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New York Times best-selling author, relationship expert, and licensed therapist Nedra Glover Tawwab gets to the heart of relationships in her new podcast, You Need to Hear This. Glover Tawwab guides influential guests and callers alike on the healthy way to set boundaries, improve interconnections, and find peace of mind in their daily lives. Through actionable plans and emotional support, Glover Tawwab outlines simple steps that lead to big changes. Each week, Nedra listens to a caller's dilemma and advises them on navigating the turbulent waters of their life. Face it, relationships are hard, but they don’t have to be. Listen, and learn how to transform unpleasant connections, communicate your needs, and communicate at a higher level. You Need to Hear This every Thursday on iHeart Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Family wedding. It is up to us to set our expectations reasonably. And so that is what will help preserve those relationships. Now let's think about some reasonable expectations. If you are fresh out of college and you want to get married and all of your friends are recently graduated You may not want to have the most expensive wedding of your dreams and expect everybody to travel to whatever paradise and be able to pay for themselves and have you know, the $1000 bridesmaid dresses. And if you do that, maybe expect that some people can't go along with it. Maybe expect that you know, there will be some people in your family who are gonna have some feedback. Maybe expect that your sister-in-law isn't always going to be bubbly about your experience? How can we temper our expectations around our weddings? It is such a special day. You know, I think so many of us, we're planning, we're processing. We're like, this person must do this. Nobody can ruin my day, but I promise you a wedding is just one day and the grand scheme of being married. And if we don't get through this baby step, we will have some challenges ahead in our marriages and in those families that we are becoming a part of. And it sounds like if if that is not remedied early on, it just it just keeps going. And all of these issues sort of come up, unfortunately, at a time that isn't even about you. So that brings me to my next thought, passive aggressiveness, You know, I know it's a phrase that many of us have heard, like, what is it, though? One big thing that it is is bringing up information
With my father's illness. I am an only child. So since his passing, I have been helping as much as I can with helping her with technology and taking ownership of doing all the things and have been intentional to call her every day and give her opportunities to participate in activities with me and my son. Even before my father got sick, my mother has always been judgmental and sort of limited in her worldview. Without getting too political, she is very left and often makes comments about those with other viewpoints. She also, since I was a young girl, has said comments related to my body image and lifestyle that have been triggering, as this generation might call it. She routinely says things that really get under my skin. When my dad was around, I was able to limit my time with her, in situations that involve a lot of sharing. Now that my father is gone, I find it hard to set boundaries with her. I feel sort of guilty that I do not want to spend a lot of time with her. But at the same time, she routinely makes comments about my weight, household, or political comments that are hurtful or confrontational. In our relationships with others as we are doing what we think is required, we have to wonder, is this even necessary? Have we been, you know, maybe directly or in some informal way, asked, can you give me a call every day? Because, you know, maybe we feel like that's what I should do as the only child. That's what my mother's expectation is. But has that been stated? Is it actually a need for you to do that thing? We can show up and be really healthy with others when we're doing so out of love and not out of obligation. So I just wonder what feels comfortable. Perhaps comfortable is talking every other day, talking once a week, but I tell you what
Our relationships with others, we can be so excited and intoxicated by the energy of that person or the role that this person have in our lives. And we may need to step back when it's not being, I wanna say reciprocated because I don't think it should be mutual, but when it's not being reciprocated, not even in a 50 50 balanced way, but in any way, when we notice that this person is not giving, we need to step back and maybe say, what does this person represent for me? And why do, why do I even want this from them? What is it that I'm afraid to ask for in my other relationships? Why do I think this is the only person who can help me with this challenge I'm having? In today's letter, we will be talking about friendship. And not just friendship, but a best friendship. I know so many of us, we have high hopes when someone is our best friend. We want it to be the most powerful connection ever, and our expectations are high. But I'll tell you what, I've seen some situations where it is a one-sided best friendship. It is one person who's the best friend in that dynamic. Let's listen to today's call and figure out if this is a best friend relationship, or are we talking to the best friend? Hello. I'm a 20 year old woman who's been wrestling with thoughts about my best friend lately. We've been incredibly close since 10th grade, but I've observed her becoming somewhat distant lately. About a week ago, we had a minor disagreement. And although she apologized, things might feel a bit awkward between us because of it. Our friendship has seen its fair share of arguments and reconciliations over the years, leaving me feeling deeply confused but oddly attached to her. It
To commit to it if that's what you want to do. We don't have to be, you know, friends with people because we've been friends with them for 10 years. Like, you know, the average friendship is around 7 years, and ten is pretty good. You know? I I have some friends who, thankfully, you know, we've been friends 20 plus years, 25 plus years, and that is beautiful. But guess what? I've had some friends, we were friends for 1 year. I have some friends, we were friends for 6 months. I have some we were friends for 10 years. You know, so everybody isn't going to be on a lifelong journey. Those friendships I've had for, you know, the long haul so far? Easy. Oh my gosh, so easy. I could take them around anyone and they almost steal my other friends. And, you know, I'll say like, don't steal my friend. I don't want to see her at your stuff. You know, it's like, that's my friend. I only hang out with good people. Of course, you would like her. Of course, she's wonderful. But we have to think about what our friends are representing while we have them with other people. What am I reflecting as a part of me? You know, I love it when when people love my other friends. I have one friend right now. And he is just he's so fun. And everybody is like, why didn't you bring him? Where is he? I went to a concert recently, and he was He is He is a great person. And it, you know, it's it's really great when you have those situations where it's like, that's how it could be.
At all the time. But guess what? A symptom of depression is rage. It is anger. I've seen it a ton in women where they have anger outbursts, where, you know, they have these really big emotional confrontations with people, really centered around some feelings of depression. You know, depression makes you feel powerless in some ways. And what does anger make you feel powerful? And so sometimes that depression, it can shift and it can turn into, like, I've got the power. So I gotta tell these people, I'm I'm going to yell and scream. I'm tired of being walked over. So a sign of depression could be could be rage. And so without having some sort of mental health resource here, I would say that, you know, that that could be a function of the depression. The last thing I want to highlight from what we just heard is, and I'm going to repeat the line here. She never apologizes for her actions, anger, or behavior. I don't know about you, but if I get about 2 or 3 apologies for the same thing, and I start to notice that you're not really trying to change this. You just want to smooth things over with this apology I have said to people. I've said to people, you know, I understand you're trying to smooth this over or you're you're, you know, you want us to move on. But what I'm noticing here is you're using an apology as a way to keep going instead of a way to change your behavior. So even if your mother apologizes, it doesn't mean that her behavior will change. She will say, I'm sorry for this thing. And then she will do this thing again next week. So I wonder for you, what does this apology signify? Because it doesn't
