In Episode 28, Beth and Mel use Beth's Book of 365 Questions to explore 3 specific questions, which opens up the show's conversations in a wonderful way.
We would love to know your own answers to these simple but profound questions.
00:00 Introduction and Warm Greetings
00:22 Introducing the Question and Answer Journal
01:33 First Question: Last Meal Cooked for You
05:02 Second Question: Resolution for Tomorrow
11:17 Third Question: What Are You Chasing?
16:48 Fourth Question: Who Is Your Best Friend?
20:37 Reflections on Friendship and Confidence
30:31 Conclusion and Listener Engagement
https://soul-inspired-you.captivate.fm/
More from Beth Hewitt
Get Beth's Gratitude and Vision Building Journal
Join the 30 Day Gratitude and Vision Building Journey
Social Media @gratitudeandvision @visualiseyou @Bethhewitt80
More from Melissa Amos
Get Mel's Book - Memoires of a Mystic in Training
Social Media @themelissaamos
Music Credits: Laura Mitchell of LauraMitchellSings.com https://www.facebook.com/laura.mitchell.1232
Mentioned in this episode:
Gratitude and Vision Building Journey
Good morning, Belle. Good morning, Belle.
Beth Hewitt:How are you doing today? Saying how lovely and warm it is for once.
Beth Hewitt:Hello. It's been autumn in the
Melissa Amos:summer. Yeah. And finally,
Melissa Amos:touchwood. I feel something, some warmth is arriving. Yes,
Beth Hewitt:at last. It's been a while.
Beth Hewitt:So I had a little idea this morning. Not an idea. It was inspired thought
Beth Hewitt:that dropped in, which is all about this podcast.
Beth Hewitt:And I have a little book called that my friend got me a while
Beth Hewitt:ago called question and answers.
Beth Hewitt:365 questions over five years.
Beth Hewitt:1825 answers, a five year
Beth Hewitt:journal. And I've had it for about ten years, and
Beth Hewitt:I haven't used it as it's probably supposed to be used, but I like to
Beth Hewitt:use it as dipping into just journaling prompts and
Beth Hewitt:just when your brain needs a bit of a gear up kind of thing. And
Beth Hewitt:I thought, we're about 25 episodes in. We
Beth Hewitt:had those Mel and Beth interviews right at the beginning. It's been a little
Beth Hewitt:while since we, like, just shared some
Beth Hewitt:insights about who we are and how we think and that kind of thing.
Beth Hewitt:So I wondered if you want to answer some questions. This sounds
Melissa Amos:intriguing. I'm up for it. So we can do
Beth Hewitt:this however you want. So each page has got a different date on it.
Melissa Amos:Okay. And you can, if you want to pick a date,
Beth Hewitt:and I'll pick those date. Should we see as it. It was
Melissa Amos:inspired today? Okay. Say, as in the day we're recording. It,
Beth Hewitt:what was the last meal that someone
Beth Hewitt:cooked for you? I think it's a really good question because there's. I don't know.
Beth Hewitt:But in my house, I do a lot of the cooking, so I need to
Beth Hewitt:think on this one. I need to think on this one. I don't
Melissa Amos:do all the cooking in the house, but I often
Melissa Amos:eat separately just because my diet's
Melissa Amos:different, my schedule's different. I'm just
Melissa Amos:different. So the last meal that was
Melissa Amos:cooked for me was,
Melissa Amos:what did I have Friday? Oh, my God.
Melissa Amos:Why is this a hard question? It gets the brain cells working, though. That's what
Beth Hewitt:I love about this book, doesn't it? Actually, on Saturday,
Melissa Amos:does it count that I went out and bought everything and then
Melissa Amos:there are no rules, so my kids were in charge, and we were like, what
Melissa Amos:do you want to eat? And they weren't. They were
Melissa Amos:like, on a Saturday, I was like, can we have picky food? So we went
Melissa Amos:out and bought pizzas and chicken and salad,
Melissa Amos:cera sticks and all the bad stuff. And I never usually eat
Melissa Amos:it, but I made my salad and then ate all the
Melissa Amos:pizza, and I never eat it. And what's
Melissa Amos:even more intriguing about this is yesterday I went
Melissa Amos:to a kinesiologist, told me to not eat gluten anymore, and I got to eat
Melissa Amos:gluten. And I literally gluttoned out
Melissa Amos:this weekend on gluten. So it was clearly
Melissa Amos:to raise my intolerance so that it would come
Melissa Amos:up. So, yeah, a pizza. Mine was. So it was Father's day
Beth Hewitt:just here this last weekend. And
Beth Hewitt:I went to. Or we went to my father
Beth Hewitt:in law's, and my mother in law made bacon
Beth Hewitt:sandwiches. She was making all kinds of different sandwiches. And so I didn't even know
Beth Hewitt:we were going to get fed. It was quite a nice surprise. We're quite
Beth Hewitt:privileged that we've got. I've got lots of dads and granddads in my life. Father's
Beth Hewitt:day is like a whole day. The man in my house doesn't actually get to
Beth Hewitt:experience Father's day until 05:00 when he's. When we've been to all the other dads
Beth Hewitt:and granddad's houses. So it was quite a nice surprise. I think it
Beth Hewitt:was pit stop number three when we got this on a pit stop. Who it
Beth Hewitt:was when I got this bacon sandwich. So that was nice.
Melissa Amos:Lovely pizzas and bacon sandwiches. Life of a
Melissa Amos:spiritual teacher. But I have eaten so much chocolate this weekend
Beth Hewitt:because of all of the dads and granddads in our house.
Melissa Amos:What about balance? Isn't it? It is. And I
Melissa Amos:think that. So when I was at the kinesiology, she
Melissa Amos:said to me, I draw minerals out of food really well.
Melissa Amos:I do eat pretty well. Like, I try and eat fresh and green as much
Melissa Amos:as possible. And she said something interesting. She said it's
Melissa Amos:probably because I'm so conscious about what I put on my
Melissa Amos:skin. Like, I don't put any perfumes and
Melissa Amos:symptoms. Yeah, me neither. Interesting. And in the house, don't
Melissa Amos:have things. And she implied that was
Melissa Amos:I'm no doctor, but she implied that was a
Melissa Amos:contributing factor to how well I can draw food out because I
Melissa Amos:didn't need the supplements. Isn't that
Beth Hewitt:fascinating? I love that. I never thought about that, but I love how it's a
Beth Hewitt:twist on. I think, oh, this is a bad thing that this is happening to
Beth Hewitt:me. But actually she's saying actually, because you do this, you're actually
Beth Hewitt:really good at drawing out. Yeah. So there we go.
Beth Hewitt:Okay. Question. Would you like another
Beth Hewitt:date? What date would you like to go for? Pick a day. Let's go.
Melissa Amos:August 12. Be weird if that's when this
Melissa Amos:episode comes out. Wouldn't it. Wouldn't it just. Or if
Melissa Amos:there's a listener. If there's a listener listening, and it's August
Melissa Amos:12, you've just had an awesome synchronicity. It's you I'm
Melissa Amos:talking to today, so let us know if it's all you are in
Melissa Amos:blur. Yeah. Okay. This is a good one. I don't know
Beth Hewitt:how to this. 1. August 12. What is
Beth Hewitt:your resolution for tomorrow?
Melissa Amos:For August 13? My
Melissa Amos:resolution for tomorrow. So I
Melissa Amos:literally. Speaking of the gluten thing. So it's literally been 12
Melissa Amos:hours since she said to me, well,
Melissa Amos:16 hours. So I'm currently
Melissa Amos:contemplating whether I go full on keto, just cut out
Melissa Amos:gluten. I'm contemplating all of this, and so my
Melissa Amos:resolution is.
Melissa Amos:And I'm going out for dinner today. Celebration. So this
Melissa Amos:is. So my resolution for tomorrow is
Melissa Amos:mindful eating. I think just the
Melissa Amos:mindfulness, because what's interesting about kinesiology is you're using
Melissa Amos:your body, right? And your body is. Without even knowing what
Melissa Amos:you're testing, your body is responding
Melissa Amos:strong or weak. And it's amazing. Like, I was
Melissa Amos:watching her work, and I'm like, this is so fascinating
Melissa Amos:that we know. Like, she put some tinctures on my
Melissa Amos:shoulder, and I didn't know what she was putting on there. And tested. She was
Melissa Amos:like, yes, for this one. No, you don't need this one. And my
Melissa Amos:body was going, yes, feel how strong
Melissa Amos:my arm was when I had
Melissa Amos:this particular mushroom chew on my arm, which,
Melissa Amos:interestingly, the woman who makes the tinctures was like, this is what you need.
Melissa Amos:And I was like, why do I need that? And that was the one I
Melissa Amos:tested the strongest with. So I'm messaging. You're amazing. Anyway,
Melissa Amos:so by being mindful with what we eat, I
Melissa Amos:think it's tuning back into that wisdom of, I
Melissa Amos:know whether it's okay today to have pizza and bacon
Melissa Amos:sandwiches, or if today is a
Melissa Amos:salad and fish day or whatever.
Beth Hewitt:I love that. I love these questions. They're making us think outside of
Beth Hewitt:the box. Where are you answering that? Yeah. What is my resolution
Beth Hewitt:for tomorrow? So I am going to be really
Beth Hewitt:productive all week, actually. But tomorrow I'm going to be. My resolution is
Beth Hewitt:to be productive, but also moderately productive. So what I
Beth Hewitt:mean by that is, I know what I need to do tomorrow, and I'm going
Beth Hewitt:to be, like, a bit of a conveyor belt of just creating loads of stuff
Beth Hewitt:tomorrow. But I also want to balance that with
Beth Hewitt:time for me, time for family, bit of self
Beth Hewitt:care, a lot of mindfulness, and just be really present through that
Beth Hewitt:process. So that's my resolution. Tomorrow.
Beth Hewitt:Specifically tomorrow. Love that.
Melissa Amos:And we both like, it's the mindful thing.
Melissa Amos:And what's even more interesting for me, as I was doing a session for somebody
Melissa Amos:last night, helping her with her business,
Melissa Amos:and that's exactly what was coming up. It was
Melissa Amos:like, she's, what do I need to be doing? Where should I be focusing?
Melissa Amos:And everything was like, you need to just stop for two weeks.
Melissa Amos:You just stop. That doesn't mean you do nothing, but
Melissa Amos:you stop. And your work is to sit on the mat and to just
Melissa Amos:meditate. And she knew this. Like, she knew this before she even came on the
Melissa Amos:call, but I swear she needed to hear it
Melissa Amos:separately and everything. And I was pulling
Melissa Amos:cards, and they were all, like, literally affirming what we were
Melissa Amos:saying, stop and just sit. And
Melissa Amos:that is when the inspiration comes through. And this is what we
Melissa Amos:mean by the energetics behind what it is that we're doing.
Melissa Amos:It's not, I have to do the right thing because then
Melissa Amos:the energy that you're coming into, it could be different. Like, I need to just
Melissa Amos:get this done. I've got all of this work to do. Huffy puffy, or I
Melissa Amos:have to eat this diet. Is that. Why does it need to be diet? Why
Melissa Amos:are we looking at food at work or whatever, as
Melissa Amos:something that fuels us and that enhances us and that is part
Melissa Amos:of what we're doing, rather than something that we need to
Melissa Amos:restrict or get through? And I think that comes with
Melissa Amos:that stopping and that what do I need right
Melissa Amos:now? What's useful right now? What's most important right
Melissa Amos:now? And we have this infinite wisdom
Melissa Amos:that should we care to tune in and listen, it's
Melissa Amos:there. I love it when we do, when we find the time and space to
Beth Hewitt:do that, just sitting on the mat experience, because we can often
Beth Hewitt:feel like it's almost like we're on a rubber band kind of thing. We can
Beth Hewitt:feel the tension immediately. Like, to begin with, might be like, okay, but I don't
Beth Hewitt:want to sit on the mat. I want to be, like, over there. But
Beth Hewitt:when we're in that kind of mentality, we're missing all of these wonderful nuggets
Beth Hewitt:of experiences and conversations and
Beth Hewitt:synchronicities because we're
Beth Hewitt:like, we're doing. We're taking everybody out, and it's
Melissa Amos:fine. As another example. So this morning I went for a walk,
Melissa Amos:and I was out for about an hour. And what I will
Melissa Amos:often do is put my headphones in and listen to a
Melissa Amos:training or a podcast or something that's like
Melissa Amos:enhancing my mind, my knowledge, whatever.
Melissa Amos:And then this morning, I had my phone with
Melissa Amos:me, and then I was like, no, I need to just
Melissa Amos:stop today. Nothing in the brain for a moment and just
Melissa Amos:stop. And then I happened to. I had some interesting
Melissa Amos:internal conversations, and then I happened to meet
Melissa Amos:somebody that I hadn't seen for ages, and she was there with their dog, like,
Melissa Amos:with a chat. And had I had my headphones in, it would have been, like,
Melissa Amos:super awkward, wouldn't it? Or I might not have seen her, or. Because I've
Melissa Amos:been in my head and gone another way where I was literally like, should I
Melissa Amos:go this way or this way? And I was just tuning in. Which
Melissa Amos:way do I. Yeah.
Melissa Amos:Yeah. Okay, are we ready for question number three? Yeah, you picked
Melissa Amos:this time. Okay, I'm gonna say the
Beth Hewitt:13 September.
Melissa Amos:Oh. Oh.
Beth Hewitt:What are you chasing at this moment?
Melissa Amos:Rainbows. I'm chasing rainbows. What
Melissa Amos:am I chasing? Oh, that's such a good question. But isn't it? Oh, it's
Melissa Amos:so loaded, isn't it? What am I chasing?
Melissa Amos:What am I chasing? I don't
Melissa Amos:know. I don't think I'm chasing anything. Am I chasing something?
Melissa Amos:I'm chasing? I want my shoulder to get better. I think
Melissa Amos:I've spent a lot of my life
Melissa Amos:chasing, and it took a lot of time to unwind
Melissa Amos:that. And I'm super resistant to
Melissa Amos:actually making goals surprising, but I
Melissa Amos:am very resistant to doing things like that. However,
Melissa Amos:there's been some stuff coming up for me recently
Melissa Amos:about the impact of my
Melissa Amos:words and speaking
Melissa Amos:on stages or in
Melissa Amos:podcasts or beat that. There's something there. And I
Melissa Amos:feel this. I don't know. Am I chasing it? For me, when
Melissa Amos:you say chasing it, I don't know. Like I'm just out of
Melissa Amos:reach. Yeah, it doesn't feel like it's here,
Melissa Amos:but it doesn't feel like it feels more like I'm moving
Melissa Amos:towards it than chasing it. But I would say
Melissa Amos:that is what I keep seeing
Melissa Amos:ahead of me. So, similar
Beth Hewitt:answer for me, really. But I've been catching
Beth Hewitt:myself recently because it took
Beth Hewitt:me a while to get to this position where I could merge my corporate knowledge
Beth Hewitt:with my spiritual knowledge and be who I wanted to be in the world. I
Beth Hewitt:forget sometimes that I am there because it's the old belief
Beth Hewitt:patterns that have been going on. And sometimes I think when you hit a different
Beth Hewitt:income level or you're at a different stage on your career,
Beth Hewitt:whatever that is, we can sometimes default back to,
Beth Hewitt:it has to be hard, or I'm never going to get there, or kind of
Beth Hewitt:thing, because that was the pattern. And those were the beliefs that I
Beth Hewitt:held for a long time. And like my mom would say, why are you going
Beth Hewitt:around the houses to get to where you want to go? Because I would go
Beth Hewitt:from job to job to get to where I am right now. Forgetting sometimes that
Beth Hewitt:I'm here now, I don't need to use that pattern anymore. So
Beth Hewitt:sometimes I'm catching myself thinking that I'm chasing
Beth Hewitt:something, but that I've actually achieved that, if that makes sense. And I think
Beth Hewitt:it's every single time I'm, like, leveling up or
Beth Hewitt:stretching myself a little bit. It's like my default button sometimes goes back
Beth Hewitt:to, this is going to be hard. It's going to take ages to get to
Beth Hewitt:where you want to go. And then I go, hang on a minute. Look at
Beth Hewitt:what I've built, look at what I've created. Look at where I am compared to
Beth Hewitt:where I was. So it's kind of a cheaty
Beth Hewitt:response, I suppose, to what about, what are you chasing at this moment?
Beth Hewitt:But I think it's almost, what is my subconscious thinking that it's chasing
Beth Hewitt:when actually I'm not really chasing the thing that I
Beth Hewitt:was chasing for a long time. I totally get that.
Melissa Amos:It's like this irony, right, that what
Melissa Amos:I was chasing was ease and flow. Yeah. What I was
Melissa Amos:chasing all the time thing. And then the resistance comes up and all
Melissa Amos:of that stuff, but it's like, how can you
Melissa Amos:chase ease and flow? You need to be in ease and flow. And then, yeah,
Melissa Amos:it's mad. I also learned something about myself this
Melissa Amos:week, something in my human design. Someone
Melissa Amos:I was talking to, a friend, and she was telling me, I can't remember
Melissa Amos:one of my destiny, whatever. And it was like,
Melissa Amos:ease and flow. You need to be in ease
Melissa Amos:and flow. And if it's hard, it's not for you. And I'm
Melissa Amos:like, oh, my God. My whole life I've been saying that
Melissa Amos:it shouldn't be hard. Like, I literally used to say, it shouldn't
Melissa Amos:be this hard. Like, why is it this hard? My family
Melissa Amos:would almost make fun of me for being, like, always just trying to
Melissa Amos:find the easy route and flow into things. And then when it
Melissa Amos:came up, I was like, yes, this is entirely
Melissa Amos:me. And then yesterday in my kinesiology
Melissa Amos:session, we had to pick colors. And
Melissa Amos:I don't know why she was like, pick colors. So I picked colors. And the
Melissa Amos:first two colors I picked, the combination was desire for
Melissa Amos:independence in life, to feel free. And I'm like,
Melissa Amos:oh, my God, that is exactly me. That is. If
Melissa Amos:you could sum what I'm chasing in a
Melissa Amos:sentence. It's like the desire for
Melissa Amos:independence to be free. But you can't chase that.
Melissa Amos:It's got. You've got to be it. So maybe I
Melissa Amos:am chasing it, but. I'm getting the images of pooh bear when he throws
Beth Hewitt:the sticks over the side and he just watches them flow down. That's what we
Beth Hewitt:need to be. We need to just be a stick flying down the
Beth Hewitt:river. We play poo sticks.
Melissa Amos:A very good poo stick bridge in the local park.
Beth Hewitt:Nice. The kids think it's hilarious. It's called poo sticks. There
Melissa Amos:we go. Okay. Should we do another
Beth Hewitt:one? One more. One more. What date
Beth Hewitt:would you like to go for?
Melissa Amos:6 May. I knew you were going to say that. Did
Melissa Amos:you? Yes. Who is your best friend? Oh,
Melissa Amos:you are? Best
Melissa Amos:best friends. Oh, that feels really
Melissa Amos:exclusive, doesn't it? I know. I don't like this question either.
Melissa Amos:Best friends, it depends. The best
Melissa Amos:friend is the one that actually calls me out on my
Melissa Amos:stuff. And actually, for a long time I didn't have a best
Melissa Amos:friend. Yeah, I didn't really have a really very close
Melissa Amos:friend, obviously, like my husband and my
Melissa Amos:family. But I've done a lot of healing around the sister wound
Melissa Amos:over the last six or seven years. Really. And now
Melissa Amos:I would say that I have a few
Melissa Amos:best friends, but the person that's coming to
Melissa Amos:mind is my friend
Melissa Amos:Jessica, who I've actually only met in real life once.
Melissa Amos:She lives in the States. Yeah. But we do a lot of work together.
Melissa Amos:We're on similar trees with our business
Melissa Amos:and with. And we've got quite different life philosophies in a lot of ways.
Melissa Amos:But what I love about her is we keep each other accountable.
Melissa Amos:We can talk about everything. We can be honest with our
Melissa Amos:struggles on things. We can laugh when
Melissa Amos:we're doing our work. We are working together at the moment.
Melissa Amos:So if I have to pick,
Melissa Amos:I would say that. But also now I have
Melissa Amos:some really good sisterhood
Melissa Amos:circles. Yeah. Which feels nicer for me.
Beth Hewitt:Yeah. I would say again something very similar. So I
Beth Hewitt:never really had a best friends growing up.
Beth Hewitt:I had lots of friends in lots of different circles,
Beth Hewitt:but there wasn't somebody I would say she is my best. I don't know
Beth Hewitt:what was going on at the time to maybe come to that conclusion.
Beth Hewitt:But I do know, like, my daughter has similar viewpoints as
Beth Hewitt:well. My daughter has lots of different music groups or actor type
Beth Hewitt:groups or university groups. And I was always the same. I think it's maybe that
Beth Hewitt:transient nature that I love and having so many
Beth Hewitt:jobs like you make friends all over the place. So
Beth Hewitt:I think I would like to think that I am my own
Beth Hewitt:best friend. That might sound a bit sad. Hopefully when I go into spaces and
Beth Hewitt:if I'm being the nice best me that I
Beth Hewitt:aspire to be, that I may have been leaving a little bit of an imprint
Beth Hewitt:in all of those different friendship circles. And I know that I could
Beth Hewitt:pick up the phone and reach out to lots of people whenever I needed to
Beth Hewitt:do that. I've got friends from school that I'm still in contact with, that we
Beth Hewitt:still meet up. My mum is
Beth Hewitt:a really good friend. I don't know, I think it's just a partner. We're really
Beth Hewitt:good friends. So I think, yeah, just that I like being
Beth Hewitt:a best friend to lots of the best friend that I can be in
Beth Hewitt:lots of different circumstances. And even when I'm
Beth Hewitt:managing teams, I want to be the best supportive kind of manager. And there was
Beth Hewitt:one time when I was managing large business support programs and the program disbanded
Beth Hewitt:and then people were starting to be made redundant. I think
Beth Hewitt:because I built up really good connections. It wasn't like
Beth Hewitt:management is doing this and then this is happening and all that was left
Beth Hewitt:was me and my project assistant. And when it was just the two of us
Beth Hewitt:left together, we bonded even more. So I think it's just
Beth Hewitt:been the best version of me so that I can be the best friend for
Beth Hewitt:other people in whatever circumstances I find myself in, is how I'm going to
Beth Hewitt:answer that question. That's the best answer, I
Melissa Amos:think, and it raises such a good point.
Melissa Amos:And I know. Okay, so I had a mentor who,
Melissa Amos:we're not going to go into it all now, but I had a mentor who
Melissa Amos:basically warned me off against having friends. And it was all this whole thing.
Melissa Amos:Yeah, we'll maybe talk about it another. It's a whole
Melissa Amos:system. The book has opened up. Oh,
Melissa Amos:and again, it was unpicking the woundings that
Melissa Amos:happened from there. But I understand the point because
Melissa Amos:sometimes when we look at friendship and best friends and we go back to our
Melissa Amos:school days and it was the first thing I said, wasn't it? It feels quite
Melissa Amos:exclusive. I have one that means I can't have another.
Melissa Amos:And the more work that I've done on myself, it has come
Melissa Amos:into this. How do I be the friend that I want to
Melissa Amos:be? And this whole internal talk like, you're with
Melissa Amos:yourself the most. The most. I don't be the best friend
Melissa Amos:that I want to be because I'm a people pleaser and it's in spite of
Melissa Amos:me. I do this for me, like I have my
Melissa Amos:friendships for me. What do they say about you're the sum
Melissa Amos:of the eight people that you hang out with the most, and if you
Melissa Amos:hang out with a lot of people, I think that gives you a lot of
Melissa Amos:qualities for me, I think that can be really healthy to have
Melissa Amos:that people who are very different and have different philosophies
Melissa Amos:to you because it gives you more of a rounded view of the world.
Melissa Amos:So I think you do. We start a
Melissa Amos:friendship, we've got to put ourselves in the middle
Melissa Amos:front of that. Who am I in this
Melissa Amos:friendship? What do I give? And then it's for the other
Melissa Amos:person, it's okay, who am I to them?
Melissa Amos:Who are they to me? Like, how can I help them, assist them,
Melissa Amos:make their lives better? How can me being in their presence be a
Melissa Amos:positive influence on them? And then it creates this
Melissa Amos:2nd, 3rd
Melissa Amos:Persona, if you like, which is the us energy, which is the
Melissa Amos:friendship. There's me in this friendship, there's you in this friendship, and then
Melissa Amos:there's this Us and this dynamic between us and it's, we got
Melissa Amos:to do it for all of that. I can't just do it for me because
Melissa Amos:then I'll be like selfish and maybe
Melissa Amos:draining and it's all about me and la la, I can't just do it for
Melissa Amos:you because otherwise then I'll be resentful and
Melissa Amos:whatever, maybe. And
Melissa Amos:this us energy is
Melissa Amos:like the, that's super important because if the us energy
Melissa Amos:breaks down, then I go and be me, you go and be you, and then
Melissa Amos:we drift. And so it's a really interesting way of looking
Melissa Amos:at the energetics of friendship, I think.
Beth Hewitt:Yeah. And then making it so it's not about you
Melissa Amos:completing me. You're my best friend. And I think this is where
Melissa Amos:my old mentor was getting at was that
Melissa Amos:when you start to call somebody your friend or your best friend, then there's
Melissa Amos:these expectations that start to
Melissa Amos:arrive on them. They can be
Melissa Amos:unhealthy. Yeah, I'm not sure I agree with.
Beth Hewitt:Her, but I understand that. I understand the logic
Beth Hewitt:of that, but, yeah, I don't necessarily agree
Beth Hewitt:with that. But yeah, maybe we'll talk about another. And any
Melissa Amos:mentors out there, I wouldn't recommend this, but it's an interesting,
Melissa Amos:it's an interesting line of questioning and it certainly
Melissa Amos:raised some thoughts for me and led me down an
Melissa Amos:inquiry of what actually is a friend and what am I expecting from a friend.
Melissa Amos:And then how that then actually transpired. The silver
Melissa Amos:lining behind all this was that I. Okay, I
Melissa Amos:did, at that point, withdraw myself from friendship groups,
Melissa Amos:but then I started to do that, work on myself and be like, who am
Melissa Amos:I? What am I expecting? What am I becoming? And then
Melissa Amos:I went out. It was a while later, it was maybe even a year later,
Melissa Amos:but I went out to a gathering, and I was so nervous,
Melissa Amos:and there was always people there that was so big,
Melissa Amos:personalities. That's where I met you, actually. What,
Melissa Amos:like, met you in real life? Oh, in London,
Melissa Amos:yeah. And I was like, oh, my God, there's gonna be all these people
Melissa Amos:there. And I was really nervous, and I was like, oh,
Melissa Amos:my God. And then I remember landing in there, and
Melissa Amos:I'm like, you know what? I'm just gonna come and be me. And they'll either
Melissa Amos:love me or they won't. Exactly. Yeah,
Melissa Amos:I went there, and it was like I landed in something, and I was like,
Melissa Amos:what I belong? And I felt that and not
Melissa Amos:that. And it wasn't because of anyone else. It wasn't
Melissa Amos:anybody else acting any differently to me. It
Melissa Amos:was my view of the world, my expectation
Melissa Amos:of what I'm going to do. Is somebody going to come and save
Melissa Amos:me? And I was thinking, everybody there thinks that I'm super
Melissa Amos:confident and that I'm the one that, like, yeah, everybody.
Melissa Amos:And I thought, and I think they're probably feeling the same as me, so how
Melissa Amos:can I be that person to them that helps them belong?
Beth Hewitt:Yeah. And that night
Melissa Amos:had flipped so much for me about
Melissa Amos:how comfortable I am in rooms, who I am as a
Melissa Amos:friend, as a colleague, as a community.
Melissa Amos:It had nothing to do with anyone else. I love that story.
Beth Hewitt:Thank you for sharing that. I had a similar conversation with my daughter, who was
Beth Hewitt:struggling to find friends at university not that long
Beth Hewitt:ago, and not that she was struggling to find them. I think she had this
Beth Hewitt:grand idea that you had to have university, you had to have millions of friends,
Beth Hewitt:and that you're always, like, on the go kind of thing. And she was thinking,
Beth Hewitt:this is not the experience that I thought it was going to be. And I
Beth Hewitt:said, think about what are the things that you. I already know what things are,
Beth Hewitt:but let's think about the things that you love to do. And let's go find
Beth Hewitt:the groups. Let's go where your people are. Don't try and put yourself in a
Beth Hewitt:position where those are not your people, because that's what. That's university land. We end
Beth Hewitt:up in a house with six people that are completely different to us. And so
Beth Hewitt:we found this gaming society. And she was like,
Beth Hewitt:yeah, but I don't think I'm ready. I think I need to build my confidence
Beth Hewitt:up before I go to the gaming society. I need to be ready for that.
Beth Hewitt:No, you need to go to the gaming society to build your
Beth Hewitt:confidence. And we were talking about, think less about
Beth Hewitt:your anxiety and nervousness around feeling confident going into that space. And think about
Beth Hewitt:what kind of friend would you like to be for somebody who is also
Beth Hewitt:turning up for the very first time and be that friend for
Beth Hewitt:them. And so she went and she met
Beth Hewitt:this guy and they got on so well. They went to McDonald's afterwards and he
Beth Hewitt:actually left. He left his bag in McDonald's. They got all the way back to
Beth Hewitt:the flat and he was like, oh, my God, I've forgotten my bag. It's a
Beth Hewitt:McDonald's. And she was like, it's okay, we can go. It was like 1112 o'clock
Beth Hewitt:at night. It's okay, we can go. We'll go back. And really, I've only just
Beth Hewitt:met you. Just. No, let's go. You would have done the same for me.
Beth Hewitt:Let's go back and collect, get you back. And it was there underneath the table
Beth Hewitt:and then walk back again. And that created a friendship that had real
Beth Hewitt:bonds from the beginning. Because she'd gone into that environment with that
Beth Hewitt:energy of, how can I be the friend that I want to be?
Beth Hewitt:For me, if I was feeling this way, which I am feeling this way, how
Beth Hewitt:can I be that for somebody else? So I think sometimes if we flip the
Beth Hewitt:switch of this is how I'm feeling. These are my genuine feelings. I'm
Beth Hewitt:nervous about this, but how can I be the person to support me
Beth Hewitt:internally? And how can that then be reciprocated? Because we attract
Beth Hewitt:like. Attracts like, right? So if we're feeling that way, then we're going to maybe
Beth Hewitt:bump into people you can see in a room when you go to networking events.
Beth Hewitt:The people up against the wall were like, oh, my God. And the people who
Beth Hewitt:were like, in the centre going, life and soul of the party. And if your
Beth Hewitt:people are at the side of the wall, like, just sipping their coffees and
Beth Hewitt:people watching, then go talk to them. Those are your people. It's
Melissa Amos:such an important skill. And not everyone
Melissa Amos:has it. And actually, me sharing that story, I've
Melissa Amos:shared it with some other people who were there. And it came about
Melissa Amos:me sharing it because somebody said to me once,
Melissa Amos:who was in that circle? They were like, when I thought you were
Melissa Amos:really intimidating, and I'm like, who, me? Like, before they met
Melissa Amos:me. And I'm like, or not. I was. That they were intimidated by me.
Melissa Amos:If you knew what was going on in my brain, you wouldn't be.
Melissa Amos:And I was like, okay, so this is interesting. Like when. So when I'm
Melissa Amos:looking at somebody else and think they're all this and they're all that, it's
Melissa Amos:probably not true.
Melissa Amos:And I don't know. I think the most important thing is
Melissa Amos:to be yourself. And I think it's okay to admit that you're feeling
Melissa Amos:confident. Not confident or unsure or a
Melissa Amos:little bit out of it. And it's sometimes when you even open up to that,
Melissa Amos:not with. Through blame, not. You made me feel this way because
Melissa Amos:nobody. You know what? When I stepped into that room, I was really
Melissa Amos:nervous. And then
Melissa Amos:there's a. I don't know. I think that can form a bond as well,
Melissa Amos:rather than trying to fake your way through it.
Melissa Amos:I don't know. For me, it took healing. For me,
Melissa Amos:it took inquiry. For me, it took understanding, awareness.
Melissa Amos:Yeah. And a bit of bravery and a bit. And this
Melissa Amos:decision, this intention. I'm going to go in there
Melissa Amos:and I'm going to bring my own sense of, I'm
Melissa Amos:meant to be here. I'm part of this room. I'm going to bring that sense
Melissa Amos:with me and the sense that I'm part of this room and
Melissa Amos:we are all part of this room. And it just flipped
Melissa Amos:so much. Now I go to some networking events and I'm
Melissa Amos:so aware of that, that there's some new people and that
Melissa Amos:maybe some people are intimidated. Apparently I give off their
Melissa Amos:vibe. So it's an interesting
Melissa Amos:dynamic. And, you know, the trauma that I faced working
Melissa Amos:with that mentor when she was like, you're not allowed to have any friends, actually
Melissa Amos:led to something. We shouldn't say that, exactly. And give her
Melissa Amos:credit. It led to something
Melissa Amos:that helped me but actually become a better friend
Melissa Amos:and have more eventually more friendships. I
Beth Hewitt:have enjoyed the book of questions. Maybe we shall bring it out in
Beth Hewitt:25 episodes time. How did you find the book? Of course I love
Melissa Amos:the book. You should bring the book more often. I want to know from the
Melissa Amos:listeners, do you like the book? I know I've got a good one. If maybe
Melissa Amos:the listeners could give us some dates. Yeah. And
Melissa Amos:then we can do this every now and then because I love that.
Melissa Amos:Questions that. Who'd have thought would be speaking about pizzas,
Melissa Amos:friendships, confidence and mental
Melissa Amos:traumas. Thank you, buck. Until the next time.
Melissa Amos:We'll see you soon.