IRL - Friends In Real Life

Friends In Real Life.

We've spent so long sequestered where the relationships that we had had were primarily virtual. They were over the phone, they were on video chat, but they weren't

tactile, they weren't "I'm right in front of you." So things like when I'm texting, I can curate. When I'm Facebook posting again, I can curate. I can choose to write out a paragraph and then delete it and then write something else. Right. So there's a filter there. And in real life, there is still that filter but it's trickier because somebody can see when you're thinking you should say one thing, but you say something
else. There are micro gestures that will tell you everything if you are open to it. If you're present enough, you can pick up everything from a split-second movement that happens.

We were sequestered even before the pandemic; as a society, we really didn't hang out together that much. Everybody has this magical number in their head that if they have one friend or seven friends or 21 friends, that's enough and they don't want anymore. What kind of friend is it? , is it really a friendship, or is it an acquaintance? People are constantly evolving. And so it's like you need to see their authentic selves in order to connect with that.

Listen here: https://www.ourfriendlyworldpodcast.com/

Friends IRL (In Real Life) TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] MATT: .

[00:00:00] MATT: Hello.

[00:00:06] FAWN: Good morning. Do you have your morning juice? Which is coffee? You feel better?

[00:00:14] MATT: I always feel

[00:00:14] FAWN: better after coffee or

[00:00:16] MATT: before coffee. Juice in the morning. Whenever I'm recording with you darling. Mm-hmm. . .

[00:00:22] MATT: Oh Lord.

[00:00:23] FAWN: Welcome back everybody. Hi. So, um, Whew. Okay. Before we get into what we're gonna talk about today, help me get over the struggle.

[00:00:35] FAWN: I don't know what to do. I feel like I used to be creative and now I feel like I'm not creative. Right. I feel like everybody else is so much more brilliant and when we have assignments, everybody else is so much better like that. It's been a very long time now that I haven't created stuff. I haven't, and then when I do, it's so boring and generic.

[00:01:05] FAWN: See, I

[00:01:07] FAWN: feel terrible

[00:01:08] MATT: and I completely get that. Back in college, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We had a saying, uh, brain cells must be sacrificed because when you drink, you lose brain cells. But anyways, um, how I come to it now is how many brain cells am I going to spend a brain cell thinking about this problem?

[00:01:28] MATT: and most of the time I, I do the bare minimum. And you,

[00:01:32] FAWN: so you lose brain cells when you think about something. No, when

[00:01:35] MATT: you drink. Oh. So that's why we said brain cells must be sacrificed, but that takes us to brain cells. See? So now I say I haven't spent a, I haven't spent any brain cells on it. I haven't mean, I haven't spent any time really thinking about it because welcome to the world, right?

[00:01:50] MATT: You've got 85 things going on at any given moment. So it's about choosing your intention. in choosing where you want to spend your mental energies. Cuz we talked about this, we talked about how you have only so much currency, emotional and otherwise to spend in the course of a day. The same way you have only so much kind of thinking currency or decision making currency.

[00:02:11] MATT: You can only make so many decisions in a day.

[00:02:13] FAWN: Really?

[00:02:14] MATT: Yeah. Oh yeah. So, and we talked about, we, we

talked

[00:02:19] FAWN: about this not way as parents we're so tired at the end of the day.

[00:02:22] MATT: It can be yes.

[00:02:24] FAWN: I mean, I'm, I'm like barely making it up the stairs at the end of the day. Well, yeah,

[00:02:30] MATT: that's why I'm conking out at like 8:00 PM folks.

[00:02:33] MATT: My goodness.

[00:02:36] FAWN: It's

[00:02:37] FAWN: terrible.

[00:02:37] MATT: It's not terrible. It's, it's where you choose to spend your intention, your thought process and your energies. And you know what, all it means to me when you say, I'm not the most creative one, you're not choosing to spend enough, maybe as much energy as these other people are choosing to spend or able to spend.

[00:02:54] MATT: See, that just

[00:02:55] FAWN: gives me more stress. I put everything I have into a bunch of things.

[00:03:00] MATT: Exactly, and that's just it.

[00:03:02] FAWN: But I, I have to, at this point in my life, I, I. That's what I have to do. What? You want me to ignore our kids? Do you want me to ignore the house and you want me

[00:03:12] MATT: to ignore em? There, there, there are plenty of sayings that I can, I can, um, throw out right now.

[00:03:18] MATT: One of 'em is kind of body, so I won't throw that one out. But, um, you know, it's about what you focus on grows and, and focusing your attentions properly. Um, you know, I am one of those people who I get so focused on one or the other. It's, I have a hard time walking and chewing gum at the same. and that's just what it is.

[00:03:36] MATT: I mean, I choose to focus my attention on one thing at a time, and sometimes that means I have to context shift like crazy, but

[00:03:46] FAWN: still, I guess I'm screwed then hey, because I can't there. There's a lot of things that I take care of. I take care of you. I take care of the kids. I take care of our health, our food, our everything.

[00:04:01] FAWN: There's so many things I'm taking care of. I'm working on children's picture books. I'm working on voiceover career. I'm working on photography.

[00:04:09] MATT: So career, and maybe you should leverage the creative talent you have in the house already.

[00:04:15] FAWN: What do you mean?. .

[00:04:16] MATT: Well, I mean, it was spoken word, Christmas song, right?

[00:04:20] MATT: Yeah. I spent half a brain cell on that For you. Had we spent, had I spent five and had the girls spent five each and had you spent five, that would've been a lot of

[00:04:30] FAWN: brain cells. Okay. So what Matt is talking about is we're doing voiceover work. Um, we're learning the craft. Voiceover acting.

[00:04:39] MATT: Well, you are.

[00:04:40] FAWN: I am.

[00:04:41] FAWN: And, and, but through me, you guys are experiencing what I'm learning. Mm-hmm. . So we had this competition with, the voiceover network. It was to do a Christmas Carol or a Christmas song, but you can't sing it. You have to do a voiceover. The thing that really got me was I didn't wanna do a video.

[00:05:01] FAWN: One of the reasons I love this podcast is I can be free knowing that no one's looking at my face, but if you're looking at me and I'm reading a line, I get really messed up. I can't, I hate being in front of the camera, which is why I'm a photographer behind the camera.

[00:05:20] MATT: Yes, but that's just it. Again, working within the theory of constraints or the practice of constraints.

[00:05:25] MATT: Okay, fine. Video, that's fine. But what would stop you from say, doing Still knocked, which is Silent Night in German, which is how I originally learned it. Welcome to being a Lutheran.

[00:05:37] FAWN: Matt, I don't know what that is we are thinking of, but like these people

[00:05:41] MATT: say, say, saying Silent Night to song Silent Night in German. So

[00:05:46] FAWN: why not? Because it's not, you don't understand Matt, babe. These people were so creative. It's about they were pushing boundaries. Okay. That's not pushing boundaries.

[00:05:55] FAWN: These people took these songs and they were very funny. Well honestly be

[00:05:59] MATT: like, they're amazing. Would be, that would be a terrible thing to do because you know, is voiceover, so that should be probably in English, but still it's. Pushing. It's about, and it's about leveraging your community, your friends, people around you to help you come up with good

[00:06:15] FAWN: stuff.

[00:06:17] FAWN: Ooh. And another thing is like, yeah, I have no time to mess around with creating a video and doing all these takes like I have things to do.

[00:06:25] MATT: So you're so focused on the video aspect of it. Yeah,

[00:06:28] FAWN: because that's what everyone did. I took my videos and I turned them into audiograms. Anyway, that's not what we're here to talk about.

[00:06:34] FAWN: Oh dear. I'm just saying I feel so inadequate and I don't know what to do. Like I was talking to a friend Kathy yesterday. I was over at her house having a lovely tea, and I swear three different times I broke down in tears and I stopped myself. So it wasn't a full on cry, but it was because I feel like I'm failing all the time.

[00:07:02] FAWN: I feel like I'm failing, you know? I'm not where I wanna be with the career and all that stuff. And just growing up the way I did, knowing what I know now, I would've changed so much because I am now more aware of opportunities and more aware of how you can speak up for yourself and more aware of how you can leverage your life and negotiate and really talk and communicate in order to get things done the way you want.

[00:07:39] FAWN: You know, like I got accepted to the Cooper Union on the spot, which is not what they do with a caveat of if you would just turn this one thing in. And I, I froze, and I, and I didn't, and it's haunted me this whole time, you know, because they asked for drawings. They're like, you know, based on your photography, you are in, you're in kid.

[00:08:05] FAWN: Just give us 30 drawings. One a. And I was like, oh my God, I have to do these like Michelangelo type masterpieces. And I froze and I couldn't do it. But do you know what I'm saying? Like I do when you, and, and you know, when Kathy was like, stop being so hard on yourself. Not everything is about money. You know, everyone will say that not, but it is to me, I'm sorry, when you don't have it right, of course.

[00:08:33] FAWN: And you feel like, you know, It's, it's terrible. Anyway, but it's so nice to have friends remind you of your wins, well,

[00:08:43] MATT: again, social comparison theory, which we talked about, what was it last week? Yeah. Again, one of my main takeaways is, Okay. It's inevitable. You will compare, compare yourself to everyone.

[00:08:55] MATT: Just make sure you compare up and down. You have to again say, wow, I got this thing that no one else got. And, you know, does that make you into a, a snob or a mean person? No. An elitist, no. As long as you're comparing both, both ways. Mm-hmm. , you know, um, Edison love him or hate him, and most people aren't tremendous fans of him constantly compared himself to Da Vinci.

[00:09:19] MATT: and the things that Da Vinci had invented. This is what the Simpsons taught me anyway, . Okay.

[00:09:25] FAWN: The, the Simpson Simpsons. The cartoon. Yes. Oh my God.

[00:09:29] MATT: Really? Yes. Constantly. He, he always felt like he was behind da Vinci, cuz Da Vinci invented so many things. Plus he was an artist. Plus he was, I mean, come on, da Vinci invented the helicopter

[00:09:42] MATT: for goodness sake. How mental is that? . Hmm. . But anyways, it's, it's inescapable. And that's what one of the things that social comparison theory teaches us. But we need to, a, keep ourselves humble. B, keep ourselves realistic, and c, always be learning, always be hustling. And, and that's, that's what that is.

[00:10:07] MATT: Okay. You know, ask for help when you need it.

[00:10:13] FAWN: Yeah, but sometimes you don't know what you should be asking for.

[00:10:16] MATT: That is true. And that's, and that's, that's why you, that's the trouble, that's why, see, I, that's why I love having friends who check me, who, which is of course a hockey term, which means basically you keep somebody from skating the way they wanna skate.

[00:10:30] MATT: That's why I have friends who correct, who ask questions, who dig into stuff. And you too.

[00:10:37] FAWN: So today's subject, I'm just gonna get into it cuz I'm like, I'm not feeling

[00:10:42] MATT: we're never gonna get there.

[00:10:43] FAWN: Yeah. I'm not feeling any better . I still feel like crap.

[00:10:46] MATT: I'm sorry babe.

[00:10:50] FAWN: wo to me. Woe is me. So you, you have been talking about this and we've been talking about it too you, you call it IRL

[00:11:02] FAWN: I'm like, why are you remember the. You're, you've gotten way better with me, but so Matt's a computer programmer. When he used to come home from work and I asked him how his day was, all I would get was a stream of acronyms,

[00:11:18] MATT: three letter acronyms,

[00:11:19] FAWN: TLAs, like he would just tell me what he did that day.

[00:11:22] FAWN: And what he did was like all these coding things, they

[00:11:26] MATT: were random letters strung together as far as Fawn was concerned.

[00:11:29] FAWN: And I wanted to know how he felt that day, who he saw. . You know how, how was your day? And it was all computer stuff like no words. Just, it was crazy. Anyway, so , I r L in real life, but I guess that's what is everyone talks about, right?

[00:11:52] FAWN: I r L is not a computer term, but

[00:11:54] MATT: the com, the computer geek has taken over

[00:11:57] FAWN: friends in real life. What do you have to say about. FUD .

[00:12:04] MATT: Well, what's so interesting is I spent, or we spent so long sequestered where our relationships that we had had were primarily virtual. They were over the phone, they were on video chat, but they weren't

[00:12:19] MATT: tactile, they weren't "I'm right in front of you." So things like when I'm texting, I can curate. When I'm Facebook posting again, I can curate. I can choose to write out a paragraph and then delete it and then write something else. Right. So there's a filter there. And, and in real life there's, there is still that filter.

[00:12:38] MATT: There. There is a filter, but it's trickier because somebody can see when you're thinking you should say one thing, but you say something

[00:12:44] FAWN: else. There are micro gestures that will tell you everything if you are open to it. If you're present enough, you can pick up everything from a split second.

[00:12:55] FAWN: Exactly. Look, a split second movement. that happens. But I kind of wanna disagree with you because we were sequestered even before the pandemic. And I'm not just talking about us as a family. I think as a society, we really didn't hang out together that much. I mean, that's how we started this whole thing.

[00:13:15] FAWN: Mm-hmm. with, we, we called it be friendly at at one point, but that's the whole friendship movement we started, started way before the pandemic.

[00:13:26] MATT: That is true.

[00:13:26] FAWN: And no one would. Not no one, a few people, a fraction, a small fraction of the population was on board with us. Right? Like yes,

[00:13:40] MATT: exactly right. And these are the people who are looking for friends.

[00:13:43] MATT: Mm-hmm. , I think most people bebop through life in the same way that they're not looking for relationships, they're not looking for friends, which is really, really sad.

[00:13:55] FAWN: And we heard so many people say. , you know, when they found out what we were working on, what our project was, they would like in a very adamant way,

[00:14:06] FAWN: like it was almost, um, mean like I felt attacked by them when they would say it, they would say, I'm not here to make friends. I'm not looking for friends. I don't need any more friends.

[00:14:21] MATT: And, and that's just it, that phrase right there, I don't need, need is a weird word, any more friends. Everybody has this magical number in their head that if they have one friend or seven friends or 21 friends, that's enough and they don't want anymore.

[00:14:38] FAWN: And that's just it though, that What kind of friend is it? , is it really a friendship or is it an acquaintance? Is it, what is it? Is it someone you just see at the grocery

[00:14:50] MATT: store or is it somebody that you, it's not invite over once a month? Or is it somebody you play poker with or is it you know, somebody who you go over to their house and you watch footy ball?

[00:15:01] MATT: Who knows? There's

[00:15:02] FAWN: a lot of assuming going on, like what I noticed there was a lot of assuming going on. People thought, I have plenty of friends, I have no more room. And I always, cause I'm already so busy. Oh my God. So that was part of the problem. , right? The four letter word. Wait, b u s y. Yeah. Four, four letters.

[00:15:23] FAWN: Um, I hate that word. Those were fighting words for me. We did a whole episode in the very, very, very, very beginning that if you say busy to me mm-hmm. , those are fighting words. . Or it's the end. I'm like, okay, got it. So that's a big F you to me when you say, I'm busy, instead of saying, this is what I'm doing, you know?

[00:15:46] FAWN: Right. I can't make it. This is what I'm doing. Mm-hmm. , or I just don't feel like it, but to say, I'm busy. No, thank you. Bye. I, it's a deal breaker. But anyway, so we're talking about friends in real life and. I kind of changed my mind because we were all about friends in real life. That's what our whole matchmaking service was.

[00:16:09] FAWN: Our whole platonic matchmaking service we had that we still have, right? We still have the code for it and everything. We have the code, but it's not hosted. We just put it on ice for a little bit. Um, but our whole, I forgot my train of thought. What was I saying?

[00:16:32] MATT: Sorry, I was taking notes. Um, you were talking about, I don't know,

[00:16:38] FAWN: Well, that's awkward.

[00:16:39] FAWN: Wow.

[00:16:40] MATT: I have no idea. Oh, in the beginning we firmly believed in, bringing together people physically, but, and then you were segueing somewhere else.

[00:16:49] FAWN: Oh yeah. Okay. Thank you so much honey. Thanks for listening, ,

[00:16:54] MATT: and thank you for listening,

[00:16:55] FAWN: listeners. Oh my God. So that's, I was of the firm belief that for sure we need in-person.

[00:17:05] FAWN: and that's what we were, that's what we were all about, right? That we, we found a way, we had an algorithm and we had a very, very old technique of matchmaking to have people be in person. And that when you have people on social media that are following you, or maybe you're even talking to once in a while.

[00:17:29] FAWN: That that's not real, real friendship. But since the pandemic, because everything had to be online and everything was either through social media or through Zoom, I actually made some fantastic friends. And I wanna say we, Matt made some fantastic friends, like Barry came over a few weeks ago from another state.

[00:17:52] FAWN: But we're close enough, you know. When we met in person in real life, we were both commenting like, that's weird because like I think Barry mentioned immediately, what did he say when he first saw us? Like, something about you are exactly like I, I imagined you to be. And it was a shock, you know? And it was a shock.

[00:18:22] FAWN: on another level. I was like, why are you even saying that? Because I already felt that we were family. Right. Because we have been talking for so long now. Right.

[00:18:31] MATT: But circle back, Barry is of course, Mr. Kind.

[00:18:35] FAWN: Yeah, he, Barry has been on our show a few times. He's coming back in a couple weeks and he travels and tours the United States to spread kindness.

[00:18:48] FAWN: He goes to schools, he volunteers. He's an amazing poet, musician, he spreads kindness to kids and, and he's just an amazing, just a lovely guy. Angel. So talented. Anyways,

[00:19:02] MATT: yes. So anyway, we got

[00:19:03] FAWN: together in real life with Barry,

[00:19:06] MATT: Barry owns his inner Popeye. Mm-hmm. . I own my inner Popeye. You own your inner Popeye.

[00:19:14] MATT: We are who we are and that's who we are. And, and you know, Merry Christmas and I'm not gonna present to you that I'm a, something that I'm not. Mm-hmm. . So that makes for an easy trans that made for the easy transition. It's cuz none of us were fronting.

[00:19:30] FAWN: Mm-hmm. . Right. There was no editing, like how you said people,

[00:19:37] FAWN: people present or front people edit what they're gonna say and what they're gonna look like on social media. Right. So it's harder to, it's harder to sense when someone is being authentic and what's really going on. If there's a lot of editing

[00:19:51] MATT: Yes.

[00:19:52] FAWN: Photoshopping, editing of what you're gonna say. Uh, editing of exactly what angle you're gonna show of your life,

[00:20:00] MATT: and I have to imagine like musicians, like when they quote unquote meet their fans, It's like, particularly in this day and age, it seems like, um, like our girls listen to a lot of very emotional female singers, and that's a moment in time that they wrote about.

[00:20:18] MATT: They don't live there. They're, they've, they've gone through a whole life. And I have to imagine like a fan of a particular song imagines that the singer is still caught in that place because a singer very carefully shows you that . . And if they're not there anymore, even if they have to sing that song every night and try and bring up those feelings and that energy, they don't necessarily live there.

[00:20:43] MATT: And so I think it's, it can be really disheartening for a fan to meet a lot of

[00:20:48] FAWN: singers. Wow. And I just thought about it. And if you love that song and you're listening to it over and over and over again, you are living there forever. Forever. You

[00:20:56] MATT: are living there as a listener, but the performer's not living there.

[00:20:59] MATT: Mm-hmm. , the performers moved. So it can be a very weird and uncomfortable space to just assume that, you know, that's the way it is. Right. And you know, the best bands, the best singers, the best, everything. They're constantly evolving. The best people are constantly evolving. And so it's like you need to see their authentic selves in order to connect with that.

[00:21:24] MATT: And

[00:21:24] FAWN: so you're saying in real life, then you can see the movements, you can see the change in atmosphere. You can change a person's, outlook by interacting with them, right? You can see the peaks and valleys even in within a few minutes. So you're not just looking at a static presented piece of art, right?

[00:21:48] FAWN: Which is what people. Right out there on, on the internet, on social media and everything.

[00:21:54] MATT: And there you go. And, and in point of fact, I am constantly now thinking about, and I had this thought just the other day, which is one of the things that led to this show. And I was talking to my, my, my good buddy. And there's a lot of points we intersect on.

[00:22:06] MATT: There's a lot of points we don't. And he mentioned just kind of obliquely that, you know, he took his whole office out to dinner to celebrate the holidays. He did. He did. That's nice. And I'm like, . That doesn't even factor for me that he's a guy who's the boss who takes everybody out. So I have to wonder what's gonna happen when, you know, I, if I was to walk into his real life, say at work, cuz men have a nasty habit of com compartmentalizing and maybe it's a good habit.

[00:22:37] MATT: I don't know, but I think it's, I think it'd be tricky. Mm-hmm. , because I think that he's on some level he's again compartmentalized. So he shows me those pieces that I'm comfortable with, but he doesn't show me a lot of the other pieces.

[00:22:53] FAWN: And another thing is there's not enough time, and that's

[00:22:56] MATT: another

[00:22:57] FAWN: interesting issue.

[00:22:58] FAWN: So even if you meet in real life, perhaps you have just enough energy mustard together, you. , is that the word? Muster? Muster? Yes. Not, not mustard. Not

[00:23:10] MATT: mustard muster. .

[00:23:13] FAWN: Not enough ketchup together to get together. Like you, you, you gather enough energy to present a certain thing. Right? Like I don't have the energy for that.

[00:23:23] FAWN: You'll see my peaks and valleys within two minutes probably. Right, right. and if I do keep up a certain front, I'm exhausted. .

[00:23:33] MATT: I'm like, yes. Yes we are. As a matter of fact, yeah. I'm a little daunted by, um, yeah, there's talk about getting together with all my workmates mm-hmm.

[00:23:42] MATT: and trying to figure out what that's even gonna feel like.

[00:23:45] FAWN: I think that's why it's a good idea to have activities. because you're not just there staring at each other and talking. Right. But if you're eating together or you're playing together, yes.

[00:23:57] MATT: And that's just it. There's, there's talk, there's talk about, and

[00:24:00] FAWN: or even going to a show

[00:24:01] MATT: together, right.

[00:24:02] MATT: At a, at a previous job, we would connect on Zoom for happy hour and we play games.

[00:24:08] FAWN: Right. Or like, I'm just thinking, like, just going to the theater. , you know, experiencing something together and then you have something to talk about together. Yes. Then that it, it takes the pressure off, it kind of massages the situation.

[00:24:21] FAWN: So there's not a tense moment. Right. It's like you massage everything out. Right. And

[00:24:28] MATT: you smooth it out. And again, it can be helpful if you say, meet people out in the world. Mm-hmm. like, Hey, let's go check out the winter festival. Right. And then theoretically there's, there's a lot to connect about. And again, I also talk about how one of the things that helped us build friendships are shared experiences

[00:24:45] FAWN: mm-hmm.

[00:24:45] FAWN: And yeah. That's why people have such amazing bonds. Like if it's a hardcore experience that you just so happen to have experienced together, you're forever bonded by that experience, right? Like, it could be a trauma even. Mm-hmm. . I think , that's a great key. For me. It's hard, like, there are so many people that are so into hiking or , I don't know, horseback riding and all this stuff.

[00:25:11] FAWN: I'm like, Um, I don't know what I, I don't, you know, I don't know. I seriously don't know what I would wanna do with someone because, again, because I'm constantly, my energies are always going into so many different directions, right? That I don't know what my thing is. Like, no, thanks. Like my idea of hiking is not this other person's idea of hiking

[00:25:35] FAWN: I'm short . My legs are tiny.

[00:25:38] MATT: Right. Your, your idea of a nice hike would be maybe a little pond walking around, a little pond in, in brilliant sunshine. You know, say, and I wanna sit down one or two o'clock, and then maybe go somewhere

[00:25:50] FAWN: afterwards to, and I want something to eat. I'm like, can I just sit and eat?

[00:25:54] FAWN: Like, do we have to walk because, Because I'm so short. For me, I'm like doing a light jog for someone's normal walk. Right. And I, it's like hard to keep up with people. Mm-hmm. , I get it and know it's stressful. It's like back in the day when I would go bowling with my friends and they would get so mad at me because I would not be a good bowler.

[00:26:18] FAWN: Like they get, they get upset and then it's stressful for everybody. and then I'm angry . Well,

[00:26:26] MATT: that's, that's a

[00:26:27] FAWN: fun day. Do you know what I'm saying though? I do. That doesn't, it's not a good experience for me. Do, so it's hard to say, well, what activity can we do together? And it's stressful to even come up with an activity.

[00:26:38] FAWN: So do you have any suggestions for that? Well,

[00:26:42] MATT: it's about maybe sorting out a slacker sport. I, I worked in an la God, it seems like maybe the last time it wasn't, but it's almost the last time I worked in an office. We would go and play disc golf.

[00:26:53] FAWN: See, do you remember what happened when you took me disc golfing?

[00:26:57] FAWN: I lost your favorite disc golf because it ended up in some tree. Again, stressful for me,

[00:27:04] MATT: right? It, but it's about really judging and for you and understanding and, and you know,

[00:27:09] FAWN: our first date, you guys, our first date Matt took me miniature golfing. Yeah. This is before you knew apparently I was a chewbaca.

[00:27:19] FAWN: Yes. I was so angry. . And he was there. He had a little notebook. Keeping, keeping score,

[00:27:25] MATT: score, score. You're supposed to keep score. That's the

[00:27:27] FAWN: point. I don't like it. , .

[00:27:32] MATT: But again, that's part of learning and, and you. It's a part of connecting and, and, you know, learning how the other person is, you have to clearly communicate and, that's just it.

[00:27:42] MATT: Sometimes you're gonna come up with stuff that works and sometimes

[00:27:46] FAWN: you're not. So I guess my thing is to have people come over and I cook for them, right? So I'm keeping busy and I'm nourishing the people, I'm offering different tastes. So that's my thing. I don't know, maybe I'm not, I'm just not a hiker.

[00:28:04] FAWN: I like to do things by myself when I'm hiking, like, because I go at my own pace. I don't it. It's not a competition. I hate competition. Hiking isn't a competition. It is when you are short Matt .

[00:28:17] MATT: Okay, I'm just gonna be quiet

[00:28:19] FAWN: now. Anyway, let's wrap this up. So what are some pointers? So we to be in real life, it's best to find a common experience, right, like an activity. Mm-hmm. , but it doesn't have to be hiking. And

[00:28:34] MATT: it's very important that both sides are patient and both sides pay attention to how it's going and how the other person is feeling and et cetera.

[00:28:42] FAWN: Mm-hmm. and in real life is quite extraordinary because I.

[00:28:50] FAWN: To, again, going back and noticing the tiniest movement or the tiniest change in a person's voice or their expressions or the way they look, the way their eyes, like something can shift in a split second. . It's such a beautiful way to connect. And when you're present enough to notice that, I think that's what opens up a beautiful friendship

[00:29:15] MATT: Absolutely.

[00:29:15] FAWN: To form. Because when someone notices that you pay attention like that, when you're heard like that, right, it means the world to everyone.

[00:29:27] MATT: Absolutely.

[00:29:27] FAWN: To everyone. I mean, that's how, that's one of the ways I fell in love with Matt because I'm like, whoa, this guy notices things that most people ignore.

[00:29:40] FAWN: He, he pays attention. He's paying attention, he's hearing me. And so that made me open and more receptive to who you were. Like, who are you? Thank you for listening. Thank you for noticing. And then, so that made me more. I wanted to find out more about you because you obviously gave me the great gift of paying attention to me, and it just happened naturally then that I was like, who is this person?

[00:30:14] FAWN: Who is this Matt? And it formed a beautiful friendship, which led to this amazing. Marriage. I'm gonna knock on wood. Hello. Watch us fight right after this nice thing that I just told you. But anyway, so anyway, that's my take on it. You, your take. Uh,

[00:30:31] MATT: I'm in complete agreement. However, I wanna segue us over into another zone, which is, just, it's an important thing to pay attention.

[00:30:40] MATT: And I used to say it was two times and now I don't know, but basical. If you say, if somebody says, Hey, you wanna hang out and do X and you don't wanna do it, absolutely, you should say no, but long, about two or three times, if they ask and you constantly say no, they're gonna stop. That's somebody's attempt to maybe grow the friendship and maybe, take it outside of, let's say maybe the workplace or outside of, you know, wherever it is you've met this person.

[00:31:10] MATT: So it can be really uncomfortable and certainly if you always hear no, how are you gonna feel about it? And so you gotta think about that on the other side of the coin. So if you say no to somebody two or three times, then you better suggest something good or you better say yes to something you're not comfortable with.

[00:31:26] MATT: And that can be fun too, to expand your boundaries unless it's

[00:31:29] FAWN: hiking. Matt, I know you probably have something else to add to this, but can I just say something else about the no thing? Thank you for bringing that up. The no thing, that's another dirty word for me, because No. Well, thing is that Well, I, I'm notorious for saying no.

[00:31:48] FAWN: Like remember when I had to pull out a wisdom to tooth? Yes. And they, they gave me this drug cause I was freaking out. I was scared. And then it made me so mellow. . And then when they called my name to go into surgery, I just said, no . No. And we thought we were funny. It was funny. It was funny. . No, no, . Um, so years ago Oprah started talking about we need to say no, women need to say no.

[00:32:18] FAWN: And I thought, and there are points in time where

[00:32:20] MATT: they absolutely

[00:32:20] FAWN: should. Yes, absolutely. I think there are so many people pleasers out there and you have to. Yes, definitely. I just think that it went overboard because all of a sudden I kept hearing women in a rude way say, you know what, I'm, I'm gonna practice saying no to you.

[00:32:38] FAWN: I'm like, Thanks for practicing. It was just rude. Like I was in Santa Fe and I went to a photography workshop that you pay big money for. Mm-hmm. and this photo editor was, who was one of the teachers, um, We were waiting for the next, , course to open up, right? Mm-hmm. , she was a speaker.

[00:32:58] FAWN: She was there to like, we paid to like have, an interaction with right these people. And so I remember we were standing, waiting for the next thing. We were all just standing waiting. Mm-hmm. in line. And I went to her. I'm like, do you mind taking a look at my book, this project that I finished several months ago?

[00:33:19] FAWN: It's a book. Do you mind just taking a quick look? She looked at me and she, I swear to you, it was like line by line, the same uh, tone that you would hear on Oprah. And she looked at me and she's like, I'm gonna practice saying no to you. So, no. I'm like, wow. Ew. It was so gross. So I think we've gone overboard with the whole no thing that just don't, don't just say no.

[00:33:51] FAWN: It's like saying, I'm busy. Please explain . And I'm not saying that you have to explain why you don't wanna do something. Mm-hmm. . But instead of being lazy about it and just saying, I'm busy because it, it's such a blowoff, like you're blowing the person off. Mm-hmm. and it, it's gotten rude. It's gotten to the point of rude, say, I really need to be alone.

[00:34:17] FAWN: I have no energy to go out, you know, just be honest. Why is it that you're saying no? Just speak honestly and ex like express yourself. There's so many beautiful words out there. Use them. It's like painting. Use all the different colors. Don't just stick with one like standard word.

[00:34:38] MATT: And if the person wants to be your friend, they're gonna hear that.

[00:34:41] MATT: Try and understand it. Mm-hmm. . Respect it. Respect it.

[00:34:46] FAWN: There you go. That's the word. And it's the people that don't respect that then, you know, okay, I don't wanna hang out with this person ever.

That's

[00:34:53] MATT: fine. Right? Or this person is projecting certain things onto you, or

[00:34:56] FAWN: who knows? Oh, people get offended, like rather quickly

[00:35:00] FAWN: So then, you know, and you know, fast, so you know to stay away, from that person. Right. But, uh, yeah, I just, the word no and. If someone invites you to something and you genuinely think you may like this person, and you do have to say no. Yeah. I think we get used to saying it so much now that you, before you know it, you've said it more than three times.

[00:35:24] FAWN: Like, we learned this when we lived in this cute little town, and people were really into having, dinners together. Mm-hmm. like dinner parties, like getting together at a nice table. They really were, everyone was into cooking. It was just a beautiful thing that this community did and they asked us all the time over, and we were from LA and we were used to saying, no.

[00:35:50] FAWN: And that's when we realized, right, Matt? That's when you said, we can't do that more than three times. Right. Because they'll stop asking us. Right. They'll

[00:36:00] MATT: give up. Right, because you're getting the slow No, which is right. Just a terrible term. But it's true.

[00:36:04] FAWN: Yeah. And it's also, it takes a great amount of courage to go to someone and initiate something,

[00:36:13] FAWN: And so when you get turned down, it could be, you could take it personally, it kind of hurts a little bit

[00:36:18] MATT: ing some, a smidge. Yeah. And

[00:36:20] FAWN: if you keep getting that, then the person's like, okay, I'm done. Right. Well,

[00:36:24] MATT: this person obviously doesn't want to hang out with me or do things with me. Yeah.

[00:36:28] FAWN: It takes a certain effort to create an opening.

[00:36:31] FAWN: Right, right. By asking someone would you like to Right. Fill in the plank. . And so, yeah, after a while just please know that it could close the door. Being aware of that is what we've been practicing ever since those days from that cute little town. Right, Matt? True. So I think that's it for me, for now.

[00:36:54] FAWN: Thank you so much, Matt. Matt just waved like he's good, right? Matt? So you're good? I'm good. There's nothing else you wanna say? Nope. Okay. Thank you again so much for listening. We love you. If you could do us a favor, ask other people to listen. Download our episodes, spread the word about what we're trying to do here, which is create a friendlier world through the Art of Friendship.

[00:37:23] FAWN: We're here for you every week we will always be here. Reach out to us, our friendly world podcast.com and that's it. Talk to you in a few days. Be well, bye.