If I Speak - 12: How to be a good friend

Episode Date: May 7, 2024

Moya and Ash get deep and meaningful on the subject of true friendship, and help a listener who’s feeling weird about dating a “normie”. Plus: blame game pass-the-parcel. Got a problem? Tell us: [e-mail] *Gossip, elevated.* Music by Matt Huxley.

Hello, hello, hello! You have wandered into the Bureau of Gossip'm moyle ovi mcclain and i've got ash sarkar live and direct raring to go ash what are this week's headlines for you this week's headlines are that i feel a tiny bit frazzled by just like stupid little tasks and i think it's just because i've been like working quite hard so then when you don't have like a tidy room or you're like oh god the cat food delivery is gonna come when I'm recording the podcast you just have this like base level of kind of like stress hormone coursing through you and the shoulders creep up to the ears but other than that I think I'm good what are your headlines how are you doing oh I had I'm emerging from the longest January of my life.

This January has lasted four months. It has been bleak in the extreme. The sad's got me big time. There's been a lot of stuff that's happened. And I've done some major reckoning with myself as a result of that, which is great. I was describing it to you earlier as it feels like the aftermath of a breakup, which is always a time when I'm very raw, but I can actually reflect on myself and my mistakes and my flaws. And it leads usually to like a great period of personal growth. So I'm quite glad now. I feel like'm out of the the sads and into the time to grow

stage and things are on the up I know things on the up because I started re-entering society again and by that I mean hinge I've got tattoos booked I've got hair booked I've got hinge booked I've got holidays booked I'm seeing people again it's it's yeah it's coming up millhouse but it's it hadn't been for it been kirk for a while and now we're back to millhouse i've got a race car bed yeah i had a race car bed while someone was sleeping in a big bed with their wife for a while but we're now what was your what was your number one self-revelation uh well i mean that's a whole that's a whole, I think actually we're going to speak to a little bit in the intrusive thought segment

that we'll be doing later. That's a trailer. But I think my major revelation was just that I've been acting from a place of shame and low self-esteem much more than I thought I had been. And the way I've been navigating my relationships both professional and personal it's not to say that you know I'm a terrible person and I've been you know behaving poorly but I definitely have been feeling for a while there's a lot of

untapped emotions that I couldn't quite understand and I felt I really lost touch with my sense of self my identity and who I really like was and perhaps that's because it was in shift but I did a lot of realizing about my tendency to be massively codependent and that doesn't mean what people think it means it actually means that you are putting everyone else's needs before yours even when they don't ask so it's this unsolicited martyring is how I describe it. And that the only way I thought I could be of value to other people was through just constantly providing for them to a point of being almost like, sometimes controlling, but also, and then I'd get resentful when the same energy wasn't reciprocated

rather than having like these mutual loving relationships all around so that's something I'm really grappling with but I think we'll talk about that more later unsolicited martyring are you sure you're not south asian what can I say globalization baby like we're all influenced by everyone nowadays I was like that is the most bingoli phrase i've ever heard in my life i love that god you could that makes me so proud that makes me really happy that that sounds like you're one of us please uh collect your mango pickle at the door are you are you ready for our traditional icebreaker yes i am even though we just kind of did a bit of ice breaking that was that was that

was like smashing the ice which went straight to the earth's core immediately i mean that was you just like driving the ice breaking ship through the like glacier but now we're going back to chipping away at the sculpture the sculpture to create something beautiful so in the spirit of vogue 73 questions but minus 70 because we don't have the time or the ip let's begin tell us about a secret talent that you possess um i can sing quite well not amazingly not amazingly but well enough that when people hear me sing they're like oh you've got pipes but I feel like I'm better at singing uh when I have a pitch that I can um adhere to I'm quite like I think I'm a contra alto but I'm I'm quite good at singing good enough that if I'm karaoke then people are like oh wow but I prefer to I think

the point of karaoke though isn't to be good at singing it's to give a show so I prefer to do like rather I won't ever do a Whitney because A, I can't reach those notes. But also I think that you're asking for failure if you do a Whitney. Whereas I'll definitely do an Alanis or I'll do Red Hot Chili Peppers. I've seen you do your Red Hot Chili Peppers. It's very, very good. Where's the most visually beautiful place that you've ever been? Oh, God.

The places that stand out, the Caribbean, British Virgin Islands, Lake Como. That was sensational. So beautiful. I think Lake Como might be the most beautiful, visually stunning place I've been, but also a specific train ride that I made while I was going on a mini inter-ailer in 2022.

I want to say when I went through the Swiss northern Italy from Switzerland down to northern Italy there's a there's a train ride which you go all the way through like all the lakes and that was so gorgeous but yeah I think I think what I'm thinking about just overall consistently beautiful it would be Lake Como northern Italy um but there's so many places what's yours um the thing that comes to mind is when I saw the Pacific Ocean for the first time so we'd been traveling through Mexico and we'd started at the Gulf of Mexico end and we'd gone from um you know the Yucatan Peninsula down to closer to the border with Guatemala. So, you know, San Cristobal, which is where the Zapatista uprising happened.

And then we went over to the Oaxaca coast. And I was so excited because this was the ocean that I'd never seen before. And I don't know why, but that exerted such a huge romantic pull on me. And when we got there down to the beach and you stood in the surf, it's so powerful because these are waves which have been building up from these tiny ripples, literally thousands and thousands of miles away

without ever touching land. And so when it crashes into your legs, it is just so humbling. Like it really is. You're like, I am this tiny speck and nature is so majestic and powerful. And the color of these like powerful waves, the sort of like see-through turquoise that I'd never seen in my life, but like also, you know, slightly opaque from, from the bubbles contained within I was just bowled over by it and so while there are other landscapes that I've seen which are more

beautiful or you know more sort of aesthetically pleasing more easy to photograph there was something about that experience with the waves and knowing that this you know wave crashing into me it traveled thousands and thousands of miles that i was just nuts about it and i was like maybe the romantic poets had a point about nature i've got a last question for you and it is an axis that i came up with i'm so excited claxon claxon how do we make the axis claxon i don't know axon i like axon i'm gonna all right are you ready i'm so ready okay so the horizontal axis is oil spill or bank vault right where are you in terms of emotional regulation are you oil spill or are you bank vault oil spill you know this you know where i am in terms of emotional regulation are you kidding wait wait

wait and the vertical axis is vamp or clown oh i'm an oil spill clown i think maybe you're a little bit more vamp than that do you know what this is this is actually a uh I think this is the difference between my self-perception how people see me because when we're talking about vamp you you do mean like sexy right yeah yeah I think when I always say like oh I'm you know I'm a jester people like no you're very sexy but I think it's I think it's I I think internally I don't match the external not to be like i look femme fatale but i'm actually just a clown internally i am a ridiculous clown like very goofy um externally i think i'm betrayed by my my appearance there's no way to put that without sounding like so

egotistical but like i'm sorry that i'm really hot but actually I'm really funny I'm not I'm not even funny I'm just a goof like I'm I'm an awkward goof uh so it's it's a it's a there's a real there's a real contrast there and I think people often approach me thinking that I'm going to be this like femme fatale really suave person and then I'll sort of like talk to them get really awkward trip over knock my head roll out the door like it's a it's a real clown state so I think I think I am internally oil spill clown um but it also depends on who you're with because with a stranger maybe I am a bank vault zap bam and very aloof and very mysterious but that's just the awkwardness what are you i am obviously a clown bank vault i think that's i think that's correct with the with the vibe that you give me

i was saying earlier before we recorded my special talent is dissociation i'm like bam the separated mind from body like whatever is happening to the body, the mind is not here, which makes me very resilient. And that's the good side of dissociation. But the bad side is that like mega, mega repressed. And I also think that my clown identity comes from the fact that I'm very uncomfortable

with the vulnerability that comes with being outwardly sexual so i retreat to the comforts of the circus um rather than just to say you are really hot but you you definitely lean into like i'm joker i'm fun rather than i'm homie simpson yeah I mean, you're a really hot clown. All the other clowns in the circus want to be around you. I'm a super hot clown. But again, it's about

how do you want people to relate to you? I want people to relate to me as a clown because that feels a lot safer. So clown, bank vault. Shall we move on to your intrusive thought? It's something I've been thinking about lots and lots and lots and i actually did consider deeply whether to bring it onto the podcast um but what is a podcast for if not for introducing conversations that you should be having in real life with other people um when instead you can be doing clown to clown communication

so it's like what is a podcast if not a cry for help yeah I mean this is this is actually a side note which is I've been trying to every time I think of something talk about the podcast I do try and actually talk about it to people first because I realize this is not just like a therapy space this is something people are going to listen to and i have to um i have a responsibility if i want to have these conversations in general i should have them in some manner or bring them up or reference them um to the people that they directly affect i've had conversations around this and that's now i feel resolved in how i'm sort of like thinking about this a bit more that's when i'm ready to bring it to the podcast and to discuss it with you and get the hard truths because you'll give me the hard truths. Okay, shall I get intrusive? So here is something that has been coming up for me recently,

which is what does it mean to be a good friend? And I've always considered myself a pretty good friend I talked earlier about codependency and how I put the needs I perceive for others above my own because I think that's the value that I'm bringing to any relationship even when they don't ask but you know my friends I think would say that I'm always, they do say like, you're always there for me. You're always there to analyze my problems, give me advice and, you know, spend time with me. I reach out to them. Like I'm constantly like, okay, talk to me, talk to me. How are you feeling? How are you feeling? But recently I've been questioning how good a friend I actually am or the way that I approach friendships because first of all does being a good friend mean supporting your friend like however they say they want supporting even if that goes against

your instincts so how do you also stop yourself projecting onto your friends how do you stop trying to you know think you know what's best for your friends and act in that or is it that sometimes you should be challenging them uh and when do you go from caring to controlling that's another thing because we talked about the mummy tyrant axis before and i always identify as like a mummy tyrant and it's like that can be that can be very controlling i was i was discussing someone someone on um hinge was asking uh what's like your role in your group? And I said, oh, you know, I'm the chief like vibe facilitator. And they said, wow, that can get a bit dictatorial, can't it? Like they made a joke about vibes a dong.

And I said, funny, because my nickname is Chairman Mayo. So like, and then also how much can you demand from your friends? Like if a dynamic doesn't fulfill you and you discuss that but nothing changes should you readjust what you expect from your friends are you asking too much from certain people are you trying to dictate the way that friendship should go is there a rule like i i do wonder as i get older am i a good friend or am i just like a codependent manipulator so this is what I'm bringing to the table today what does it mean to be a good friend I think this is such an interesting question and

it's also interesting that you're asking it so I think that in itself there's so much to unpack and get into and then there's also the thing to unpack about like why are you bringing this question at this time and And what does that say? Not just about your relationship to other people, but your relationship to yourself and how you feel about the role that you play and whether or not that is meeting your needs anymore and whether it needs to change.

When I listen to what you're saying, there's one really big ingredient that's missing and that's time so it sort of seems to me that you're asking this question of what does it mean to be a good friend and this idea that you can calibrate it perfectly in the moment rather than thinking about a friendship which is stretched out over a period of you know many many years if you're lucky and what it means to be a good friend being judged on that kind of duration rather than moment to moment because I actually think that kind of moment to moment rumination is paralyzing and it's intensely anxious because what it almost sounds like you're doing is that in that moment of connection you're going like am I good enough is this meeting your needs what is this should we take a step outside of ourselves

as well how in the moment am I um rather than going like okay well over the course of time that I've known you how well have I met your needs how well have I understood you how in tune do we feel how in tune do we feel now compared to where we were before and is that likely to change again and will we come back together because yeah for me what does it mean to be a good friend? Instinctively, I don't answer that in terms of how do you support your friend or what are the things that you do? Because that will obviously change. For me, the mark of a good friendship, and that's different from just being a good friend, which is a matter of identity, but the mark of a good, and that's relational and that's dynamic, is how you deal with change together.

Because the nature of a friendship is that you're going to do a lot of changing. You're going to form relationships with other people that will change you. Things will change in your life, like where you live and what you do. Maybe even the things that you value and then you're going how does our connection evolve along with with those changes or perhaps stay the same and be a really important source of grounding so yeah for me it's about dealing with change um but yeah i suppose what are the things you're feeling at the moment, which are bringing this question to the fore? GDPR.

Okay, so there's been just several things that have... There's people in my life are going through change um people that i love very dearly and it's been a question of am i supporting them in the way that they need or am i supporting them in the way that i like want to dictate um they haven't they haven't really brought that to me it's something that i've been considering as well uh also related to family members who are going through stuff as well um and I think I think I've also it's I'm at a period when like a lot of people my age I think start questioning you know their identity and what they put value in and how they go about stuff and I my value has been a lot of my value has been put in my work I my self-esteem has put into my work I talked about this before

because you know I I have I think a fear of putting that into romantic relationships because I don't think it will meet my expectations and it will leave me unfulfilled but I still have all this energy and need for validation so I just put it into my work and then will leave me unfulfilled but I still have all this energy and need for validation so I just put it into my work and then I put it into my friendships and I don't think I'd realized until very recently how much of my self-worth is linked to feeling like I'm valuable to others but I only feel valuable to others if I'm constantly providing for them whether that's from being on call on WhatsApp 24 seven, even when they don't ask me to. And then, as I said, resenting that I am tired,

I'm, you know, I'm burnt out and I'm still there being like, tell me about your issue. Like, let's go through this. Let's unpack this bit by bit. Or if that's just, you know, on a night out and I'm like, no no I'll get all your drinks don't worry I'll get all of this I'll get your meal I'll do all of this and I've done that to different degrees for as long as I can remember but for the first time because of the different things that have happened I'm really questioning you know is this healthy for both me and other people is this actually support or is it a way of trying to buy love from them and i think what i'm really worried about is if i if i i've like i'm trying to be less codependent i'm trying

to be someone who isn't just always instantly responsive or going above and beyond what people have asked for um to provide for them to try and build a healthier thing but there's such a there's a in in the space i'm drawing back from there's such a void because i don't know who i am without just constantly providing organizing facilitating that's the way i i show value and so i'm trying to like grasp who i am without that like what is my personality um and also just i have this deep fear that they won't love me anymore like this really deep you'll see me for what I am which is just like quite loud and annoying and short and bossy and you won't want to be around me I don't provide value if I'm not just you know throwing big parties and everyone wants to come to the party just so they can be there it I used to make

a joke all the time that I like bringing people together because I can then sit back and they'll still think fondly of me because they've met all these amazing people but I don't actually have to like put myself in in the middle of the conversation but I realize now what that is is I don't trust myself to be engaging or like lovable on my own so I just want other people to do that work and if I bring other people together then they are doing that for me and I can just kind of like bask in the, you know, the off, not off cuts, what's the word? Radiated warmth. Yeah, yeah, the radiated warmth,

the secondhand warmth from being the person who brought those people together in the first place because I don't think on my own that I'm lovable enough. And I think this undercuts a lot of what people think, which is everyone I talk, well, most people I talk to, maybe it's because I'm drawn to certain types of people, but underneath a lot of, people think which is everyone I talk most people I talk to maybe it's because I'm drawn to certain types of people but underneath a lot of you know anxieties neuroses however they present tends to be this core belief that either you're not really lovable or you're a bad person

you're going to hurt other people and that one day someone's going to find that out and that's what you know lots of fear of abandonment lots of this codependency comes from. So I don't think it's a unique feeling. It's just, I hadn't perceived it myself. I always thought, yeah, I'm so lovable. I'm all of this and that. And for the first time I'm realizing actually maybe at my core, this isn't a belief I hold. It's like a Scooby-Doo unmasking where you're like, oh my God, it was low self-esteem all along. I mean, I think there's so much to say to this I think the first thing is we've never really talked about this directly but there is a tiny bit of an age difference between us so I'm 32 and you're 29 29 I felt like this in my 20s and I don't feel like this now and I very much played that same role where the thing

that I prided myself on doing was bringing together groups of people individuals and watching this social group form around me and that was at a time where I had very intense doubts about my own lovableness. And those doubts have since faded. One, because of super committed relationships. And then two, because this community that was first being brought together through like fun and hedonism has now become a community of intense reciprocal care, which is directed at me, I direct outwards and is, you know, directed amongst each other as well. These are groups of people who I first introduced and have now become very, very good friends, very, very like, you know, loyal and reciprocal to one another. So again, the ingredient of time changed what had been in some ways an expression of my need to belong, my anxieties around not not being lovable. It then changed into a source of real strength and a feeling of being held

and not belonging because someone has assessed me and found me adequate, but belonging because these people will love me at my worst, at my most withdrawn and at my most distanced and at my most confused and at my most wobbly. They'll love me at my most fun and extroverted. They'll love me at my most prickly. They'll love me at my most warm. And that's because over that period of really eight years, we've had enough shared experiences as a group which aren't just centered around fun and are centered around, you know, moments of uncertainty to go, all right, this has given me a real sense of stability. So I think things can change over time and the circumstances around you can have an impact on your self-perception. That's very, very good. So that's the first thing, which is how you're feeling was very much a feature of my twenties. It's not a feature of my 30s. What is a feature of my 30s is feeling that I've got these responsibilities

and I'm always slipping up on them. And that's not just to do with friends, it's very much to do with family as well. And I think when you're somebody who derives a huge amount of your sense of self from being the person who can spin all the plates right you can spin the plate of career and you can spin the plate of friendship you can spin the plate of family um one of the things that I've observed within my own friendship group is that all the women who I'm close to are parentified children by which I mean they played a co-parenting role in their families and that's because I did that and my closest female friends have done that as well um you know my partner did that a bit as well but he was also an older brother so it's perhaps a bit more a bit

more natural to play that role and I actually find people who just got to be the baby very, very difficult to be around. Like I can maybe have a bit of fun with them. But the idea of like a deep and profound friendship, like nah, like all my female friends are parentified children and have played that role. And I think that it's a chosen problem. And it comes back to, you know, how do you see yourself? I see myself as the person who chooses the problems that come with responsibility rather than problems that come from just expressing yourself as those feelings come up. And I gravitate towards people who do that as well. And the flip side of that is always a feeling of not doing enough or there's something else in the back of my mind like you know right now for me that thing is to do with my mum because

you know I lost my stepdad in March it's a huge transition for my mom's massive transition for my siblings as well and in the back of my mind I'm going am I present enough for you am I am I here enough for you and the thing that my mom said when I was sort of hovering around her and being a bit like what are your needs can I anticipate them I think it might be this maybe we should do this she sort of you know took me by the shoulder and she said I really love that you're doing this and she gave me the pat on the head that I needed and she was saying you are my rock you are the person who I can turn to but this is a path that I can only walk alone and that's a part of life and you've got to let me do it and it was both a pat on the head and a little bit of a like down girl that I needed and it

was something that also held that mirror up and said in this time of like intense grief and uncertainty I needed to fill that huge void that had been left by this loss with an affirmation of my role as being the useful one the responsible one the person that can anticipate and meet people's needs and I think that like, at the moment, the way that you're presenting it as, it's a bit of an either or. It's like, this role that I play, well, it's entirely born of my low self-esteem. It's entirely born of like, you know, a gap in who I am. And there's truth in that. But what's also true is that neurotic people make the world go round and you are also doing something very important my cat food delivery is here can we hold this i'll be right back

it's here if i speakers yes unboxing time all right you're talking about how neurotic people make the world go around so neurotic people make the world go around maybe if you want to pick it up from there oh i want to pick it up you you hadn't finished what you were saying no that was that was the close of my thought i don't even know what to say because i'm like i'm still still thinking through these things uh yeah i think i think you're right it's not it doesn't have to be an either or I think there's so much value in being someone who does try and create relationships of support and care I just have to lean away from the instinct of being controlling within them and trying to dictate them on my terms.

So if I see a friend engaging in behaviors that I think are harmful, it's like, how can I support that person without projecting my very rigid ideas of what's good for them onto them in a way that will just inject our relationship with you know shame rather than this idea of I will support you even if I don't totally think the path you're going down is good for you but I'm still gonna be here for you uh that's something that I'm trying to like grapple with as well it's it's kind of links to like the ideas we were talking about in what you do if your friend is a bad partner but it's it's more like if you see your friend engaging in a self-destructive cycle there's ways to materially support them but you cannot pull

them out of it you cannot save them and something i'm trying to interrogate in myself is why do i always feel like i need to fix someone? Like what, what is that saying about me? Cause it's not really about my friends at all. It's about me and my need to like fix people. I do. I thought it was interesting what you said about parentified children. Cause I, in my,

in my family setup, we, you know, it was, it was, I grew up with a matriarchy, but it was like me, my mom,

my sister, my sister and I are very close together in age and I without going into like too much detail I would definitely like sort of like adult emotions were very much put on us from a young age my mother's an amazing parent but like it was a three a house of three women just like hanging out on their own so things would get things got like pressured and heated a lot and there were lots of adult emotions I was privy to from a young age that I think made me feel responsible and I I think I feel very guilty because in some ways I did reject I took on the role of like parenting but I also rejected it um and I think I I sort of let down my sister quite a lot in in lots of ways um so I'm getting quite emotional talking about this um oh my god no not the first I was like

where is the first person yeah it's the klaxon I was like who's gonna be the first person to cry on the podcast um and I think I think I yeah in a lot of ways uh didn't do the best job I could have done with my sister and I feel so guilty about that and the way that I I think I resented that she was the baby of the family and also that she she has like her own like a lot of her own stuff going on um and we've had you know i don't want to go too much she's got like fragmented relationships over the years and she has fed back to me she's like i just wanted to be friends a lot of the time and we didn't we grew up with like so we grew up really close but also like mortal enemies so and i i felt this i felt this crushing sense of responsibility to

like look after her make sure she was okay and i couldn't fulfill it i just i couldn't live up to those expectations this is i think you know this really this really really um this makes a lot of sense. And I think there's two things that I'd want to say to that. The first is that in life, you will fail people. And I have failed people and I will again. And And sometimes that failure is a result of my callousness or my ignorance or my selfishness. Sometimes that failure is a matter of capacity, sometimes not being the best placed person. Sometimes it's because I'm in a painful place too. And I think rather than trying to bring the amount you'll fail people down to zero, which is impossible, it's about going, how can I look at that with compassion, both for the person that I failed and also myself as well?

Because you will never achieve a state of perfection where everyone's needs are met. That doesn't mean that you cut yourself off from them or you give up on the idea of responsibility or you give up on the idea of care. But I think it just means an acceptance of the mess of it. it just means an acceptance of the mess of it. And that we have in our head, these idealized pictures of what relationships should be. And I definitely felt that quite recently. And I often say this to,

you know, because my partner and his parents are still together. And like, he's got a really good relationship with his brother. And, you you know there's lots of elements of my family which are quite chaotic especially now like that you know we've lost my stepdad um and I'd say to him like oh my god my family is so much more fucked compared to yours like almost projecting this idea of like you know a kind of picket fence nuclear family onto him and he's like no that's not true that's just not true there is chaos in my family and pain and broken down relationships

they're different they're different to yours but they exist this idealized picture that you have nobody has like absolutely nobody has and i think that um especially when you are someone who derives your identity from like being there for people you can wield this idealized picture against yourself as a weapon you're holding yourself to this impossible standard and you would never ever do that to anybody else you would never say to anybody else all your relationships must look like this you'd be incredibly forgiving of other people's flaws and you kind of have to sit in this dynamic place of both obviously working on yourself and striving to be better because i think we've got a responsibility to do that and i think that's important whilst also

being accepting of yourself i think these two things have to happen at the same time is it contradictory yes but that's what it means to be human to be contradictory um and i suppose like another thing uh that i'd say about it is coming back to this idea of control um the queen herself nigella lawson when she was talking about the urge to cook for other people said that a lot of people just see that as a caring response but it's actually also a controlling one and when I think about care and control I think that there is this relationship between the two because also when you care for people and you take control of a situation and you go this is what it means to be responsible and this is what it means to meet the needs in a way I think that's also you exerting control, not just over another

person, but of the chaos that is life. And to sort of build up an image of yourself as being capable of dealing with it and controlling it and marshalling it. That's not the worst sin in the world. But there are drawbacks as well as benefits. And I think that at the moment, you're very, very intensely focused on those drawbacks. That's not a bad thing. You should definitely be aware of them and explore them. But nothing in this life is without drawbacks. And I do very much believe that life is sometimes about choosing your problem.

Should we choose other people's problems? Choose other people's problems. Yeah, I think just to round that discussion off, Should we choose other people's problems? Choose other people's problems. I think just to round that discussion off, this is an ongoing process of realization that I am experiencing, as you can tell from the oil spill in real time, and that I don't currently have a therapist, which you can probably also tell.

I don't have a therapist, I have a podcast. I have a podcast. But I do feel like I'm slightly further along than i was a week ago in being able to reckon with the the more difficult parts and like the shame and also realizing that it's not all drawbacks like there is there's positive elements here it's just being able to like accept myself so that others accept me and that will mitigate or change the way that I use care as control. Um, because I know, I, you know, I've realized like lots of my past romantic relationships have actually been with other codependents who we both were wielding like control and care as a weapon against each other,

or just like a way to control the other person to different degrees um so yeah it's i i'm i'm sort of i'm really excited i feel like a veil has been lifted and that i now have a whole new path of exploration to go down and excavating both self but also just being a better friend it has already changed the way i relate to some of my friends and it's like this again i talk this weight, but it feels like a weight has been lifted in some of my friendships. Like I don't feel the same sense of just constant anxious responsibility. I just feel like love, this love in the space, this love has returned. Without that nagging, I have to save them, I have to fix them, I have to do this, I have to provide for them. Instead, there's just this like affection rather than resentment. So already i can tell the mindset is changing but this discussion has given me even more food for

thought that i will be chewing on because you've cooked for me one last last last thing one last last last last thing um and this is something which i realized in uh recent months is that sometimes being the person who needs saving is a very generous thing to do with your friends. And, you know, earlier in this year, I was like, I am going to deal with the long repressed trauma, which I just pretended wasn't there. And, uh, opened up to my longest standing best friend about it. We've been best friends since we were 11. And it was a really new thing for us for me to say I feel uncertain and I am needy and I am wobbly and I am bambi learning to walk and giving her the chance to be the person who could like you know ride in on the white horse and scoop me up with like advice and recommendations and guidance so sometimes when you're going like am I being a good enough friend actually go

I need to allow other people the chance to be a good friend to me and that can bring you closer together I think that's very very wise advice and i will say no more because we could talk about this for two years we could talk about this for two years i'm sure we will be talking about it for two years this is basically what we're going to talk about for the next two years so everyone lock in now um do you want to read the dilemma or shall i i would like to read the first dilemma i would love you to. Go on, Ash. So it's time for I'm in big trouble, which is our audience submitted dilemma section.

If you have a problem which couldn't possibly be made worse by us, you know what to do. Email ifispeakatnavaramedia.com. That is ifispeakatnavaramedia.com. So here is our first dilemma. Dear If I Speak, I am a big If I Speak listener. I heard you say in one episode, actions speak louder than words when it comes to dating.

I choose not to start sentences with I identify as, but in this case, I have to, to make my dilemma clear. I identify as a somewhat non-binary being, politically somewhere in between eco-anarchism and socialist landscapes. A year and a half ago, I got very drunk in a gay club. Me and you both. I got very drunk in a gay club, got introduced to the only straight guy around who I ended up taking home and having sex with. We've been dating and seeing each other a lot since then. The problem is he's the most normie guy who loves football and beer.

It's me, I'm normie boyfriend. He's somewhat left, but not politically active or anything along those lines. We don't really have intellectual deep convos, but we share the best sexuality together. I am in this constant struggle in my head that I am somewhat denying my beliefs because of dating him. I always pictured myself with a human that I find intellectually impressive. In the beginning of our relationship I tried breaking up with him.

I told him that I want something different from a relationship. He didn't understand why we should stop seeing each other since we were having a great time so I ended up seeing him again and our bond just got stronger. It's very confusing to me because I know, for example, that most of my friends wouldn't even hang out with him, but I somehow feel safe in his normie vibes. I constantly think about breaking up with him, but every time we see each other, I feel so comfortable. He's the most loyal and present person I've ever met. And now taking it back to the action speak louder than words, I have a crush on this non-binary academic who writes about trans rights we hooked up a couple of times

but they made it clear to me it's just a sex thing and I'm like okay great this person can write about all of these important care related topics but treats me like a stupid little snack so why not stay with someone who's always there for me I'm'm very confused, but also maybe all of this is no dilemma at all and I should just chill. Would be amazing to hear your opinion on all this. Moya. Oh, Ash, I always want you to go first because I feel like I feed off what you say

and I want to take a moment to formulate what this person is also saying rather than doing my normal knee jerk reactions. So I hand the baton back to you. I love that you're like, you doing my normal knee jerk reactions so i'm i hand the baton back to you i love that you're like you can do the knee jerk reactions you can do i think that you think you think well you think about you write the script okay you steal this 11 whereas i'm just seeing it now let's get real okay okay all right all right all right. Let's not expose how the sausage gets made. No one wants to see that.

Okay, my thoughts when I'm reading this is that there's an interesting element of subculture here. And I'm, of course, not talking about being non-binary as if it is a subculture., and I'm of course not talking about being non-binary as if it is a subculture. It's so much more than that. It's an identity, it's a way of relating to not just your own gender, but the gender of others. It's something much more profound than a subculture. But the way in which political identity and gender identity is being thought of is very, very subcultural. It's this idea of there are places that you go, there are norms that you adhere to, there are things that you do, and

you're part of a little club of people who present themselves in the same way. And the situation you're in is feeling connected to somebody who isn't part of that subculture at all, feeling connected to somebody who isn't part of that subculture at all and being drawn to someone who very much is part of that subculture and is like a leading light in it right like is literally writing the book on what it means to be part of that subculture um do you want you say you mean like sub community is that like i'm saying subculture almost like almost like the the signaling of being a part of a community not just through your identity and your culture identity as well but yeah yeah like what you wear where you go yeah the sort of um books you read the music you might listen to all of those things and again i'm very much not saying

that being non-binary is a subculture i'm saying the way in which this is being presented is very much through the lens of subculture um and what's missing from just is he nice to you but does he really understand who you are and your differences because that for me is the important part of of who you have a relationship with you know not are they the same as you but how do they relate to your differences um because there are lots of ways in which someone can be very superficially similar to you and be completely completely different so that's where i start this is very much being framed as a subculture rather than who understands me do i feel understood by this man yeah i've i had similar thoughts my first questions are i think yourself and your own

feelings are missing from this dilemma what is so present is the perceptions of other people and how you think other people will perceive your relationships you have this external sort of like out-of-body view of yourself interacting with these two different people um which is normie straight guy who i presume is also cis from the way you're talking about them and then the non-binary academic so you say you know you think you're denying you're like i think i'm denying my beliefs because of dating him what are those beliefs because it'd be interesting to know like what about your beliefs you think you're denying like is this person actively you know engaged in behaviors that go against your principles or do they just exist as a person who happens to be part of like you know normie not massively politically engaged even

though they're left like are they just sort of benign is that is that a denial of your beliefs or is that as ash says someone who isn't engaged in quite the same corner of the world as you um because whereas this non-binary academic it's like on paper you have so much in common but you didn't actually have a connection with them the way that you do with this person Because whereas this non-binary academic, it's like on paper you have so much in common, but you didn't actually have a connection with them the way that you do with this person. So yeah, it's like, when you're with this normie guys, I hate the word normie. I hate the word normie. I've railed against it so many times.

It's a huge bugbear in my mind because I feel it's, and this is not against you, listener. This is more that I feel the word normie is really condescending and patronizing because on the left, we're meant to be trying to talk to people, the general public, who might not be like this kind of person who might not be politically engaged, but lean left about their lives. And it's not like a talk down thing. It's like a how do we connect and build coalitions and this idea of normie very much creates this little small cabal of like left-wing thinkers who are just like you know handing down what we think is better for you and you're just too normie to get it like you're too basic which is the opposite of left-wing politics like don't we want left-wing politics to be the most popular politics possible it doesn't make sense to me to like think of people in normies and i actually think this is maybe a problem that you have in this dilemma um but yeah when you're with them when you're with this guy do you feel like your personhood and your gender identity are validated do you feel like you have a good time do you have a laugh you say we don't have intellectual conversations but do you want them with this person are you getting them elsewhere because as Esther Perel says no partner can be a village like you get different things from different

people and you don't have to be with this guy forever if you don't want to but it sounds like you you know you say you're a bond deep and we have an amazing sex like we have a really great time but you've got this idea in your head of like the person you should be with and it doesn't quite match up to this person. Whereas when you actually engage with the sort of like archetype of the person you think you should be with, it's disappointing. What do you actually like enjoy? Because you're saying what you want, but I always go back to this amazing fact from the early days of I think Match.com, which is when they first started match.com online dating they would suggest people would fill out their little questionnaires of what

they wanted and they would match people based on that but nobody got on with their people that they'd outlined because what we think we want isn't actually what we need these ideas we have like these aspirational ideas of the perfect partner for us another reason i think dating apps aren't very effective at making you meet people because you're apart from like chemistry your perception of what you want is only as good as your self-knowledge and your self-confidence and as we've talked about previously in this episode like so many factors go into skewing your idea of self and like how you navigate stuff and what you actually need to feel supported and validated and cared for in a romantic relationship or any relationship. So I would you say, like, why not stay with someone who's always there for me? More than that, how do you feel when you're with them?

It's not just like this person's there for me. This person likes me. How do you feel? Are you in when you're in the moment? Are you having having a good time how do you feel when you're with them are you happy are you having like are you having a laugh do you feel relaxed are you comfortable there are always going to be places that a partner can't access from you but it's there's the difference between you know being with someone where you feel like you're suppressing your queer identity and you can't share that with them or being with someone who necessarily isn't part of that world but you feel totally validated and like they will they get

it just even if they're not they don't come from that space they could get it you say you know i know for example my friends wouldn't hang out with them like hang out with him but maybe that's because you haven't introduced him to your friends like there's you haven't you haven't tried to fit this person into your life externally because you don't you already have this idea that he won't fit but you don't know until you've actually incorporated because he is fitting in your life immediately does that make sense that makes loads of sense and i think in terms of maybe offering some practical advice I wonder if our listener should be with anyone at this point in time, because what I'm getting from this letter is you've tried to break up with this person. You've not been able to stick with it. And the way in which you phrase that as well, you know, he didn't understand why we shouldn't keep

seeing each other. So we just kept on doing that. Well, it's not all about him and his wants, right? You tried to make a decision and then you went back on it. You have some knowledge that this non-binary academic isn't caring for you or cultivating the kind of relationship with you that you actually want want but you're still being drawn to it you're saying oh you know my friends wouldn't want to you know hang out with you know normie football lover it just seems to me that you've outsourced your judgments about what you want to other people and actually it doesn't sound from this letter like you've got any idea of what it is you really want and maybe what's happening is that you've substituted

self-knowledge with labels and being able to put names to things of Of course, that's one aspect of self-knowledge, but that's not the same as being really in tune with what you want and what you need. And the last thing I'd say on that is you talk about your friends, you know, would never even want to hang out with him. Maybe that's true, maybe it's not. But if you're in a situation where your friends would be so intensely judgmental of who it is you're seeing to the point that you feel it's a judgment on you that's something that needs to change either how you relate to that group of people maybe they're a lot more generous and welcoming than you think they are and this is something about your own feelings of self-worth that you put a judgmental perspective in the mouths of everyone around you or maybe they really are that judgmental in which case

don't don't think that's a good social situation to be in because like we're saying earlier in the show the mark of good friendships is the accommodation of change you will change in your life new things will happen new people will be in your life you'll be changed in ways that you can't even anticipate and the mark of good friendships is being able to sort of grow and move and absorb lots of those things and if you can't do that with this relationship that's not right i don't know whether it's it's that you should be on your own i think sometimes there is i don't want to use people as you should be on your own. I think sometimes there is, I don't want to use people as props,

but I think there is value in working through sort of like discomfort or this, like work. I feel like this, for some reason I get an instinct that this person you should stick with them for at least a bit. Because if it turns out that you sit down

and you look at what you actually want and how you are feeling in the moment and when you stick with them for at least a bit. Because if it turns out that you sit down and you look at what you actually want and how you are feeling in the moment, and when you're with them, you're having a good time, it's just when you're away, then all these external, your anxiety about external judgments keep rushing in. So I actually do think it would be good to see this out further.

And you talk about, you know, I want to be with someone intellectually impressive. Why are they not intellectually impressive? Is it just because they're not an academic? I think there's so much there for you to unpack about yourself and your value judgments on people. Whereas this person, from how you've described them, you haven't said anything really negative about them apart from, you know, they're like beer and football and they're not massively radical left. It sounds like they could teach you a thing or two about value judgments and acceptance i think you need to like accept other people more to be honest from the sound of it but yeah it's it's a very interesting dilemma and maybe if you write in with an update in a few

months that would be great i would love an update i mean this is a split decision amongst the judges uh ash says break up mooya says stick with it. We've got time for a short eeny weeny dilemma if you want to read it out. I will read it out. Dilemma two. Duh. I had a falling out slash disagreement

with my best friend, who is also my cousin. I apologized for my part in it. However, she never took any accountability. She gave an excuse for her behavior. And in the moment, I just accepted it so we could move on. Me being the people pleaser that I am. Since then, we don't speak daily like we used to.

And I really miss having her in my daily life. My ego is not allowing me to make the first move and resume our daily calls as I want her to take accountability first. Or do I accept she won't take accountability and continue our relationship as before? Ash. Okay, so I'm going to respond to this in a really, really brief way. So I'm sorry if there's not the sort of empathetic padding that other dilemmas get.

The first thing is that the word being used here is accountability. I think that the word you really mean is blame. And I think that when you're playing this game of pass the parcel of blame, where you go, well, I accepted some blame. Why can't you accept some blame? You're going to be stuck in that forever. And actually maybe a way through this is opening up a conversation with your best friend slash cousin, where you ask them, how much do you understand about what I'm feeling and you invite them to say what's your perception of what my experience was like and this is actually

something which comes from um like systemic family therapy as a technique um this opening up of the dynamic by saying okay just put yourself in my shoes like what do you think i'm thinking and that being a starting point for a conversation because it's practicing empathy and that's also something which me and my husband do when we're having arguments where if we're stuck at an impasse one of the things we do to break out of it especially if we're doing blame past the parcel is that we'll stop and we'll go okay this is what i think it's like from your perspective am i right and it's actually a very very useful thing to do what do you think uh i'll give you some empathy you talk about your ego not allowing you to make the first move so you're aware of what

the issue is here you're waiting for someone to take accountability but you haven't communicated to them how you actually feel um it's giving codependent you're being the people pleaser i am i just accepted it so we could move on um yeah you say she gave an excuse as well so she probably gave what she thought was an explanation even if it wasn't an apology and you accepted it so now she thinks that you're back on good terms who isn't reaching out here this is a question like is it both of you because then you both know something's wrong but you're not addressing the elephant in the room i think as you've been waiting for someone to her to make the first move and she hasn't if you miss her reach out that's the simple thing you reach out it doesn't mean i think you're worried if reaching out means you're ceding ground to her and sure if you think about things in like a competitive

it's a war way things you're ceding ground but if you think about things in a i love this person and i want to rebuild the amazing relationship we have it's it's not war it's actually like growth and change for both of you so you've identified the problem your ego is not allowing you to make the first move that means that you can put your ego aside you have that ability you clearly are emotionally intelligent um i would reach out text and say hey i would love to like meet up and speak if you're able to or just have your call um and then talk to her tell her how you're feeling but also invite her to say how she is feeling and then you can continue your relationship

not as it was before but even better that's my advice that's such smart advice thanks see good cop bad cop really works as a dynamic there's a reason why it's a staple of all copaganda dramas good clown bad clown just to circle back earlier access shall we wrap up the circus show's over let's take this show on to the next unsuspecting village this has been if i speak i've been ash sarka who've you been i've been beyonce knolls now i've been moya lothian mclean we'll see you next week bye see you next week bye