Create Nourishing And Mutual Friendships

Friendship can be one of the most powerful sources of emotional nourishment—if we allow ourselves to show up fully and choose mutual connections. In this guided somatic inquiry, we explore how we engage in friendships, where we might feel imbalanced or unseen, and how to move toward deeper, more satisfying connections.

Through gentle awareness practices and reflection, we reconnect with our own needs and consider how to meet others with authenticity and care. Whether you seek to strengthen existing friendships or invite new ones in, this session supports and inspires meaningful connection.

Transcript

Last week we looked at romantic partnerships.

Today we're looking at friendships.

Next week we're looking at family relationships.

There's so much complexity with relationships.

We tend to have a lot of conditioning around relationships.

We live in a culture that encourages certain kinds of relationships and certain kinds of friendships.

We value marriage more than we value friendships.

The world is changing.

A lot of times now our friendships are our deepest relationships.

Let's just tune in for a moment to see what's our body telling us as we're starting this inquiry.

The somatic inquiry really rests around,

Can I be present in this moment?

One of the things we do at the start of any practice is we come into the moment.

We come in by looking around the room that we're in.

We come in by noticing our breath,

Maybe relaxing our body.

With these somatic inquiries,

We can do it in a way that makes sense for us.

One of the foundations I'll mention as we start is we want to be aware that we're here in this moment.

Sometimes friendships and relationships can be activating in terms of sadness or grief or anger or regret.

We have a lot of emotions,

Of course,

Around relationships.

If you find that you're getting really drawn back into the past or you're feeling activated and not have much ease in your breath or maybe you're really tight in your body,

Pull back from it for a moment.

If you have your eyes closed,

Open your eyes.

Really just look around the room and we can do that right now.

Establish where you are and when you are.

Sometimes there's pain in relationships and when we're doing a practice like this,

We might be going back into the past.

We could take a breath.

We could notice how our body moves with our breath.

When we breathe diaphragmatically,

Our stomach softens on the exhale.

A bit of liveliness comes into our body on the inhale.

We bring in some fresh oxygen.

At any moment,

We could look around.

We could do some breathing practice.

We could just hold our hands or put our hand on our heart.

As you're moving through the inquiry,

Keep that in mind.

What I have in mind for us to do together is a series of questions about relationships.

And one of the things that we do with somatic inquiry is we kind of drop the question in and then see what our response is.

The first question is,

How do I show up in my friendships?

Sit back and let it come forward as it does.

We're not trying to really figure it out in our head so much.

There's a combination of thoughts and memories and ideas about friendship,

But also what's happening in our body and our heart.

How do I show up in my friendships right now?

You can go into the past as well.

Anything as important as relationships,

We tend to bring the past in to the present,

And that's not a problem.

That's fine.

Am I someone who listens deeply?

Do I speak my truth?

Do I hold back?

How do I show up in friendships?

We probably have some patterns in how we show up,

And we're different with some people than we are with other people.

We might have been very different in the past than what we are now.

And so if we find as we're going through this that we have an imbalance,

That we always give more,

Then that's an opportunity to make note of that.

You could take notes or whatever,

But you could also just make a mental note and let it flow.

What is my role?

Am I always the one who reaches out?

That's very common.

Often people will say,

And I feel that myself,

I'm always the one who's texting or saying,

Hey,

What about getting together with some friends?

And then with other friends,

It's a bit more mutual.

Trauma and our experiences and our prior friendships have a lot to do with this.

We might have social anxiety.

We might have attachment that we really want that friendship to be deeper.

There's a lot of ways that our past experiences and trauma show up in this.

So if you bring to mind some friendships now and or in the past,

Is there a reciprocity in your friendships,

Your close friendships?

Do you feel nourished,

Seen?

When you think about this friend,

How does that feel in your body?

When we feel nourished and seen,

We tend to have warmth.

We relax our body.

We have a bit of ease in the breath.

Or do you feel depleted,

Overlooked?

And we can come back to our role.

Am I always the strong one?

Am I allowed mutual vulnerability?

Can I express myself?

Can I be upset?

Can I express emotion in this relationship with this friend?

Is there room for that?

Are they interested?

Notice as you're doing that,

How it feels in your body.

When we think about a certain friend,

We might feel like,

Oh,

It's so much hard work.

And we are in relationships for so many different reasons.

So this is not about,

This is a good person,

This is a bad person.

It's a good friendship,

It's a bad friendship.

Sometimes we have friendships that are difficult or more challenging.

And often that's because of their past trauma.

Or maybe something is going on now for them.

If you're friends with somebody who has a lot of trauma in their life now,

A lot of relationship upset,

A lot of pressure,

Maybe somebody's sick,

Or there's financial pressures or something,

That person's not gonna be as available as someone else who's having a bit of a smoother time.

That's something else to be aware of.

We can't always do anything about that.

And it really contributes to,

Does this feel like a mutual reciprocal relationship?

Can I be myself or am I always giving support?

Bring forward specific examples of certain people.

That's often very helpful so that it's not so general.

In this specific relationship,

Who has more airtime?

And when you think about them,

Does your body soften and relax?

Or do you feel tired or tense?

And what's your sense of reciprocity,

Of mutuality?

And then let yourself go through a few different friendships and see what it feels like with each one,

Nourished or depleted.

When we find that we would like more reciprocity,

Maybe we're always the one who's listening or supporting,

Then we can also look at why that is.

Why are we in a relationship that's not very mutual?

And there's a lot of reasons for that too.

When we think about that,

Another question we could look at is,

Do I allow myself to be deeply known by my friends?

Sometimes it feels a lot safer to listen and to support another person than it does to take the risk to be known,

To admit that not everything's going that well.

So what do I hold back on?

Where do I withhold?

That's a pattern that tends to go across a lot of people.

Across friendships,

There are people who we feel safer with.

And sometimes we're in friendship circles where we don't really control who else is in the circle.

Or maybe we're friends with someone and then they have a new partner.

And so we're in a relationship with that person's partner that may or may not feel all that comfortable for us.

There's so many different combinations.

So what do you fear might happen if you show more of yourself?

If you let the other person know you more deeply,

Your needs,

Your joy,

Your grief,

Your anger,

When you're dysregulated,

When you're upset,

What would happen if you showed up in a more authentic way,

Let yourself be known more deeply?

And let's take a few minutes here to experiment with that a little bit.

What does that feel like?

One of the first things that might come up or one of the main things is,

I don't know if I'd still be in that relationship if I really showed up.

But my sense is that that person doesn't really have the interest in me,

Except for what I can do for them.

Or they don't have the capacity.

Somebody is very dysregulated and has a lot of pressure,

Or they are not very emotionally available.

Sometimes the only relationship we're going to have is one where we're giving all the support and they don't really connect with us.

It's not right or wrong,

But it might be the way it is.

So let's look at that,

Bring one relationship up and really consider that.

What would happen if I tried for more of a mutual relationship and I really let myself be known,

I took a risk?

So,

You know,

If something bothering me,

I've been really struggling with this thing,

Or can we talk about this thing that I'm struggling with?

Bring up an example of how you might introduce that into the relationship,

And then let's pay attention to how that feels in your body.

Take a few breaths.

And if it's fear that's showing up in our body,

Fear that we're going to be abandoned,

If we're too much trouble.

A lot of these are messages from childhood.

What does that feel like in your body to pretend that you're going to say it to that person?

So bring their face to mind,

And imagine that you're saying this to that person,

To your friend.

What does that feel like in your body as you say that?

And does that feel like a risk that you could afford to take?

Stay with this for a few minutes.

Let yourself really explore that.

And if you're getting a no,

I don't think I could afford that.

Let's go a little bit more deeply into that.

Why not?

Maybe you have familiarity with this person and you know them to be quite judgmental.

So you don't want to risk them shaming you or judging you.

If that's the case,

Maybe the smart thing to do is not to risk being too vulnerable with that particular friend.

And of course,

That brings up the question of how can I deepen my friendship so that I have more friendships that are nourishing,

That are more satisfying?

So it might be that,

Okay,

With this person or that couple of people,

I'm going to probably have to leave it as it is.

I don't really feel like I could afford to be who I am.

They're not the kind of person who's going to listen while I talk about how I feel about something.

If that's the case,

We might put them in the category of close acquaintance,

But they're not going to be someone we can really count on because we can't really be ourselves with them.

Sometimes people's feelings are very fragile.

I also have friends who are going through some intensity and I know that they're struggling.

Over the long term,

We're there for each other.

Sometimes it's just not the case.

Part of the benefit of doing somatic inquiry and really looking into this is we can sometimes see more clearly.

So if I'm in these relationships and I'm putting time into these friendships where I'm not really feeling nurtured,

I'm feeling depleted,

Where I'm feeling like I'm the listening one and the other person's always talking about themselves,

We don't have to make the other person the bad guy,

But we also might not want to put as much energy into those relationships.

So that's something that's helpful to know.

And why are we holding back?

Why is it that I'm not opening up more?

Sometimes that's a habit.

We have a habit of being in a relationship with someone who talks about themselves all the time and we feel more comfortable holding back.

But what would happen if you took the risk?

Maybe even to say something like,

I'm not very satisfied with our relationship because I feel like we're not really sharing that deeply.

Or a lot of the time when we're talking or when we're out somewhere,

I don't really feel like you're that interested in knowing what's going on with me because when I bring it up,

Or when I try to speak about something,

You pretty soon change the subject back to what's going on with you.

So can we talk about that?

And what does that feel like?

Is that something you could do?

More likely you could do it with some than with others.

Some people are going to get mad and that'll be the end of the friendship.

So we have to be realistic.

That might be the result.

And that might be okay.

We might find that acceptable.

One of the reasons I bring that up about being honest with somebody who tends to monopolize the friendship,

Monopolize the time,

Is because sometimes people have a dysregulated nervous system and they just talk all the time.

So it's not really that they're not interested in this.

It's that they have a habit.

I sometimes call it anxiety talking.

When people have a lot of discharge that they need to have,

They've got a lot of tension.

And they're not really stored up.

Some people will discharge that by talking.

And they can probably talk to anybody.

And that's part of the reason why I'm kind of okay with some of the new AI people being friends with chat GPT or different AI platforms because they can discharge what's going on.

They can talk it through.

They actually have a pretty good empathetic witness in terms of the relationship with an AI.

Sometimes that can help us to discharge and to come back into presence.

And if you're the one who's doing that more,

If you're the one who's talking more and you're wondering,

My friendships don't feel as deep as they could,

Is there something that you're doing that you could pull back on that and change the habit of how you're relating?

I don't consider someone who does that a bad person or not a good friend or not a potential good friend.

It's more that our nervous system is leading us or driving us to talk all the time or to release our energy or stress through talking.

And we kind of forget about the other person.

Sometimes friends do interrupt a lot.

That might be someone that we give up on.

It might be someone that we choose to spend not as much time with.

It might be somebody that we could talk with them about that and say,

You know,

I don't like to be interrupted.

I feel like you're talking over me.

I can't really share with you when you interrupt me.

Could you pay more attention to that?

Could you be more mindful of that?

And maybe I'll signal you when I see it's happening.

So this would be someone that you want to deepen the relationship with,

Obviously.

Some people you're going to go,

I don't really think there's any potential there for anything good to happen.

So I'm just going to let that go.

But other people who you really care about or who for some reason you have to spend a lot of time with,

It could be a partner of a friend of yours.

Sometimes it's really worth bringing it up and saying,

You know,

This is the dynamic I'm noticing.

And you could do it by email.

Sometimes I'll do that and say,

This is what's going on.

And I would like to have a conversation about it.

But meanwhile,

I've gotten it out.

They can have their initial reaction.

And then I can have a conversation with them.

And if I can't have a conversation with them,

Then that's a really big indicator as well,

That maybe they're not open to or available to or have the stability to have a conversation.

One of the things that I'm finding more and more is that I'm less patient in a way.

I'm just not wanting to spend my time with people who aren't connecting deeply.

It doesn't feel as satisfying.

So that,

I think,

Has given me more courage to say something.

And it might be that we have a conversation.

The other person goes,

You know,

I know that that's a bad habit of mine.

I would really like to be friends.

I'd like to know more about you.

And I get it that I'm not making that easy.

Maybe you can say,

OK,

Well,

When I notice you're doing that,

I'm going to do a timeout sign or I'm going to do something to let you know.

And then we can come back,

Do a reset.

So some people are available for that kind of relationship restructure and some people aren't.

If it's someone who's important to us,

It might be helpful to really look at that and maybe to practice it ahead of time so that you can imagine yourself saying that to the person.

When you interrupt me,

I feel like you don't want me to talk.

I feel like you don't want to know me.

What's going on with that?

How can we change that or can we?

We have a lot of commonality in this.

There's not something wrong with us because we're having these issues.

It's something that a lot of other people are experiencing as well.

That's really helpful for us to know.

Sometimes we have to be realistic,

Too.

Maybe we don't have enough in common anymore.

Some people really like to do this kind of thing.

I remember six or seven years ago,

I ran into someone and she said,

I like to go to the bar on Friday and Saturday nights and sit at the bar and talk to people.

Do you like to do that?

And I went,

No,

I don't.

She said,

Okay,

Bye.

She went and talked to someone else.

That's really honest.

I don't like to do that.

She does.

She's looking for someone to do that with.

So good for her.

I haven't run across many people that are that clear about what they want.

I find too,

That it's really easy for us to feel left out.

Some of that comes from getting our feelings hurt and from wanting to be included and wanting to be part of something important and where we're nourished and really in good connection.

And sometimes it's just not the right fit.

There's a lot of people in the world.

And one of the things that I find is that if we were to try and reach out and find people that have our interests,

We have a much better chance of having these deeper friendships.

One person I know was looking for deeper friendships and was very lonely after COVID.

She said,

You know,

I'm really passionate about the environment.

She found a local group who were going to farmers markets and having booths on the weekends and stuff.

She volunteered there and she met a lot of people who she really enjoyed.

They have a common passion.

That's another thing that sometimes we're in these relationships because of when we went to school together,

There's family connection or something.

Maybe they're just not our kind of people.

And so how can we find our kind of people?

Sometimes it's helpful to have a little bit wider of a group that we can reach out to and count on,

Partly because we're vulnerable.

If we have one really best friend or sometimes everybody gets off doing other things,

They might fall in love with somebody,

For instance,

And then they just go off the radar for six months.

Sometimes they move or sometimes they pass on.

I have some friends from when I lived out West in Canada who just aren't the kind of people who want to maintain a long distance relationship.

So when I would go out and visit,

They'd be really happy to see me,

But didn't have any energy for anything else.

Let's pull back a little,

Take a few breaths.

One of the things about doing this kind of inquiry around relationships is a whole bunch of stuff might come up.

Memories,

We might be feeling lonely or isolated or kind of hopeless around friends.

Maybe our standards feel like,

Well,

I'm too picky.

Maybe if I let other people just be who they are,

I'd have more friends.

But we're not looking for just people to hang out with.

We're looking for people to have an intimate connection with.

If we were to think about friendship as a primary relationship,

A lot of people now are experiencing romantic relationships going nowhere or breaking up or being too difficult to maintain.

Especially younger people,

But people my age as well,

Are looking to friendships as a primary source of connection.

So let's take a few minutes to let that one in.

Do I see friendships as a place of emotional intimacy,

Pleasure,

Place to have fun,

A shared life?

Sometimes people will move in together as well.

I see some tiny house communities of people that are wanting to be close together,

But not living together.

So what is your sense of that?

Especially if you're not in a romantic partnership.

But even if you are,

I think it's very healthy to also have good friends.

Either way,

Do you put friendships as a priority or are they something that takes a backseat to family or to a romantic partner?

When we imagine friendship as a primary source of emotional intimacy and connection,

We want to be doing that with people who are capable of having that kind of relationship with us.

We have to be our own best friend.

That is absolutely for sure.

And from there,

We also want to reach out and be friends with other people.

If you have a good friend,

Would you consider making a commitment to them to vacation together every year or to maybe rent a house together?

What is your sense of looking to friendships as a primary source of connection?

It might be with one person or it might be with several.

What does it feel like inside your body when you think about it?

Do you tense up?

Do you feel warmer,

More relaxed?

Could you imagine that?

Let's let that come to mind in a detailed way.

The visuals of that,

What it might look like.

Friendships are my source of connection and nurturing and I feel deeply known by my friends.

I know them.

We have each other's back.

What does that feel like for you?

Take a few breaths as well.

Let your body relax.

There might be one person you're thinking of as a friend.

It might be others.

And then we could move to what would I like to nourish in friendships?

Maybe I don't have enough friends or maybe the friendships I have aren't really that juicy anymore and I'm really looking for some more connection,

People who are more like me,

People who aren't as self-absorbed.

There's so many different things that we might want to bring in.

We might want to bring in new people.

It takes a lot of courage to reach out to new people.

Sometimes we're just in a different place in our life.

I find when people get into a romantic partnership or they have kids or they go to school or something like that,

Often they're not as available.

We might circle back with them later or we might not.

It seems that friends are easy to make when we're in school.

Sometimes you'll form friendships at work but that can have its own set of problems.

So how do we find friends?

Apparently there are a lot of apps like dating apps but they are for friends so you could find that.

What I always find is volunteering at some place that's doing something that I care about.

You always meet people who are like-minded.

I've volunteered for many,

Many different things through my life.

Sometimes it was social change,

Social justice organizations.

You can volunteer with an animal shelter,

With helping kids read at school.

There's so many ways that we can volunteer and then we have a structure in which we meet people.

We each have kind of a job where they're volunteering.

You could teach English to people who are coming from some other country that doesn't speak English.

If you're a yoga teacher,

There are so many places that need yoga teachers.

I started a spiritual book club when I first moved to Nova Scotia because I wanted to meet people who are interested in that kind of thing.

I just hosted a meeting once a month at a local bookstore,

Met a ton of really cool people.

That's not for everybody.

I'm pretty outgoing in that sense.

Maybe somebody else has already started something like that that you could participate in.

There's community gardens.

There are literally hundreds of ways that we can get involved.

That's one option that I think is a really good one.

What am I really committed to?

What am I really excited about?

It might be a food bank.

It might be a community group.

It could be kind of informal,

Like I'm going to help out these neighbors.

Often if we get into something where it's a cause that we're passionate about,

It can really open up our hearts because we're enjoying it and then we're around other people who also enjoy it.

If you like to travel,

They often have courses at universities where they'll have the course for several weeks.

You'll learn about this country and then the whole group goes on a trip together somewhere.

That might be a way to find people that you like to hang out with because you're really interested in travel and other cultures.

But taking courses,

Taking classes could be a good way as well.

One thing I find too is that as we get burned a few times with friendships and other kinds of relationships,

We're a little less confident or a little less optimistic.

And that can be something that we could just try and see.

I've got a friend now who I just reached out to her three or four years ago now and said,

I'd like to get to know you better.

Do you want to go for lunch?

We've formed a close friendship.

Sometimes that's going to help and sometimes it's too scary and that's okay.

You don't have to do that.

Often there's a vibe there when we're interested in each other.

If you have some kind of structure that will be helpful,

A community group that meets every Thursday for coffee or something or whatever that might be,

It's like cards or something like that.

I know that's very popular in seniors groups as well.

But I find that the people I really want to be around are people who share something that I'm really passionate about.

For years I was involved with a meditation group that met every Thursday and I made some really good friends in that group.

Just in the last few minutes of the inquiry,

Take a breath of all the things that came through your mind and all of the things you thought about during this practice.

What are one or two things that you might want to take forward and that would help you to deepen relationships or build new relationships?

What comes forward that you might want to go forward with?

And you might not have a lot of energy for this.

A lot of people have a lot of demands.

We're tired.

It might be something like,

You know,

Right now I'm going to join this Facebook group and I'm just going to get some social interaction that way.

I can do it when I feel like it.

There's nobody making any demands on me.

Open the possibilities.

What is it that I want?

What is it that I have time for?

Is it with my existing friends?

Is it that I want to meet some new people?

Do I need to work on social anxiety?

Or maybe I need to work on not talking so much and not interrupting so much?

How could I deepen intimacy so that I feel more connected and more nourished?

Leave this with a sense of possibility.

Things that we kind of have a little bit of excitement around.

Maybe there's something that's inspired you.

We could for sure offer ourselves our own friendship and from this connection we have with ourselves we can reach out to other people.

And also nervous system regulation.

Doing something every day to regulate your own nervous system will make you more attractive to other people and it will be easier for you to have If you're feeling quite anxious you could use your breath.

There's so many practices,

Especially on Insight Timer,

That are really helpful around connecting and regulating your nervous system.

You could listen to guided practices.

Learning to breathe in a more relaxed way.

Learning to support your nervous system is really helpful.

When we feel anxious other people pick up that anxiety.

When we feel relaxed and steady other people pick that up and they want to be around us more.

So that works both ways as well.

We all like to be around people who are feeling pretty steady and calm because then we feel safer and calmer.

That's just the way our nervous systems are responding to each other.

There's a lot of different elements to look at with friendships.

It's such a rich area.

The purpose of these inquiries is really just to spark some ideas and some interest and to look at,

You know,

I think maybe some of those friendships have run their course.

I find them exhausting and I could let that go and I'm going to bring in something more nourishing instead.

Whatever that might be.

It's good to be able to explore some of the different ways that we're in connection.

What we really need is connection.

It doesn't have to look a certain way.

We really want to be seen and known and sometimes we need to make a change in how we're interacting in order for that to happen.