In today’s fast-paced world, many of us struggle to cultivate deep, meaningful friendships. Loneliness can strike even when we are surrounded by people, especially if those relationships lack depth and authenticity. In the latest episode of Life of Love, we delve into the art of fostering genuine connections with friendship expert and soon-to-be therapist, Jewel Hohman. Jewel shares her inspiring journey from battling social anxiety to mastering the science of building enduring friendships.

One of the key themes discussed is the significant impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our social lives. The pandemic intensified feelings of isolation, making it more crucial than ever to understand the dynamics of creating lasting bonds. Jewel emphasizes the importance of consistency and regular interactions in developing strong friendships. According to research by Shasta Nelson, meaningful connections are built on shared joyful experiences and a consistent presence in each other’s lives.

Personal anecdotes from Jewel illustrate how moving to new social environments can pose challenges in forming connections. She shares practical steps for adapting to new cultures and settings, highlighting the role of intentionality in friendship-building. It’s not just about being present; it’s about making small, consistent efforts that lead to significant improvements in our social lives. This resonates deeply with many listeners who may be navigating similar transitions.

The episode also explores the role of vulnerability in fostering authentic friendships. Jewel discusses how inviting someone into your personal space can increase vulnerability and deepen connections. She shares her own experiences during the pandemic, where she intentionally cultivated friendships by aligning her social interactions with her energy levels and personal boundaries. This approach not only helped her form new bonds but also strengthened existing ones.

Moreover, the conversation sheds light on the concept of “social aftercare” and “connection glasses.” These strategies are designed to help individuals enhance their ability to connect deeply with others. Social aftercare involves reflecting on positive social interactions and focusing on moments of connection to boost confidence and desire for social engagement. Connection glasses, on the other hand, encourage individuals to actively seek and appreciate moments of connection in their daily lives.

Another insightful topic covered is the different types of friends we need during various life transitions. Jewel explains that different friends serve different purposes, and it’s essential to be authentic about our needs in friendships. For instance, during periods of grief, one might seek friends who can empathize and offer support. In contrast, during times of growth and self-improvement, friends who share similar interests and goals can be more fulfilling.

Jewel also addresses the common misconception that friendship should happen effortlessly. She argues that while some connections may feel magical, building a deep friendship requires intentional effort and application of friendship science. The episode emphasizes that everyone, regardless of their charisma or social anxiety levels, can cultivate meaningful friendships by understanding and applying these principles.

The discussion on increasing our capacity for authentic connections is particularly enlightening. Jewel highlights the importance of tuning into one’s energy levels and honoring personal boundaries when socializing. She shares how shifting from high-energy social activities to more intimate gatherings can lead to more fulfilling connections. This approach resonates with many listeners who may feel overwhelmed by traditional social settings.

Finally, the episode offers practical tips for making friends at events and transforming initial connections into lasting friendships. Jewel encourages listeners to walk into any event confidently, engage in meaningful social interactions, and nurture relationships in a way that feels natural and fulfilling. This advice is both inspiring and actionable, providing valuable tools for anyone looking to enrich their social life.

In summary, this episode of Life of Love with Jewel Hohman is a treasure trove of insights and strategies for cultivating authentic friendships. Whether you’re navigating new social landscapes or seeking to deepen existing bonds, Jewel’s expertise and personal experiences offer invaluable guidance. By embracing vulnerability, consistency, and intentionality, we can unlock the power of true connections and build lasting friendships that bring joy and fulfillment to our lives.

Episode Transcript

Julie Hilsen: 

Hello, dear friends, and welcome to another episode of Life of Love, where we gather every Thursday to talk about things that can enhance our lives, anything that’s vulnerable, anything that we can share to elevate our existence and help live the life that we’re meant to be. And today’s a very special day. I get to pick the brain of a friendship expert. Her name is Jewel Holman and she’s getting certified and she’s been trauma-informed and studying to be a therapist. She’s on a mission to help over 10,000 people and helping them with creating, sustaining and fulfilling friendships, and also helping them be authentic to themselves and within themselves.

Julie Hilsen: 

So I can’t think of a more appropriate topic for life of love, because just friendships just bring so much freshness. They bring vitality to our lives and enjoy right. I mean, who doesn’t want to have supportive friends around them, cheering them on and feeling connected? So it’s a very basic human need and one that Jewel had noticed. Like after COVID, some people just felt disconnected and maybe COVID made it more obvious. So I’m really excited to introduce and host Jewel today to the show. Thanks for being on Life of Love.

Creating Meaningful and Authentic Friendships

Jewel Hohman: 

Thank you so much. And what an intro. That was so beautiful. That was so beautiful.

Julie Hilsen: 

Well, I appreciate your beautiful message I mean so I want to just get into it. Can you share with my audience, Can you tell them about your, your path and what sparked you to say you know, I deserve a better friendship or I deserve more strong connections. What did you see that sparked you to to go down this path and just give us some insight into that?

Jewel Hohman: 

Yeah, absolutely so. I spent my goodness, I think, the majority of my life being what I would call a social perfectionist. So I had a lot of social anxiety. I was really trying to, you know, get social situations right, and this was such a painful experience. Now, what’s so fun? And a lot of people might relate to this, but I never thought I had social anxiety or that this was, if you will, my quote-unquote life issue, because I was extroverted and.

Jewel Hohman: 

I had friends and I was like, well, that doesn’t really apply to me, but the truth is there are socially anxious extroverts a lot of times they’re socially perfectionistic and there’s confident introverts. So recognizing oh, I was a very socially anxious extrovert was so huge for me and I did so much work and learned. I have a background in research. I have a degree in psychology and sociology and I worked at a psych lab, so I know how to read research articles and so, by diving into, okay, what felt like, what would help me, if you will like, regulate my nervous system and really feel confident, like being myself, and how to deal with this social anxiety. So after I had done that, I realized that social anxiety and learning how to work through that was so helpful in connecting me with people in social settings, but I didn’t have the meaningful bonds that I really wanted, and so I was like, well then, what the heck? Now around? This time is actually when the pandemic hit and I was in a situation. So actually what we know right now is that the lowliest age group is actually in their mid-20s to early 30s, which is very interesting. But typically this makes a lot of sense because this is typically when our friendships really change from like college and from our early 20s. This is typically when people you know starting to marry, how the kids move, get really involved in their careers and we’re not spending as much time with our friends as we used to. So that was me, right, my, I was in that group and a lot of my friends, you know we’re we’re moving, we’re far apart. They really had these gaps. They didn’t have the bonds I wanted and so, just for myself, like having no intention to start a business, for this to be my life, there’s, there’s got to be science out there that will help me create meaningful bonds. And there was, and I did. I actually, um a year, a year, a year, just started a podcast and I had two of my friends on and I that I used the friendship science on, if you will, and it was so fun. But one thing that happened that I was so surprised about was so many people kept coming up to me and be like how did you do that? I see you going on all of these like girls trips. Now I see you hanging out with these friends. How did you do that? How did you, you know, become like so confident all of a sudden, because, even though I was extroverted, that different energy of I’m showing up comfortably myself was so different, and so that’s how I really got started into making this my career. I became honestly just, I was just very in love with everything I learned about and I realized which I knew. This is so funny.

Jewel Hohman: 

I knew the data. I knew that the majority of our population is lonely regularly, um, even like millennials most of them not most of them, but a lot of them report having no close friends, and it’s the first time we’ve really seen something like that. Um, loneliness has been literally, literally increasing since the 1970s. It’s only getting worse in that years. Even without the pandemic If the pandemic didn’t happen loneliness was still a problem. So I knew that. But it was a total other experience for people to be like, hey, but how did you do that? How did you meet these friends? And that’s when I really realized like you know, I became that there were humans behind these statistics.

Julie Hilsen: 

For me, if that makes sense, yeah, I think it’s really interesting how you said that, because even if you have friends, you can still feel lonely within those friendships, because if they’re not fulfilling what you need, then you can still feel lonely. So the data that you looked at was actually the loneliness factor. And it sounds like it’s its own epidemic.

Julie Hilsen: 

I mean, it’s like this silent thing that’s just sort of, you know, sucking the life force out of people and they don’t feel like they’re connected and having meaningful interactions with other people, like you said. So you took extra training and you learned this technique and did you find out there was something that most people struggle with. Is it the anxiety of it, just putting themselves out there, or is it the freedom and the joy, like what are there? Is there a theme that is like red lights, like everybody’s messing this up?

Jewel Hohman: 

Yeah, that is such a good question because it is a little different for everybody, okay, but I will say, like we have a lot of cultural and structural barriers that we didn’t used to have. So like, for example, third places used to be very prominent and they’re not now. So if third places were a place between work and home where people would really gather we see this in like sitcoms sometimes, like there’s a show called how I Met your Mother and they always meet at this bar. But for my grandparents they went to the bowling alley like three times a week. That was their normal. And then they also had their church, where they would go to their church once a week. That was their. Those were their third places between work and home, and we don’t really have that anymore, especially now that so many of us are working in the light. So we have some structural things like that, but also we really have like a cultural isolation here, like there’s there’s so many things I could say about it, so many contributing factors.

Jewel Hohman: 

So if anybody’s listening to this and they’re like I right, like it is just me, like I love that you said like it’s a silent thing, because when it’s silent there’s so much shame about it. There’s so much. I should have figured this out already. What’s wrong with me that I don’t have these meaningful ones? And the truth is like it’s absolutely nothing. It doesn’t mean anything about how charismatic you are. It doesn’t even mean anything about your social anxiety levels or not. What it really means is that you haven’t applied this friendship science and sometimes people are put in situations where they’re naturally applying it, but for most of us, because of the way our culture and our structures are set up, most of us aren’t. So I do want to bring awareness to that and give light to that.

Jewel Hohman: 

But I loved your question of what are individuals getting wrong? Because, at the same time, just because there’s no sure things that we want to advocate for and should, it doesn’t mean that we’re all doomed Right. So a lot of what individuals get wrong is they think that friendship just happens where it doesn’t. I mean I just click with somebody or I do not, and although that idea on some level is so beautiful and I really get it because when you do feel really connected with somebody, it does feel like just like this random, amazing thing that just happened to you, and I’m not saying there isn’t any like magic behind it.

Jewel Hohman: 

However, that’s not what makes a friendship. So we know that there are three things that make friendships and if you can kind of I know this is on YouTube so I can do a little triangle with my hands here I can do a little triangle with my hands here, but if you imagine a triangle, there are certain things that we need to move people up the triangle from the acquaintances to close friends. That’s it. And when you think about it that way, we can drop the shame, we can drop the oh, this should just happen to me or not, and we can be more empowered to approach these meaningful bonds in a way that really fulfills us.

Building and Nurturing Meaningful Friendships

Julie Hilsen: 

I love that because you have your base. It’s like, okay, so you made this connection and you’re, you know you have something in common with this person. Or you know they just smiled at you and you see them in your third place maybe, or at work or maybe in a Zoom, like you guys. You know you shared in a comment that was meaningful and you can take like a spark. It doesn’t have to be like this twin flame, like crazy connection, but it’s just like, oh, that person saw me and I saw them, and so you know you have this base. So then you decide to nurture this. You’re like I’m going to you intentionally say then you decide to nurture this. You’re like I’m going to you intentionally say I’m going to build a friendship and and so I love that because it takes away the mystery of it that you know that you, you know that you offended somebody or you did something wrong.

Julie Hilsen: 

And I know when I moved, I moved from the Midwest to to Georgia and a lot of the Southern women are brought up in a different way and I had to get, I had to like learn different subtle clues that you know. I couldn’t just throw up exactly how I was feeling, because Southern women don’t really share their, their feelings. They more like talk about clothes and food and recipes and it’s all fun, like I have Southern friends that I just adore, but it took me a minute to be like I can’t just give them everything. I’m thinking I’ve got to like dose it out. Or the first time someone said bless your heart, I was like my gosh. What did I do? Like cause I knew that they weren’t really blessing my heart. Like this is a diminutive thing. When a Southern woman says bless your heart, you’re like screwed. I’m going to start over. I need to find a new person to be a friend with.

Jewel Hohman: 

Oh my gosh, that’s always been. I just have to say, too so funny to me because just that phrase alone. I actually didn’t know for the longest time that that phrase was condescending and I’m just like, wow, that seems so beautiful, Like right, Like you are blessing someone’s heart. I really did not understand that.

Julie Hilsen: 

And you know I had to just learn to trust that I’d meet my people, my tribe, and just keep trying because I’m a really great friend. But yeah, so once you have this acquaintance and then I know it’s probably like a whole program. But what are some things you can do to support that friendship, to water it and make it, you know, help it grow? And I know there’s no guarantees, but I just want to give people a little snapshot and hope that it’s worth building relationships and having a friend, a meaningful friend. If you’re feeling isolated or sad everybody feels like that every once in a while Where’s my support? You can get into woe is me, nobody’s seeing me, and everyone has that, and I can track it. Sometimes it’s even with my cycle. I’m like I’m such a victim at this time of my cycle. But you know, just beyond that kind of stuff Like, um, what would you? What would you tell people to help like, keep friendships nourished and and to know that that there’s things that are things that are very actionable and empowering to do.

Jewel Hohman: 

Absolutely. I’m so glad you asked. And there are like this is a very like watered-down version A lot of this. Again, this is like science, this is research, this is stuff that we know, and I always love to give credit where credit is due the person that really put this together. Her name is Shasta Nelson. She walked so we could run with this information. So if you picture that triangle there, the base at the bottom, I like to call it meaningful moments Because, like right here right now, with us having this conversation and me hearing some of your stories, that’s a meaningful moment.

Jewel Hohman: 

It also comes when, like maybe you know we are experiencing some kind of like, if you will, I don’t love this, but quote unquote negative emotion, like we’re upset and then a friend comes and supports us. It’s also a laugh with a friend. It’s also, you know, just recently, my friends and I really can’t sit around to our apartment making dinner. That’s a meaningful moment. So that’s the base for it, right? And then, as we go up and how we nurture these friendships I love what you said of watering that go up and how we nurture these friendships. I love what you said of watering them, how we move somebody friendly and acquaintance to more of a deeper bond is we do this, by the way, with dating the same thing?

Navigating Vulnerability and Authentic Friendships

Jewel Hohman: 

um just by the way, uh, but, um, is we create more consistency with them? Now some people hear that and they’re like, oh, oh, my gosh, but bear with me. So consistency can really be broken down into two parts, and that is history and frequency. So history, but that really means, like so many people, I okay, actually I get this all the time. This is my little pet peeves, little rant, I guess, but people tell me all the time but I have a best friend and I feel so close to her and I only talk to her like four times a year, like why can’t I just create another friendship like that? And I’m like, because you and this best friend have either been friends since kindergarten, since college you were roommates at one point. You have so much history builds up together and so many meaningful moments build up together, right, so you can feel really close to that person because there’s so much investment already there. So there’s that um. The other thing is frequency, and this is why so many of us become really close to our coworkers. We see them every day, right. So frequency as well, so that consistency and it could be a little bit of both, like a really great example of like consistency is. I have a friend locally to me like a new friend, and the consistency that we’ve created of me checking in with her, us going on walks together, us trying this new yoga studio that was in my place or a place in our city things like that creates that consistency, starts to build up history and frequency. So we have that.

Jewel Hohman: 

On the other side of the triangle, we have vulnerability Vulnerability. There’s some people that are like, yes, I love that, this is part of it. I love right, like, sharing my heart with other people. And then some people hear me say that and now they’re like sucks. So, no matter where you fall on your feelings of vulnerability, one thing that is helpful to know about vulnerability is that vulnerability is just that person seeing you and you seeing more of them, them seeing more of you, just as you get to know each other. So one of my favorite examples is if you have a co-worker and you work with them and they come over to your apartment or to your house, that’s vulnerability. They’re getting to see you outside of your work environment and get to see you in your home and in your space and how you’ve decorated it and how you organize your shoes when people walk in, you know, like things like that. So, um, as we increase consistency, increase vulnerability and have that base of meaningful moments, we move somebody from acquaintance to close friend.

Julie Hilsen: 

Um oh yeah, well, that’s really I like to think about that, and you know the frequency and the vulnerability and you know it’s um, it seems to me also like timing of different things, like during big transitions you might need.

Julie Hilsen: 

You know different kinds of friends and you know, and to me, like sometimes my expectations of how a friend should show up was like hurting my friendships, I noticed, because I was like then I’d be disappointed and I didn’t know if I should tell them that I was disappointed and that you know, like you were saying before that shame about how you think that it should be just so obvious.

Julie Hilsen: 

Why is it so easy for some people to have meaningful friendships and you feel like you’re struggling or that you’re, you know, more alone than not, and maybe it’s a point of defining what type of friendships you’re open for, like you said, if you’re not willing to be vulnerable and that really makes you crazy, like maybe just own that and maybe your friendships don’t look the same as everyone else’s. Like, can you explore that with us, like the you know being authentic about what, what you actually need, instead of just like pulling off, like you know if you watched friends on TV or you know sitcoms about how their friendships are. Well, that’s TV Like. What’s real friendship? Like what does it mean to you and how do you explore that with people you’ve worked with?

Jewel Hohman: 

yes, this is such a good question. Oh, my brain just lit up. I have so many things I want to say, so I will say, as far as it comes to like getting what you need in a friendship, so that’s what I did, um back, and I did this in the pandemic also, like I can do this in a global pandemic and create, you know, like two, like best friendships. I really think anybody can do this um. So what I did for myself and, by the way, at that time I had friends, people in my life and I really improved my connections and this is really common for a lot of people two different ways. One, I did want to make new friends. I wanted to make new friends that were closer to me, like, um, geographically, where I could see them more often. A lot of us are lonely and just a deep form of connection it just is what it is is be around people physically. So I was craving that, and I also wanted to have friendships where we were really really growth mindset oriented and very passionate about, like emotional work and relationships.

Increasing Capacity for Authentic Friendships

Jewel Hohman: 

These girls ended up being. One of them is a travel operations manager and is dealing with relationships all the time. The other one’s a therapist, so it’s kind of funny how that worked out. But, um, but I I, if you will I prioritized those relationships that I had intentionally, and it wasn’t just the two of them. At the time. I picked four women that I was like, okay, here are women that I, you know that meet these, if you will, needs or desires of mine and I’m just going to invest in those relationships. I’m going to increase the consistency and vulnerability and we’ll see what happens. And I’m just going to invest in those relationships. I’m going to increase the consistency and vulnerability and we’ll see what happens. One of them is not interested and one of them isn’t like a close friend, but she’s up higher in my triangle and I’m so grateful for it. The connection is still just as special. So, as far as creating friendships that like feel good to you, by me creating these friendships that were meeting my needs, it like a lot of people think, oh, it means I have to like leave my current friends behind and by me getting connected to these women and building these meaningful bonds, it increased my connection for these other friends because I wasn’t relying on them to be with me in person. I wasn’t getting as upset, if you will, if they weren’t able to drive to me, I wasn’t getting that upset if they didn’t want to have conversations about relationship dynamics and things like that, because I was getting that met in another place. So my connections with them and the connection I felt in my body was only increased Now.

Jewel Hohman: 

So I do think it is a great to find and think about what you’re looking for and I love the way you said that there’s different kinds of friends for different kinds of areas in our lives. So for some people you know you really want like a commonality friend you do not need and this is so huge connection doesn’t come from having like everything in common. It’d be. Everybody, I’m sure, has an experience like this, where you have friends with the co-worker and they have friend that they’re like we’re so different. Right, it’s because connection really comes from feeling safe and seen in a satisfying way through the consistency, vulnerability and meaningful moments.

Jewel Hohman: 

However, sometimes we go through periods right where we are in like grief and we want to connect with somebody who’s also grieving and things like that. So that is something to look for and for people just to get curious about what they desire in friendships. But I also want to say and this is really important, because what makes applying those three things those three things to move somebody up a triangle, to create a deeper body, what makes it really difficult. And one thing I had to get really real on myself with, even before applying this process, back when I had a lot of social anxiety, was dealing with my own thoughts about myself and about other people, because I was at a place where I was like, oh no, like they’re gonna judge me for this. Because I was at a place where I was like, oh no, they’re going to judge me for this, because I was judging me for.

Jewel Hohman: 

X Y Z. So they’re definitely going to judge me for X Y Z. I was also. You know, I have some betrayal wounds and so I was like, oh, I can’t trust other people. I also thought it would be hard.

Jewel Hohman: 

So what truly gets in the way of us applying those three things is we make connection kind of harder in our minds for a bunch of different reasons. One common thing that I really see so often in man when I network with people and say the first thing they say to me is, oh, I don’t have time. And a lot of times it’s because we view connection and building these friendships as a chore, because we think it takes a lot of time, because we don’t know how to create that feeling of being meaningfully connected with somebody. You know, because again, we have these like thought barriers, these mindset barriers of thoughts about yourself, thoughts about others.

Jewel Hohman: 

Um, that makes it more dreadful, like so a really common example of that is like why would you, at the end of the week, go out to a dinner party if you’re like, oh, that’s gonna be so much effort and so much work and, right like I, it might be a little awkward? I don’t even know if they like me like, yeah, who has time for that? Right? Who wants to make time for that? Not me. Um, compared to if we’re like, if we create security within ourselves and there’s so much I say about this would be maybe a whole other episode. But, um, for us to feel good with ourselves and for us to create that connection in our bodies, to be open to it, that is what really fuels us, that energy of connection, of being willing to connect, and that was truly how I created these friendships for myself, um, like four and a half years ago at this point. So that was kind of a lot, but anyway, yeah.

Julie Hilsen: 

So I just want to simmer that down a little and okay, I want to make sure I’m hearing. So if you work all week and it’s Friday night and you want to hang out with friends, so you connect to yourself your energy level and say, well, I have energy to order pizza and make a salad, does anyone want to come over?

Jewel Hohman: 

Yes, that’s so good.

Julie Hilsen: 

So you tune into what your energy levels are, because my history, like I, have different periods of my life and it used to be. You came home, you got dialed up and you went out on Friday night and you hit the bars or whatever. And I have no interest in that at all anymore. I don’t have the energy. I don’t like the scene. I’m married. I don’t really want to go out without my husband because there’s so much to navigate right now in the clubs and being victimized it’s a little scary, and you know, being victimized it’s a little scary. I think tuning into what situation you feel safe and you feel comfortable in and then inviting them into your perfect idea and seeing if that resonates with them. But that’s part of being vulnerable, saying hey, this is where I am, where are you? That check-in.

Jewel Hohman: 

It absolutely is vulnerable. It really is, and I think it’s so beautiful to honor that, though, and we think sometimes that by saying no, it means that we don’t have to connect with somebody, but the opposite is true. Like um, recently, I had a friend say no to like spending time with me at some of them, and I was like I’m not even paying attention on my content, I’m a jib, because they they said in there, they were like hey, but I’m really glad that you asked me. I this is what’s going on for me right now and I’m just working through it and because this person was vulnerable and they stated right in general that the connection was important, they said no, and I walked around that event feeling so connected to them after I got that message. So it doesn’t always have to be I need to force myself to go out and spend time with people. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I love what you said about inviting people into what you need and the experiences you want to have. That’s so huge.

Jewel Hohman: 

I also want to say, though, for a lot of us a majority of us we need to increase our capacity to feel connected, though. We need a lot of us capacity to feel connected, though, we need a lot of us. Our brains are required to be protective first and foremost, and so a lot of us, kind of like, see our relationships and our friendships that way, and because so many of us don’t have the meaningful bonds that we want, it’s like looking at the second half of the triangle here being like, oh, I gotta make sure I’m protected and safe in that, in these relationships, and that can keep us very distant from people, if that makes sense. So we all honestly, in my opinion, we all need to increase our capacity to connect with others, and so one way to make that trying a little easier is not to go and, like, force yourself to go out it is not what I’m saying but to increase your capacity to look for connection and to feel connection.

Jewel Hohman: 

A lot of my clients are overthinkers, and we have this activity called social aftercare. I help every client build their own, but because the clients will typically vote a net and overthink it after and be like, oh my gosh, I said this and that was dumb, or they totally judged me for this, uh, one thing we do to increase their capacity to feel connected is to ask themselves questions like. Ask themselves questions like how, who like really engaged with me or what were, what were moments that I felt connected with somebody that maybe I’m missing, and you’d be surprised at what we like miss just because we’re really focused on protecting ourselves and our brain rather than connecting with others. So a really great example and I did this a lot in the beginning. It was so huge for increasing my confidence as well.

Jewel Hohman: 

I was looking at, yeah, like so-and-so laughed at my joke and so-and-so asked to spend time together and I felt really confident here, like if we can increase our capacity and pay attention more to those things, it increases our desire to want to be around other humans, to connect with other humans, and increases our desire to be vulnerable and to say, hey, this is all I’m up for for tonight, right, like I’m only up for making a salad and having some pizza. It increases our capacity to connect. So, yeah, that’s. I would really love for everybody to leave with that today. Like, encourage you, like I like to say it’s almost like putting on glasses Trying to look for it’s almost like you’re on connection glasses and to look for the connection that you have in your life, because connection is fueling and we feel connected. We just create more of it.

Julie Hilsen: 

I love that and it’s, it’s empowering, it’s from you and and knowing you’re good enough and you’re divine and you deserve it. Just put your glasses on and decide to see it. Yeah, so I do love it. It’s just such a great message and I did want to ask you are you keeping a tally? You said you want to reach 10 000 people. Have you? Where are you on your journey at that?

Jewel Hohman: 

so I just started. Um, my podcast is literally brand new to the world as of like last week. It’s called the socially delightful podcast, and so I want to grow that way. But as far as the work that I have been doing for my gosh the past four years now, so far I have over 65 clients, so we’re off to a great start and we have a wonderful long career to go, but I’m hoping.

Julie Hilsen: 

Well, I would be encouraged if people share this episode. That would be a contact, Absolutely.

Julie Hilsen: 

So we’ll keep tallies of the listens and get you closer on that, on your tally, thank you. I would appreciate that and everyone can help, so anyone who, if you’re listening to this and you’re thinking of somebody I know, I saw a really sad post on Facebook. It was like someone in my community it was a community page. They said their daughter was 14 and didn’t have anyone to hang out with, didn’t have any friends and and I was just my heart just bled for that, that girl, because 14 is supposed to be, you know, carefree and and just go and have fun and play with makeup and dance. You know I, I’m going to age myself, at least to put on records and dance, you know. But you could sync up your Bluetooth mic. You know speaker and dance. It’s the same thing. So I just I know that there’s a lot of people like you said, from 14, and your oldest client was in her 60s, I think.

Jewel Hohman: 

You said yes, my oldest client right now is 66. I’ve worked for my entire career, though I have a few people I like to say like that are retiring and that are entering high school ever a few people I like to say like that are retiring and that are entering high school. So, yeah, yeah, it’s, it really is a problem that is affecting all of us. I will say, though, social anxiety and there’s so many factors it includes, like social media I feel like you need to be on all of the time, but, um, social anxiety has, like really really increased, especially for the younger generation, and that gets in the way of them connecting and applying this work as well, and that’s another huge reason why I’m doing what I’m doing is I don’t want our loneliness epidemic because the us search in general said we are in a loneliness epidemic. I don’t want it to get worse.

Julie Hilsen: 

Yeah, and it’s something free. Anyone can help with this. You don’t need any kind of medicine, or you know like it’s connecting, reaching out and like having resources like yours. Um, did you want to shout out your website where they can connect with you?

Making Friends at Events

Jewel Hohman: 

yeah, absolutely so. We just put up, um, thanks to sam, my amazing virtual assistant. Uh, we just put up two of the two of our best trainings that we, that I’ve done. Uh, these trainings were used at the largest women’s conference in my state, so I’m very proud of them, um, and they are how to belong at any event, so how to walk into any event and create that feeling of belonging.

Jewel Hohman: 

Uh is, and it’s more than just the feeling as well. There’s also like tips on how to um just really enjoy the socializing and connecting with others as well. And then we have another training, that is, these are all free and available, so the next training is how to make a friend at any event, and it’s it goes into a little bit more about the triangle I talked about today, and. But instead of just like going to an event and meeting somebody and having that magical moment of quote unquote clicking with somebody it’s okay, how can I turn that into a friendship? How can I nurture that in a way that feels good? And you might be surprised at how much easier it could be. Now let us think.

Julie Hilsen: 

Well, thank you, that’s just a beautiful message and it’s inspiring and, like I said, I just hope it reaches the people who need to hear this, and I know I’ve learned a little about self-reflecting and how I’m showing up as a friend from this conversation. So, thank you.

Jewel Hohman: 

Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. Your questions were so beautiful.

Julie Hilsen: 

Oh, it was easy. It was easy to ask. Thank you for being so open.

Jewel Hohman: 

Thank you.