Can You Bank On Your Friendships | LAYC25

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Welcome back my friends.

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And I hope that it's all right with you...

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That I call you my friends, because I feel that way.

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After all here I am, sharing intimate thoughts from inside my head and my

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heart, and sharing so much of my own life, experience, and evolution.

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Just like I would with my really good friends.

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And that's the conversation today.

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It's about friendship.

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I know we've talked about friendship on a couple of past episodes, including Best

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Friend Day Everyday and BFF Not Forever.

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But there's still more, so much more to be said on the topic.

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And I know I'm not alone right now in having friendship very much on my mind...

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Because I'm hearing from you, and I'm hearing from the people in

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my immediate circles, about...

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Wow...

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Friendships are not simple.

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Friendships take work.

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They're like flowers in a garden.

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They need tending, and cultivating, and sometimes they need weeding.

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They will always need sunshine and water to bloom...

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And very much like flowers in the garden...

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Each one is unique and beautiful.

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That is the magic of friendships.

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They're always different, changing...

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Growing.

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Adding color and joy to our lives.

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But if you neglect the friendship...

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It will wither and die.

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No matter what age you are now, I'm sure that you've probably

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lost at least one friend...

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To a life ended sooner than we wanted to let them go.

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One of my greatest regrets in life was not making up with a very, very dear friend,

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before she was killed in a car accident.

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We'd had a terrible falling out over something completely unimportant now.

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I'd had the opportunity to say, I'm sorry.

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And to accept the apology she wanted to give me, but my stubborn pride kept me

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from enjoying her, and our friendship, for those few more weeks that I could have.

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As the years go by and as life changes and we start to experience

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our own human body frailties.

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We have to say goodbye to people that are dear and our lives.

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Recently, we've also lived through the experience of a global pandemic that

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made human connection and relationships even more important in our lives.

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In episode 23, Best Friends Day Everyday, I talked about evaluating your

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friendships coming out of the pandemic.

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And what you noticed about who were the friends that showed

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up for you during this time...

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And who were the friends who did not show up for you and how

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that might have surprised you...

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Or disappointed you.

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Plus on the upside...

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Who were the new friends that you made?...

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That you might not have otherwise?...

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Without the changes forced on you, because of COVID-19.

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At the time I also introduced to you a tool, that I developed

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that's helped me for years...

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Work through the complexities, and challenging times, of really good

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friendships with evolutionary women.

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I call it my friendship health check-up.

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It's a free tool that I'm offering to you to download and use any time, and often.

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It may help you to go through the process of evaluating your friendships and knowing

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that relationships change just like we do.

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Who are you now in those relationships?

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How are they serving you?...

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To be more of you?

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Not less of you...

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and perhaps...

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It will also reveal, that some friendships may now be at a crossroads...

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And it's time to consider re-allocating them in your life.

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So when you're ready...

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Pop on over to www.MyEncoreFriends.com and grab a copy.

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I'll also put that URL in the show notes, to make it easy for you to find it.

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Recently, I was reminded of something that Stephen Covey said...

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and by the way...

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Wasn't that man just brilliant and insightful about human

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relationships and human behaviors?

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Mr.

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Covey shared a very powerful metaphor to describe relationships

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as emotional bank accounts.

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He showed us how we could use that as a frame work for evaluating

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the health of our relationships.

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I think it's very interesting to think of each important relationship

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in my life as a joint bank account.

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It takes two of us to sign up and engage, in this joint emotional

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account, to make it sustainable and available for both of us...

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When we need to draw on it.

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It's also where reminder that we must always be making regular deposits...

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Or the account will simply be overdrawn, if we're not both putting

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in more than we're taking out.

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So using Stephen Covey's model, I took a look at some of my relationships that I

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wasn't sure were really balanced anymore.

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And it helped me to look at it less emotionally...

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And make some decisions around continued investment in those accounts.

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It's always important to be thinking about our friendships in terms of...

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Who we are now...

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Not who we used to be...

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And who we want to become next.

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If you've been with me for a while, you know I talk about vitamin G, which

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stands for Vitamin Girlfriends, and how significant my best girlfriend

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relationships are in my life and contribute constantly to my sense

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of wellbeing, and my personal and professional development.

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And of course...

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the pure joy and fun of having friends to celebrate my accomplishments in my life.

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I examined each one of those treasured Vitamin G relationships...

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In the context of that joint emotional bank account...

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And asked myself questions like...

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Is this account solid?

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Does it have a balance that was built on mutual respect, and

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shared values and commitments.

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A commitment to continue to work together through ups and downs,

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and grow together and solve any problems that may come along our way.

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I had to ask myself, am I honestly able to say that I'm adding deposits

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and adding value to the relationship?

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Do I feel confident that each of us, are making deposits and adding value?

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Do I feel there's balance?

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Is there a fairness?

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A balance...

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a reciprocity in their relationship?

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Even though I have no expectation of us to be equally contributing,

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always at the same time, the same amount, or with the same impact...

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After all, life just doesn't work that way.

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Some days I will have more to give, and some days, I will need to receive more.

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What's important in a really good relationship is that there is a commitment

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over a long term, to work together and grow together and support each other.

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Sometimes, and I hope it's not too often for you, or me, that we have to

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make a decision to freeze a friendship account for a while, until we can

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renegotiate the terms of the relationship, and restore the account balance...

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A healthy, happy, loving relationship.

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Occasionally, we may have to face the difficult choice of having to terminate

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or close a friendship account forever.

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Conditions like willful neglect, emotional abuse, betrayal of trust, or confidence...

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Passive aggressive behavior.

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Friendships cannot thrive under these conditions.

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So it's best to make a difficult decision.

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Do it quickly, and know that you're closing the account, in

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the interest of both of you.

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Carefully chosen friendships serve an extremely important

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purpose in our evolution.

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They're there to help us become the best of us.

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The right friends see potential in us...

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That perhaps we're not even aware of yet.

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They're there to support us, to live the legacy that we desire and

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enjoy it while we're present to experience it, and influence it,

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and leave an impact in the world.

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They're there to celebrate with us great achievement, and epic accomplishments.

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I want my best friends there.

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When I reach my goals,

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I also believe strongly that it is a disservice to our friends, if we're

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not doing everything that we need to...

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To live up to our full potential, and be the best version of ourselves.

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In doing so...

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In always striving to be the best us...

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We automatically become far better friends...

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To our friends.

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When we continue to invest in ourselves, we have more capacity

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to invest in our friendships.

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So for today, I'd like to leave you just to think on the friendships

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that have had an impact in your life.

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How many of them are still close friends?

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Which ones perhaps have been re-allocated to a different priority in your life?...

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But they're still there.

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And like friends that we haven't seen for a while...

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But when we reconnect with them, it seems like we can just pick

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up right where we left off.

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Then there are those friends, that as they say, have come into our

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lives for a reason and a season...

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They've taught us something valuable.

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If you're like me, and you realize how much richer your life truly has been

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because of the investment that friends have made in us, and the investment

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that we have made in our friends.

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You're going to want to continue to have a return on your investment, for years...

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and make sure that you're always being the best friend that you can.

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Wealth managers and financial advisors will always counsel you that it's best to

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take a long-term view of your investments.

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And it's essential to make sure that you're doing regular review of your

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investments so that you can rebalance your portfolio when it's necessary.

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That's how you get the greatest return on your financial investments, but it also

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works for your friendship investments.

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Remember...

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You've got my Friendship Health Checkup as a resource that can help you with your

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planning and assessing friendships, and make the necessary adjustments to create

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strong, rich, beautiful friendships.

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Every day is a wonderful friendship day for me.

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Especially when I get to engage with you.

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I'd love to hear your friendship stories..

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How you learn to be a better friend.

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It would be great if you share those stories on the Lift As You

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Climb Movement Facebook Group, because I know that your story...

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Your examples can inspire someone else and you'll be there to lift

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them on their friendship ladders.

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All right.

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So that's a wrap for today on the friendship conversation, but

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we'll come back to it again.

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There's never an end to that topic.

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However, next week, I want to change things up for us

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with a totally new theme...

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Where I'm going to share my musings on the "We FIX You" industries.

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I think they've got it all wrong...

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and...

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I'll be excited to share some insights, and some news on spectacular

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summer guests on the podcast.

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So Tune IN!

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And have a great week friends!