[00:00:00] Nina: Welcome to Dear Nina Conversations About Friendship. I am your host, Nina Badzin. I’ve been writing about friendship for almost 10 years. Hard to believe that. And I’ve learned so much along the way.

Today’s episode is timed on purpose. It is right after an episode you might have heard last week with my mom, where we talked about forgiveness and getting ready for the Jewish New Year, which has a lot of lessons and themes and themes to think about that really can apply to everybody.

This week I am playing one of my most important episodes, I think, in the two years I have been podcasting—with Ruchi Koval. It was an episode that really challenged me. The episode was Ruchi and I answering an anonymous letter from somebody who had heard other episodes in the past about making friends and keeping friends and, you know, so many different topics within. And she sort of challenged me fairly and totally respectfully.

I mean, I love letters like this. If you have other letters or you’re challenging episodes or giving me hard questions to answer, I really appreciate that. And I do them on the episode or I’ll do them in the newsletter. This letter was about basically, in my own words, and you’ll hear it in the letter writer’s words in the episode, it was about what you do when you just aren’t feeling the vibe with somebody— Either new or somebody who you’ve been friends with and you just do not want to spend time with them anymore.

And if something really negative happened, that would be easier, right? It’s easier to end a relationship with somebody or drift away from somebody who has done something hurtful or just has something about them that is not working for you for very obvious reasons.When it’s something less obvious, it’s just like the chemistry is off for whatever reason, that’s much harder.

What do you do when someone clearly wants to be friends with you, and you just aren’t into it? It may just be that you don’t have time, but usually if it’s somebody that the chemistry is wonderful with, you just make time.That’s what we do. We wedge people into our lives just as people have wedged us into their busy lives, when we’ve moved to new places or started a new job, or for whatever reason have been in a new environment. We’re lucky that people have given us time.

You know, sometimes we then try to give other people time, but let’s say you get started, you have the one coffee you’re just not feeling it, but the person keeps asking, what do you do?

I held onto that question for a long time because I didn’t really know how to answer it. If you’ve listened to this podcast for a while, you know that I do not call myself a friendship expert. I’m really more friendship curious. I’m a friendship enthusiast. I dive into these conversations, and I’m interested in having them probably more than normal.

I’m not saying I’m the only one who likes to talk about friendship. I can rattle off 10 names of just people I know who have books and are on Instagram and talking about friendship, and they all have quality things to say. And some of them are technically experts. Some of them are like me, they’re journalists, they’re enthusiasts, but all of us are really steeped in these topics.

And I still think this question would be hard for every one of them because most people are not looking to hurt other people’s feelings. And I’m reposting this episode because it’s still a challenging topic and I like having it in this time of the Jewish year, because it’s a time when we’re really focused on improving ourselves.

A lot of talk in the world these days on the internet and elsewhere, I’ve spoken about it on the podcast, is sort of an overemphasis on boundaries and everybody needs to protect their boundaries. And at what point do we encourage people to actually put themselves out a little? And Ruchi pushes us a little in this episode. She pushes us to realize that not every moment we spend in the world is about what makes us happy, what fills our cup. There is a place in life to do things for other people. And I kind of feel like a lot of us don’t like to hear that. I know I sometimes don’t like to hear it. Of course, I want to spend all my free time with people who I feel total chemistry with, but I do think she is right that just as there have been times when people have made an opening for us, we need to remember to reach back and make an opening for others.

And that doesn’t mean spending every weekend with someone that you just kind of feel so, so about, but making time for people who aren’t just your best, best, best friends. The episode is a lot more nuanced than that. That is just the intro I wanted to give you to explain why I’m replaying this conversation.

Ruchi is absolutely incredible. I’m going to tell you a little bit more about her. Ruchi Koval is a motivational speaker and a relationship coach who has inspired personal transformation in thousands of people, and I can tell you, she has inspired me a ton. She’s the co founder and associate director of congregation, JFX and innovative community in Cleveland, Ohio. She has been a Jewish educator for two decades leading self development groups for adults and teens and mentoring educators around the world. Ruchi is also a musician and author. I’ve read both of her books. She is a mother of seven and a grandmother now. Her two books are called Conversations with God and Soul Construction. And she has a third book on the way. And I will tell you that Soul Construction is all about the Jewish study of Mussar.

And that is a lot of what this episode is based on is character study and improving parts of our character.

I will have all the places you can find Ruchi in the show notes and making sure you all know how to find my show notes. You can look on my website on NinaBadzin.com. It’s B A D Z I N. I always have information about the guest, information about how to join my Facebook group, how to find the newsletter, the social media, the Instagram, you know, all the stuff.

Now I’m doing TikTok. Is that a good use of my time? Probably not. So we’ll see how long that lasts. Although I am having fun with it a little bit, probably embarrassing my kids while I’m doing that fun. So, like I said last week, wishing everybody who celebrates and everyone who’s just in the world a happy Jewish New Year, a meaningful time of reflection and self improvement and just thinking about what’s important in life and what we would like to have for us in the next year and what we can do for others in this next year.

I present to you the Ruchi Koval.

Hi, Ruchi!

Nina: Hi, Ruchi!

Ruchi: Hey, Nina.

Nina: I am so grateful to you for coming to help me out today. You’re really the first person I thought of, we’ve known each other through the years and you’re just so wise. And I know you’re so busy teaching and writing and traveling across the world, but you made time for me and for my listeners.

I received this letter and I felt kind of personally called out, fairly. It was a fair call out and I’m gonna read it to you and to the listeners, and then I’m going to beg you to help us. But first I wanna tell the listeners a little mor about you.

Ruchi is the co-founder and associate director of congregation JF X, an innovative community in Cleveland, Ohio. She has been a Jewish educator for two decades, leading self-development groups for adults and teens and mentoring educators around the world. She’s a certified parenting coach, [00:02:00] motivational speaker, musician, and author of two books and a mom. She’s a trip leader for momentum, inspiring hundreds of women in their journeys in Israel. I recently finished her second book. I also read the first one, but the second book is called Soul Construction: Shape Your Character Using Eight Steps From the Timeless Jewish practice of Mussar.

So let’s get right to the letter.

Dear Nina,

Many of my friends are also listeners of your show and we would love to hear an episode on ways to implement some of the boundaries you’ve discussed in previous episodes. For example, what are actual phrases you can use in difficult conversations, such as: feeling like you no longer have anything in common with a once close friend who you do not wish to hang out with frequently anymore. Or, if you like to chat with woman in a class you’re taking but they mistake your friendliness for wanting to be even closer friends outside of class and you aren’t vibing with them like that or you genuinely don’t have time for more friends.

It’s obviously not socially appropriate to outright say, “I’d rather not give you my number. I don’t want you to text me because I’m not interested in doing anything with you in the future. Let’s just stick to being friendly class buddies,” – because yikes- that sounds brutal!

I know your previous advice has offered the make an excuse type of answers or to keep creating soft distance so the other person can get the hint—but many female personalities require an actual answer. There are certain personalities you have to be assertive with because they are steadfast in their repeated friendship attempts— whether wanting to remain close friends instead of being demoted to an acquaintance or dogged in wanting to initiate a friendship you are not interested in.

What are some phrases listeners can use as conversation blueprints when we need to be honest and assertive in the situation, but do it delicately and with heart?

Boundary blueprints, please & thank you!

Kaya

Nina: Oh, Ruchi, this is so hard. I just wanna be awkward and passive aggressive forever. Not passive aggressive, but [00:04:00] just busy. I wanna just be quote unquote busy. and I hear the listener’s plight here that it only works if the person takes the hint.

Ruchi: Yeah. And I think the person who’s writing this is also struggling with their own authenticity, not wanting to constantly lie. But yeah, when I originally read this letter, I did get a bit of a pit in my stomach. This is a toughie and it happens all the time.

So thank you for having me. I’m very thrilled to be here. As you mentioned, I’m a Jewish educator. And so I look at every situation, or at least I try to look at every situation, through the lens of Jewish values and of Jewish ethics and particularly the study of Mussar, as you mentioned, which my book is about. It’s basically about studying our own character traits and trying to become better people through analysis and improvement of our own character traits.

Nina: And I want to interject and say, you do not need to be Jewish to benefit from these lessons. I mean, they’re really things that every single [00:05:00] human being, any kind of religious background, or no religious background, could benefit from because we are all, most of us, trying to not be jerks basically. I mean, that’s what the letter writer is saying. I really don’t want to be friends with this person, but I don’t want to be jerk about it

Ruchi: Yeah, and I totally agree, this wisdom is for anybody. So when I was trying to think about this question, a number of character traits or values came to mind that are at play here. The first one is kindness. Because we want to be kind to other people, but by the same token, we don’t have time to be kind to everybody all the time. And the kindness has to work for us as well. The other value that came up for me when I was thinking about it was the value of honesty because we do obviously value honesty, but by the same token, another value that comes to play is the value of promoting peace. We don’t want to hurt other people with our honesty. So [00:06:00] sometimes, the wisdom of Mussar will teach us that is better to actually edit your truthfulness for the sake of peace. So, these are some of the values that floated to the surface when I was sort of analyzing how I would handle a situation like that.

The first thing I think I would do, was to ask myself, is this an opportunity for kindness. Meaning, is this a person who’s lonely? Is this a person who’s new to town? Is this a person who doesn’t have very many friends? And if so, the same way I might give a charitable contribution for a cause for the needy, maybe this could be viewed not as a friendship opportunity for me necessarily.

Meaning maybe it doesn’t fill my tank in that way, but maybe that’s not what this opportunity is about. Maybe it’s about doing an act of kindness for another person. And I think sometimes we get overwhelmed because we think to ourselves, oh gosh, I don’t have time to be friends with this person. Like, we’re sort of envisioning weekly get togethers and bestie reunions. It doesn’t have to be that. We could go out for coffee [00:07:00] once and I could say to myself, you know what, I’m gonna give this person two hours of my day. And this is my act of kindness.

Now, of course it has to be done mindfully, because nobody wants to feel like the object of someone else’s pity. So it has to be done with a certain degree of genuineness, but it could be that this is an opportunity to do a good deed for somebody who needs it. And I don’t have to commit to doing things all the time. I could commit to one thing and then see. The person might not take it to the next level. I mean, they might, but they might not.

Nina: They might not feel the chemistry you fear that they’re going to feel. I do feel that it’s nice to give people a chance if you can. It is hard to not do the one time. And if they don’t take the hint, because I get it—listen, by the way, backing up. If someone takes the hint, if you really feel like you’re too busy and you kind of make it hard to make plans, if you’re the person on the receiving end of some kind of invitation and you make it difficult, I can’t do this data. I can only do evenings or whatever it is that might genuinely be that you really can’t [00:08:00] get together. But if you’re kind of purposely making it a little difficult, I still think that’s a good first try. If you really just like, like she said, not vibing, sometimes you just get like a funny feeling or whatever, I still advocate everything I’ve said in past episodes because I do think it’s a kindness to not even necessarily get started if you’re just already set on it. But if they don’t take the hints, I agree, it would be not the worst thing to at least go once.

Ruchi: In addition to that is a bit of a mindset shift. Maybe I’m not doing this to fill my friendship tank. This is not what I need right now, but this is something that I’m doing to fill another person’s tank. and to look at it as a short term investment, a short term commitment, instead of getting overwhelmed. Sometimes we spin out of control and like, well, if I do this, then this is gonna happen.This is gonna happen. And we sort of create this whole mountain of maybes. So maybe just to look at it as a one shot deal. I’m gonna try this. Don’t look at it as a first date. Just look at it as a date.

Nina: That’s an important point and it really cannot be overstated that having coffee [00:09:00] with someone one dinner, one protein shake after a workout class does not mean you’re inviting them to your 50-year-old birthday party.

Ruchi: Exactly. So that’s one thing, as far as the degree of honesty that you want to interject into this new relationship. I think it really depends on the other person. And since, in this scenario, this is not a person that you know very well, so you don’t really necessarily have a good sense of how they’re gonna take your honesty or lack thereof. When it’s somebody that you know very well, you could say to yourself, look, if I say this, they’re gonna take the hint. Or if I’m honest, they’ll understand. But you know, this is somebody you don’t know. So you don’t know can they handle my honesty? Can they not handle my honesty?

But this is where the values of truth and peace sort of come to war with one another. The idea, from my approach, is that peace should always come before, not always, but usually come before truth, so that if you’re not sure if another [00:10:00] person can handle your truth, then it’s much better to fudge the truth for the sake of peace.

So I would say, oh my gosh, I’ve got so much going on right now. I’m so busy. And you know what, that doesn’t even necessarily have to be a lie. You know, we are busy, we’re busy, we’re all busy. We’re busy with other things, sort of in parenthesis is, well, if it were my bestie, I would make time. But that doesn’t mean you’re not busy. And it could even be a small degree of honesty. So the writer was looking for a specific word or phrase. I wonder if a person could even say, you know what, I’ve got so much in my life right now. I do not have the bandwidth for this.

I’m so sorry. You seem like a lovely person, you know, but I’m just so overwhelmed, like make it about you. And that’s sort of telling them that they’re not a priority without telling them that they’re not a priority. They don’t have to know that if it were somebody else, you would shoehorn them into your life.

I don’t see how somebody could misunderstand that.

Nina: That’s pretty direct. That’s pretty direct in a good way. I think it’s direct in a completely non-personal [00:11:00] way. It would be hard to say for a lot of people. It probably would be hard for me to say, but I think I could. And hopefully Kaya who wrote the letter and her friends who are looking for a blueprint, it is somewhere between that really direct thing that they realize they can’t say, which is, I am not interested. Like you just can’t say that. I think we both agree. And she knew that in the letter.

Ruchi: And I don’t really think you have to lead with that. You know what? You could start out, like you said, by being like, okay, this Saturday night is crazy. Oh my gosh, I’m traveling this week. And then they’re already sort of getting the sense that your life is a bit overwhelming, so you don’t have to start out at the first request by saying, I’m too overwhelmed to allow you into my life right now. A lot of people are not that tone deaf. I know for me if somebody starts making excuses, eventually I’ll be like, yeah, I just don’t think they’re into it. And I’ll feel embarrassed and uncomfortable, and I’ll stop asking. So it’s true. Some people are not going to take the hint, in which case this might be a plan B. I’m not saying that this would be like a plan a to be that [00:12:00] direct.

Nina: I had a situation about 20 some years ago when I moved here and I was asking somebody for plans, and it took me a minute. I didn’t get the hint immediately, but I did get it. It gives hope to people out there that are trying to let someone down. People do get it, even if they don’t get it right away.

So I think I offered a date. No, that doesn’t work. I offered another date. No, that doesn’t work. I offered another date. This is all in the same conversation. So sorry that doesn’t work. And I think I even was like, do you think anything this summer? I mean, when I think of my desperation. She really said nothing this summer is going to work. Something like that. She wasn’t offering other dates. That’s how you really know someone’s interested. You offer a couple dates and if they can’t, someone interested will be like, but I really am open a lot of Mondays.

Ruchi: Or they might even say, you know what, let me see if I can move something around, like they’re working with you. That’s a sign that they’re interested.

Nina: And it takes experience. I’m more finely tuned to hear that. And I guess Kaya might have had a [00:13:00] bad experience where someone didn’t take the hint. I do think most people do, but Kaya brought up another type of scenario, and that is you have a friend already, and you’re kind of ready to bring that friendship down a level. She called it demote. I probably have used that language in other episodes because my point on that was probably, we don’t need to end every connection. It’s not necessary to sever every bridge. Sometimes we just make the friendship come down a level and more times than that, that’s a mutual thing. If the chemistry’s not there anymore, as much, sometimes that’s on both sides. That’s why it feels that way.

But Kaya again is bringing up, well, what if it isn’t? What if the person’s like, why are we not talking? This is what I’m picturing is she’s getting texts from someone, I never hear from you. We don’t talk as much of anymore. Why are we not hanging out? Do you feel that a situation like that, where that person has been a closer friend, deserves a more honest answer?

Ruchi: So the answer is I do. I do think that person deserves your honesty because in this case, fudging the truth for the sake of peace will not bring peace. [00:14:00] It will bring more confusion and more hurt. There was a relationship there. And so that person deserves a different degree of honesty from you. Now I have to say, I tell this to my kids all the time because my older kids are all in their twenties. I say most of being an adult is doing awkward things and pretending they’re not awkward. And this is part of what I was gonna say too, about the previous scenario.Feelings will be hurt and you can’t always prevent that. That’s not real life. We want to be as kind as we can. We want to be as truthful as we need to be. We want to pursue peace as much as we’re able, but the bottom line is— you know, I always say this— There are relationships in which nobody ever gets hurt. Those people are called acquaintances.

Nina: Wow. That’s a quote. I’m quoting that.

Ruchi: Because we don’t really care that much about each other. What you do is basically inconsequential. I’ll bump into you at an affair. I’ll be like, oh my G-d, it’s nice to see you, blah, blah, blah. We should get together. And then we don’t, and it’s fine,[00:15:00] but in relationships where people actually care about each other feelings will get hurt because we have expectations and we have disappointments and we have connections and we care about that person. So that person matters to us. So to sort of go about this with the goal, like, but I don’t wanna hurt any feelings is unrealistic. We wanna mitigate hurt feelings, but avoidance entirely is not real life.

Nina: You know why I struggle with this. I know why, I should say that differently. Not as s statement. I know why I struggle with this. I’m such a pleaser. And I probably represent a lot of my listeners. And I think sometimes I’m putting a value in the wrong place of, yes, not hurting feelings, but also I don’t want anyone to be mad at me. I don’t want anyone to not like me. And I’m aware of that. I mean, I am really aware of that. I will go through probably years of lacking of a boundary so that I don’t hurt feelings, so that someone’s not mad at me. So it’s equally about the other person as it is about my own worry of [00:16:00] being talked about or that I disappointed someone, and I wasn’t as nice as this as I made myself out to be.

Ruchi: The other piece is that if somebody is mad at you, that doesn’t necessarily mean you weren’t nice enough. It means they’re mad at you. So if we need to have that conversation with a friend in terms of the demotion, so to speak, right. If we’re looking for phrases to use, and I completely agree, this is a very difficult conversation to have, and it will be awkward and it will be uncomfortable and feelings will be hurt. Okay. But I would say something like this, I know that we had such a beautiful connection and such a beautiful friendship, and I just sort of feel like, and I really hope that I’m not hurting you because that is not my intent at all. In fact, the only reason I’m being honest with you is because I care about you and I’m not gonna lie to you. I just feel like over the years, we’ve sort of gone our separate ways and I don’t feel like we have that connection anymore. [00:17:00] And so, I mean, tell me how you feel. Tell me how you see it. Do you feel that as well? You know, because sometimes friendships just change over the years and maybe, maybe that’s okay.

Nina: Oh, that was good. I do think it would be hard. And I want you to know that I’m sweating a little bit, even thinking about this conversation.

Ruchi: Me too sweating. That’s why we almost need a script. I have to tell you, I have a friend who has my friend from childhood. She lives now in the same community where my parents live, which is not where I live. And so every time I go visit my parents, I look her up and we get together and we go for a walk and we talk and it’s great. And we really connect. I have noticed that when she comes to my community, which is where her parents live, she never ever calls me. And for a long time, I felt hurt about that. And I kept thinking to myself, should I bring this up with her? And then I’m like, she’s telling me with her actions that she doesn’t feel the same way about our relationship as she used to.

So I don’t need to look her up every single time I go, or if I want to, she readily [00:18:00] agrees. If I want to keep doing that for me, I can keep doing that, but I don’t have to keep doing that. We also have to be willing to let go of friendships when other people are giving us the signal. Friendships morph and grow, people grow and change. Because I was besties with her at 17 that doesn’t necessarily mean we have to be besties at 47.

Nina: Yeah. Now let’s take this one step further. Let’s say in the kind of mock conversation we just had where you said at the end, you said, well, how do you feel to the person? And what if the person says, well, I would like to work on it. I agree with you. We haven’t been spending as much time together and I think we should make the friendship a priority. That’s where I wonder if Kaya the letter writer is feeling stuck. Let’s say the other person is more interested in wanting to get back on track or get closer again.

Ruchi: I think a person also has to ask themselves, how much of a toll is the relationship actually taking on me? Meaning if a relationship is unhealthy or hurtful, I think that’s very different. If I’m just not in the mood anymore because, you know, you could ask yourself like, what is this really [00:19:00] going to take out of me an hour a month? So what happens if I invest an hour a month? Maybe emotionally, I can let myself off the hook on this relationship, but if this person still wants to hang out, you know, how much do I dislike it? I think there is a range, there are relationships that are bad for me. And then there are relationships that are just mildly inconvenient. If the other person really wants to work on it and it’s not taking that big of a toll on you again, maybe this is just an opportunity for kindness.

Nina: I was just going say that’s where kindness comes in over, what it would be, what value would it be over, over truth, right? Kindness, over truth in that case.

Ruchi: Selfishness. I have my selfish needs. I’m not in the mood of this friendship. And I’m not saying that it’s selfish in a bad way. I’m just saying self-focused as opposed to other-focused.

Nina: This is hard stuff. I think one of the most important things you’ve said, and you say a lot of important things, is just this acknowledgement that feelings do get hurt when you’re in relationships with people.

Ruchi: If you would think about anybody in [00:20:00] your life who actually matters to you, chances are that person has hurt your feelings at least once.

Nina: Oh, this is hard stuff. The main thing we’re talking about here is boundaries. That’s what Kaya is looking for. And I think we’re taking it a step beyond her letter, which is, there are boundaries that are important and necessary. And then there’s also kindness and just finding a way to balance those two things is hard, which is why I probably happened to have a not great answer to it in previous episodes, because I think I’ve been in denial of the fact that sometimes feelings do get hurt.

Ruchi: If the goal is avoidance of that, then a lot of important things are not gonna happen.

Nina: While we’re speaking of truth and unequal desires for our friendship—How involved do you think a parent should get in their kids’ teenage stuff? We have still a little time in this episode and I think that’s another boundary. If you know your kid is leaving someone out, and another kid’s mom has brought that to your [00:21:00] attention, but you know, your kid— Same thing like where teens also get to choose their friendships. I guess what I’m getting at is sometimes parents get overly involved in directing the teens friendships. And at what point do kids get to make a decision?

Ruchi: Look, I’m a big fan of contracting yourself to make space for your kids to make mistakes in general. I think a part of this too, is that a lot of times, I don’t know that moms are necessarily role modeling to their kids because we don’t necessarily talk to kids about our own friend drama either because we find it embarrassing or I don’t know why, but if we could talk to our kids about how we handle our friend issues, that’s a really great opportunity for leading by example. But from a parenting perspective, you know, just because another mom texts you doesn’t mean you have to react. And I know it feels like, oh my G-d, I have to show that I am the most responsible mom and I don’t stand for this stuff. And I believe in values and you know what I mean?

Nina: Back to the [00:22:00] pleaser thing. I don’t want anyone to be mad at me, think I’m a bad mom. I don’t want anybody to be mad at my child or think she’s a bad kid or he’s a bad kid. I hate to use the word bad, but that’s what we’re talking about.

Ruchi: I’m gonna go with, not necessarily. You have just received information. That information might be true. Might be the whole story might not be the whole story. Might be filtered through someone else’s biases. There’s a hundred reasons why that person may have sent you that. It doesn’t mean you have to react. I feel like when it comes to our kids, I put it in my database along with everything else and I let it marinate and I decide what is the best thing for my child’s growth and development as an ethical and kind human being in this world. When I do decide that it’s necessary to talk to my kid, I always try to phrase it as a question. Hey, I got a text from so and so I’m not going to pretend I didn’t know, or whatever. Or if a mom says to me, please, don’t tell your kid that I reached out to you. I’ll be like, I’m so sorry. I can’t do that. I have a culture of honesty. I [00:23:00] can’t do that. But I’ll say, do you want to talk about what’s going on with your friend and let your kids share if they want to what’s going on from their perspective. Sometimes they’re going to want to talk about it, and sometimes they’re going to want your wisdom and sometimes they’re going to learn from their own horrendous mistakes, just like we learned, or maybe didn’t learn from our own horrendous mistakes.

I sometimes think about the amount of information that parents have today about what their kids are into, whether from social media or security cameras, or Life360 or 1,001 other technological ways to keep tabs on your kid. I feel like we have too much information, not too little information. And our kids really need to learn from their mistakes sometimes. And it also depends on how old they are. Do you know what I mean? How much we’re gonna get involved. And that’s why a parent has to sort of know their child and there are no real hard and fast rules. Like when do you step in, when do you stay out? It really depends on your kid. But one thing is for sure, we cannot parent out of shame. I want someone else to think I’m a [00:24:00] good mom. So I’m gonna do this. You know, I don’t want my friendships to be impacted by my kids’ friendships. Well, that’s what maturity means. A good friend to me means a friend who’s willing to let our kids’ drama be our kids’ drama and not become our drama. To me, that’s a mature friendship.

I have had parents text me, and I’ll say to them, you know what, I’m really sorry that this is going on, but I really want to try to let the kids work it out. And if my kid has egregiously hurt another child, of course I’ll talk to my child and I’ll be like, Hey, what’s going on? And if they need to apologize, I’ll definitely have them apologize. But a lot of the time there’s more to the story and it’s more nuanced. And we can’t go in like guns blazing because some super influential mom has texted us. You know what I’m saying? That doesn’t need to be boom trigger.

Nina: I wanted to bring up something you said in your book, which I think is really relevant here to this balance that we’re trying to strike between honesty, the value of being honest, but also [00:25:00] kindness and peace and all of this. You say that people are put into our lives for a reason, those aren’t your exact words. That’s what you were talking about in the chapter, it was on page 46. And then your exact words were: Somehow their souls and ours needed to intersect. We are the exact friend acquaintances or relatives whom they need in their lives for their soul’s journeys. And they are the exact people whom our souls need, at least for a short time in our journey as well. Aren’t you happy to hear your own words like that? Because that is what we’re saying here. Isn’t it?

Ruchi: Yeah. I literally just taught that this morning in a class.

Nina: Ah, and it’s very relevant because again, the title of this episode’s going to be, something along the lines of, when the desire for friendship is not equal, which works both in the new friend concept and in the someone wants to demote or an already close friend concept. That’s very hard when the desire isn’t equal, but that mindset of, maybe this person is here to teach us something or maybe it’s that we are there to teach them something like [00:26:00] sometimes it is just about giving, but within reason. I wrote after that in my own notes, but dot dot dot, boundaries, because I know that’s what Kaya and gang are asking for. They’re asking to preserve their own boundaries. I know that there has to be some space to not feel like you have to give all your time to other people.

Ruchi: Yes, you know, so it’s very interesting. Judaism generally advocates to give 10% of what you have away to others. And that’s recommended in terms of income. There is a concept of giving 10% of one’s income to charity. And it’s also understood in terms of time, giving 10% of your time back to the community or to the universe. So, I feel like with friendships, like a lot of times we look at friendships in terms of what fills us up. Like I will surround myself with the people that I need in my life who serve a purpose for me. I’m not saying that in a mercenary way. I’m just saying that’s typically what we do. My friends are the people that I enjoy being with that I love. [00:27:00] Right. What if 10% of our friend time could be a donation for the greater good. Because there are times in my life where I’ve been needy of friendship and you shared a time in your life where you were needy of friendship. What if somebody was just nice to us because we were needy, not making us feel like a pity project. But just giving us time because we needed time. So maybe again, it’s just like a little bit of a mind shift. Maybe this person is in my life so that I can become a generous human being and that I could be a giver. And there were people who were nice to me when I was needy. And so maybe I’m just paying it forward. I’ll be nice to someone else who’s needy. Sometimes there are people who are socially awkward, they don’t really have a lot of friends and they just need a friendly face. You know, clearly if they’re going to monopolize all our time or our mental energy, that would certainly place for boundaries. Right. But, you know, barring that, I’m all for boundaries, but I think in some cases, boundaries have a large space in some people’s lives where it’s always about [00:28:00] boundaries. So again, we’re looking for sort of a nuanced and balanced approach to these things. I can be nice to that person in a way that still works for me in a way that doesn’t take over my life.

But it’s again, sort of a mind shift, okay, this person is in my life for a reason. What might that reason be? Might that reason be that I can be a giver right now? I can do an act of kindness for this person. Not all of my friendships have to be for me to get something out of it and to have my tank filled up. I just went out to lunch with a friend right before this episode and it it’s so mutually delightful. We love being together. We love talking. Whenever we leave each other, we’re like, oh my G-d, that filled my tank. Not every friendship has to be like that. Sometimes I’ll spend an hour with a person and it filled their tank and that’s okay. I filled her tank, you know why? Because I want to be a good person.

Nina: I think that’s a great note to end on. I could talk to you forever and ever, because you are so wise and you do say the hard thing. That’s why I knew having [00:29:00] you on that you wouldn’t let me off the hook or Kaya. Kaya didn’t wanna be allowed off the hook. I think she wanted something beyond just always saying I’m busy. There is something in between all that. And I think that’s an interesting point about boundaries taking up an inordinate amount of relationship talk. It’s true on Instagram. I don’t know how much time you spend on Instagram,

Ruchi: Let’s just say that I just put a time limit on my phone for Instagram. So that just tells you how much time I spend on Instagram.

Nina: Ruchi, thank you so much. Can you tell listeners where to find you?

[Find Ruchi’s links above in the show notes.]

Ruchi: Thanks for having me, Nina.

Nina: One of these days, you have to get back to Minneapolis. I have to get back to Cleveland. Thank you. Thank you.

Ruchi: My pleasure.

Nina: Everyone else, thanks for listening. Remember when our friendships are going well, we’re happier all around. So come back in a couple weeks for the next episode.