Feel Like No One Around You Gets It Anymore? | Navigating Connection When You're All in Different Seasons

There is a quiet shift that happens as you grow. The conversations that used to feel easy start to feel surface level. Not because anything is wrong with the people around you, but because you are craving something deeper and the space for it is harder to find. In this episode we talk honestly about what happens when the people you love are simply in a different season of life, how that can leave you feeling disconnected even in rooms full of people you care about, and how to navigate those relationships without resentment or guilt.

🎧 If you have ever left a conversation feeling emptier than when it started, this one is for you. Come listen.

Transcript

Growth Can Create Conversation Mismatch

Shared Experiences Shape Each Friend Group

What You Want From The Talk

Growth Does Not Require Cutting People Off

Find New Rooms For New Interests

Weekly Reflection And Closing Requests

Speaker 0:07

Hey friends, welcome to another episode of Becoming with Kethney. You want to know what one of the hardest parts of personal growth is. It's when you realize that you can't have certain conversations with the same people anymore. And it's not because they don't like you anymore. It's just because the conversation sometimes just feels different. Not necessarily negative or bad. It just doesn't land the same anymore. So what happens when you grow and you don't have necessarily the space to talk about the new things that interest you? That's what we're going to talk about today. So stay tuned until the end to hear more about this topic. So oftentimes, as we grow and navigate different phases of our life and our adulthood, our mindset tends to change. Things that didn't interest us before suddenly becomes interesting. Or we find new interests and passions. Or we just start reflecting more deeply on our life. And you know your default is to talk about these things to people that you've always talked to before. Whether it's a close friend group, people at work, people from your sports team, your family members, cousins. Anyone really that you use to always just talk to about anything and everything. And it can be challenging sometimes when the conversation it just doesn't hold up the same in those spaces. And it doesn't hold up well in those spaces, not because you're socially awkward, because I used to think about that all the time. I used to say, Am I just socially awkward? But no, I realized because the conversation that I'm trying to have and what I wanted out of that conversation wasn't supposed to be had in that space. I'm gonna tell you the reason why. Before I get to that, I want to touch on a misinterpretation that I initially had. So remember, I just said that I used to think, am I socially awkward? And I feel like that was me trying to figure out what was happening. Why were the conversations that I was trying to bring up just not clicking and satisfying me in the same ways that it used to in the past when I used to speak to certain people in my life? And so oftentimes you might be thinking to yourself, you know, hey, should I not bring this up? Am I being the deep friend and talking way too deeply? So serious. Or even, am I changing too much? Now, as I was reflecting on this, I realized that growth sometimes can cause conversation mismatch, and that doesn't mean that that's a sign of relationship failure, whether that relationship is friendship, sportsmanship, family, co-workers. That's not a direct correlation necessarily. And so I want to talk about how I started rethinking the way that I had conversations with different people in my life. And you can think about it this way. Instead of putting the topic as conversations, you can put it in terms of what you do around certain people. You know, for example, you have friends that are your quote-unquote party friends, your goofy friends, the friends that, you know, can always make you have a good time and laugh, you know, and those are one group of friends. You have other friends that are your teammates if you play sports or your workout buddies, if you're interested in working out, and you guys always keep each other motivated, you work out, you play sports together, you're really into this shared experience. And then you have friends who are your support friends, your ride or die. You know you can go to them for anything, and they'll be there for you. And when I started thinking about it in this way, I realized what's the unifying thing across all those different friend groups? It's the shared experience, it's what ties y'all together. And I think this transition between adolescent and to adulthood and then the various different phases of adulthood 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, having children, not having children, being in relationships, not being in relationships, so many different factors, those are what differentiates the kind of conversations that hold up well in certain spaces. Because when we were younger, I was thinking about this. When you're getting your education early on, we all are sort of herded into a similar path. You know, and so we're always our shared experience was getting our education, figuring out what we wanted to do with our lives, but we knew we had to go to elementary school, middle school, high school, and potentially college or trade or figure out how we're gonna navigate and support ourselves through life. And so those first beginning educational stages were all in the same shared experience. So when you make your close friend groups, you talk about everything and anything because at that stage, everything and anything are pretty pretty similar outside of maybe the different clubs or sports or hobbies that you guys dive into. And so it's easy to think that, yeah, I used to talk to these people about everything and anything, and it just the conversation always left me feeling satisfied. And now you may be in your 20s, 30s, 40s, different stage of life, whether you have children, you don't have children, whether you want to start a business or you're okay, you know, in your corporate job and you're doing something that you really love and you're passionate about, whether you love to travel versus you know staying local and being a homebody and staying in the state that you grew up in. So as you see, when we get into those later stages of adulthood and we're figuring out our lives, certain conversations that you have with people and you bring to certain spaces, they don't click the same way if that person is not in that same state and mindset to have that conversation. And another point that I want to bring up too is sometimes too, it depends on what you want out of the conversation. I'm often a person, like when I I will say like 90% of the time when I bring things up, I'm usually passionate about the topic, I'm interested in it, and I want to have a back and forth dialogue, like, oh, I'm interested in this business venture, you know, they might talk to me about their business venture or their side hustle, and it's like a back and forth engagement topic. Versus sometimes, you know, if you just want to vent and you don't necessarily need a back and forth, you just wanted to let whatever you were feeling, whatever you were thinking out, it might not matter what space you bring it up into because you know that you just wanted to let it out. Someone heard you, they acknowledged it. Because I I want to make this clear too. If you're having a serious conversation, for example, about something we all go through, which is romantic relationships have their ups and downs, right? And you just want to vent to your closest friends. Sometimes you just want to vent, you might not go to a support ride or die friend that will might give you advice back because you might not want that necessarily. You might go to the partier friend, the one the goofy friend, the one that'll get your mind off of it. And that being said, that friend is not gonna be like, Oh, I don't care that you're going through issues. No, they're obviously gonna care, but what you get at from that space is it'll help take your yes, you're allowed to and able to vent your frustrations or what's on your mind, they'll acknowledge that, but then they'll be able to make you laugh, get your mind off of it for a temporary moment in time. And if that's what you need at that moment, then you could bring it to that space. So, what I'm really trying to say here is try and manage your expectations and really reflect on what you're looking for out of the conversation when you bring it up into certain spaces, because that'll help you to determine and really know. You know what? I would like to talk about this in this space because this is what I'm expecting to get out of this conversation, and I know I'll feel satisfied if I bring it up here. Another thing I want to talk about is that I feel like it's always said in personal growth spaces that just because you grow some means that you need to leave people behind, and I don't think that's a hundred percent accurate, I think it's definitely dependent on you, it's definitely dependent on the situation, but I think that with growth, you just need to reflect and really understand what you're feeling and what you want to do with what you're feeling. Because, you know, say for example, there's many different types of people in the world, there's introverted people, there's extroverted people, we got our ambiverts. Um, and then there's also, you know, people who have big friend groups, you know, and people who only have like one or two, or maybe just one very close friend. And so the advice that I initially gave in terms of bringing it into different spaces, if you're someone who has a big friend group, that might be a little bit more easier for you because you have a selection of diverse people that you can go to for many different interests that you have, versus and that might be easier for you to do, versus someone who has a tighter knit circle or just one really close friend, and you talk about everything and anything that friend. If you guys are, you know, at different stages of life, different interests, that could feel a little bit more challenging to do because then you're like, all right, I can't what I'm seeking out of the conversation, I won't be satisfied if I bring it up to this my one good friend because it just won't land the same because I'm not getting what I need out of the conversation. So, what do you do in that instance? I would say this is where you find different environments to be able to satisfy that need when you bring up those conversations or you want to have those conversations. And the way you do that is go online, find a Facebook group, start a Reddit thread. There's always someone out there that is experiencing the same thing that you're experiencing or similar that has the same interest as you. And I I really love Reddit because Reddit for me is real, real people, real experiences, and they just they just share exactly what they're going through or what their thoughts on something are, and sometimes there's little debates respectfully though, debates back and forth, and you get that satisfaction of okay, these are real people, you know. I'm expressing my thoughts on this, and this is what they're telling me. And you don't have to start your own Reddit thread, you could even, I'm sure there's so many people who've asked questions in Reddit. I'm sure there's one that already exists, just so you can have that, you know, satisfaction of something that's on your mind, you want to talk through it and see what other people have experienced. Other things that you could potentially do is join a course, see if there's any course or conference or live event, maybe, um, that someone is willing to host. Because I feel like nowadays there are lots of people that bring groups of people together over a shared interest, and usually it's in the form of a class, or sometimes it is someone who wants to talk about their experience and there's local groups, so do some research and you could find that as well if you want something more live. Um, that could be also very interesting in a way to satisfy that need, but always try to, if you don't necessarily have the luxury of having different spaces to bring certain topics to, you can find those spaces for yourself outside of what you already have, and that's always an option for us folks who don't have a huge selection of friends and family or co-workers, or just nothing fits. And even if you do have a huge selection, sometimes it still doesn't fit because everyone is either so similar and only has that one interest. Um, and so you could always that applies to you too. You could always do that and do your research and find groups to join to be able to satisfy that new interest in your life. Remember, some spaces they hold your history, and some spaces they hold your growth. And sometimes your history and your growth can be the same space, and other times they can't. It really depends on your unique experience and what's going on in your life and what you want out of this. Remember, this is all about your becoming, not anyone else's. So make sure you're getting the most out of it for you. So here's the reflection for this week that I want you to sit with and think about. Have you ever felt like certain conversations about your growth didn't fit in some spaces? And where have you found people who understood the season that you're in? Remember, you're not strange for wanting deeper conversations, for wanting more out of the conversations in your life when new interests arise. Growth sometimes requires new rooms. It doesn't always mean though you need to leave the people that you have history with behind. So if you liked this podcast and this episode for the week, remember to like, follow, and subscribe. And if you can think of just one person that this episode might be helpful to, share it. Share it with them. Remember, I am trying to create a community where we remove the taboo of talking about things that at least crossed my mind as I and I'm still navigating this journey of adulthood and this transition between adolescent and finding my becoming in life. So share it to that one person that comes to mind. And if you want to leave a comment, make sure you leave a comment or go to any of my socials and feel free to send me a DM. I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts. Thank you. And until next time, this is Becoming with Kethney. Bye!