The Dr. John Delony Show - Financial Infidelity, Finding Community, & Appreciating the Elderly

Episode Date: December 16, 2020

The Dr. John Delony Show is a caller-driven show that gives you real talk on life, relationships and mental health challenges. Through humor, grace and grit, John gives you the tools you need to cut through the chaos of anxiety, depression and disconnection. You can own your present and change your future—and it starts now. So send us your questions at johndelony.com/show or leave a voicemail at 844-693-3291. We want to talk to YOU! Show Notes for this Episode 6:42: Husband is spending money without talking to me and won’t disclose the amounts. 16:50: How do we navigate Christmas situations with a side of the family I just don’t really like? 25:50: Teaching Segment: Appreciating the Wisdom of the Elderly 30:46: How do I build a community during a pandemic? 40:41: Lyrics of the Day: "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" - U2 tags: marriage, disagreement/conflict, money, infidelity, family, boundaries, relationships These platforms contain content, including information provided by guests, that is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The content is not intended to replace or substitute for any professional medical, counseling, therapeutic, financial, legal, or other advice. The Lampo Group, LLC d/b/a Ramsey Solutions as well as its affiliates and subsidiaries (including their respective employees, agents and representatives) make no representations or warranties concerning the content and expressly disclaim any and all liability concerning the content including any treatment or action taken by any person following the information offered or provided within or through this show. If you have specific concerns or a situation in which you require professional advice, you should consult with an appropriately trained and qualified professional expert and specialist. If you are having a health or mental health emergency, please call 9-1-1 immediately.

On today's show, we're going to talk to a married mother of two who just doesn't know if she wants to be married anymore. We're going to talk to a young man who is struggling because visiting family is boring and awkward. And he wanted my opinion. And he got it. And we're going to talk to a young woman who just started a new job when the pandemic hit.

And she is struggling with the chief demon of our time, loneliness. Stay with us. Hey, what up, what up? This is John and this is the Dr. John Deloney Show. It's a live show where we show up and walk alongside you and your friends and your family, people who are trying to figure out life and learn how to be human beings again. We don't even know what that means anymore, but we're figuring it out together. I'm still learning.

We talk about everything on this show, right? No matter what's going on in your heart, in your head, in your family, in your country, so many people are just like you. I know you feel like a snowflake. I know you feel like you're the only one having these thoughts. You're not. We all are. And so we're going to talk about it. We're going to talk about everything, right?

Infidelity, holiday nonsense, politics. I don't care what it is. Bring it on. Let's do it. Let's figure it out together. And sometimes on this show, actually it's becoming more and more of a theme that I want to inject into this thing, is positivity. Positivity.

I get so many emails from all over the world, literally, or the, I don't know what you call them, the DMs, the direct messages on Instagrams, whatever it is. People telling me, hey, I was listening to your podcast last night. I just think it's the greatest thing ever. I was crying and crying. And part of me loves that. And then part of me thinks, man, I don't want to be the cry guy, but some of these calls are so hard, right? And so then I've got to figure out ways to inject joy into this. Unlike my friend Will back here, he's in the booth just guest watching. It's a little bit, a little bit, I'll be watching you, a little bit creepy,

but he's back there just checking us out. And he was here for literally three minutes and he I'll be watching you inject some joy. This email comes from Nikki Pendley. She says, Hey, Dr. D, I wanted to let you know that my dad is a rock star. Awesome. I'm 40 years old and he's been an amazing part of my life since I was born. I know that my dad's parents divorced when he was a teenager. And when I was a kid, we always had to navigate visits with his mom or his dad carefully. As a teenager, I found out that when he was young, his dad was physically abusive to him and his siblings. I heard from my aunt that he was beaten sometimes to the point where he wouldn't lift his face off the ground. Thus, this was a big part of the reason his parents divorced. My dad made it his mission in life to end the chain of abuse. He and my mom had four kids, moved across the country, and they did their best to raise us.

They took us to church. They did homework with us. They supported us in our interests. My dad was never the disciplinarian. My mom took over that role because dad didn't feel like he had a filter to stop himself when he was angry. He focused on loving us. When I was going through my teenage angst and friend troubles, he would come wake me up on Saturday mornings with a foot rub. He made me pancakes and wanted to know everything that was going on in my life.

As a mom of my own kids now, I can't imagine what that must have been like for him. He is truly a hero who didn't fall into the same trap he was born into, and I'm so grateful to have him in my life. Nikki Pendley, thank you so much for sending this note in. And to your dad, when you have no model, when you don't know what a good dad looks like, because your dad sucked, when your dad beat you up literally, and you just have to figure it out and you know, I don't know what good parenting looks like, but it doesn't look like that.

And so I'm even going to take myself out of the equation. That's not always the best solution, but man, in this situation, it worked. And they had a wife that helped balance them out. That means they must have talked about things, communicated with one another. And then he just leaned in and said, I don't know what I'm going to do next, but I'm going to be present. And pancakes. Right, James? Nicky's dad was already regulating with breakfast back in the day.

You suckers making fun of me all over the world. You and your breakfast alone. Well, this dad did it and it worked. That's all I'm saying. Nicky, thank you for sending this in. Your dad truly is a hero who didn't fall into the same trap he was born into. And we are all grateful that he's there. So whatever's going on in your heart and mind, good stuff, tough stuff, bad stuff,

give me a call at 1-844-693-3291. That's 1-844-693-3291. Or you can go to JohnBelloni.com slash show, fill out the form, and we will see about having you on the show. Quick little note, I feel like such an idiot doing this because I'm just not this guy I didn't get into this business this radio show thing to be this guy but I just want to let everybody know how grateful I am I was sitting on a plot of land in nowherehere, Texas over the Thanksgiving holiday, and I got a text message from my supervisor, Jeremy. And Jeremy said, hey, check your email.

It's pretty awesome. So I thought he was playing a trick on me, and I opened my email. It turns out this little book that I wrote called Redefining Anxiety. It's just taking another look, letting people know you're not broken. You don't have a medical illness. You don't have a genetic disposition that's going to end your life. There's another way to look at anxiety that's much more freeing, much more optimistic, much more hopeful. It's a tiny little thing. It's a pamphlet. It's like 70 or 80 pages. But it came out at number two on the bestseller list in adult nonfiction.

I didn't know what to say. I thought they were messing with me at first. And then we dug into it, and then Dave Ramsey sent me a note. It's been a really cool thing. And here's the thing. We didn't promote it. It wasn't supposed to do what it's doing. And so all the thanks goes to you good folks who are listening to this show, looking for new ways to approach your families, looking for new ways to approach your life.

So, man, I don't know what to say. And for those of you who listen to this show and know, golly, dude, you talk too much. You know it's a big deal when I tell you I'm speechless, but I am. And I'm just grateful. So thank you. I'm not going to talk about it anymore. I just wanted to say thanks to everybody listening. That's really cool.

All right, let's go to Dawn in Chicago, Illinois. Dawn, good morning. How are we doing? Good morning, John. How are you? I'm doing so, so good. How's it going and what can I do to help? Well, I've kind of got an incident.

I don't know. An incident? Okay. Yeah. My husband has been, he's made some purchases without my full knowledge or blessing, some big, some small. After these purchases, he either lies about them, the price of them, will not totally fill me in or discuss how we paid or our pain or just how things are being handled. So give me an example of something he's bought that was too much, that was a violation of your trust.

Him and his brother had bought a brand new tractor. I totally, I still to this day don't even know the full amount of it um i know that he's making payments to his brothers um that's always a good idea and by always i mean never a good idea to owe your brother money um so i've been trying to find a tractor for my little place and i can tell you this. He probably spent somewhere in the neighborhood of a bajillion dollars. Yeah. Because tractors cost more than rocket ships, evidently.

They are super expensive. So, yeah. So we'll just make up a number, and it's just big. But the bigger deal here is, besides the money, is he's lying to you and he's being deceptive, right? He's not telling you the truth. Correct. So anytime somebody comes to me with this sort of question, my first question is to you. Are you a safe place for him?

And what I mean by that is, are you somebody that you all sit down and you talk about purchases, you talk about dreams, you talk about big things together, and you are somebody who has your own vision and that vision is going to come true no matter what. You're somebody who nags him to death. You're somebody who's always poking at him and he's just had to create an alt universe just to get through his day. Or are you a really safe place? You talk about things if he would just talk to you about it and you're finding out we call it financial infidelity around here but he's cheating on you with his money right or with y'all's money so which one of those are you um i would say in the beginning and for a while uh we always talked and sat down and mapped out everything. So what happened? What happened where that quit happening?

I finally kind of spoke up about him buying things, like very impulse. And he was kind of always on me about buying you know a shirt or something here or there for our kids or you know that kind of stuff and then he would go and buy a gun you know and not tell me about it or he would make up this big elaborate like about, oh, it was such a great deal. Sure. And I think that I probably got on the nag wagon and was trying to put my foot down with it. Right. So at the end of the day, we could talk about this for probably several hours.

My guess is there's other things here that if you were to dig into deeper than the money, does he tell you the truth about everything or is it only money that he's shady about? I think there's other things that he's shady about. And do you get onto him about just money or do you have a very particular way? You like the house, do you have a very particular way? You like the way your business is run, the way the kids are taken care of? And what I'm getting at here is, are you guys roommates or are y'all partners? Roommates. Okay. Mm-hmm.

Do you want to stay married to this guy? That's where I'm stuck. I don't know. You didn't answer my question. You didn't answer my question. Do you want to stay married to this guy? No. Okay.

Have you ever said that out loud before? No. How long have you been married? Not out loud to anybody. How long have you been married? 13, almost 14 years Do you have any little ones? We have two

How old are they? A six and a nine year old Okay When you just said out loud for the first time to somebody I don't know if I want to be married to this guy anymore Did you feel a sense of panic or a sense of relief? Panic Okay So here's what you got to do today Alright Did you feel a sense of panic or a sense of relief? Panic.

Okay. So here's what you got to do today, all right? Because I know you call me about money and your husband spending. That almost never, ever happens in a vacuum, right? It almost never. You've got this great couple who is in partnership with everything. And by the way, right. Um, he just lies about money. That's just usually not how that works. Yeah. And so today, I know you call me about money. This is a bigger deal than that today. I need you to get with a

friend that you trust. And I need you to be totally honest with your friend. I need you to tell your friend, I need you to sit there and listen to me and it's going to be best to not be a family member. And I want you to walk through how you feel, what's been happening and be honest. What have you contributed to this? Right? Because it's easier to get with a friend and just blame him for everything, but that's probably not all true. You've contributed as well, right? And I want you to ask your friend who knows you, knows your husband for their honest reflection. And as you're talking, I want you to be honest with yourself about, do you want to stay married to this guy or not? I'm a big believer that any marriage can come around if two people are willing to be humble and lay down their nonsense and work on coming together.

It sounds like this one's got some deep crooked roots to it, but it's also got some real shallow roots that are growing in other directions. And it feels like it's escalating, right? From a shirt to a gun to now a tractor, and you're talking anywhere from $20,000 to $60,000 to $100,000, depending on what kind of farming you're doing. And the reality is that's just a symptom of two people who are just roommates. You're not intimate anymore. You're not friends

anymore. Now it's becoming a tug of war. And so this is, this is every bell should be dinging. Every, every siren you have should be going off. And before you just launch into him, because as you said, your tendency is to go at him, I want you to get all those feelings out of your head and go through them with a friend and decide which one of these are true, which one of these are not true. And I'm going to be honest with you. I've got a great marriage. And there have been seasons when if somebody had asked me that question,

do you want to stay married or not, I would have said no. And that to me is a signal. It's a gong, right? It's a drumbeat that says, man, you're on shaky ground now. And that's when I had to stop what I was doing, lean way back into my marriage, lean way back into my relationship with my wife and double down on healing. And so far, every time we've been over that bridge, we've come out stronger on the other side, but it takes two people being very humble. And all you can control in this situation, Don, is you. That's it. And that sucks. But today, get with somebody, get all your feelings out, mine them for truth, right? Ask

yourself, are they telling me the truth or are they not telling me the truth? And then I want you to sit down and come up with a plan and then you're gonna have to make an arrangement with your husband, don't come at him, but say this weekend, we need to talk about something that's gonna take a couple hours, need you to clear your deck,

we need to have a hard conversation. And if you come to the realization that you don't wanna be in this marriage anymore, you have to start the that you don't want to be in this marriage anymore, you have to start the conversation with that sentence. I'm afraid that I don't want to be in this marriage anymore. And I'm afraid you don't either. And I want to start from there.

If you do want to save your marriage, I want you to start with that statement. We've been married for a long, long time. 13 years, we have two beautiful kids together. We've got a farm together, and we're roommates, and I'm terrified we're not going to make it if we don't make some major changes. And you may have to go first with talking about the stuff that you've contributed to this thing.

But this sucks. And, Dawn, it's going to be hard, and I want you to lean directly into it, and here's the deal. After you have this conversation with your friend, after you do the hard work of getting all your thoughts, all those jumbled frustrations out of your head onto paper, after you have that conversation with your husband, and it's going to be multiple, not just one, it's going to be multiple. I want you to give me a call back. I want you to let me know how it goes. I want you to walk with us, everybody listening, because you're not the only one.

There are millions of people in your situation right now who just said out loud for the first time, I don't know if I want to be married anymore. And that's a hard, hard place to land. Thank you so much for your vulnerability. Thank you for trusting us with being the first people that you've told that to. Now the hard, hard work begins. Call your friend right now, Dawn, and we'll look forward to hearing back from you. All right, let's go to Noah in Madison, Wisconsin.

Noah, what's up? How are we doing? Hey, doing good, John. How are you? Outstanding. So how can I help, brother? Yeah, so with kind of Christmas time coming up, all the Christmas parties going on, I guess my wife and I are kind of curious on how to navigate.

Hey, hold on. Hold on one second. Will you do me a huge favor? Yeah. How old are you, Noah? 25. 25. All right.

I'm going to give you some world advice that has nothing to do with why you're calling. Is that cool? Yes. In the first sentence, if you go back and listen to this on the podcast, you said the word kinda twice and I think sorta or probably or something like that. Like so with kinda Christmas, kinda coming around, and me and my wife kinda. I want you to be 25-year-old freaking Noah and start speaking with periods at the end of your sentences. The world needs you, okay? Yes, sir.

All right, let's do it again. Here we go. Ready, go. All right. So how do we navigate Christmas parties with Christmas coming around the corner with my mom's side specifically, who my wife and I don't necessarily connect with all that much? So how do we kind of navigate, or excuse me, how do we navigate?

There you go. Good for you. Nav we navigate those parties, especially when we can't really use the COVID scenario next year? You know, do we bring that up with them? I guess I'm just looking for guidance on what to do. I love it, man. All right. So no, this is a question that's going to help millions and millions of people. So thank you for having the courage to call and ask. There's so many folks going through this. So many folks navigated Thanksgiving either well or poorly or sort of E right. And now you're in it.

And so thank you for calling. So let's do it. I want to do a mind experiment. Okay. Okay. So it's your mom's side of the family. Is that right? Correct.

How long have you been married? Last July. It's a year and a half. Oh, it's a year and a half. Y'all are figuring this out as you go, right? Correct. I love it. So your mom says, hey, all of us are getting together at such and such event.

And you say, we're not going to be able to make it thank you so much for the invitation hope you'll have an awesome time period what's what's your mom's response um so i mean wait so we right before this uh phone calls this weekend we did, we did message them. We said, hey, you know, just with everything going on, we, that was exactly what I actually said. You know, hey, thanks for the invite. Hope you guys have a blast. We're just not going to make it this year.

And this year, you know what, she said, okay, you know, sorry not to see you this year, but we understand. And it was, you know, that is an easy transition, but again, kind of. So do you feel weird about saying that? I mean, a little, I guess the background is growing up, you know, we, uh, I felt obligated to kind of go to the, excuse me, to go to the, uh, party. Um, on my mom's side, especially with my dad's side, uh, it's always a blast so never having issues there just with especially my mom's it would always be kind of the extended family so her cousins her aunts and uncles like the whole shebang um of recent years it's it's just her immediate family so her sisters

and then my grandma why don't you like going to why don't you like going do they hug you and kiss you and tell you how wonderful you are they talk politics? Why don't you like to go? No, just, I guess, awkward. Besides those family Christmases, I honestly never really hang out with my mom's side, never hanging out just out of that holiday time. But dig into awkward for me. What does that mean? It means you're just standing there eating, listening to stories that you've heard 30 times and being around a bunch of middle-aged or older women. What's awkward about it?

Yeah. I guess with, I don't know. Because here's the thing. If it's just awkward, Noah, then go. Like, go. It's an evening that you are honoring your mom and her family with. And you're 25. You're going to bring joy to them.

They're going to be excited to see you. You're the handsome little boy that made well, and here's this beautiful new wife. Yeah, it's boring. Life is boring, right? It's boring. Life is boring, right? It's awkward. But if you, if it's something, put it this way, if y'all are just going to sit at home and watch Netflix and that's going to be more exciting, then forget that dude, go. If there's a reason y'all aren't safe, if they make your wife feel uncomfortable, if it's just not as, I mean, go, right? So you're not giving me, you're not selling me on why,

why your mom and her family aren't worth a few hours of your evening. Yeah. Is it because it's just not fun? Um, I, well, with, I guess the, the awkwardness behind it, it's, it's not necessarily fun with us in the sense that even with the extended family one, it was typically just my brothers and I just at the table, you know, talking with each other and kind of saying hi, you know, for that few minutes and then doing our own thing the rest of the hour and a half, two hours. So I guess that's kind of part of it. So, Noah, listen, I want you to do something this year. If it's safe medically, I want you to do something this year. If it's safe medically,

I want you to go and I want you and your wife to plan to ask your mom questions, her sister questions. So here's the thing you're showing up to this event, really expecting to be entertained. And I want you to go to be a participant, go to be somebody who isn't waiting to be plugged into, but who's plugging into other people. And my promise is those folks who were there, who are older than you, who are twice your age or 15 years older than you,

or however old they are, have stories to tell that would blow your mind, have fun adventures to talk about. If you can poke through, man, my grandmother was as proper as proper could be. But if you could get behind that proper, dude, she was a riot. Like she was the most sarcastic, awesome, hilarious, biting, just a riot. But you had to get past it, right? I want you to go and think of it this way.

I'm going on behalf of my mom, not for me. And dude, you're talking like a few hours, brother. That's not a lot. I don't, I don't, man, when this call started, I thought it was, you weren't safe. It made y'all feel uncomfortable. If it's just boring, dude, because they're going to not be there. They're going to not be there someday. And I know you think it doesn't matter. I know you think it, I don't care that we don't talk that much. I'm telling you right now when it comes to legacy, it's going to matter. My wife is a qualitative researcher.

She goes through stories and letters. And for the last few years, she's been working on several books. But these books are based on letters that she's found and interviews she's had with 90-year-old, 95-year-old members of her family. She's tracked them down. She's met with them in strange towns and little coffee shops and nursing homes all across the United States. And those boring, quiet people who just sit there in the corner at family events have wild stories. In her case, family members who were chased by Nazis in Germany and who had to figure out how to run a dairy farm and had to figure out

how to survive the dust bowl and who had to figure out how to eat cows, but they didn't know what they were doing. I mean, had to figure stuff out. And you just get into those stories and you find these love letters and you find this richness in depth. My brother, your family's not there to entertain you your family's there to be honored to be with right And so if you're safe If they're safe Now again, this is weird because of covid but if you're safe, they're safe I want you to go and I want you to you and your wife to have fun With coming up with questions that you're going to ask

What's the best boyfriend you ever had? What was your first kiss? What was the weirdest date you ever went on? Aunt whoever Aunt Karen, Aunt Becky, whoever they are Hey grandma What is your favorite boyfriend besides granddad? Like right, I want you to dig into these questions Ask them what their favorite songs were

Could they dance? Do they know who Chubby Checkers was and do they love him? Right, get into it And my hope is you're going to find out a richness and depth to your family, to your legacy. Here's the thing. And Noah, this isn't, I'm not harping on you now, brother. We live in this culture where we burn grandma's house down just because it was old. It's a small 3-2 made out of old hardwood,

and we just burn it down because it's too little. And we throw up two tall and skinnies that are going to last for about 25 years before they fall apart. So we can maximize the square footage of that dirt. Both presidential candidates were thrown out because they were old, right? That was the most common criticism. They both were whining a lot, and they were old, right? That was the most common criticism. They both were whining a lot and they were old. And man, sometimes behind that elder statesmanship is a lot of wisdom.

They've seen a lot of things. I'm going to challenge all young people listening to this. If you're under the age of 40, I want you to make it your mission in life to surround yourself with people who are older than you and not think about, is this boring? Is this awkward? No, man. Think about what you can glean, what kind of wisdom you can pick up, how you can be with folks. And that might mean getting around folks at your church. That might mean connecting with family during the holidays. And let's be super around folks at your church. That might mean connecting with family during the holidays. And let's be super honest, this year, it may not happen. COVID's just screwing up everything, right? And elderly folks are in a very high risk category,

so it may not work. But man, put yourself in those situations. So Noah, go do it. Get around them. In fact, I want you to do it and I want you to call me back. And if I was wrong, I will announce to the whole United States and the world, I screwed up and I was wrong. No, I should have stayed home. And then you'll find out. And the next year you'll be 26. Your marriage will be two and a half years old. And y'all will know we are never going again. And by the way, one more little ranty thing. As we enter into the holiday season, a couple of things about Christmas. Number one, if you don't want to be around your family, don't use a virus as an excuse. Have the courage to say, we're not going to make it this year and let that be that.

Because you're just going to kick a can down the road and it's not honorable. It's not honest. If you can't go, just say, I can't go. Right? That's it. The second thing is this. If you and your girlfriend, you and your boyfriend, you and your husband, you and your brother, your sister,

y'all are planning on going to whoever's house for Christmas. You know you're going, and you know it's going to be weird. You know Uncle Whoever is going to be there. You know that one uncle always wants to pick you up with his thumbs. That one uncle always wants to talk to you really close with coffee breath and whatever. When you decide to go, all complaining is over. It's over. Because you know it's coming. Decide, once you decide you're in,

then decide to go make it fun as you possibly can. Go make it joyful. Right? Now, something about me that I like is indoor plumbing. I like it. For Thanksgiving, my family and I went to my in-laws' hunting ranch in Texas. There is no running water. My brother-in-law is awesome. You know what he did for us? He dug us a new hole. That's right. He dug us a new hole.

And they have this old diner chair that they routered a hole out of it, and they screwed down a toilet seat onto a chair and it sits over, you guessed it, the hole. So here's what I got to do as the in-law of going to visit my family for Thanksgiving. Once I decided I'm going to go, there's not going to be any indoor plumbing. We're going to use the bathroom in said hole. From that point forward, I can't complain about it. I can't whine about it. I have to make it the adventure that it is. And one day I will tell you about being out there in the middle of the night and hearing the wild Texas pigs coming right at me in the middle of the night. That's a whole other conversation.

But all I'm saying is once you decide to go, whether it's no plumbing, whether it's no weird uncles or whether it's weird grandparents, whatever it is, when you say you're in, it's over. It's over. You're in. Don't whine about it. Don't be frustrated about it. Just go and say you're in, it's over. It's over. You're in. Don't whine about it. Don't be frustrated about it. Just go and make the absolute best of it. Make it an adventure. Make it joyful. And then everyone around you, their spirits are lifted, right? And this is a season for spirit lifting and God knows we need it this year. All right. I'm done. I'm done being

a loony tune about that. Noah, thank you for that call, brother. I want you and your wife to go. I want to hear what it's, what, how it goes. Let's go to Sydney in Bat about that. Noah, thank you for that call, brother. I want you and your wife to go. I want to hear how it goes. Let's go to Sydney in Baton Rouge. Sydney, what is happening? Hey, John. Thanks for having me on. Thank you so much for calling. How can I help?

So I was looking for some, I guess some guidance or some advice on how to deal with not really having a social support system. My husband and I moved in 2016, about two hours away from all of our family. And due to various reasons between my job not having a culture where you can really make friends with your coworkers, because of the level I was at, and the Dave Ramsey journey that we've been on, and now the pandemic, I really just haven't had much opportunity to make

any real life friends. And I'm sure you can understand that some online friends are good, but they're not the same as having someone to work for coffee. Absolutely. So I, number one, thank you for this call. Number two, I'm living this right now. And Sydney, I could be calling you and asking you the same question over haul over the holidays over the Thanksgiving holidays went back we spent some of it at like I said at my in-laws ranch had an awesome time out there and it was a blast and then we went and spent some time with my parents another town where two of my oldest best best accountability friends live. And it's Kevin and Michael. And one night

we went and sat together for, golly, dude, I don't know, late into the next morning or early into the next morning. And I tell you what, Sydney, my soul was healed. It felt good, right? And I realized how much I missed my old friends. so i'm with you i moved to nashville a few years ago i'm in the same boat here are some things i'm trying right now okay and all of this is in beta all of this i'm still figuring it out and all of this the master word over all this is intentionality okay so a couple of things i've done. Number one, I know the science and interactions over screens. And one of the sayings I like to run around and say is, we've got 4,000 friends on Facebook, but we have no one to help us move our couch, right? I've got 100 new likes on Instagram, but I got nobody to help

me change a tire so I can get to work on time. And we don't know our neighbors. We don't know our friends. We don't even know our church people anymore. And quite frankly, we don't know ourselves anymore. So all that to say is this. Here's a couple of things I've done. I actually have had a couple of families over to my house that I had tangential – I don't know how to say that word. I've had related relationships with. I've known them here and there sort of.

I had them over to my house, and they sat down at our kitchen table, me and my wife's kitchen table. And I did this so awkwardly, as I am good at doing. I said, hey, we'd like to ask you to be our friends. And here's what that means. That means that we're going to show up at games. We're going to call you guys at 2 a.m. if we need something. We're offering our services to you at 2 a.m. We're going to call you when we're up. We're offering our services to you at 2 a.m. We're going to call you when we're up. We're going to call you when we're down. But I had to say the

word to another grown couple. We want to be your friend. One couple, Sidney laughed. They were like, oh, this is super weird. And the other couple, the guy, and he's become one of my close friends and mentors, he got teary. And he said, nobody's ever asked me that question before, which is a whole other conversation. It's a whole other statement on where we're at. That's number one. Number two, my wife and I have become hyper-intentional about having somebody out to our place every single weekend, period, bar none. And some folks have come and they are from high risk situations. And so our kids run around in the front yard and we sit on the front porch. And other times they don't care

at all. And they've come into our house. And then I felt weird. And so we've all gone back out to the front porch. However, we're making it work. One of the things that we're doing is being intentional. But the other thing we're doing is being very gracious. So wherever people happen to be on whatever health spectrum they are, whatever they believe about, everybody's welcome to the house. And our main goal there is to pour into other people, be hospitable, and to be in connection with other people. Is that working all the time, Sydney? No. Is it weird?

Yeah, it is. Is it awkward? Yeah. And sometimes it's really great. At 7 o'clock this morning before the workday, I was in communication with somebody who's become a great friend of ours here in Nashville, JP and Beth. And they're coming over this weekend. We're just going to hang out. And we're going to have to be intentional about it.

I met them at church. And I've met some people at work, some people, you know, just randomly, but it is hard, intentional work. The other thing I'll tell you this, Sydney, is stay plugged in however you can to your old friends, whether that's email, whether that's phone calls, whether that's, it's not enough, it's not as good, but it is a, it is just a drop of cold water in the desert until this thing's over and we can start connecting again. So when I tell you those things, how does that rattle around in your head? Well, I really wish I could do some of those things. What's holding you back?

Well, for one, we don't really have a space we're in a tiny apartment okay um we did used to have some people over but they've kind of all like gone off onto their own lives since then and stopped really talking to us are they and we can't really keep reaching out to people who don't reach back. Yeah. So what I'm going to tell you, Sydney, and I can hear it in your voice, is hard. And loneliness sucks. What I'm going to tell you is you're going to have to keep trying. You're going to have to keep trying.

And if that means you've got to go meet out at a park, if you'll have to go meet somewhere in a public space, if you've got friends that you know are safe and they are well, and you don't mind having them inside your apartment, then so be it. But you've got to keep trying. Okay. So I want you to think of this like eating healthy, only way more important. I want you to think of this like taking your medication, but way more important. And I know it feels like rejection when they don't call you back. It feels like rejection when they don't invite you. I know it does. But you got to keep leaning into it.

Because loneliness will dissolve you. Loneliness will dissolve your marriage. It gets heavier and heavier. Okay? Okay. Okay. Is your husband on board with this? Yeah, he's actually the only person I see most of the time.

Sure. Are you working? I'm working from home right now. Okay. And are you at a level in your company where it doesn't make sense to have a bunch of friends because it's just awkward because of roles and reporting structures and things? Well, I tried getting to know some of my coworkers before everybody went to work from home, but I just joined the company in September. And then we had a big launch in January. So everybody was busy focused on that. And then I kind of started being like a little more casual with some of my coworkers and then the pandemic hit and everybody went home. Gotcha. So I want you to be hyper-intentional and this is

going to sound ridiculous, but it's where we're at right now. And I'm in the same boat as you. I want you to start putting this on your calendar. Okay? I want you to put on your calendar. I'm going to reach out to one person every day and check in and see how they're doing. If possible, I'll talk to them on the phone even if it's for 10 minutes or 15 minutes.

I want you to set up like, hey, let's have a drink out at the clubhouse here at the apartment complex. I want to meet you at a park. Let's get together for sandwiches. My friend Stephanie, she's a professor in Texas. She's been meeting with students on her front porch. It's the best they can do. And she said it has been magic for the students. It's been magic for her. Whatever it is, find a way. What you cannot do is just fold it up and give up. And I know it feels personal. I know it feels hard. I know it feels like friendship shouldn't be this challenging.

You're right. They shouldn't be. That's the season we're in and it sucks. But I can tell you this, if you give up and you fold up, you're going to really put a lot of pressure on yourself. You're going to put a lot of pressure on your husband. And it's going to be really difficult for both of you to cycle your way out of this. So you be intentional. You go first. I guarantee you have something to offer to people, Sydney. I know you do. I know you and your husband as a couple have something to offer to people.

My guess is you are fun. My guess is you're hilarious. My guess is you have all kinds of things to offer, folks. You just got to keep trying and keep trying. I'm with you. I'm living this with you, Sydney. I want you to give it a shot for a few weeks. And if it totally tanks, call me back.

If it is a disaster, call me back. But I want you to have given it. I want you to have called somebody every day for the next couple of weeks. I want you to put yourself way out there, meet for lunches in the park, for early dinners and drinks at a clubhouse or a friend's will come over to your apartment. So be it. Don't give up on yourself, Sydney. You're worth friends. You're worth connecting with. All right. So as we wrap up the show, James, this one's a little bit long, so don't crank the music too soon because this one's for real. I heard this this morning at my

house on a record, sitting with my kids and I got teary. My daughter said, daddy, why are you crying? And I said, honey, some songs are so beautiful. They're transcendent and they get into your DNA a little bit. I didn't remember this song being there, but it is. It's from the 1987 Joshua Tree record, U2, and their classic, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For. Bono writes, I've climbed highest mountains, and I've run through the fields only to be with you. And I've run, I have crawled, I've scaled these city walls only to be with you, but I still haven't found what I'm looking for. I have kissed honeyed lips, felt the healing in her fingertips, and it burned like fire,

this burning desire. I've spoke with the tongues of angels. I've held the hand of a devil. It was warm in the night and I was cold as a stone, but I still haven't found what I'm looking for. I believe in the kingdom come, then all the colors will bleed into one. So yes, I'm still running. You broke the bonds and you loose the change. You carried the cross of my shame. You know I believed it. But I still haven't found what I'm looking for. Hang in there, folks. You're worth not being lonely.

You're worth connecting. This is the Dr. John Deloney Show. Bye.