# #189 - Andrew McCarthy on Male Friendship, Reconnecting, and the Power of Showing Up

An episode of [Dear Nina: Conversations About Friendship](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1576473592), 23 Mar 2026, 33 min.

Audio: https://audio3.redcircle.com/episodes/1c19381b-b751-4f94-8327-c59133d1b1c5/stream.mp3

“You don’t really have any friends, do you, Dad?” That’s the question that stopped Andrew McCarthy—yes, the Pretty in Pink / Mannequin/St. Elmo's Fire/"Brat Pack" Andrew McCarthy—in his tracks and led to a 10,000-mile journey to reconnect with the people he considered his closest friends. Andrew's book, Who Needs Friends: An Unscientific Examination of Male Friendship Across America, is available now! In this episode, Andrew and I talk about what happens when friendships quietly drift into the background, why that happens so often for men, and what it actually takes to rebuild connections with people you know would be there for you in theory, but it's been too long since you've spent time together in person. This is a conversation about male friendship, but also about something much more universal: showing up, loneliness, and the kind of safety only real friendship can provide. WE DISCUSSED: • Why “having friends” isn’t the same as actually seeing them • The idea of safety in friendship and why it matters just as much as trust • Why many men drift away from friendships over time (and don’t always notice it happening) • The pressure men feel to provide and how that shapes their identity and relationships • The difference between foundational friendships and newer friendships and why both matter • What women can learn from how men often allow for imperfection in friendships • The underrated role of asking for help in building and strengthening connection • How loneliness can be a signal—not a failure—and what it’s trying to tell us • Why scheduling (or built-in rituals like games or activities) makes friendships more likely to last • What kids notice about their parents' friendships and why modeling connection matters • Andrew’s insight that for many men, action can be a form of love LINKS MENTIONED: • Andrew's newest book: Who Needs Friends: An Unscientific Examination of Male Friendship Across America • Episode 184 of Dear Nina with Dr. Jeffrey Hall • My episode on NPR's LifeKit about old friends Meet Andrew McCarthy Andrew McCarthy gained fame as an actor in the 1980’s appearing in such iconic films as Pretty in Pink, St. Elmo’s Fire, and Less Than Zero, as well as cult favorites Weekend At Bernie’s and Mannequin. He has starred on Broadway and made numerous television appearances, most recently seen as a regular on Fox’s The Resident. Andrew most recently directed Brats, an intimate and provocative new feature documentary, which premiered on Hulu in June 2024. The documentary explores the iconic films of the 80s as well as their stars, branded with the name the “Brat Pack.” Beyond his work in front of and behind the camera, Andrew has become an accomplished author, and he is one of today’s leading travel writers. Andrew lives in New York with his wife and three kids. ALL THE DEAR NINA LINKS + CONTACT INFO !! Catch up on all Dear Nina episodes on Apple and Spotify 📢 How to promote your service, business, or book on Dear Nina 🎈 Celebrate your friend on the show by dedicating a week of episodes! 📱 Subscribe to my newsletter “Conversations About Friendship” on Substack ❤️ Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, & the Dear Nina Facebook group 📪 Ask an anonymous friendship question 📪 email: dearninapodcast@gmail.com 🔎 Want to work with me on your podcast, your friendships, or need another link? That’s probably here. Special thank you, as always, to my assistant producer, Rebekah Jacobs!

## Transcript

[0:04] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Welcome to Tier Nina Conversations About Friendship.
[0:07] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I am your host, Ena Badson.
[0:09] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I've been writing about friendship for over a decade, podcasting about it for almost five years.
[0:14] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Usually I'm speaking about female friendship.
[0:16] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But I am hearing more and more from listeners who are worried about the men and their lives.
[0:21] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Their husbands don't seem to maintain friendships, their sons are more isolated than they'd like.
[0:25] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Their brothers, their dads, listeners are worried about them.
[0:28] \[SPEAKER_02\]: So when I saw Angela Carthy,
[0:30] \[SPEAKER_02\]: wrote a book about male friendship called Who Needs Friends, an unscientific examination of male friendship across America.
[0:38] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I knew that I had to talk to him.
[0:39] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Yes, I am talking about that Andrew McCarthy, the actor, director, travel writer, but in this conversation we are not talking about pretty imping or mannequin or the backpack we're talking about.
[0:50] \[SPEAKER_02\]: his book who needs friends.
[0:52] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And the question that set this friendship project in motion when his son said to him, you don't really have any friends, do you dad?
[0:59] \[SPEAKER_02\]: This episode with Andrew is yes about male friendship, but there are some big themes that apply to everyone, old friend, newer friends, loneliness showing up, physically showing up, which Andrew does a lot of in this book.
[1:11] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Why men might sometimes drift away from one another?
[1:14] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And we also talk about the positive
[1:20] \[SPEAKER_02\]: One big takeaway from me in my conversation with Andrew Ann and his book.
[1:23] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He does such a great job discussing something that's hard to name in all friendships.
[1:28] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's how important it is to have a sense of safety with someone that you are going to have a deep friendship with.
[1:33] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You can't just trust somebody without feeling safe with them, without feeling like your information.
[1:38] \[SPEAKER_02\]: We'll stay with them, that they will be there for you.
[1:40] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And it's not a word I have used much before, and I encountered it in Andrew's book and it really stuck with me.
[1:45] \[SPEAKER_02\]: One thing to note in this episode is that we refer several times to another episode which was 184 with Dr. Jeffrey Hall, who was such a fun guest, somebody that Andrew quotes in his book as well.
[1:57] \[SPEAKER_02\]: We refer to it many times in this episode without giving it the episode number.
[2:01] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It will also be in the show notes.
[2:02] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I'm excited for everybody to hear this conversation and you have to get all the way to the end to hear a very special moment which I'm just going to spoil for you right here when I thank Andrew for coming on the show and he says thank you Nina.
[2:14] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I really appreciate it.
[2:15] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I love your podcast.
[2:16] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I will be making that into some kind of social media moment.
[2:19] \[SPEAKER_02\]: How could I not?
[2:20] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Hello, I am speaking to Andrew McCarthy.
[2:23] \[SPEAKER_02\]: All right.
[2:23] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Here you go.
[2:24] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Welcome Andrew.
[2:26] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I think I'm going to be ready.
[2:28] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Most of our listeners are women, and one thing I hear is the concern they have for the men in their life.
[2:33] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Nobody here in this show needs to be convinced that friendships matter that this is something we need to prioritize, but they struggle helping the men in their life and your book who needs friends captures this so beautifully.
[2:45] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Starts with this gut punch with your oldest Sam saying, you don't really have any friends, do you dad?
[2:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And I was curious about what that must have felt like because you do
[2:55] \[SPEAKER_02\]: you actually aren't someone who doesn't have friends.
[2:57] \[SPEAKER_02\]: So what would make him say that?
[2:58] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, I had a number of really close friends when I was a young man when I first moved to New York and I had several guys who were really instrumental in me sort of becoming who I would become in life.
[3:10] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Over time, they moved away.
[3:12] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I got busy with my career.
[3:14] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I then started having my own family.
[3:15] \[SPEAKER_01\]: They had their family.
[3:16] \[SPEAKER_01\]: It evolved it.
[3:17] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I hadn't seen the number of them in 10, 21, 30 years.
[3:21] \[SPEAKER_01\]: when my son did say that my son that was sitting in the kitchen and he was playing a guitar and I was sitting there, there being tea and he was telling a story about one of his buds and I should probably talk about such a pool.
[3:31] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So yeah, yeah, yeah, I know I love them and they're pretty disappointed because you don't really have friends do that.
[3:36] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I knew it affected me because I acted instantly like it didn't impact me because I don't want my kids to suit but he had a nerve thought about it for a second and I just said, yes, I might be a friend like he said, but I don't see them but I know they're there and that's enough.
[3:49] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That was the
[3:51] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That's what I told myself for a long time.
[3:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: It's enough.
[3:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I know that.
[3:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I know Chevy's got very no math and stuff.
[3:55] \[SPEAKER_01\]: There I know.
[3:56] \[SPEAKER_01\]: When he laughed, I did, I thought, the kitchen I just thought, you know, it's not enough.
[4:00] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I need to go see my friends.
[4:02] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That's what it involved into this sort of 10,000 mile road trip across America, across crossing the country, to go see my oldest dearest friends, if I hadn't so long and
[4:12] \[SPEAKER_01\]: let them know how meaningful they were in my life.
[4:15] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But there's something we don't tell each other when we're young, you know, but now they were old.
[4:19] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I just want to make a point, but you know, you really matter to me, and you had such an effect in my life.
[4:25] \[SPEAKER_01\]: When I finished the trip, it was one thing, which I just felt so much safer after the trip.
[4:29] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I felt like I had a net under me in a way that I usually don't invite.
[4:33] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So it had a profound effect on me.
[4:35] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I like the word safety in this because while on one hand you knew you had these friends and in theory they would be there for you no matter what because they have been there for you you've been there for them to actually prove it again for this period of your life that would make sense.
[4:49] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You can't just know something in theory after a certain number of years.
[4:52] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, things do start to decay and change whatever that's sort of one of the definitions of true friendship.
[4:57] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Isn't it that you see something then and it's like it was yesterday.
[4:59] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I mean, people say that all the time.
[5:01] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But to me, I think one of the guys, one of my friends, I think, as I said, what's one word that describes friendship, what's the most important word for you?
[5:09] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And trust is a common word, but for me, did that feeling of safety?
[5:13] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know, I just like, you've gotten it and you're not the one and you think, I'm safe with you.
[5:17] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Me, who I am, is safe with you, you are.
[5:20] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And that is not something I experienced a lot in my day-to-day life, out in the world trying to be the guy doing stuff and all that.
[5:27] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And it's not that I realized I was yearning for or missed it until I experienced it again.
[5:31] \[SPEAKER_01\]: The relief I felt in that was profound.
[5:34] \[SPEAKER_02\]: something I want to touch on, it reminds me of something you were just saying like maybe you don't feel it in your everyday life and I know you can't speak for all men but you do encounter a lot of men both your own friends but also people you meet on the road and there seems to be a drum beat of a similar concept they talk about this pressure in their everyday life to be the provider and where friendship maybe can't fit into that.
[5:57] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Can you talk about that?
[5:58] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, I did find it.
[5:58] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I thought it was one of the common thread through all men that I can, and yeah, and I started, if I was going to see my old friend, I started randomly going up to people.
[6:06] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Literally.
[6:07] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Risoran, excuse me.
[6:08] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Can I talk to you about your friends?
[6:09] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And guys would look at me like, yeah, you're in my mind.
[6:12] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But the interesting thing, after the initial sort of taking back, not one of them said no to me, everybody just was, yeah, okay, involved in most guys that turned up at the end of the conversation, you know, I'd never talked about this before.
[6:24] \[SPEAKER_01\]: They all wanted to keep talking when I was ready to move on.
[6:27] \[SPEAKER_01\]: one of the universal things is the need to provide the sense of we need to take care because what it's a man to be care and provide and the degree to which we are able or unable to do that I've had the lot to do with our self-esteem.
[6:39] \[SPEAKER_01\]: However much I can try and tell that to my wife to because I'm in my wife much more capable and can provide better than I can in many aspects of our life.
[6:47] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But first self-esteem doesn't seem as tied into it as mine does.
[6:50] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But when I would say that's the guy who just looked at me.
[6:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Of course.
[6:54] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Absolutely.
[6:54] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That's what I do.
[6:55] \[SPEAKER_01\]: It's underneath it off.
[6:56] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I can't, you know, use when I'm from Biden, meaning make money and showing up and doing things that I feel good about myself.
[7:03] \[SPEAKER_01\]: and my value and work and life and to constantly have more of lack than I'm more generous and gracious and all that stuff.
[7:09] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And if I'm feeling less like I'm not getting it done, I send being more defensive and more angry because I'm frightened, you know, an anger comes out from wanting control and control, comes from fear and you know, all that stuff.
[7:20] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So it's a huge issue for my experience for me and for a guy as well.
[7:24] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I'm not one of those macho men that want to be, you know, in control.
[7:27] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I provide, I'm a provider, none of that nonsense.
[7:30] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I don't have that aspect.
[7:31] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I don't have any kind of John Wayne syndrome, but I do feel certain obligation.
[7:35] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Like I, I guess one of my friends I said, don't you feel this because of course?
[7:39] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I want to talk about some of these reunions because a lot of what I know my listeners will find interesting is this mix of old friends and newer friends.
[7:47] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I mean, new are compared to some of those foundational friendships.
[7:50] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I highlighted so many things that I had to control myself because I have pages of notes and quotes that I like with love to read to of your own work, but you wrote it.
[7:59] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Oh, I love hearing quick things back.
[8:01] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Okay, well, I'm going to read one.
[8:03] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Go for this moment right here where we're going to get into some of these friendships and the difference between the old friends and the new friends.
[8:08] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And you said, my friendships with SEVY, Matthew, and Eddie are as Eddie aptly labeled them, foundational relationships.
[8:15] \[SPEAKER_02\]: While nothing can replace those early connections, friends made later in life have rich value.
[8:20] \[SPEAKER_02\]: If for no other reason, then that it can be so much more difficult to make friends as we get older.
[8:26] \[SPEAKER_02\]: They require a conscious and active and vulnerable making commitment.
[8:30] \[SPEAKER_02\]: in a way those early friendships did not, when friendships seem to just happen, and they can propel us into the future in a way those long-time friendships don't necessarily.
[8:40] \[SPEAKER_02\]: The lack of history, with newer friends, can promote feelings of expansion, a fresh outside perspective, can prove liberating.
[8:48] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I'll tell you really fast I was on MPR having to defend why we need to keep our old friends.
[8:53] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But that was the assignment, that was the interview as I was defending why it's a good sign of your social health if you can keep up some old friends, not all of them.
[9:02] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And then of course I got so many comments.
[9:04] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Angry comments on Facebook and stuff about how that doesn't mean anything and all that matters is new friends.
[9:09] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And I of course think new friends are important too.
[9:11] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's just I was putting that position.
[9:12] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Both are really important.
[9:13] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I love that in your book.
[9:15] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Both kinds of friendships are here.
[9:17] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Let's go back to Savi, like every winding from that quote, he was the first friend you saw.
[9:21] \[SPEAKER_02\]: What can you tell us about that part of your trip?
[9:23] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It was the impetus.
[9:24] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And I don't even know that you meant to see other friends after that.
[9:26] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's not like you, it kind of happened.
[9:28] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Oh, yeah.
[9:29] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So after Sam left, I thought about it for a minute.
[9:32] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So I started calling my three friends, my two other friends, immediately left to mind, Savi, Eddie, and left for Matthew.
[9:38] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And so I called them all up.
[9:39] \[SPEAKER_01\]: We said, yeah, yeah, that's when we made plans.
[9:41] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I was going to fly down to the
[9:44] \[SPEAKER_01\]: My friend, Savvy, I thought he was only in both.
[9:46] \[SPEAKER_01\]: We don't have four hours away, and he counted on me a couple of times, and I knew he'd add back problems, whatever, and so I just got in the car and I went down to see him on him out.
[9:54] \[SPEAKER_01\]: This ridiculous, I'm going to see my friend.
[9:56] \[SPEAKER_01\]: He just seemed evasive in a way that he was always a bit slippery, but he had a team to be evasive in a way that seemed odd, and you know, that's what's now front of my mind, I needed to do.
[10:05] \[SPEAKER_01\]: At least one of my friends, since they all went to a rejected me, I went down to see him.
[10:11] \[SPEAKER_01\]: We didn't talk away, he'd had a terrible backdrop until he'd become sort of a shot in.
[10:14] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I know for myself that I love to be alone, I'm very much happy in my own company, but you know, you can slip over into isolation very quickly without noticing the invisible line.
[10:25] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So it's just really valuable to see him again.
[10:28] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And then until...
[10:29] \[SPEAKER_01\]: your last week's podcast is trying to make that famous thing that takes 200 hours to make a good friend and now consistency is so important.
[10:36] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I went down the next weekend to see him again.
[10:37] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And then I went down to see him again.
[10:39] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Then it just sort of evolved that I wanted to see my next friend.
[10:43] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So, the driving and then I sort of evolved it.
[10:45] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I started talking to other men and then I, somewhere in that early state, somewhere in West Virginia probably had this idea that maybe there was a book here about men and their relationships to each other.
[10:56] \[SPEAKER_01\]: women are so much better and connecting and checking in and all that kind of stuff and guys don't really do that.
[11:01] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Women can, that's at a higher bar where it's guy to tolerate.
[11:05] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I think a lot more than women will sometime in each other like my wife who is deep friendships and many, many, many, many more than I ever will.
[11:14] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But she can really run a full emotional gamut with her friends whereas I just can't believe.
[11:20] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Why was it so slippery, Andrew?
[11:22] \[SPEAKER_01\]: When I know my friend, I'm willing to make allowances for him.
[11:26] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I don't need all my friends who tell all my needs.
[11:29] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So, he tells this certain need that I have.
[11:31] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I trust him utterly, and I tell safe with him.
[11:34] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That's enough for me.
[11:35] \[SPEAKER_02\]: women can really learn from that the way you said it in the book.
[11:37] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You said that men tend to, of course, you know, we're always generalizing, men tend to work those flaws into the friendship.
[11:44] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Instead of having to discuss them, that people have to apologize for them like none of that.
[11:48] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's like you maybe discover the flaw and then you work it into the friendship.
[11:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's part of the friendship.
[11:52] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And my friend, Sebia, when he death a little slippery thing, I go, don't do it, Sebia, come on now.
[11:56] \[SPEAKER_01\]: What's going on?
[11:57] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know what I mean?
[11:58] \[SPEAKER_01\]: He knows exactly what I'm talking about.
[12:00] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And it's honoring his privacy a little bit and giving respect to who he actually gives.
[12:05] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I mean, not actively doing that, but that seems to be what happens when I think that.
[12:09] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And let's you know, I see you and I still like you and love you.
[12:13] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I see your imperfection or whatever you're holding back for yourself.
[12:17] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And that's fine.
[12:18] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I'm still your friend.
[12:19] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I think that's huge when valuable.
[12:21] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And he sees like the other day he crawled me and he said, how you doing?
[12:24] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I could find.
[12:24] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Okay, I know what that means, and then I laughed and relaxed a little bit and I was able to talk to them.
[12:32] \[SPEAKER_01\]: There I guess that's sure hand or something, but it's also in the best version of it.
[12:36] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I respect for each other's privacy in a certain way, I think.
[12:40] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Because you're my dear friend, you don't have to know everything about the name.
[12:42] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I don't need to know everything about you.
[12:44] \[SPEAKER_01\]: If you want to share that, make it great, but you know, it's not that fine too.
[12:48] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I'm too, anyway, I dig right.
[12:49] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Now I think women struggle more with that with the expectation that you're going to reveal everything.
[12:54] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I think a little more privacy and respect for people making decisions that don't necessarily have to be explained would be a good thing for more women to take on it.
[13:03] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I actually think and hope that a lot of women will read your book and share it with the men in their life.
[13:07] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I would also read it for themselves because I think we can learn a lot from
[13:11] \[SPEAKER_02\]: maybe taking the pressure down a notch and some of these friendships although I am glad you showed up because no matter what you do have to show up eventually and yes like last week's guest who you quote the book Jeff Hall on those 200 hours those 200 hours you already put those in with each one of those friends this book to me is not about those 200 hours book to me was about okay yes you put that time in once upon a time that's how you are so close but they can't
[13:38] \[SPEAKER_01\]: like in spirit they can but that showing up that you did in this book is so important right after that everything i mean that's really something i've learned in the last 10 years of my that that old silly line that you know 90% of life is showing up i think that absolutely without question true and just show up and whatever shape into whatever degree you can show up and that's really important to me and that's grown to be very important to me
[14:04] \[SPEAKER_01\]: One of the things that I've learned from you said, Minda, go, Minda, go, Minda, go, you think that I realized one of my real failing to the parent, because kids don't listen to us, or how to kick them, listen, do you want to get older?
[14:14] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know, they don't listen, but they don't model, but they see what we model for them.
[14:18] \[SPEAKER_01\]: One of my think it sounds, apparently, that I didn't model friendship behavior with my kid.
[14:23] \[SPEAKER_01\]: My kids didn't see my buds coming over me going out the way back, want to stay night with them because I am such a sort of solitary person and I my family picked up a lot of my active space and I'm happy with that and my work and all this other stuff so I don't have an active friend group in that way.
[14:40] \[SPEAKER_01\]: It was a real failing that my kids see that I really realized that when I was doing this book that wow that's something that I didn't teach them well.
[14:50] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I say, of course, I've got to be like this cheap.
[14:52] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And even when I get the end of the book, I do talk much more now to my friends on the phone and we'll text or talk on the phone a lot more since we reconnected and sounded safe.
[15:01] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Wow, dad, it's a night to see you talking to your friends like that.
[15:03] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I just never did do that.
[15:05] \[SPEAKER_01\]: It makes me feel really nice because it's like, oh, yeah.
[15:07] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And kids, you know, mirror back a truth to it.
[15:09] \[SPEAKER_01\]: My kids have got because my wife is so good at it at friendship that they've learned a little bit better model They've to have a do and don't in front of them how to do it and how not to do it So if that makes any sense, I really put a feeling it had been a mind to not actively Maintained those friendships in a daily way for my kids to see that it's a good message for dads because it shouldn't all come from the mom If it's up to personal to ask did you see it modeled with your parents?
[15:36] \[SPEAKER_01\]: My nitrous memories of my childhood with my parents that weren't active between us was basically I have a bridge every Tuesday night and bought it once a month, it would be in our house and we used to sit at the top of the stairs and sneak down and I used to hop on them playing bridge.
[15:50] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know what I mean?
[15:50] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That was a nice, I loved seeing my, and the hearing my mother laughed.
[15:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I never remember my mother laughing in our daily life, but once she was playing original, I guess you'd have some wine or something, but she would be, I'd hear her laughing.
[16:06] \[SPEAKER_01\]: growing up.
[16:07] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I think in many ways, and my father had one friend who used to come over all the tough days to sit around smokes and go out and play big shot.
[16:12] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But I used to like being in that room when they were hanging out, until they would kick me out.
[16:17] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So I guess I haven't talked about it much, but I mean, at least when I saw my parents, they're most relaxed.
[16:21] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I saw them, you know, as a kid, you never see a parent that's outside of your own spirit.
[16:27] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And it was the beginning of seeing them as individual people, which is of course when the greatest moment in life.
[16:32] \[SPEAKER_01\]: When you
[16:34] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I'm growing up, I see my parent and someone having their own separate life for me.
[16:39] \[SPEAKER_01\]: When I would see them doing that, I would experience that in a pleasant way.
[16:43] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Oh, that's so true.
[16:44] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You know, I talk often about one of the benefits of couple friends.
[16:47] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Why it's good to bother having couple friends is for your marriage, you get to see your spouse put on their best face forward in a way we don't always at home.
[16:55] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Yes, ideally, it would be nice at home.
[16:57] \[SPEAKER_02\]: We were like that too.
[16:58] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But you go out with another couple.
[16:59] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You know, maybe you turn around you're like the way my husband is funny.
[17:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: He's the funniest.
[17:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We've been better.
[17:04] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You can see the other person is the British.
[17:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Where she damn thinks I'm honny.
[17:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yes, we're honny.
[17:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Right.
[17:09] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Right.
[17:10] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I'm honny.
[17:11] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah.
[17:12] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Exactly.
[17:12] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Of course, I have thought about why it's important to model friendship for the kids, but I hadn't really thought about it for the exact reason you just said, which is similar to why it's good to have couple friends.
[17:21] \[SPEAKER_02\]: So that your kids can see you as this different person than just their parent, the spouse of their other parent or whatever.
[17:28] \[SPEAKER_02\]: co-parent, whatever these days, it is huge.
[17:31] \[SPEAKER_02\]: My parents also, bridge was major.
[17:33] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I was like really smiling when you said that bridge was a huge part of their social life.
[17:36] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Couples, my dad, my dad passed away four years ago from Parkinson's.
[17:41] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He was diagnosed in his late 50s.
[17:43] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He died at 80.
[17:44] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I mean, so it was really advanced.
[17:46] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But bridge, he couldn't play at the end.
[17:48] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He couldn't play those last few years.
[17:49] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He really couldn't keep up.
[17:50] \[SPEAKER_02\]: The many played bridge with allowed him to stay really
[17:56] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Slowed the game down and everything, but that bridge was like a lifeline.
[18:00] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's so good to have some a lot.
[18:01] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I'm not sure you know much more of Mr.
[18:03] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Kiss to turn everything and then be real.
[18:05] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I'm really beginning to hear this.
[18:06] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I'm getting older.
[18:06] \[SPEAKER_01\]: How all the statistics I learned during this book the biggest one was that 80, 85-year Harvard study, where it's had the single most important thing to a longer, healthier, happy life.
[18:15] \[SPEAKER_01\]: It's not career or a disadvantage of that, but it's connection.
[18:18] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Social connection.
[18:19] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Oh, yeah.
[18:20] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I really begin to see that.
[18:22] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That's a massive.
[18:23] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Yeah, and another thing, Bridget, if you think about it for your parents and it had something on the calendar, it existed higher than, you don't have to schedule.
[18:31] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Well, scheduling is the worst photo friendship.
[18:33] \[SPEAKER_02\]: think about how your friends in this book you're like I'm coming and they're like great and then they're nope I'm busy I miss this and this I love that you went anyway scheduling is the hardest part of maintaining friendships and so that's why pickleball so huge now I'm because it's just on the calendar you don't have to think about it all the time and two saves we play pickleball women for now right now I've been playing for over a decade but mash on is hard work it's not so unfair yeah she puts you have to group that you place with all the
[18:58] \[SPEAKER_01\]: same thing so it's on the schedule it kind of exists higher than you it's already on the calendar and there's something to do while you're talking there's actually doing and that doing while you're talking particularly for guys because guys are not going to get together and have a cup of coffee that's just not going to happen people jogo god going to go play golf or whatever but you know this stuff that happens in that camaraderie's really valuable and happy it's like toddlers in a certain way the parallel play is really a twerking because
[19:24] \[SPEAKER_01\]: very rarely you just sort of sit around and talk about stuff in the guy you're doing something and the doing connection I do one of my newest friends that I made it one ten years now we've been friends but we became friends because I moved in next door to him and I had to build a basketball group from my son who was learning to we bought this basketball on terrible and doing yourself and he happened to be great so he came over and helped me for four hours we finally built this basketball group where she did really and I just
[19:54] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, yeah, we never talked about that, but I know that's how that friendship started.
[20:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Also, it's a U.S. to him to help you.
[20:03] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, he could have poked his head of, oh, what are you going to do?
[20:06] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Do you know how to do this?
[20:08] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You're going to go and talk about that.
[20:10] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I asked because it's a huge part of making friends and keeping friends as asking people for help.
[20:16] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And we just forget that.
[20:17] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It tells the other person that you trust them with your vulnerability.
[20:21] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I can't do this thing.
[20:22] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Can you help me?
[20:23] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Really small, like I need to write to the airport, or huge, you just have news that admitting vulnerabilities, of course, for a guy, because if you admit vulnerability, that's admitting weakness, that somehow that's gotten misconstrued.
[20:36] \[SPEAKER_01\]: They've gotten tied together when they have nothing to do with each other, and yet.
[20:39] \[SPEAKER_01\]: If I could make vulnerability, then it could be construed as weakness and the one thing a man can't be as weak.
[20:44] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So we did 10 knocked or want to do that, of course.
[20:47] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And it's ludicrous and ridiculous.
[20:48] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But when you do at someone's or help, you know, I do a lot of travel writing and I don't speak any other languages.
[20:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So when I'm there, we do, we go up to people when I'm trying to break through.
[20:57] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I'm pretty self-contained and sometimes, and so I'll just go up and go, can you help me?
[21:02] \[SPEAKER_01\]: people never say no, because it allowed them to feel empowered, they don't feel threatened then, so they don't have to behave defensively, people are the best thing we can do with that for health.
[21:11] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And of course, the hardest thing, but often with little things, when I don't even need help on, that's for health, because it just breaks down that barrier and allows them people to feel comfortable.
[21:22] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know, the more important thing is the harder it is that for health, so I know often ask for help with things, I often don't even need help, but it's just the way
[21:31] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's a good practice, it's a good way to bridge that gap between a person.
[21:35] \[SPEAKER_02\]: S. Apparel had something recently, and I saw going around.
[21:38] \[SPEAKER_02\]: She does a lot of work on marriages, but she also talks about friendships.
[21:41] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And just to danger out there of self-reliance, everybody feeling like they have to do everything for themselves, which leads to total lack of community.
[21:49] \[SPEAKER_02\]: There's friendship, and then there's community.
[21:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And they're not always the same thing.
[21:52] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You can have a good community, and you might not have a good one to one.
[21:56] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But it's important to have both in our life.
[22:01] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We have deeds.
[22:02] \[SPEAKER_00\]: We can't do everything on our own.
[22:03] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, the lone wolf thing is it massive problem for guys because that's what a man who would American man who did the ball.
[22:11] \[SPEAKER_01\]: In the 1800 man used to write basically love letters to each other.
[22:15] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know, Abraham Lincoln and Joshua Speed with a dearest friends and had shared a bed even and you know, some people were saying it was a sexual relationship.
[22:21] \[SPEAKER_01\]: There was so much intimacy and spoken intimacy among men and somewhere between the Victoria and post World War II to the John Wayne Evolution of Carrier Ownwater and the Stoic and Silent, the idea of manhood changed to that and it's really been a disservice to God, I think.
[22:41] \[SPEAKER_01\]: that notion of just being solitary and self-contained is so dangerous to us.
[22:48] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I mean, I'm very much not a macho dude, but I can certainly be very self-contained solitary.
[22:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And even just guys I met on the road to the strip, some guys I'm a big and one guy met in Nevada, tiny town in Elco, Nevada, and he said, yeah, I never had much to choose for friendship.
[23:03] \[SPEAKER_01\]: He's a lovely guy, interesting guy, but he was pretty encased in himself.
[23:08] \[SPEAKER_01\]: It's rocks.
[23:09] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I think that's rock.
[23:10] \[SPEAKER_02\]: As we talked about that Harvard study, that's not going to vote well, probably, in the end.
[23:14] \[SPEAKER_02\]: One thing I actually found really surprising, happily surprising in your book, is how many guys actually did have deep friendships, though.
[23:21] \[SPEAKER_02\]: more than I would have thought.
[23:22] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I think I would have assumed that you were going to have more conversations like the one you just said, and use the word skittish.
[23:28] \[SPEAKER_02\]: That's a great word.
[23:29] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Like everyone was skittish at first.
[23:30] \[SPEAKER_02\]: They didn't necessarily want to talk about it at first.
[23:33] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But then they would open up to you.
[23:35] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And many of them did have these stories of guys who they were like, I don't even know how I would live without this person.
[23:41] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I'm going to die when he dies.
[23:42] \[SPEAKER_02\]: That was the same.
[23:43] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Yeah, I was amazing.
[23:44] \[SPEAKER_01\]: There were a couple of guys I've met in Ohio that were in the
[23:48] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, they said wonderful thing because yeah, we started recently saying I love you to each other.
[23:52] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I tell my kids, I love them, I tell my wife, I love them, I can't tell my best friend for six years, I love them.
[23:56] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know, there were cops and there were top guys and there were awesome those guys.
[24:00] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And, you know, yeah, a couple of guys that met down in Austin Tech, they're two, they've been friends for a decade.
[24:05] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And then I like what I'm saying, I don't know what my life would have been without him.
[24:09] \[SPEAKER_01\]: feeling it so much small, envy that when they said that, just something I can't even comprehend.
[24:14] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You have that kind of daily friendship and that kind of support, a rock next to you, like that, I really envy that.
[24:21] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I think that it's not something temperament to that.
[24:24] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I might not be shooting for, but also it just hasn't been my wasn't lucky enough to have that experience, but yeah, I did encounter guys who had that.
[24:30] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And they tended to be a little gentler and a little more open-minded,
[24:39] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I don't know if you got all the way through my interview with Jeff Hall, but he did say something kind of interesting that he's working on next.
[24:47] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He always has these studies, the 200 hour studies was probably seven years ago or so.
[24:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: His next one that he hasn't quite done yet, he's hypothesizing, then he'll put it into his relationship lab at the university that telling people they're lonely, maybe causing more loneliness than they're really.
[25:06] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Yes.
[25:06] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I thought that was kind of interesting, which I thought was fascinating, and you'd have quite a conversation.
[25:10] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And that notion that everybody is lonely, and that doesn't also nothing wrong with that.
[25:15] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Because everybody gets lonely at certain moments, but then the notion that they have to be wronged and with that.
[25:19] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I thought that was really interesting at all, not lonely, technically, regardless of.
[25:23] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Talk more about that.
[25:24] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He was saying, and it spoke to me, too, that loneliness is actually the solution for the battle.
[25:30] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Just like, right?
[25:31] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Just like, when you have pain, right?
[25:33] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I think about actually, as I was reading your book, you're not going to believe this, was not as bad as what Sevi was dealing with at all.
[25:40] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But I had a back spouse and my back went out last week, and I'm much better now.
[25:44] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I'm mobile and everything.
[25:45] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But I mean, I was like, in bed reading your book, all the laying down was uncomfortable.
[25:48] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And sitting was uncomfortable.
[25:49] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Look, you have to constantly change.
[25:50] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But I was thinking about the loneliness thing, the back pain, and how that spows him on the back.
[25:55] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Actually, something may be grateful for.
[25:57] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It was to save my back from, I was obviously doing something, and it was to save me from further injury.
[26:04] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And I think loneliness is kind of the same thing.
[26:05] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's that feeling that you might get.
[26:07] \[SPEAKER_02\]: is the solution.
[26:08] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's to tell you, okay, time to connect.
[26:11] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You have to do something about it.
[26:12] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's not magically going to happen that you're going to feel better.
[26:15] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But it's the sign that you're alone too much, maybe, that you haven't put as much time into the social connection.
[26:21] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, and what's so interesting is that it becomes sort of a positive thing.
[26:24] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Not necessarily, as opposed to this negative and lacking in terms of self indictment about how you fail, you're an illusory because you're lonely.
[26:32] \[SPEAKER_01\]: But it's letting, yeah, it's spurring you to action in a certain way.
[26:37] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Yeah, like it's normal, it actually would be concerning if you had no friends and no real social connections and felt no loneliness.
[26:46] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's the inverse.
[26:47] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's like the lack of loneliness is the issue, not feeling lonely, not lack.
[26:52] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Obviously, if you have very full social life, you may not feel it.
[26:54] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Although that's what our episode really was about.
[26:56] \[SPEAKER_02\]: That people in their 20s are very connected are busy.
[26:59] \[SPEAKER_02\]: They're always doing stuff that they still make feel a sense of loneliness, but it's more like they're just not settled.
[27:04] \[SPEAKER_02\]: That's his current study.
[27:05] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Okay, finally, I want to just read you one comment from my Facebook group.
[27:10] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I didn't say I was interviewing you as I told you before we recorded.
[27:14] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Just in case you were super busy and couldn't do it, I didn't want to tell anybody.
[27:17] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And I just said, I'm interviewing a great guest about male friendship.
[27:21] \[SPEAKER_02\]: What are your thoughts on male friendship?
[27:22] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And this one comment kind of encompasses them all.
[27:25] \[SPEAKER_02\]: She said, I find it sad that my husband puts so little effort into maintaining his friendships.
[27:30] \[SPEAKER_02\]: By now our children are teenagers almost grown up, and I've so much time for my own friends.
[27:35] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I didn't have so much time in the past either, but over the past few years that has improved so much and I don't want to miss any more of my friendships.
[27:43] \[SPEAKER_02\]: My husband on the other hand hardly maintains his contacts, and he doesn't want any advice from me.
[27:48] \[SPEAKER_02\]: My husband is such an interesting person to talk to.
[27:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I feel like he doesn't even see his own potential.
[27:53] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I thought that was sweet.
[27:54] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's a shame.
[27:54] \[SPEAKER_02\]: But the more I try to convince him to spend time with friends, the less he seems to want to, at least that's how it feels.
[28:01] \[SPEAKER_02\]: He doesn't enjoy couple evenings.
[28:03] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Still, I think it would be important for him to also do friendship stuff on his own.
[28:07] \[SPEAKER_02\]: There's quite a big discrepancy now between the time I spend with friends and him.
[28:12] \[SPEAKER_02\]: What advice can you give not just her all my listeners who I kind of started with are concerned is there anything they can say to their husbands or just the men in their life to spend more time with friends.
[28:23] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, I should go hang out with that dude because I'm exactly the same.
[28:26] \[SPEAKER_01\]: My wife would say it's saying that I am not a social scientist when I tell my wife I was writing a book about friendship.
[28:31] \[SPEAKER_01\]: She went, you are writing a book about friendship.
[28:34] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I could get bomb perfect for it.
[28:36] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I would know friends, so who better to write a book about friendship?
[28:39] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Then a guy who has, that is, friendships attribute.
[28:43] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I do think guys do bets when they're in action, in motion.
[28:46] \[SPEAKER_01\]: What was great about rekindling my friendships and it was good fodder for books that I drove 10,000 miles to go see them all.
[28:52] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know what I mean?
[28:53] \[SPEAKER_01\]: To go do something.
[28:54] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I take a lot of what guys judge our life why of what we achieve.
[28:58] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That I drove to go see them.
[29:01] \[SPEAKER_01\]: mental loss to me was proof to not necessarily to them, but to me.
[29:04] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And what's a demigrant?
[29:05] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I can't believe you told me it was true to me that this is important to me and with the value.
[29:10] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So again, logged in the miles literally and made the effort action for guys is the equivalent to love.
[29:16] \[SPEAKER_01\]: For me, it's been very helpful.
[29:18] \[SPEAKER_02\]: that's beautiful.
[29:19] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Okay, two more things I lied.
[29:20] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It wasn't the last one.
[29:21] \[SPEAKER_02\]: How did they feel about being in the book?
[29:23] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I know they're not all the same, but just from a writer perspective, that's sort of interesting to me in a memoir.
[29:27] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I gave it to all I offered to everyone.
[29:29] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Do you want to read what I wrote about you?
[29:30] \[SPEAKER_00\]: And three said yes and two, just to know, I'm good.
[29:33] \[SPEAKER_00\]: That's trust right there.
[29:35] \[SPEAKER_00\]: I said, well, you're going to have to buy it then.
[29:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: You're not giving your
[29:37] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Oh, my friend said, I've read it to him on the phone.
[29:40] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I just hadn't read the chapter to him on the phone.
[29:42] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I didn't mean to, which is sort of like, said, I wrote this about you.
[29:44] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You okay with this?
[29:45] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That was very meaningful 20 minutes, both on a car.
[29:50] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I got a bus, which is like, oh, God.
[29:52] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And he called me back the next day, which is what you wrote.
[29:55] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And the book, when you get older to it, a lot of this stuff is brought to life.
[29:59] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And it's just a long day.
[30:00] \[SPEAKER_01\]: You know, I'm just like, wow.
[30:02] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And so saying it, saying it, saying it, saying they have something to say to somebody.
[30:06] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Say, well, I just think it'll come a time when you can't, and you'll wish you had when with my folks were dying, or friends, I'm so glad I said to these friends, you mean so much to me.
[30:16] \[SPEAKER_01\]: That's all, and that's all it takes, that vulnerability is just always was met every time.
[30:22] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I would never shagged for that.
[30:24] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You said about said that he was your coal pilot the whole way, which I thought was really beautiful.
[30:28] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You saw him.
[30:28] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And Baltimore, and then you saw him other times, he was kind of like your passenger, your unofficial passenger in your car.
[30:34] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Because he was proud of himself.
[30:36] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, that was great.
[30:37] \[SPEAKER_00\]: Yeah, I love that.
[30:39] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Okay, I actually feel like we covered everything except the title.
[30:43] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And that was the real final question.
[30:45] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I was surprised by the title, who needs friends?
[30:48] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You didn't answer the question.
[30:49] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Well, men's in the subtitle.
[30:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Yeah, I guess that's true.
[30:52] \[SPEAKER_01\]: When I'm working title, I was having for while was to men need friends.
[30:55] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Then I got no guide sitting on a plane would be reading a book or to men need friends.
[31:01] \[SPEAKER_01\]: because it makes them too vulnerable, too soft, too weak, all the things a man has prayed not to be.
[31:06] \[SPEAKER_01\]: So I just thought, man, yeah, I'm gonna need to friends.
[31:08] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And it could be a true question where it could be that kind of befended way.
[31:11] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I just put it in your face in a tolerable way, for men particularly, because again, I thought to do something too soft, guys would reject that, out of hand, and not go, wanna go with it.
[31:23] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And I thought that that was, that's our biggest challenge, and it's still not even saying it, that I did this good choice.
[31:31] \[SPEAKER_01\]: them.
[31:31] \[SPEAKER_01\]: And do you have to meet people where they are?
[31:33] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Yeah, you got to deal with reality.
[31:34] \[SPEAKER_02\]: That's right, you're selling a book and you got to deal with reality.
[31:37] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's a great book.
[31:38] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Listeners, get it for yourselves, get it for the men in your life, but also for you because there's so much that we women can learn from male friendship, what makes them work, what can be a challenge, but there's a human element that's true for everyone.
[31:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I'm just glad you took the time to write it and really appreciate you being here with a little old me and Minnesota here.
[31:59] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I appreciate it.
[32:00] \[SPEAKER_01\]: Oh, thank you.
[32:00] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I really appreciate it.
[32:02] \[SPEAKER_01\]: I love you, Pasha.
[32:03] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Oh, thank you, and I say at the end, every time I know you'll agree Andrew.
[32:07] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Listeners should come back next week when our friendships are going well, we are happier all around Harvard degrees.
[32:13] \[SPEAKER_02\]: So do I.
[32:14] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Thank you listeners for being here with me for a very special episode.
[32:17] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I talked to so many fantastic authors and thought leaders and professors, regular people, my mom, friends in my life.
[32:24] \[SPEAKER_02\]: It's not that often that I talked to a celebrity.
[32:26] \[SPEAKER_02\]: So that was a lot of fun and had to cut keep my cool.
[32:29] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I think I did.
[32:30] \[SPEAKER_02\]: You can let me know.
[32:30] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I often have a discussion thread going for each episode in my Facebook group.
[32:34] \[SPEAKER_02\]: That's at Diorina, the group.
[32:36] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And find me on social media on Instagram and TikTok at Diorina Friendship.
[32:41] \[SPEAKER_02\]: And finally,
[32:41] \[SPEAKER_02\]: On the newsletter, there's lots of friendship advice.
[32:44] \[SPEAKER_02\]: I do do anonymous letters that people write to me there as well as other fun.
[32:48] \[SPEAKER_02\]: Book picks and Tiki picks and just friendship discussions of all kinds.
[32:51] \[SPEAKER_02\]: That is at DoYernina.Subsect.com.
[32:54] \[SPEAKER_02\]: See you next week!

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