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Midlife Friendship Audit: Who Stays, Who Goes & How to Know the Difference · Butterfly Days w Tami Jorden

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  034| Midlife Friendship Audit: Who Stays, Who Goes & How to Know the Difference
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  Tami Jorden, Butterfly Days (00:01.428)
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  Welcome to my realm. This is Tammy Jordan and you're listening to Butterfly Days. Y'all know that I am a huge fan of friendship. I think it's a wonderful, wonderful part of life. But there are some tricky points that come up around midlife. And today we're going to go there. We're going to talk about real friendship. And I don't mean that warm, fuzzy hallmark card version. And I would also say that social or transactional friendships are just fine.
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  But I mean the real, honest, sometimes uncomfortable truth about friendships and midlife and what it looks like to really get wise about them. Because here's the thing, some of us are holding on to friendships the same way that we held on to jeans from 1999. They don't fit anymore. They have not for a long time and yet there they are still in the closet just in case. So let's talk about it because I have some...
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  outside the box ideas for you. You know, when we think about it, friendship has looked different at every stage of our lives. When we were kids, friendship was simple. was whoever lived on your street or sat next to you in class. Proximity was everything. No real discernment required. You were just together. It was great. In our teens and early 20s, friendship got wrapped up in identity. Your friends were who helped you figure out who you were.
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  and loyalty was everything. You'd go to the mat for each other, even when you probably shouldn't have. Then came early adulthood, marriages, careers, kids, moves, and our friendships were largely driven by circumstance at that point. Work friends, mom friends, neighborhood friends, book club friends, whoever was in the same stage of life at the same time, and then midlife. And something shifts, y'all. For the first time in our lives, we have enough self-knowledge
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  enough wisdom to actually choose our friendships with intention. We know what fills us up. We know what drains us. We've lived long enough to know the difference between someone who's genuinely in our corner and someone who just, well, occupies a slot that we've never thought to question. And that's not cynicism. That's wisdom doing its job. So here are the questions I want you to sit with. Are your friendships right now
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  Tami Jorden, Butterfly Days (02:28.309)
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  real or are some of them wish friends? What is a wish friend you ask? Let me tell you. A wish friendship is one where we love someone for who they used to be or who we need them to be or who we keep hoping they'll become. Those are wish friendships. But the actual day-to-day relationship doesn't match the hope that we're caring for it.
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  And here's where I want to get really honest with you, because this part matters just as much. The exact power of friendship is that it's a reciprocal relationship. If only one of you does the work, it's just caretaking and it's not a friendship. Yes, ask yourself how you feel after you spend time with that person. Do you leave feeling seen, energized, more like yourself? That's real data and it counts.
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  but then ask the deeper question, am I good for her? Because if you find yourself constantly wishing she were different, needing her to change, quietly resenting who she actually is, then baby, the truth is you may not be showing up as a great friend to her either. Real friendship requires that both of you are genuinely good for each other. It's not just, does she show up for me? It's, do I also show up for her?
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  And do I accept her for who she is right now? Being able to broker that truth honestly about yourself, not just the other person, is what separates wisdom from self-serving. That's what I'm advocating here. It's what allows you to make genuinely good choices about which friendships are worth pouring yourself into. Some friendships are worth fighting for and growing in, and some have simply run their natural course. And when you're honest,
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  Both of you know it. And you know what? If you both don't know it, that's also a sign. Releasing folks with grace isn't a betrayal. It's not. It's respect for her and for yourself. We can talk ourselves into staying in those friendships for a long, long time because we've known them forever, because it would be awkward, because we'll hurt their feelings, because, and this is a big one, y'all.
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  Tami Jorden, Butterfly Days (04:49.953)
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  because someone somewhere told us that we had to keep our friendships. That letting one fade would make us a bad person, but that's gaslighting. And sometimes we're the ones doing it to ourselves. Listen, longevity is not the same thing as loyalty. History is not the same thing as healthy. How long you've known someone does not automatically make the friendship good for either one of you. And here's the part that might surprise you.
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  This isn't just an emotional matter, friendship isn't. The science is firmly on your side. Research has been saying for decades loudly that strong social connections are one of the most powerful predictors of longevity and quality of life. Not wealth, not status, connection. The Harvard study of adult development is one of the longest running studies on human happiness over 85 years. Found that close relationships more than
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  almost anything else keep us healthy and happy as we age. But here's the key piece. It's the quality of those connections that matters. A few deep, safe, or reciprocal friendships will do more for you than a wide circle of surface-level ones every single time. So when you make the courageous choice to invest in the friendships that actually nourish you, and you gracefully release the ones that don't, you're not being selfish.
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  You're being smart. You are literally adding to the quality and the length of your life and giving someone else the chance to do the same. So what does gracefully releasing a friendship look like? Well, it doesn't have to be a confrontation. It doesn't have to be a dramatic exit or a hard conversation. Not every friendship needs a funeral. Some just need to roll to a stop. You invest a little less,
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  You initiate a little less. You stop working so hard to maintain what hasn't been working for a long time. And if guilt creeps in, and it might, because we have to grow into a new normal, I want you to remember this. Staying in a friendship out of obligation or fear of what people will think, or because we've always done it that way, that is self-abandonment. And we are too wise for that now. The brave smart move is to step back
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  Tami Jorden, Butterfly Days (07:18.016)
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  Get honest with yourself and ask, who are my people? Who do I show up most fully around? Who celebrates me, tells me the truth with kindness, and has my back when things get hard? And who do I do it for? Those are your people. Protect that. Infest there. Pour into those friendships with everything you've got, with your full heart. And let the rest gently go.
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  This is my benediction for you, my beautiful butterflies. It is my hope for you today that you give yourself real permission to be discerning about who gets a front row seat in your life. May you stop carrying friendships out of guilt that were never meant to travel this far with you. I hope you look around and see clearly the women who see you, the real you, and celebrate you and speak to you in love.
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  I hope you hold these women close and tell them what they mean to you. And I hope you find the courage to gently release what no longer serves you, knowing that it creates space for something and someone better. You're not obligated to stay small to keep anyone comfortable. You are allowed to choose. May you see clearly in midlife.
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  Choosing well is one of the wisest and most loving things that you can do for yourself and honestly for others too. Bless you this week and always. And remember, I'm rooting for you to live the most beautiful and strong version of your life. If this message has touched you, I'd love to hear about it. We always appreciate your likes, your subscriptions, and your sharing it with friends. Take care and we'll talk to you again soon.