[00:00:00] Beth: it’s hard when you see a group of people doing something or families doing something and you may not be included, your kid may not be included, and that all just kind of ties into just really noticing is this mine or is this my child’s? when we think about who you are as a friend and what you want, that really just may be different from your kids. Part of this looking at what was your experience with friendships growing up may be completely different also because your kid is not you,

Nina: Welcome to Dear Nina. Conversations about friendship. I’ve been writing about friendship for over a decade. Talking about it for about four years on the podcast

Today’s episode specifically helps me, but it will help other people too. If you ever find yourself not knowing sometimes how to help your kids of any age with friend issues, because maybe [00:01:00] your own expectations are getting in the way of how either you were parented around friendship, or how you experienced friendship and what some of their current friendship issues bring up for you. . Maybe you’re dealing with your own adult friendship stuff and then your kid deals with something and it brings up all this stuff for you.

And today’s guest, Beth Segaloff, is a licensed clinical social worker and EMDR therapist. She has several other job titles, . She’s the founder of the Tree of Life Center in Fairfield, Connecticut, she does do in-person and virtual support for grief, trauma, and life transitions. she’s such a calm presence. One of the many things that she does focus on in her work is this desire we all have to belong and fit in and want to be part of something, but also acknowledging that everybody’s experience with friendship is different. And what we might have had as kids or what we have now may not be the experience for our kids and how to manage our own expectations.

A lot comes out of this conversation. I sometimes cannot [00:02:00] believe how much gets packed in to 30 minutes or so. Let’s welcome Beth to the show.

Hi Beth. Welcome to Dear Nina.

Beth: Thank you. I’m so happy to be here today with you.

Nina: You are the perfect person to have for such a heavy topic, and sometimes I avoid some of these parenting things because they’re hard and it’s like I don’t want to talk about my own kids.

But I also receive a lot of anonymous letters. And I receive anonymous comments in my Facebook group, which is called Dearing of the Group. I know that these expectations around how our own friendships are and how our friendships were when we were teens or kids, Is getting in the way of how we are parenting our kids around friendships. How are you seeing this in your work?

Beth: Sure. Um, I mean, I see it all the time in my own life and I see it with my clients all the time as well. And I think just to even start to acknowledge [00:03:00] that yes, our experience with friendships as children, as adults absolutely affects the expectations that we have on the friendships that our kids are forming or not.

I think first, just even say that, let’s look at this with more compassion than judgment because we’re normal. Anything that we experience is gonna affect how we see a, a present day situation. also to acknowledge that for us growing up was completely different than what our children are experiencing.

So we would go to school, maybe do a sport, maybe do an afternoon activity, but then be home. of course there were other things that people may be doing after school and with families, but it was mostly around school and family. Now, I mean, you know, you have children and if you’re listening and if you have teenagers especially, it is a completely different environment.

They are connected twenty four seven to their phones. Everyone knows where they are at any time because of the [00:04:00] snap map. they’re overscheduled. There’s not a lot of downtime. They can’t go to school and not worry about if somebody is going to video or take a picture of them at any time and it be posted for the world to see.

So the levels of anxiety around friendship is much higher than it was when we were growing up, I think it’s just important to acknowledge that because already it’s a different experience. If you say , go outside and play, it’s possible that no one is outside because they are all in their 700 activities that they’re scheduled for.

Nina: So the way we’re telling kids to make friends or to expand their social opportunities might not be realistic for them

Beth: And the way that they communicate changes so quickly, right? Where you may just say, just call your friend, or just go knock on their door. They don’t text anymore. They only communicate on Snapchat, sometimes on Instagram. Sometimes it’s this way. When we say just do this or just do that, it’s not that simple for [00:05:00] them. Also if they do have free time, their friends may not because they’re so busy.

Nina: Are you seeing, um, a movement towards, it seems like it from what I’m reading, but I’m curious in your work, people with younger kids, so like teens to college may be unfortunately too old for this change, but maybe middle school on down, people being a little stricter about when to give a kid a phone, when to let a kid have social media. Are you seeing a change at all? I I’m hoping answer’s yes, but what’s the answer?

Beth: I’m seeing a desire for change, but I don’t know if it’s actually happening.

Nina: Takes a critical mass, a whole community of parents have to decide the kids are just gonna text. But that they’re not gonna be on social media. They’re just gonna text. This is how they’re gonna make plans. And if everyone would do it, we wouldn’t have the snap map.

Beth: I think, like I said, I think that there’s talk about it and I don’t know how much is being practiced. I know that I was with a client yesterday and she’s not allowed to have Snapchat, but I was talking with the mom and her together around this is her only way to communicate with her friends

and that sounds like a ridiculous thing to say because I want to [00:06:00] say just call her or just text her. But that’s not what they’re doing. So there is this complication and then other families who do agree to it, but then say, oh, but she’s at practice really late, and so I want her to have a phone in case we’re running late or so I know where she, I can see on whatever app it is that we’re using so she can see where that we’re on our way.

Nina: So that’s one way that the expectations we have as parents may affect how we help our kids navigate friendships is not being realistic about how they actually communicate. What are some others.

Beth: I would ask everyone, and I’ll even ask you to really pause and think about an experience that you have with a kid that they’re having with a friend. Something that you notice a friend or lack of friend and be able to pause and really wonder what it’s bringing up for you

Nina: Oh, such a good question. I’m so glad you asked it that way. I don’t know that people stop and do that enough.

Beth: for me growing up. Okay. my family had so many friends. My parents and I grew up in such a [00:07:00] village and a community of families and their kids. We spent every holiday together, Sunday dinners, vacations, and it was a community of people that I could rely on, I still could rely on to this day.

that was my experience as a kid growing up, and I, I loved that so much. It’s really what I desired as an adult. I became a single parent when my son was very young, and I remember when he was two, three that preschool time. Families are really getting to know one another and couples are going out for dinner and they’re all getting together for whatever.

we would be alone a lot on weekends. I remember feeling at that time so sad and like, I didn’t belong, but did my son feel that way? I don’t know. He was in school, he was doing great. I would notice things because I’m very sensitive and I would have to ask myself.

I don’t know if I was doing it back then, I can think about it now. Was this mine or is it his? And if it’s mine, I need [00:08:00] to do my work around that. If it’s his, then we can have a different kind of conversation. But I think if, if I were to continuously say like, why don’t you have plans?

Why aren’t, why aren’t you doing anything? Why are you home? Where’s your friends? Then that automatically would make the child feel wrong if maybe they just want to be home or maybe they’re not comfortable in a certain situation or maybe there is something going on. But I think really being able to pause and consider is this my stuff?

If I’m not getting invited to the dinner or whatever it may be, that brings up what I don’t have and what I desired, but that doesn’t mean that’s happening for my son.

Nina: Yeah, that’s very powerful. And my own example, I think of a lot when something like this comes up I think about like my kids going to camp in the summer or other times when they’ve needed a buddy for something, someone to sit with on the bus, let’s say.

That’s a great example because a lot of times at the camp my kids go to, they’ve decided months before who they’re sitting with on the bus. Well, if your kids and they didn’t start right at the [00:09:00] beginning, they. Come several years in, they don’t really have anyone to sit on the bus with, perhaps.

One summer, one of my kids had a plan with someone actually, and then got to the bus and the girl was like, oh, I made a plan with someone else. My daughter handled it And that’s how I, that’s how I reacted. Beth. I not only. I was like angry inside and concerned and anxious for my child. It went on for like a week now, it didn’t matter that she was fine. It took me an entire week to like come down from the scene of the bus. That icky, awful feeling for that 30 minute scramble when it was like, well, who’s she gonna sit with?

Is she gonna have someone to sit with? She gonna sit all by herself. Is it gonna ruin her whole summer? When I think back to that younger Nina, that younger me, because this was time ago already. We’re probably talking eight years ago. I mean, so that’s in a parenting life that’s a long time. I sort of ashamed of that younger version of me, even though I understand how I got there. Must have brought up for me, having been left out at some point,

Beth: , I often think about things through the nervous system, when we experience something and it doesn’t process through, it lives in our nervous [00:10:00] system.

If things are not processed through, we may go throughout our day, throughout our life and in different experiences, different relationships. If something activates that in us, it sparks something in our nervous system and we think it’s happening again. It could be anything, but it could be the bus that drove by. It could be the way that your daughter said something. It could be a word that she used and it may have activated whatever it is for you. that feeling of like when it happened to you, even if it’s doesn’t have to be this big traumatic event.

But I think just to be aware of that is so important. thinking about that, like your daughter was fine,

Nina: Right.

Beth: but for it was something for you that created, the anxiety.

Nina: the next step that can happen. I’m just gonna call it bad behavior I see out there where people take to the Facebook and they kind of criticize all the other parents and all the other kids even. everyone’s a bully. every parent is parenting horribly because their kid left my kid out or something, and this is what I wish I could help people with. There are some normal parts of growing up that [00:11:00] include being left out and it doesn’t make every other parent out there a horrible parent that’s teaching their kid not to be kind, and it doesn’t make every kid out there a bully.

Beth: I see some of the comments and I see it as somebody’s pain.

Nina: Mm-hmm.

Beth: I see it as that like little hurt person who may not know how to express themselves and then projecting it right onto what they think their kid is experiencing, and that’s not right or wrong or good or bad.

I think that it just is. But if we can have some awareness around what is my story and what am I projecting, that’s my kid’s story. I think that we would give ourselves a little bit of a break and some grace and then our kids can have a little bit more freedom. I’ll put myself in this bucket because I know I’ve done it before is project some of of mine into just like, what I think his experience is. And it’s just so unfair because it’s not his. Or it may be, but it may not be. But that takes a whole lot of awareness To really do that. And I think I remember a moment where [00:12:00] this sort of happened for me, where again, talking about wanting to be part of, right.

Part of like other families. So I always tried to create that and see what people were doing for dinner. But it was like, I’m too busy for dinner. And they was like, don’t you all have dinner? But everybody was in different directions anyway. I remember saying to somebody at one point, should I stop asking? She said yes,

Nina: Oh wow. Like the other parent said, stop asking.

Beth: I knew that my sort of feelings of where’s my family, where’s my community? it’s him and I and wanting to create that with other families. So I was watching it happen with everybody else. so I would ask this one person, you know, do you want to do this? Do you want to have dinner? Blah, blah, blah. And she and I finally said, it sort of came outta my mouth, should I stop asking?

Nina: I am sitting with that and it’s hard, like it’s hard. I’m, I’m struggling even hearing it, and yet I wonder if she, in a very painful, hard way and I don’t even know a better way to do it. Did you a favor so that you would put your energy elsewhere?

Beth: Right. [00:13:00] Well,

Nina: did in her own way.

Beth: you know, this person has, uh, a bigger family and in a lot of different directions, it may not have been about me at all. It may have been, I don’t know. But again, I had to think about, well, does my son even want to go there? Maybe he doesn’t, maybe this is about me.

And looking back now, I actually feel like. those times that we had together were really sacred, where maybe we weren’t with a huge group of people all the time, and that was my experience. , I think I knew that was my discomfort and feeling lonely and maybe not his at all.

Nina: You know, Beth, something similar happened to me where in the early days of me living in Minnesota, in my twenties, I also was like trying to make plans with certain people. And it’s very similar. I would reach out, give a date, give a date, oh, that date doesn’t work. And I think the person said to me. Really nothing this summer is gonna work. And it was sort of similar to the story you’re telling me. And it really was embarrassing and humiliating at the time, but also liberating. because I was like, okay. I mean, I didn’t say, oh, okay. I was much more embarrassed [00:14:00] than that, in my heart. But I did eventually faster than I would’ve otherwise moved on.

And I’m glad she really did me a favor because I did eventually make good friends here, but only because I stopped barking up the wrong tree. You have to stop barking up the wrong tree.

Beth: But I think if we want to connect the dots from this to also the difference between when we were growing up and our kids, they see what every and so do we, what everybody is doing on social media. it’s hard when you see a group of people doing something or families doing something and you may not be included, your kid may not be included, and that all just kind of ties into just really noticing is this mine or is this my child’s?

And I think we do a real disservice because the other piece is when you think about, I like to be around a lot of people, i’m definitely like, I’m an extrovert. I also like my alone time, but I love being around people. My son does too. But I think in general, when we think about who you are as a friend and what you want, that really just may be different from your [00:15:00] kids.

Part of this looking at what was your experience with friendships growing up may be completely different also because your kid is not you,

Nina: that’s right.

Beth: you are somebody who likes to be out all the time and likes to be around people all the time. Your kid may not be, and can you accept that? Can you accept that your child may not want have to have plans all weekend or every night.

Nina: And then also you may have several kids who have different personalities and one is home all the time and one is out all the time. I think that can be confusing for parents too. because it could feel like the one who’s home more, something’s wrong and maybe nothing’s wrong. That’s, there’s just their temperament.

Beth: that’s the point. When a kid is home because they’re so overscheduled and because they’re on social media and all the things, and all the things, and parents I know are also incredibly overscheduled and busy as well when they’re home quiet or doing nothing or relaxing, and then we automatically say, well, why are you doing anything? What’s wrong?

[00:16:00] Maybe nothing is wrong.

Nina: What if you know that they don’t want to be though? what if it is a situation where they’re, I know it’s, look a little veering off the topic. I’m just curious on your advice, I am imagining the listeners like, okay, fine, but what if they really is an issue? What if they were dropped from the group text, uh, on Snapchat and that’s why they’re home because they actually don’t know what the plans were. They don’t know until they see on Snap Map where everyone is.

Beth: It is really hard to see your kid struggle and it is devastating to see when they have been left out. And I work with a lot of kids who are dropped from the friend group. That does tie into this conversation because it ties into again how, what is your experience as an adult with the friend group and. With the other parents where are you included? Where are you not included? How do you include people? How do you intentionally exclude people? And so when you see your child, if they are left out, it’s really hard. And I think today it happens so quickly of you don’t know if you’re gonna be in or out today or tomorrow.

You may get dropped from the group chat. [00:17:00] You may all of a sudden like, Nope, you’re not allowed to sit at the lunch table. I think when you ask what can we do about that, I think be present.

Nina: Yes, yes, Beth. That’s really it. I’m telling you. It’s, it’s happened in this house. I hear from a lot of people it’s like they want their kid back in. I can tell you it’s, I think I’ve talked about it on the podcast. It’s definitely happened to one of my kids, and it was really for the best. That wasn’t the right group for that

Beth: But they don’t think that at the time.

Nina: , Not maybe immediately but it didn’t take too long and probably saved the rest of school for that child of mine, because then that child had a chance to find the right friends. what I’m seeing, a lot of are parents getting favors from the other parent friends in the group, even if they’re not close friends. It’s just like, oh, we’ve been raising these kids together all these years. can you do me a favor? Can we get so-and-so invited to Halloween? Can we get so-and-so in the homecoming group? And I. talk about this a lot on the podcast.

I think it’s so damaging. I don’t really know what to tell them to do instead, to be honest, I just know that that’s not a great idea because you are only [00:18:00] prolonging the inevitable. Okay, fine. So your friend did you a favor and got your kid invited to homecoming. Now what? What about next month and next month and next the lunch table, all the

Beth: No, you’re right. You’re right. It feels like as a parent sometimes, like, I need to fix it. I want to solve this problem. I don’t want my kid to feel upset. I want them to feel pain. I want them to belong, and yes, yes, yes, and yes, and yes. It is a disservice to them because first of all, they know that you’ve done it.

They know. And then it leads them to feeling not capable and that they can’t do it, and they can. We just have to give them the chance. Give them the time. So I think that question of like, what do you do? I think it is being present and listening and validating and not using the don’t worry about it.

It’s gonna be fine on Monday or don’t worry about it. Just go be friends with so-and-so. giving them the space and if they want to talk about it or not. ‘ they may guarded and not want to share. Some may share a lot, but I think giving the space [00:19:00] and accepting them for exactly where they are and acknowledging that like, yeah, this sucks. Period.

But it’s also what is it like for you to sit with someone when they’re uncomfortable or where they’re upset? So if your kid’s upset, what is it like for you to sit and not fix it

Nina: It’s hard.

Beth: and not solve it? It’s hard, but it’s gold. when you’re stressed and someone tells you to relax, how annoying is that?

Nina: Yes it is.

Beth: It’s like, thanks. I didn’t, I didn’t know and I didn’t try that relaxing. you think about it when, if you are feeling a certain way about something and you just want to maybe be heard, I think something that we can say to our kids and to our friends is something along the lines of, do you want me to respond or do you want me to listen?

Nina: That’s

Beth: Do you want to talk about it right now or do you not? And then let it go.

Nina: That’s really great.

Beth: I don’t know if it always works, by the way, but I do know that [00:20:00] constant questioning is not helping.

Nina: What other major things are coming up in your work around this? Around parent expectations and our own expectations for our friendships or for our kids’ friendships especially.

Beth: I think with that level of awareness of what is, what’s coming up for me or for, for any parent when something happens with your child, and then to also really notice what it is that you are modeling in your current relationships, what your child sees you doing. I think that is just something, again, to continue to think about are you intentionally excluding people?

Are you more open to different groups of people, different friends? How do you manage something when there is a conflict? And then you can talk about it with your kid in a way that is sort of subtle. but I am, I am definitely seeing a lot of stress and anxiety really around friend groups. And I see it in adults all the time.

Nina: Oh, same. Yes,

Beth: All the time. who’s [00:21:00] not invited, who is invited? Don’t take a picture because this one wasn’t included. and it, it makes me really sad. And I think there’s a balance. And I think this is something though we of course are going to spend more time with people that we have more in common with, with people that we feel where we trust them, where it’s more aligned. And that is beautiful friendship. And is there room for meeting new people and getting to know new people and having friends that are, maybe not as close? And are building new relationships, so I think modeling that is important.

Nina: One thing I struggle to answer for people because I guess I struggle with it in my own life and I actually think I do personally if I may pat myself on the back. I am good at having lots of different levels of friendship and I’m always open to new friends and I preach a lot that you’re never too old to make new friends.

I think it’s healthy to bring out different sides of you that new friends bring, that you can’t even develop if you’re only always friends with the same people forever. The flip. Kind of like you were getting at. things can also get [00:22:00] really watered down if everything’s 15 people.

So let’s say people want to go on a trip with three other women. I think as adults, I wish we could all give each other a little bit of a break. And I brought this up earlier, but you’re not labeling everybody exclusive or a mean girl or whatever because they’re a 45-year-old woman who doesn’t want to go on a trip with 18 people.

everyone’s calling everyone else cliquey and mean and all these things, and it’s like, I don’t know, is it mean to be an adult and, and not want to have to get four hotel rooms and stuff, people in them and always take four Ubers everywhere.

Sometimes we need intimate time. And so how do you leave balance that with, being kind and inclusive?

because I’m kind of a people pleaser and so I hate to disappoint anybody. I’m not just kind of a peaceful pleaser. that’s a real understatement. I’m a massive people pleaser. I hate for anyone to think I’m not nice and whatever. And yet, I. I’m actually not a big, huge group person. I, I like things smaller and, I feel like I can’t focus when there’s a lot of people and I live in fear of people thinking I’m exclusive. It’s really an issue.

Beth: Yeah, no, I understand. But I think if you and I were to have a relationship [00:23:00] I would know that about you and

Nina: Oh, that’s interesting.

Beth: I wouldn’t expect you to come on the big girls trip, but I’d say let’s make sure that we have time

Nina: I’m worried about the opposite. I’m not worried about saying no to stuff. I have no problem with that. I’m more worried like I’m gonna be the one who plans something smaller. because I like the smaller thing. And then other people will be upset that I didn’t include them. I have no problem being like, no, thank you.

Beth: I feel the same way.

Nina: Do you see what I’m saying? It’s different than I don’t feel left out anymore, as much as I worry about leaving other people out.

Beth: I understand. I feel the

Nina: Yeah. But as I get older, I’m getting less tolerant of everybody being labeled exclusive and mean because they don’t want everything to be like girls go wild spring break. They just want it to be a quiet night.

Beth: So I think my response to that would be like, let’s continue to look at that with curiosity. And some self-compassion and maybe there’s not an exact answer for that. because I understand. I feel that same way of I wouldn’t ever want anyone to feel left out, but sometimes you want that time with one person or [00:24:00] two people.

Nina: Our work is different, but we both talk about some of the same topics. For me, that’s part of it, is that I’m out here encouraging people to be friends and go out and make friends and do things. And I mean it, and I’ve been writing and talking about it for 10 years and yeah, maybe I, I get worried of seeming like a hypocrite if I don’t include everybody in everything, even though that’s not what I’m out there saying.

That you could never just be with a friend or two.

Beth: I understand.

Nina: right? Because you’re talking to people about friend groups and being dropped from the friend group

Beth: But again, I think if we want to like circle back around to just how our experience sets expectations for our kids, we could have an entire therapy session about

Nina: I sort of feel like you’re like, Nina, you might maybe could use a little

Beth: and you can But it is really interesting, right?

It is. Why is that so important to you to feel like you don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings? Or why is it so important for you to feel like, I want to make sure nobody is left out and by I feel the same way. I never want anyone to feel left out, but I think keep coming back to

Nina: yeah. Why? That’s a good question. Like I would sooner not plan a party for myself than leave anyone out. Like I [00:25:00] end up planning big parties. I do like, I’ll have like a big 40th or a big, you know, I’m getting closer to 50 now. I’m already thinking I’m 48, I’m already thinking about my 50th and I’m like, oh, maybe we’ll just go on a trip.

My husband just the two of us so that I don’t have to even deal with this. Am I having a hundred people or am I having just the two of us? That’s kind of the only option. That’s how I see it.

Beth: I think it’s just an interesting thing to look at, and I think any of it can, we look at our own stuff and observe our kids’ experiences with more compassion and less judgment.

Nina: It is so interesting, Beth, this will be the final thing. I tell you as I’m talking, I’m learning a lot of stuff about myself and thinking about it. I think that when I know one of my kids is Making a decision that will probably leave someone out and hurt their feelings. I am upside down about it, and that is so clearly coming from my own because sometimes maybe my kid could have made a nicer choice and sometimes can my kid not have agency over their own social life?

They have to make their own mistakes. I really believe that. And also, maybe it’s not a [00:26:00] mistake. The thing I’m labeling a mistake isn’t always a mistake. It’s them not being so tied up in, oh, what does everyone think? What does everyone think? Maybe that kid’s a little more courageous and can plan her own birthday party without feeling paralyzed by the decisions.

Beth: Right. So as this conversation continues, you are gaining awareness of just through our conversation. Wait a minute. I feel like maybe my experience is affecting how I’m observing my kids’ experience again, let’s not make it right or wrong or good or bad. Because when you were saying before just because you decide to have dinner or a weekend with four people does not mean that you are exclusive, or does it mean that you’re mean?

Nina: Intimate. That’s a nicer

Beth: re Yes. Maybe we can reframe exclusivity. I mean, I think there is intentional exclusivity from a place of negativity or fear or anger. There’s intentional exclusivity around a desire to be more intimate. That’s from a place of love and connection with the people you want to be with. [00:27:00] But maybe we just need to not call it being exclusive.

Nina: I’m thinking also about how. again, trying not to wedge our kids into situations that they might not belong. And sometimes chemistry is not good and we’re not there to see it. maybe our kid was dropped because they don’t get along with the other kids or they’re, there’s not a good fit.It doesn’t mean anything’s wrong with our kid, it’s just not the

Beth: right

Nina: fit.

Beth: it’s possible that that group of people, they’re drinking a lot and maybe this kid doesn’t like to drink, and so they’re like, what do we need you for?

Maybe there’s a group of kids who are choosing not to drink and one kid Is drinking it’s not a fit anymore. So we just don’t know. But I, if we can be in these conversations with our kids with more curiosity and really check in what belongs to me take a little bit of our own adult time timeout around okay, I gotta just think about this for a minute. What is this activating in me?

I think it takes practice. I think it takes a lot of practice. And I can say that in my role [00:28:00] as mom, when I started to sort of gain more awareness on things and I was a little bit more quiet, there was a shift. because he’d be like, hello, hello. Why aren’t you saying anything? I’m like, I’m just, I’m just thinking for a minute.

Nina: Oh, that’s very powerful actually. Yes, to be quiet, be present, be curious. And less fixing. Less judging, less labeling.

Beth: Listening. Ask questions before we get to a like, well, why aren’t you going? Or, I mean, ask questions, but not that kind of question.

So I think one thing to consider is that there is a space in between how we react to something and how we respond to something. And that’s all the space of awareness. And we don’t know until we know.

So I think really being able to take a minute and practice how to become aware of what our own stuff is before we project it on what we may perceive as a struggle for our kids may or may not be. And when we can give ourselves a little bit of space from that. Maybe heal the parts of ourselves that we’re feeling that discomfort.

We can [00:29:00] see something different in our kids, observe from a different lens of more compassion and curiosity.

Nina: Beth, thank you so much. These are such wonderful, reasonable things to suggest that we do. This isn’t massive changes. they’re small and powerful just to wait to listen, to think about that space between the responding the reacting. I like all that so much.

Beth: and it’s all normal. It’s all very normal. We’re all in it together.

Nina: Yes, that too. I’ll have in the show notes the way people can find you and for people who can actually attend your in-person events. I am jealous and And they should. And I’ll have that available too to everybody in the show notes that, thank you so much for being here. I know I’ll see you back online because we’re connected in many ways

Beth: Absolutely. Thank you so much, Nina.

Nina: and everyone else come back next week when our friendships are going well. We are happier all around. Bye. [00:30:00]