Best Friends Break You

It's Monday. I'm here for you.

The Pick Me Up is a Monday morning newsletter filled with advice, personal stories, and tips to help you get out of bed and jumpstart your week.

I turned 35 and decided that if the people I love don’t have the capacity to handle me on my very blue days, then what we have between us is air, and air turns stale.

I used to kept 80% of what was happening to me in life to myself. I avoided telling anyone anything. I kept my head above surface level as my heart sank silently.

These weeks have been tough. I didn’t want to talk about it but I didn’t want to hide either.

I texted a best friend: I wanted to tell you that I’m having a tough week and it’s hard for me to even tell you that. I’m not looking for anything but I just wanted to type out what’s going on with me.

When you need it, save this to text someone you love: I’m falling apart this week. Things just feel off. I could use your support [fill in the blank].

For example: I could use your support helping me write an email to my therapist. I could use your support via a phone call to help me take my mind off things. I could use your support by sharing some advice of how you’d handle things.

There are so many things that feel impossible to say - like I’m sorry and I love you.

And it can feel impossible to say: I’m unraveling. I need you.

But I’ve found after you do it, you hardly regret it.

And some people in your life will love you on your blue days too.

In this issue: Friendships that you don’t want to fade, the number one thing you can do to be a good person this week, thought about social media.

Why you’re getting this: I'm Jen Glantz and this is The Pick-Me-Up newsletter. I've been sending it every Monday, for 8-years, to thousands of awesome humans, just like you. Thank you for letting this email live in in your inbox. It truly makes my heart explode with joy.

Ps. I’m so grateful that you’re reading this because writing this newsletter every week is my favorite thing. If you know anyone who would adore getting this in their inbox, it would mean the world if you’d share it.

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⚡Instant Pick Me Ups

📚: My cousin wrote a book! It’s a #1 new release. It’s not a topic I normally dive into but it seems interesting and I’ll be spending time with the book this weekend.

📄: Budgeting hacks to save a little more cash every month.

🎧: Another podcast I can’t stop listening to.

🛍️: The items I used on repeat this week

• Out of all the biker shorts I ordered and tried, these are my favorite ones.

• These are the shoes I wear multiple times a day. Comfortable and stylish (I think??)

• I lounge around the house in this sports bra. It’s really comfy. Not that supportive for HIIT workouts but great for yoga or pilates.

• A baby product that really is worth the hype.

🛠️: I built a tool! It can write you a custom maid of honor speech in minutes. I trained AI technology to mimic my writing style and chat with people to write them a personalized speech. The process is interactive, easy, and perfect for someone who wants to write a memorable speech but is struggling. It’s pretty mind blowing and people who have used it found themselves blown away - even in tears over the speech that was generated. It would mean so much if you’d use it or share it (on social media or with anyone who might need a maid of honor toast pick me up!) Check it out here.

💬: Beat yourself up with a feather not a bat. My therapist said this after 45-minutes of me telling her that a very long list of self-deprecating thoughts.

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One of my closest friends moved out of New York City last week

Before she left, I texted her:

Such a sad wreck I was digging through my kitchen drawer to find the key to her apartment. Once it was in my hands I realized:

Who have you become, Jen Glantz? The kind of person who makes the kinds of friends who give YOU their spare key?

In my 35 years of life, that’s never been the case.

I’ve always struggled to make close friends. As a kid, I was friends with people who had humongous and strong personalities. I was shy. I was awkward. I was the bulls-eye for so many jokes, pranks, and mean girl moments.

One bad experience after another made me grow weary of people who wanted to be my friend. I protected myself by keeping a distance. By assuming people were going to hurt me if I let them get too close.

Even in my twenties, I viewed friendship as something to hide from. I had close friends but I mostly kept a few inches between us. I didn’t tell them everything going on in my life. I didn’t show up for them all of the time in the ways friends do because I had never really had a good lesson in friendship or an example to follow.

Five years ago, when my life was unraveling and I was going through one of the hardest things a person might ever have to go through, I had a best friend I tried to lean on. Slowly, over time, I let her in on what I was going through. And slowly, over time, she pulled away from me.

On a sunny June afternoon, she told me she didn’t want to be my friend anymore. She wouldn’t give me a reason, even when I begged for one.

Finally, I had a best friend. Proudly, I opened up to her. Suddenly, she left my life.

A moment like that might make a person like me crawl back into the belief that people suck and best friends just break your heart, but it didn’t.

Shocking and unexpected things break us so hard. We’re never the same afterward.

I crawled in the direction of those inches I had put between existing friendships. I opened up more to the people I loved. I showed up more for them. I tried to be selfless and I tried to prioritize friendship.

In my thirties I made these new best friends who never knew that old version of me.

Instead, they knew a person who didn’t approach friendship like an undercover investigator trying to figure out how the other person was going to hurt me.

They knew a person who showed up as is. Who wasn’t scared anymore. I didn’t hide.

It was a tough moment watching another one of my best friends move out of New York City.

Long distant friendships are a real professional ballgame. They aren’t for rookies.

But as I held her spare key in my hand, I thought:

What breaks us, changes us. And eventually, we see how it caused some good.

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Hello, from my life:

The humongous little things I can’t stop thinking about from last week.

1. Still figuring out where to live and what to do now that our lease is up on our 1-bedroom 500 sq foot apartment. We live it here but the space is tiny for two humans, a dog, and a growing baby. Two bedrooms in my neighborhood go for $6k+. Like this one. Crazy, right?

2. I’m in my “I only eat salad if I pour a half a bag of chips on top” era right now.

   

   3. Is it just me or are you starting to feel over social media too? I’m suddenly like wow this thing is a waste of time and I go on to see what my friends are up to (and people I don’t know) but it’s not really what they are up to so why am I on this thing? I’m sure my mind will change, but right now my heart is SO not into it.

   4.I went to a “new mom” meet-up event this week. The people there were so unfriendly. They barely acknowledged me when I walked up and said hello. I was with Gemma and on the walk home, I gave her a lesson about people. The lesson is that we can’t control how people respond or react to us but we can always treat people with kindness. I want her to grow up to be the kind of person who sees someone new walk in and greets them and includes them. Kindness.

   5. Phone calls I had this week included: a reality show pitch about my life as a hired bridesmaid, a call to potentially hire a virtual assistant, two phone calls with two best friends, an hour with my therapist, and a call with a newsletter sales platform because I think I want to sell one of my other newsletters that I’ve been building

   6. Did you know that there are almost 9,000 other humans who read this newsletter every month? Why not say hello and introduce yourself

What do you want to read next week?