and it wasn't until grade 10 where she actually got her first real girlfriend and it was remarkable to kind of watch her change into this person that kind of opened herself up to it, which was very interesting because we just we could just outside looking in, couldn't really understand, not that we were like you need to have friends that are girls. Like this is wrong, like you can't all have boyfriends all the time. It didn't matter to us, but I always I'm such a type of person that is envious of those girls that have their little group. Like I never had that.
Speaker 1:And when I see people having their gallant like gallantines day stuff or girls weekends at the cottage, like I I've done that one time and just never like I envy that, like I'm kind of jealous that I don't get to experience that. So when she kind of had that girlfriend, it was kind of like this happy moment where I was like, okay, you don't have to do all of those things, but at least you have somebody that you can actually relate to with other things that are happening. You know in your bodies and in your mind and stuff that like a guy necessarily can't fully comprehend what's happening. So it's just it's interesting, it is there is such.
Speaker 2:There's something so beautiful and healing about being around women Like I. I, you know, I've had deep, deep friendships that you know may exist today, may not exist today, but are things that are like boats that have carried me through hardship. And I laugh now because, like I don't have a single guy friend, I've got one guy friend and he's only allowed to be my guy friend because he's in a relationship. Now my life is is almost all women and it's not. You know, I've got young kids, so it's definitely not as like intimate and deep and time. You know, there's just not enough, a lot of time there to be a good friend, but there is something so healing about it and I think it goes back to I think it goes back to, you know, something you said about being around guys when you're younger so simple, a lot more simple, and I think that comes down to society, right, society allows, I think, boys to be a little bit more, whereas girls we start having to be very much aware of a lot of things that are more mature very early on, like if you think about the first time someone was a little bit creepy with you you're probably pretty young, so you had to grow up fast when you were a girl and things got complicated fast. You're right, I really felt like the world of girlhood was very complicated and I couldn't keep up with it, especially because, like I just didn't. I was like I don't understand any of this and there was a lot of like politics that were happening that I didn't understand. And I don't have a mom that was like that. I don't have a mom who was very much wrapped up in all those things. My mom was an entrepreneur, she was busy, she had her good, close girlfriends and that was it. Like she wasn't in big groups of people, she wasn't into, you know, drama. So I didn't grow up with that in my world at all.
Speaker 2:So then when I went to school, and that was kind of the context of a lot of female groups I know that boys don't have that either, but I was really. It didn't feel good for me. It felt too stressful, like I was like this is, I can't keep up with all of this, and a lot of it was based off of like dishonesties and and I was like I can't. I'm not, I don't know if I'm manipulative enough to do this. I don't remember what I ate, let alone what I'm supposed to be lying about. So it was, it was.
Speaker 2:It was hard, but again, that's not the fault of women or girls, that's the fault of growing up, I think, in a society that you know doesn't respect us as much.
Speaker 2:We are not viewed as being as valuable in our girlhood or our womanhood.
Speaker 2:Right, if you think about you heard growing up like, oh, you run like a girl, or you throw like a girl, or girls aren't as smart, or every time you heard doctor, everybody pictured a boy.
Speaker 2:There was inherent gender and sex bias since we began and it, you know, growing up in an environment where it was competitive, just being who you were was wrong and bad and less than, of course, that breeds an environment that isn't necessarily healthy or, you know, beautiful to be around and I think that's the. That's what's so wonderful about, you know, kids of your daughter's age is because they are figuring out how to radically break through that. And also it's what's so beautiful about people our age, because we are looking at each other and being like I'm not spending another year hating who I am. I love who I am and I love what I do and I'm incredibly valuable whether I'm a woman who you know has a huge business, or I'm a stay-at-home mom. All of it is beautiful and valuable and amazing and I think, like I see the whole kind of revolution of women and learning how to connect through those like past those wounds.
Speaker 2:At least that's what I'm trying to do. I hope other people are too, because I need to meet you. So, yeah, it's not, we've got like there's the mother wound and that's like. That's not blaming our moms for everything. That's just the idea that there's a lineage of wounded women, right, If you think about the amount of like, I think my grandmother didn't even have a credit card. My mom's the first woman in my lineage to have a credit card, Wow. So there's that A lot of women can't say that a woman in their lineage has ever even owned a home, right? So that's common Like. That's more common than anything else. So women are still getting free. We're still learning how to be ourselves, how to value ourselves in a society that doesn't value us, and I think that, at least from what I've read and what I feel, I think that is allowing us to have better friendships, I hope. But yeah, I think you can't be truly intimate and vulnerable with people if you're not feeling free.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree, I really agree, and I love how you said that there's just. It seems like more women are kind of I don't want to say stepping into that role, but kind of stepping into themselves and really wanting to nurture these relationships. Like I feel for the longest time like I have worked, my first job was with only women. So, 16-year-old Portia, both my bosses were women, all of the employees were women. The women owned these. Both these women owned a business, a restaurant, and they only hired women.
Speaker 1:I think I only worked with a man one time and he lasted maybe two weeks and I think they just didn't like the I don't really know what it was, but I think they just didn't like the dynamic of it. To them it didn't seem simplistic, it seemed easier if it was just all women. But I remember working there and often being pinned against one another and if one person was shining brighter then they would kind of take a hold of that and kind of manipulate other people and it kind of at the time like, and I worked there for eight years, so this is like a very pivotal time of my life where I was seeing these other women have their businesses being successful but at the same time being a little bit sneaky and not being fully truthful and kind of hearing the whispers and everything like that and kind of putting a little bit of a bad taste in my mouth, being like how like I can trust these people. And there was women there that I have friendships with now that are the best friendships of my life, but how can I know that they're not doing that to me when I step out of the room? And it evolved Like I left that job, I went to another job and then I became a yoga teacher and you would think that in the yoga world that we are just all sunshine and rainbows but we are the worst, like honestly, we can be the worst sometimes.
Speaker 1:And it was even more toxic and it was kind of shocking and once again it kind of put this taste in my mouth and this was like in my mid 20s. So that's still very much a shaping time of my life. I thought I kind of was like grown out of it not necessarily and it was very like much enabled, like they wanted you to gossip, they wanted you and like don't get me wrong, I love gossiping. Not so much anymore, not at all really anymore. That's not who I am anymore.
Speaker 2:But I did then.
Speaker 1:In my 20s. I'll be honest.
Speaker 1:I loved it and I do a lot about a lot of people in town and I didn't necessarily go around and tell other people. It was just very often people just came to me to tell me the information. But it was very much like that is what you were meant to do as a woman. And it wasn't until I kind of stepped away where I realized that like I just don't want to be like that, Like it had its moment of fun, but I don't want to walk into every room and think some woman is going to talk about me or they're saying stuff about me. Like I want to walk into a room and be like embraced and knowing that, like we're all together doing this together.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you're describing your events now, and now I'm describing the event, not really, but like honestly, like anywhere, anybody that I want me, like, I really just want. I don't want to feel like it's always a competition or that there's always something sneaky happening behind the scenes, or that every time I feel uncomfortable in a conversation that it's immediately going to be about me behind a closed door, like this was happening to me yesterday and I was like going down this huge anxiety, like tunnel of doom, thinking, oh my God, this woman hates me. I said this thing the wrong way. Now she's not replying to me. Now my name is going to be tarnished. That's not who I am. Oh my God, if they knew me more, they would know that's not me. And it was just like why am I immediately going here? Like, why can I just trust that? Not everybody is the way I think. They are based on past experiences.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you brought up something really amazing. Where is that? People can be our mirrors for our own wounds, right? Like if someone cannot answer you just because they're driving, and then all of a sudden, in that 15 minute drive, you've created an elaborate story based on your own self-worth, based on your wounds from the past, and that's been, you know, I think, the truth of a lot of people's experience. And just on the whole gossip dynamic thing, I've never been a guy and a group of guys, I'll just say that. But I do have a window into my husband's hockey team. Those boys be gossiping, okay boys love gossiping.
Speaker 1:I love it, they love it, they love it when I see him they're also kind of mean to each other.
Speaker 2:I'll be honest, they bully each other and like there's sometimes when my husband's showing me something, I'm like, hey, ian, this is bullying, this is like straight, I feel horrible for this person, like I. And he's like I know and I'm like I don't know. So I think like statistically, guys and girls do bully each other differently. There's a little bit more like guys are a little bit more in your face about it. But but yeah, I'm always just wary, because I've grown up around guys and girls now and there's so many stereotypes like women love to gossip and whatever. And I'm always like, in my experience, guys love gossip, guys love to gossip too. But and I've almost swung the other way where I think I feel more comfortable with women now I had an experience I don't know if anyone else has had this, but where I had a lot of really good, amazing guy friends and I had a boyfriend and then me and the boyfriend broke up who asked me on all the dates, all the guy friends.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I was like wait, you were all just benched this whole time. You know what I mean. Like I felt so betrayed, like I was like you, did you see me as a friend, or was I just someone that you wanted to f? Yeah, you know. And it I felt like how can I trust? I'm still I'm still working on that wound. I feel like I cannot trust men, but but yeah, that's just my own personal one. Anyone has that one too. Men are kind of scary, yeah, but it's building female friendship. Like how do we, how do we do that? I read a book called the Mother Wound and it's not to like I think I'm. It's not to bash moms, it's just talking about how, you know, wounding from women has been passed down through lineage, through lineage, through lineage. It doesn't matter where you're from. Probably you come from a patriarchal culture and you know people have like the witch wound where their ancestors were lit on fire.
Speaker 1:Yeah, burned at the stake.
Speaker 2:Basically, basically for being a woman, but yeah, or just more simplistic things, not being burned at the stake. But the book was amazing because it talked about how you know it's not to blame moms or our moms, but it's just the truth in that you have a relationship with your mom that's dynamic. There are amazing parts to every relationship and there are terrible parts. Probably. Those terrible parts are probably your mom acting out wounds that she's had and then you pick up on that and I noticed that the parts of my mom and I's relationship that had a bit of friction.
Speaker 2:I was seeking out friendships that recreated that and I be. When I became aware of it, I was like, oh my gosh, like I'm trying to. I don't know, I'm not a therapist, so I was like I don't know what I'm doing here, but I feel comfortable in this role of friction, so I'm seeking that out another women and but it's not what I want, right, it's putting me in a position where I don't want to be that person and I don't want to have a relationship with someone who wants me to be that person. So that was a really groundbreaking thing for me to realize that like, okay, there's patterns here and I have to push through them and that allowed me to create better standards with the friendships that I wanted.
Speaker 2:So I had to let some people go, unfortunately, and like that was good. That opened up my life for better friendships. I know there's a lot of people out there who don't connect with the friends they have right now. They feel like they've gone in different directions and they're not as interested in the things that they wanted or they don't have the same values. Values is a big one for me and I would just say to that person it's okay, it's okay to find other friends. Just because something doesn't last forever doesn't mean it's not valuable or good yeah 100%.
Speaker 1:I felt like I lost a lot of friends when I kind of stepped away from the gossiping. Like I knew that when I started to step away, I realized that like a lot of my friends kind of just fed into that and I liked it at the time because there wasn't much else I wanted to talk about and I don't think I really fully understood my values at that time. I think my values were gossiping, like that was it. I enjoyed that and it wasn't until I kind of started to deep, you know, dive a little bit deeper into myself and really disconnect from them, where I started to realize like I didn't enjoy that as much as I thought I enjoyed it. It just kind of filled the time and they were the people that were close to us and it just seemed easier to do that than it was to let them go and find other friendships.
Speaker 1:Because I feel you might relate to this like friendships feel harder to get as you get older. I'm pretty much out there Like I'll just message anybody be like, let's be friends, like I did that to you, mj, we are friends, we are friends, let's be friends. I do that to a lot of people, but I look at that at my husband Now that he's not a woman but like I always think, like maybe you need to have more friends and but for him he's. When am I going to make friends? Like, I go to work and I do this. So I guess my question is really why is it so hard to make friends as we get older? And if it is, you know, female relationships that we are seeking, why do some of us maybe even me sometimes, when I do see some people apprehensive about even having a relationship with them or even starting it?
Speaker 2:That's a very good question. Questions.
Speaker 2:I think I don't know. I think your husband is kind of right. Like it is logistically hard, just being the person that I am right now. I live kind of further away than everybody else. I have a seven month old who bottle like doesn't, won't take a bottle, so I can't leave my house. Basically, and you know this, because our friendship is based around you coming to my house and that's kind of it. I'm like, okay, this is what I'm doing. You know, later on in life I know how I will make friends. Like I'm going to take an art class at the local art studio, I'm going to start horseback riding again and I'm going to meet people there.
Speaker 2:For me, I've always built connections off of trying something new and going to do something. And then there's going to be people there who are also doing it, and I make friends walking around my neighborhood. Again, I'm like you, I'm very okay with approaching people. I will talk to anyone and I will also say let's be friends. But the moment where it starts to get something like can I call you and ask you for something? Can I call you and tell you that you know I need a favor, that's where I start to struggle, because I start to think like well, why would you do? You know with my husband? He has to, he has to do what I want him to do because he's my husband. So it's easy for me to be like can you help me? My car has a flat tire, whatever.
Speaker 2:But, like with friendship, I always feel like it's too much or I'm just I just didn't grow up with that, so that's my own wounding. Basically, I feel like you know, I don't have a self worth problem there. I feel like I'm not worthy of other people doing something for me that isn't transactional, like I should pay them or whatever. That's where I really start to trip up and being very vulnerable with people that's where I feel like it gets harder for me, and I've talked to a few people about this through Instagram. I had a lot of people messaging me and, like, a lot of people just trip up at the asking part. They're like I don't even know how to talk to people. I can't relate. I'm a Leo, I talk to everybody, I don't shut up, but that's tough, like you got to really put yourself out there.
Speaker 2:And my mom always used to say to me when I was younger she'd always say the worst someone could say is no, yeah, mic drop. Like the worst they're going to say is no, right, and that's. I think that's something that we just have to learn in life. Like my mom also used to say, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. And she would be like if you want something, you have to ask for it, speak up, like that's how you get the things that you want. You can't sit around, you know, on a lazy boy and think like well, life's not giving me the things that I want. Like you, if you want friends, you got to go make friends. Like, if you want to get your driver's permit, you got to go get your driver's permit. It's these you have to cultivate the life that you want, and no one's going to hand it to you. Unfortunately, I really sound like my mom right now, but no one's going to hand it to you.
Speaker 1:You sound like me talking to my daughter, like, yeah, I mean, but that's the age right Like.
Speaker 2:That's the age where we're just like wait, we have to go out and do things Like, and you're learning like you haven't done these things before and you have to do it yourself and you know some people I need to push. My brother definitely need a little push. I think a lot of kids need like a little gentle, like do the thing, and even adults today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like we used to tell my daughter when she would go to new classes or knew like anything, like did you meet a new friend? Like we would ask her every day did you talk to somebody new today? And did you meet somebody new? Did you have a different conversation with somebody? Who are you sitting beside? You know, did you learn something new? And she's slowly like no, she's such an introvert and she has, like her pocket of people, but she's very much an extrovert at the same time and we'll, you know, talk to people. Like we put her in a cooking class, out in like Vaughn, she wouldn't have known anybody and the first thing, you know, she's nervous about talking to anybody. And I was like just find somebody, say hi, how's it going? Why are you here? What's your favorite thing to cook? Like, keep us simple, it doesn't have to be complex.
Speaker 2:Yeah, my hack is compliment someone Even if you don't even actually like the thing. You don't have to genuinely like it, just be like, oh, I love your bag, like where did you get that? And then, boom boom, you got a new friend.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Then they'll open up and be like oh, did you? I love I thrifted it and I love thrifting. And then they'll be like oh, like I, I learned a lot.
Speaker 1:I know that you waitress or you were to a coffee shop, so conversing can be easy and picking up the small talk in the queues is, I find, easier because you've done it so many times with so many different people, and that was my big thing. And waitressing was like finding something that we had in common and talking about it, even if I didn't want to talk about it, and it would slowly lead to something else. And it would slowly lead to something else and they would open up a little bit more and I would open up a little bit more. And it slowly like blossomed into a friendship instead of it just being like you know, conversational acquaintances and so like, and I think that's why I just approach people, because I'm like whatever.
Speaker 1:But I also grew up with my mom saying the exact same thing. The worst thing that could happen is no, and so I just take that with me. With anything that I do, I cold message tons of people like I'll be, like oh spine, see somebody on Instagram and I was like I need to be friends with those person and I'm just going to start talking to them Really good at that and if they don't want to talk to me, I'll be like, oh well, yes, next time.
Speaker 2:Don't take a no personally. Like I know, even in the last four months, someone reached out to me and was like I really want to hang out, do you want to hang out? And I was like I don't, I'm in postpartum, I don't want to hang out. And I was like nothing against that person. It's just that the idea of making a new friend right now feels hard because I'm not showering and I smell weird and my house has throw up all over it and my daughter is potty training and that's a very loose word for what was happening at the time and I was just like I don't know if I'm in the space to like show up. So people say no for all sorts of different reasons. That has nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing to do with you. So just to just to put it out, learn to put it out there and not take a no personally. I think that's like one of the, that's like a life hack, like in friendship business, anything, just Don't take it personally no.
Speaker 1:No, never, I'm trying not to.
Speaker 2:Never, never.
Speaker 1:Sometimes Sometimes.
Speaker 2:A lot of the time. No, it's hard. It is really really really hard. It's hard.
Speaker 1:And it's hard. I find it hard, especially when you don't know the person as well. Like I feel like if somebody were to give me a no and I knew them well, I could kind of understand the logic to it. You know what I mean. But if it's somebody that the friendship just started blossoming and you're like still kind of like maybe in this honeymoon stage, and then they say no, it's like to me it's like this immediate like what did they not like something that I said? Was it something? Am I not cool? Am I not cool anymore? Did they find somebody else to replace me?
Speaker 1:Like oh, and it's kind of like this defeating moment of less, like I thought we were going somewhere, like in an actual, real relationship. Like, oh, they kind of broke my heart a little bit and then you realize, oh, it's just because of whatever their pet or the family issue or whatever it may be. And you're like, oh, really, it had nothing to do with me and I cried over this. But it also reminds me the value of the relationships that I want to have with them. At the same time, right, like I value this and I really want this to be something.
Speaker 2:I think another thing I've learned. I'm sorry, I know you were just about to say something, but I think another thing that I've learned is that people want to be your friend too. It always feels like you're out there trying and fishing, but, like everybody else feels this way too, everybody else is nervous to start conversations. Everybody else is like wondering what they want to be my friend or you know, am I like cool enough for them, or whatever? And everybody else feels that way too, no matter who they are. Yeah, everybody is yearning for connection and friendship, and if you could be the person to like, take that deep breath and be a little bit brave, open it up, like you know, you could have some of the best relationships ever. Yeah, but they won't happen if you don't do that.
Speaker 1:And I think this just brought me. That really reminded me being brave. So I remember doing my yoga teacher training and you know Nina, and she was like the first friend I made in my yoga teacher training and Nina's brave, like she's brave to me, she's out, she just talks to people, she's very friendly, she's very friendly, she just talked to people, she's very friendly, she just talked to you. And I remember she always says like I remember you, portia, the scared little girl in the corner with your two gone. And you know, and if she wasn't wrong, like I didn't, I took yoga for a little bit and decided I wanted to go and pursue this as a career. Like I had no idea what I was walking into. I had no, and yoga was really what set my values into play. Like that's where I really started to learn about all of these different things, cause I grew up Catholic and never really fit into that but knew I fit somewhere, but just not that. And yoga was that first introduction to spirituality and self and all of these different things. And yeah, nina's saying like scared little girl in the corner, and our friendship is really blossomed.
Speaker 1:And I think with friendships, I think the importance and I've been friends with.
Speaker 1:You know a lot of people throughout the years and have seen the evolution of who they are, and I think what comes with that is open-minded and to have an open heart and open mind and I think that's what I've learned in all of the friendships that I've made over the years is that I'm never going to see eye to eye with everybody, but I love what they bring into my life and I'm okay to sit and listen if they need me to listen to whatever is happening, even though I don't agree with what is happening. I'm not there to give my opinion about it. I'm really just there to listen so they can vent it out. But I feel like that's like the biggest thing I've learned, especially with relationships with women, is that I constantly have to be open-minded and have an open heart and understand like I still love this person deeply, even though what they're saying. I'm like I would never back that up in my life, but I love them truly and support them regardless. At the end of the day, I think that's beautiful.
Speaker 2:That's definitely a lesson I've learned. I used to think that my friendships had to be with people like me, Like you had to be interested in poetry and horses, and you also had to have done this and that whatever be into wellness. And now I do not care about any of those things. I don't care at all. The only thing I care about is like are you a good person?
Speaker 2:Are you kind? Can I trust you? Are you going to show up? What kind of conversations are we going to have? Is it going to be complaining? Is it going to be gossiping? Is it going to be, you know? Am I going to feel lit up or fulfilled at the end of it? Are you going to care about me? I've definitely struggled with friendships where I got stuck in a listening position and then I got off the phone and I was like I don't think I said a single thing. I was just there to be this person's wall, Like I don't know. So I've definitely gone through the process of like, trying to get close to people and being like well, what is it? What do I want? I want someone who wants to laugh Like. I want someone who you know will eat a cookie with me and, just like, swim in the lake. That's not complicated. I don't care what you do for a living Like, I just don't care.
Speaker 1:But it's true, I was going to say something, I lost it out of my brain. Oh, and I remember it was the. I think I had to let go of the. I know I said this earlier in our discussion of this fantasy of how I really envied those that were in these group relationships with females, and I've slowly have come to terms with the fact that that will probably never happen. No, don't say that, portia, you're so young.
Speaker 2:I know, but also that I'm okay with that.
Speaker 1:I think I've learned that I'm not going to be. I have friendships in my life that are there for a reason and that not everybody is going to be cohesively in the same realm, that we're not always going to be cohesively in the same bubble, like we had friends, especially when our kids were young, that all of us had children, we were all married, we hung out with each other and I relished in that. I loved it and I tell my husband all the time how sad I am that we don't have that anymore, because I love that camaraderie of everybody getting together and being together. And now my friendships feel very separate. But at the same time I very much like that too.
Speaker 1:I like how there's different people that I can call on, that know different aspects of who I am, that have. Some have been there from the beginning of time and have seen me through my entire life, from my younger years to who I am today, and I have seen I have people that have seen me as a pregnant young mom and have lived my life through that, and I have seen and I have great friendships that I've met along the way and some that have just lost them recently. So it's just I enjoy that. But I think at the same time like have accepted that, but maybe I'm going back on my words a little bit now. I do. I do miss the camaraderie of it, but but I also am okay with knowing that not all of the friendships are always going to be groups of people, and maybe that's why I do events, because I kind of want a little bit of that too, because I enjoy that.
Speaker 2:Okay, I have a book for you to read. Okay, it's Ellen Hildebrand. Do you know this author? No, she's kind of like a drugstore bestseller Beach read comes to mind but with a little bit more depth. Okay, she has a book called five star weekend. She invites one she's in her fifties the main characters in her fifties at the time and she goes through something, you know, traumatic in life. So she's decides you know what I need? An uplifting weekend.
Speaker 2:She invites one woman from each decade of her life, so her best friend from high school, her best friend from, you know, her twenties, her best friend from her thirties, forties and fifties, and those women hang out together and they have a five star weekend. Each of them is a star and it's awkward, af, as you can imagine, because these women don't know each other or some of them have history of like weirdness. But the book is so beautiful it made me want to have a five star weekend so bad I'm like I'm not waiting until I'm 50. I want to have one right now where I awkwardly hang out with everyone I've ever hang out with. But it's it's.
Speaker 2:It's one of those things where it's like I think it's, it's true, like you can't, it's okay if all your friends don't know each other and you're not this big, tight, close group, but then at the same time, you could also orchestrate that.
Speaker 2:I've definitely done that a lot of times where I've been like, okay, I don't have a group of friends, but it's my birthday, so I'm going to invite four or five random women that I'm talking to right now. I love them, I know they're going to love each other, and then all of a sudden you've got friendships happening. It happened to me recently. I started a group chat of like new moms and now they're so close, they go and like hang out and I introduce them all to each other, but they, they hang out and like little micro friendships grew and I think I think that can be, I think that can be cultivated. So, yeah, I think both are good. It's good to have individual friendships, it's also good to have group friendships and I also think that, if you wanted to, you could manipulate people like I did.
Speaker 1:Okay, I should do that. I'm thinking about it. It's happened a few times where we've done like surprise birthday parties and everybody has mingled, and I think it was always that fear of like is it going to clash, is it going to be awkward? Do I feel like I have to entertain everybody? But it really didn't and it was easy.
Speaker 2:No, you have great friends. Every single person we know in common is a great person. Yeah, so they'll be fine, which is all your listeners? You're all great people. Oh my god, we're almost like a friendship group right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's have a slumber party I really want to do that Me too.
Speaker 2:So bad, except I would be breastfeeding two babies the whole time and they would be screaming. So if you guys are cool with that, come on over.
Speaker 1:I sleep with two sound machines. I hear nothing. Oh my god bless Nothing. It's a tunnel in there. My daughter fell once Side story In her room. She decided that she was going to hang stuff in the middle of the night on her like desk chair that as you do as a teenager and she fell and she was like on a chat. And she fell and she like sat on the floor waiting for us to run to her and no one did. It felt so bad but I was like Lily, like I can't hear. Like once I'm in the bedroom it's like a cocoon. I can't hear anything. Like I feel like my motherly instincts come into play when, like real emergencies happen. Like I hear my dog throwing up, you know, but like it's. I was like I didn't hear anything. She's like I just thought someone was going to come and rescue me. Oh, I'm so sorry.
Speaker 1:So I can do a sleepover with children because I don't hear anything.
Speaker 2:Tell her she has to bring a sturdy chair.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I told her she's not allowed doing that anymore after we go to sleep.
Speaker 2:Not on the swivel chair.
Speaker 1:Not on a swivel chair. Something really bad could have happened and we would have been sleeping.
Speaker 2:Sorry, that's not funny. Teenagers yeah, kids are kids, any kids.
Speaker 1:Any kids. They're all standing on swivel chairs.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I literally heard my daughter's too. She's got her little ladder thing that she goes around the kitchen in, which is terrifying in and of itself. Yesterday I'm trying to take cute selfies Okay, just for like a minute and I hear it going across the kitchen and I was like something crazy is about to happen, but I'm just going to ignore it because she's really in a mode right now where if you ask her not to do something, she'll do it more. So I was like I'm just going to ignore it. And then I heard this like gosh bang, and I went and ran into the kitchen. She was holding a broken glass and I was like how did you do that in like two seconds?
Speaker 2:I feel like where did this come from? I don't even know. Yeah, we had to. I was like where, what is this glass? How did you find this? And she was like I have to clean it up. And I was like, no, this is a mommy daddy you just please go to the other room and clean up over here.
Speaker 1:That's so cute, but not cute at the same time.
Speaker 2:Listen, I was taking selfies, okay.
Speaker 1:Don't worry, you don't want to hear I won't open up about my other story. I'm not watching my child.
Speaker 2:Hey, I mean anyone's mom's listening and you feel guilty about something. Just know that we all got a story. We all got a guilty, guilty story. Yeah, mom's got them, her mom's got them. It's just, you can't possibly watch kids 24, seven all the time. No, no, it's. I don't even have an open concept house. Sometimes I'm cooking and I'm like I don't know what's going on. In the other room she could be swinging the baby around by his feet, like I have no idea.
Speaker 1:I just hope that she's not just hope I peek in and all as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, no, it's not possible, no not at all, but that's the school of life it is. I'll just say, like that's how it's, you do your best to. I don't know why this turned into a parenting thing. I'm sorry everybody but you do your best to set up the environment so that it's as safe as possible and beyond that, people are going to get bumps and bruises and breaks and you, just you go from there. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:So I did want to talk a little bit about trust. I know that we did touch on it a little bit, but for those that are listening, that feel like they want to start a relationship but they're just feeling weary, they get into this relationship and they feel as if there is maybe an alternative motive, like why is this person? Maybe this person approached them and they're being all friendly with them and they're like okay, why are they talking to me? Is this really genuine or do they want something from me? And then the trust, I think stemming back from childhood and even high school or teens and even into our 20s, of feeling having those bad relationships Like I had. Okay, this is probably why I don't have a group of friends now girlfriends, now that I have thinking about it All.
Speaker 1:Through elementary school I had a group of girlfriends and then in grade eight, something happened. I still honestly don't even know what happened, but I got pushed out of the circle very, very quickly and I was very depressed. I had no friends Like we would go. We had to do a class trip to Ottawa and I had, like, no friends. It was very, very hard. It was very rebellious time because I just didn't understand.
Speaker 2:That's a really hard time to lose all your friends.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then I was going into high school. Now, thankfully a lot, some went to different high schools so I really kind of gave me a fresh start and I was lucky that by the end of grade eight I did find a friend and she was my best friend all through high school and everything. So something great did come out of it. But those times in grade eight were very, very hard. I went from being a person that I would never say I was popular but was noticed occasionally, to being noticed a lot for something I didn't even know I did.
Speaker 1:And I think that probably put a lot of underlying trust issues with being in a group of girls and why. Now I feel I feel fine, like I don't feel weary, but I think kind of moving into that I am sure even in my twenties if that was the same idea, I would still find it feel like kind of the same thing as you going to the, going to the sleepover, being like are they going to trick me? Like why did they want to be friends with me all of a sudden? So my real question is what would you say to those that are kind of maybe feeling the way that I was feeling after that had happened to me and just feeling as if maybe there is an alternative motive that is not going to be positively reflected on me, I would say I have the same problem, so I don't have advice, but it's something I'm working on, so like this has been a struggle of mine.
Speaker 2:Obviously, I shared my story. I'm not going to be a positive guy. You never know when I think that's a self-worth issue. I don't view myself as being worthy of other people wanting to spend time with me because when I was in Grade, a other people decided they didn't want to spend time with me and I took that to mean that I wasn't worthy as a friend and I believed it, and I've believed that from that moment on and now I still believe it. So it's my job to obviously look at my own limiting mindsets with friendship or my own beliefs. What do I believe about myself? Do I believe myself to be someone who's worthy of the other people's time or efforts? That's been something I've been confronting. And then another thing I'll say is in my experience with dating or making friendships with women or just people in general, is you get a good hunch Follow that?
Speaker 2:I've got girlfriends where we met randomly one time and we talked and I was just like I love you, I love you, and if they called me in the middle of the night, I would strap my two kids in and I would be there. There's nothing that would stop me from helping that person, and I know they feel the same way and there have also been times where I've met with someone and I've been like this feels a little bit prickly and I try to feel it out Like is it just because this person feels a little shy or insecure? What is this? But whatever it is like, I generally don't question my intuition. If it feels weird, I just back away slowly, you know, and I think, just following your instincts, you won't know until you try. You won't know until you try and just meet people for coffee or like walks. I love meeting for walks. As you know, I've made you walk all around my neighborhood a million times.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I would just say, like anything else in life, anything at all, if you want it, you have to have a little bit of courage and you have to try to go for it. Every single relationship, friendship out there is because those two people had courage to be like you know what. I'd rather live a life where I had potential friendship, heartbreak than a life where I shielded myself from friendships until I died and I was alone. And that's where I'm at, Like I would rather like have someone say no than to be like old and being like damn, I never got a girls weekend. Yeah, I never went to Florida with the girls. Yeah, like didn't have my five star weekend Dammit no I want a five star weekend, so yeah.
Speaker 2:so that's what I would say is just figure out what you want in life and is it worth it? Is it worth? Is that fear worth it? Because if that's the only thing stopping you from like reaching out to people in person or online or whatever it is, then yeah. And if you're listening to this and you want friends like, please email Portia and I we can have. I got a big backyard, the slumber party can happen. Yeah, it will happen.
Speaker 1:We got a fire pit, let's go. Yeah, it'll be easy. We could just do a tent, just rent one giant tent, absolutely yeah, just be giggles all night long. Exactly.
Speaker 2:I would probably be KO, but you guys can Google.
Speaker 1:We'll giggle. We'll giggle all night. But I think it's true, I think you do need to have courage. Like I think that is a huge component and I know that's what I kind of try to breathe not breathe but breathe into Lily a little bit is to have the courage to just push yourself to make friends, to talk to somebody new, and it was exciting for her to come home and be so lit up. But, like I talked to so and so today and I just realized that they love the same thing that I love.
Speaker 1:And it's not like she's going in and looking for a best friend. She is just looking for somebody to chit, chat with, a familiar face in the classroom, somebody that she can lean on if she needs to. I think she's comfortable with her core group and she's very inviting in there because I think she's been on both sides of girl relationships and she's been on the nasty side and she knows she doesn't like it over there and she's very welcoming to those that have been on that nasty side and she kind of opens her arms up Like we. She had a friend that would come over briefly and we knew that her, this girl and my daughter didn't have a lot in common and my husband was very apprehensive about the relationship. He's just like I don't get a good vibe from her. I don't know. I think she's going to drag her down, where I kind of felt the opposite. I felt apprehensive, for sure. I felt like she was kind of using her a little bit, but at the same time I think that they were seeking that in each other and I was weary, but I'm not going to voice that I'm weary, but I would have open conversations about it and just being like how is this person, how's the friend dynamic, what's going on? Why is she not hanging out with her friends that she was hanging out with and what's clashing? And she would open up while someone so looked at the other girl's boyfriend or whatever.
Speaker 1:Right, very minuscule things that seem very big to teenagers. And I was like, okay, and in the reminder that you know those aren't your problems, that's not your trauma, you stay outside of that, you don't need to give your input, in that, like you're more than happy to support your friend and be there for them, but that's not yours to take on and to be a part of it. She's like, yeah, I know, I know, and that friend left, hung out with her friends again when they all made up, of course. But then she came back and Bob, again I'm so apprehensive, she's using her, and I said, but they could be doing it to each other, like it could be one of those friendships where Lily's there for endless support, but I don't ever feel like she's being used.
Speaker 1:I don't see that in her face, I don't see that in the mannerisms. When they are together, it feels like they're very much together, but she does disappear. But that's kind of like how she is, like she just kind of welcomes people in without an explanation, like why are you being friends with me? And I don't really know about the exit, but it really feels like it's gracefully exited, like she's okay with that too at the same time. So it's just, it's interesting to watch what a sweet person.
Speaker 1:I know she's so sweet, but I think we just always been like she's an, she's an only child.
Speaker 1:So I think for us, for me, it was very important for her to make friends and not necessarily be approachable and be like, you know, the smartest person in the room or, you know, be friends with everybody, but to be open, to make new friends and to experience that because you'll learn from those relationships even when you are little and give you confidence for the things future that's.
Speaker 1:You know, standing up in front of a crowd, like if you have to do a presentation, it's nice if you know a few familiar faces in the room, you know that you can lean on and that you have like a little cheerleader in the corner. Even though they're not your best friend, it's still really nice to have. And so I think I don't know, I think it's important, I think through teaching her and, you know, being a parent to her, I think that's what really allowed me to kind of open myself back up to my own relationships and friendships and wanting and wanting more, because I love that. I love having friendships and different people to talk to about different things and and I'm curious by nature, so the more people I meet that have different opinions. It allows me to explore new things that I never even knew were possible.
Speaker 2:I love that too, which is always nice. So friendship, they're amazing, they're so great.
Speaker 1:They are.
Speaker 2:They're everything.
Speaker 1:They are so great. So my last question for you I ask everybody this at the end of all my podcasts, all the episodes is what is one piece of advice that you would like to leave here with everybody?
Speaker 2:Oh, maybe I'll just give the Jill Rancho special and say the worst they will say is no, and the squeaky wheel gets the grease. I think, yeah, like jokes aside, really learning. So I've got a best friend who's been my best friend for almost 10 years now and the reason why our friendship works so well is that we can be brutally honest with each other. She was going through something really hard the last couple years and I turned into kind of her therapist for a while and finally I said to her I was like you know, I feel really unseen. I feel like you don't know what's going on in my life.
Speaker 2:All of our phone calls are kind of around this event that's going on with you and I just I need some love. Back she was like I hear you, you're 100% right. Next phone call she called me Tell me what's going on with you. We're not talking about me, this entire thing. So find people like that where you can be the squeaky wheel, ask for what you need with someone and feel like you can be honest with them, and it's not a dramatic thing Because she can tell me like don't, don't say that and I'll be like I won't say it again. I love you, let's move on, yeah, and I feel like, yeah, just learning, finding people that you can be honest with and be the squeaky wheel with, and that's a beautiful thing. It is a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1:It is a beautiful thing. I always say to my husband like I want really nice adult relationships. I don't want to feel like I'm in high school in these relationships, scared to say something, scared to do something, because they're going to be mad. Like I'm, like I'm, I just want to say what I need to say and and it will feel better and and it always does.
Speaker 2:Yes, it does always. Yeah, honesty is the best. I'm incapable of not being honest, so I've lost a lot of friendships.
Speaker 1:I just say nothing. That's my go to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that, I think, is most people. And then you're like doing saying yes to a bunch of things that I don't know if this is what you're doing, but this is what I see in a lot of people saying yes to a bunch of things you actually want to say no to or don't want to do, and then building an immense amount of resentment yeah To the things that you're agreeing to. Yeah, there's a number of times where I'm like wait, well, you said you wanted to do that. And they're like well, I didn't actually. And I'm like I can't mind read, like I don't know, Say yes or no.
Speaker 1:Say yes or no. I know, but that's the hardest part, right? Because some people like I'm okay with no, but sometimes I have a hard time saying no, but usually I'm good this I don't like resentment. I've lived a long life of resentment.
Speaker 2:It's the gris it's the ickiest.
Speaker 1:Ikiest feeling and it's the heart to me. Sometimes. I have been through grief, I've been through a lot of different emotions and I find resentment the hardest to crawl out of.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because you've put your, because if you to get out of it, you have to take responsibility for your own life, and it's so much easier to be like no, actually I'm a victim here. I have never made a bad choice in my life. Everybody else is to blame and I don't need to change. I'm actually amazing and it's their fault, yeah, and like that's a safe place to be Because you don't have to look at your own S-H-I-T. But when you do and when you take responsibility, you like empower yourself to be like oh, actually I've been behaving in a way that is unsavory and it makes sense as to why those people would be doing that thing.
Speaker 2:Liberation and like just to tie this all back to the beginning of this podcast liberation is how you build meaningful relationships. If you're in relationships that are built on weird power dynamics or this or that, it's going to breed competition and it's going to breed a lot of ego based kind of weirdness, whereas if you own yourself, you know who you are, you know your faults, you show up honestly, you try to do better, you allow people to be honest, you allow them to set boundaries with you because you love them, then you're going to have true, big, deep, heartfelt intimacy, possible friendships that last forever.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 100%, you're going to agree more. On that note, I'll stop talking. Thank you so much, mj, for joining me today. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:And you'll be. You come for a walk whenever you want, Whenever you want to strap those boots on you, come on down for a walk.
Speaker 1:I'll be there.
