Friend-Wise | Becky Harling

Well, if you're lonely and find it hard to find a friend, don't miss today's Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman. It's clear that God has designed us for these friendships. Not only does our happiness grow, but our emotional health grows. And on top of that, our physical health increases and gets better, more healthy.

Welcome to Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman, author of the New York Times bestseller, "The 5 Love Languages" . Today it's the missing ingredient for many people in our world, friendship. Becky Harling has some practical help for finding friends, building deeper friendships, and then cultivating those relationships. Our featured resource at buildingrelationships.us is Becky's book, Friendwise.

And if you're lonely, if you're struggling with some kind of life transition where you don't have the network of friends you used to have, or you maybe have never had a close friend, don't miss the conversation that is straight ahead.

Now, Gary, you strike me as a person who has never met a stranger. You can make a friend in a grocery store checkout line. Has finding a friend ever been a struggle for you? You know, not so much a struggle. You know, there have been friendships that.

didn't last, not necessarily because there was any friction between us, but they moved half a world away. And long distance friendships, you're still friends. It's just you don't have as much contact as you used to have, you know. But now my wife is even better than I am. I mean, she is just super.

She has so many friends and she keeps up with them. Even when we've been in for two weeks with all the ice and snow, she's just called friends. You know, every day she has a list of people she's calling, seeing how they're doing and all that sort of thing, you know.

So, yeah. But this is a huge topic, and I'm so glad that we're discussing it today, and I'm glad Becky's with us. Becky Harling is our guest. She's a speaker, Bible teacher, holds a degree in biblical literature. She's written a number of books, including Rewriting Your Emotional Script, The 30-Day Praise Challenge, and the book we talked about not long ago, Our Father: A Study of the Lord's Prayer.

Oh, that's a great study. If you've never done that alone or with a small group, if you go to buildingrelationships.us, you'll see her latest, and it's titled Friendwise. Practical ideas for richer relationships. I think we all need this, and we're going to talk with Becky straight ahead. Just go to buildingrelationships.us.

Well Becky, welcome back to Building Relationships. Hey, it's great to be back with you, Gary and Chris. Yep, well we heard that loneliness is an epidemic levels in our country today. What are you seeing as you look at today's culture? You know, I see that still.

Some people have challenged me and said, well, that was right after COVID, you know, the COVID pandemic, but is it still around today? And I still see people as terribly lonely. You know, they can't connect. You get people at church that say, well, I left that church because I just couldn't find community, or I just can't find friends, or, you know, there are people that move to a new community and they can't find friends. And you wonder what's going on?

What's causing this? Yeah, I think you're right. I think it's still a very big issue in our culture.

So you've shared your cancer journey, how it brought clarity to your relationships.

Now, how did that season change the way you view relationship? You know, it changed a lot, Gary. I am a natural achiever, right?

So I'm always moving fast. And at the time of cancer, we had four kids. Steve was a pastor. I was directing women's ministries. I was always on the move.

But I realized as I was healing from cancer and everything had stopped, I had to ask myself the question: what do I want my life to look like going forward? And I realized a couple of things. My primary relationship was with the Lord.

So I wanted more time with him. I wanted more time with my kids and my husband, but I also wanted more time with friends, enjoying them and fellowshipping with them, and not always racing just after ministry. Ministry is great for me. I love it, but I want close friends. I want to be able to go out to lunch with my friends.

I want to be able to talk with them on the phone. I want to have real relationships because God has designed us for those relationships. chips.

Well, I think sometimes when we go through trials like you went through with cancer, we we do rethink our lives and what's really important in life, you know.

So and friendships is an important part of life.

Now you tell a story at the beginning of the book where a woman poured out her heart to you about the chaos in her life. And you ask her, how she was doing friend-wise. And what was her response? Yeah, it was so interesting. You know, that question brought her up short, and immediately there was like a long pause.

You know, she had been pouring out her heart. To me about the chaos in her life, and that was coming really fast. And then I said, Well, how are you doing friend-wise? And there was a long pause, and then she said, Well, truthfully, not very well. And to me, that spoke to some of the chaos in her life because when chaos comes into our life, we need our friends.

And we need to journey through the difficult and challenging seasons with our friends. We were never meant to do the journey alone. Even God said, it's not good for man to be alone. Yeah. That's true of women being alone.

You're right. Yes.

Well now, there is research in the book that really shocked me. You wrote that spending time with friends that is, those that you like, increases your happiness as much as if you had a $133,000 raise per year in your salary. Is that really true? That really is true. That was posted in an article by Time magazine in the year 2014.

And I think it shocks people because, particularly here in the West, we are always racing after more money, it seems. But in the end, it's not the money that makes us happy. It's the friends in life that make us happy. It's certainly our friendship with Jesus, first and foremost. But then we need each other.

And when you spend time with your good friends, you know, it releases endorphins in your brain and you get that same happy feeling that you would have if you got that $133,000 raise. I'm wondering how many of our listeners are thinking. Would I rather have the 133,000 or have a new friend? They really got to analyze that.

Now we've talked about this before, but Could you say a word about the difference between men and women in friendships? Yeah, I have thought a lot about this, Gary. And I know for my own husband, as he's gotten a little bit older, he has said, you know, I'm reading your book now on friendships and loneliness because I need more friends, you know. And I think when we were younger, a lot of times with men, when they're younger, they're chasing after the career because they want to be successful and they want to provide for their families. And all of that is good, but they can't really neglect friends in their lives any more than women can.

The hopeful thing is that I see this changing with the next generation. You know, I know for our kids, they have great friends. And my son has a great friend that he goes hiking with and does all manner of stuff with. And my son-in-law has a small group of guy friends that he's gathering with. And so I think men are becoming more intentional about it.

I think oftentimes for men. Men, it starts the friendship starts around an activity, perhaps, you know, like football. You know, there's the fantasy football things or, you know, basketball or hiking or golf, even. But then it gradually, as they're doing something together, they're starting to share their hearts more. And so for women, though, I mean, we can just kind of dive right in, give us a good cup of coffee.

And we're usually pretty good at asking questions and empathizing with one another. And so we don't necessarily have to be doing a sport together.

So I would say that's the difference. Yeah, I can see that, you know, because I think men tend to focus on common interests, whatever that interest is, and that's what brought them together. But out of that kind of a low-level friendship, they begin to develop deeper friendships along the way. I've heard that happening around the country, where they open these, I don't know what they call them, but they're basically shops where older men come, retired or not. And they'll go and they'll do some kind of a woodworking thing or whatever.

And as they're doing that, then they start to have these conversations and they start to have, it's almost like men have to be side by side rather than face to face, Becky. Does that make sense? Yeah, I think a lot of times that's true.

Now, I do have to say, I think as men mature and develop emotionally a little bit, then they're more easier for them to get together for lunch with a friend or have coffee. You know, a lot of times I see these groups of men now sitting maybe in Panera, you know, and they're all sitting around having coffee and they're discussing one issue or another. But you can, it's clear that they're building friendships, you know. And so I think it's possible both ways, but I think either way for men and women, we have to be intentional. Becky, how do healthy friendships contribute to our joy, our emotional health, and an overall well-being?

I love this question so much, Derry, because I just wrote an article for a healthy living blog. And actually, healthy friendships contribute to our joy and emotional health, but they also contribute to our physical health. It's actually pretty crazy, the research that's out there. If you have good friends, you're likely to have lower blood pressure, less stress in your life, you have a longer life expectancy, and you have far less anxiety and depression. You even have less.

Like your blood pressure is lower, and so it's clear that God has designed us for these friendships. And as we really take them seriously in our lives and we invest in those friendships, not only does our happiness grow, but our emotional health grows because we're not just sitting home watching the news all day. And on top of that, our physical health increases and gets better, more healthy over time. Isn't that crazy?

Well, if it's true, you know, it would be, if we think about it, it'd be a whole lot easier to develop some close friendships than doing some of the other things we're doing to stay healthy. Yeah, right? I mean, you know, none of us like going to the gym.

Now, I have to say, I did go to the gym this morning. Please be impressed. But, you know, I think, you know, if we're going to stay healthy. as a culture, as a society, we have to spend more time with our friends. There's even a research article done by the Mayo Clinic that says if you have a circle of close friends and you're walking through cancer, your cancer treatments are going to be far more effective than if you're walking through it alone.

The research is all there. We just need to take this a little more seriously. Yeah, well Well, you emphasize uh intentionality in friendships. Why do you think so many people struggle to be intentional in building friendships? And what are practical ways that we can be intentional?

Yeah. Okay, I love this question as well. And I think the single thing that is keeping us from being intentional the most is that here in the United States, especially, we are addicted to hurry. We don't take time for whatever the reason we live with this constant underlying angst of hurry.

So, you know, when we go to Target, we choose the shortest line. When we're in Starbucks for a coffee, we try to, you know, choose the shortest line. And now you can order a head at Starbucks. You don't have to wait at all. You just go in and pick it up.

And it's honestly, it's the same with Target and a lot of these grocery stores. We are an impatient culture. But in order to be intentional in our friendships, we have got to slow down. You know, I've used this example before, but when Steve and I were living in the Middle East way back in the 80s, if somebody came to your door, you were expected to invite them in for tea and coffee. And to sit with them for an hour, no matter what you had going on.

You know, and a lot of us are in such a blooming hurry. We don't have time for friends. The other thing that has hindered our intentionality is we've become addicted to our phones, not to calling people, but to scrolling. And if you're going to have real friendships, real life-giving friendships, you've got to lay your phone aside unless you're calling somebody because scrolling through all these social media apps or even through news channels is doing nothing for your friendships.

So we've got to lay some of this aside and begin to reprioritize. You know, I have cultivated a new habit in the last few years where, you know, on Sunday nights, I pray through my upcoming week and I kind of make a list revolving around the different things that I have going on, you know, whether interviews or whether I have a writing project or whether I'm coaching leaders or whatever. And I have a whole Column for friends.

So I want to make sure that I'm careful every single week to have quality time with friends because I know that that's really important in my life. Yeah. Far more important than spending two hours scrolling on the phone. Yeah. Wow.

And that's so common today, that all the free time a person has, they're just scrolling, seeing what they can find. But there's no relationship to it. It's just, you know, comments that people make and that sort of thing. But it's not a friendship. Yeah.

There are some assumptions that can slowly create conflict or false narratives in a friendship, misunderstandings and so forth. Have you seen that happen? And what can we do about that? Yeah, I think it's huge. You know, we all make meaning in our heads from statements that people make.

And, you know, I think about a conversation I had with one of my adult kids, my daughter. And, you know, it was just a few months ago, actually. And I had said something on the phone about one of the grandkids. And she stopped me for a minute. And she said, Mom, the meaning I'm making in my head is that.

You think that grandchild is better in soccer than my son? And I was shocked, but I was so glad she brought it up. And I said, Oh, honey, that was not actually what was in my thinking at all. What was in my thinking is, wow, you parents have a lot to deal with with all the pressure in soccer. And she said, Oh, thank you, mom.

I needed you to clarify the meaning. And I thought that's applicable not only with our adult kids, but that's applicable in our friendships because somebody can say something and you make meaning in your head. And you think, well, you know, they are thinking this or that about me. And honestly, it's likely that it had nothing to do with you. They might not even be thinking about you.

You know, they might just be saying something for a whole different reason.

So I think a skill that we can learn in our friendships is to clarify meaning. You know, what when you said such and such, I found myself making an assumption, making meaning in my head. Can you clarify for me what you meant? I want our friendship to be as close as possible. Yeah.

I think if we could develop that habit, you know, to clarify what we think they said that may have struck a nerve in us, we would work through some of those things. But friendships sometimes break up actually over those things because they're not dealt with, right? Yeah, absolutely. And conflict, you know, is going to be a part of every relationship. I mean, we all know that we're all married.

And as wonderful as our marriages all are, there's going to be conflict, right? Because we're all human. And so there's going to be conflict in friendship. And so we have to learn how to put some emotionally healthy, God-honoring, Principles that we can use to resolve conflict in our friendship.

So what are some of those healthy ways to address and resolve conflict other than what we've just mentioned in terms of just asking for clarification? Yeah, certainly asking for clarification, certainly stating that you value the friendship. Hey, I know we're having a conflict right now, but I really value this friendship.

So let's talk about it because I want to understand what you're feeling. You know, I think listening to understand is key in any conflict. Often we go to defensiveness, right? We want to defend, well, I blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, or whatever, you know. But instead, if we can tune our Our ears to the other person and say, Help me understand.

Tell me what you're feeling in this. Tell me how I've hurt you. Tell me how I've offended you. And then, after they tell you, say, Tell me more. Have them really completely get everything out that they're feeling.

And then, if there's something you can apologize for, apologize for it. And if there are things that you disagree with, you can say, Hey, this again, this friendship is super important to me.

So, can I take some time to pray about this and then get back to you? But I have found with most close friendships, once You discuss these tender issues, the other person is willing to forgive because of the longevity of the friendship. And hopefully, you are as well. And so then friendship can enter a stronger space than it's been in before. Yeah, I think it's so important and I really like the fact that you're realistic in this book and talk about conflicts and as you said earlier that they're inevitable because we're human and humans have different histories and we have different ideas, different emotions and so yeah, I think those things you're sharing and the things you share in the book are really, really helpful.

Now, talk about boundaries in friendships. Are they necessary? And if so, why? Yeah, boundaries, boundaries make good neighbors, as one of my friends used to say. You know, I'll tell you a little story first, Gary.

We had this crazy dog when we were living on a golf course, and the dog. We had to put an electric fence on him because he kept getting onto the golf course. And one day we were watching him outside. We were inside. He was outside and he was hooked to the electric fence.

And a golfer, you know, shot the ball up onto the green. And Maverick just couldn't contain himself any longer.

So he burst through that electric fence. He got a shock. He went to the green. He picked up the ball, brought it back to the golfer's feet, dropped it, and then waited for that boy, you know. And he did not get the pat on the head he was looking for.

But, you know, I think some of us are like that in our friendships. We break the boundaries because we're so excited about the friendship and we want that friendship, but we have to respect other people's boundaries.

So a small example is maybe you text a friend and you don't hear back from them for several hours. And so you text. Again and again and again. You know, that's breaking a boundary. Just wait until they have time to get back to you.

Same with phone calls. You know, maybe you're calling a friend, they don't get back to you.

So you call another, you know, 10 times or whatever. You're breaking their boundaries. They're saying by not picking up, this isn't a good time. It doesn't mean they don't love you or value you. It means they're doing something else right now.

You know, another way that we sometimes break boundaries is, you know, we try to quote unquote help or fix our friends. You know, for women, oh my word, this comes up a lot, I think, in the realm of dieting and food issues. I don't know if either of you guys can relate to this, you know, but. I tend to be a really healthy eater. You know, I am very careful to go to the gym and I eat a lot of salad and chicken.

It's a joke with my friends. But sometimes I'm out with a friend, not usually a friend that I know very well, and they'll push and push and push. Becky, you need to eat dessert. You need to eat dessert. And it's like, okay, I'm pretty sure I know what my body needs right now.

So you don't need to break my boundaries because I've got firm boundaries here and I know what I want to eat and what I don't want to eat. And conversely, friends tend to try to help quote unquote other friends lose weight. And it's like, you know, everybody's on their own path. And hopefully your friend has the Holy Spirit in their life and they really don't need you breaking boundaries and telling them how to do things.

Okay, I got to jump in on that because I jumped in. I jumped. I resonate with that. And especially, and maybe this is just women to women, but there seems to be some judgment in there, especially about children things. You know, my daughter said this this morning or my son did that yesterday.

And then the friend jumps on it.

Well, here's what you ought to do about that. That can shut down a friendship really quickly, can't it? Oh my word. Let me give you an example. Another example from real life.

My daughter was at a baby shower years ago, right? And hadn't even, it was her baby shower, you know, she was pregnant. She was with her first. And all of a sudden, you know, you get pregnant and the world just thinks they can. Tell you how to raise a kid, you know.

And she was getting all this sleep training advice, and she hadn't even had the baby yet. You know, she was just trying to make it through pregnancy. And, you know, another daughter was in, was pregnant again and was in Target. And this man came up to her and wanted to give her all this advice on what kind of diapers to get. And, you know, just people love to give unsolicited advice, and that's a form of breaking boundaries.

And honestly, if you can solve somebody's problem in a minute, that makes them an idiot because everybody is capable of solving their own problem. If they want to process with you, they'll just ask. I hear you saying, wait to give advice until you are asked, what do you think about this? Mm-hmm. Yes, absolutely.

You know, we are a society that's way too quick to offer our opinions. We're hearing about the transforming power of friendship on today's Building Relationships with Dr. Gary Chapman podcast. Our guest is Becky Harling and she's written the book FriendWise, Practical Ideas for Richer Relationships. Just go to buildingrelationships.us to find out more or join us at fivelovelanguages.com.

You know, Becky, before the break, we were talking about boundaries. But we don't typically establish those boundaries or verbalize them in the early stages of a friendship, do we? We don't say, now, don't you know this about me? We don't typically do. We have boundaries.

But we don't particularly overtly share them, ve especially very early in a friendship, right? Yeah, I mean, you don't have to say your boundaries. You just kind of have to live your boundaries and keep loving people because when you've got good boundaries in place, the other person finds that they can feel safe with you and they can trust you because they know you're going to respect their boundaries.

So you don't have to state them.

So boundaries actually strengthen a friendship. Rather than weakening a friendship, right? Absolutely, because they build trust. It's like I know if I call a friend and I invite her to lunch and she can't do lunch, she's going to be honest with me. And that makes me trust her.

And that makes our friendship go deeper. And so I can respect her boundaries, she can respect my boundaries, and that brings safety to the relationship. Yeah. Because often a friend might call and want you to do something or might call at a time that want to have a long conversation when you don't have 30 minutes to talk right now, you know, and to be able to say that, you know, I'm really interested and I really want to hear what you're going through. But could we set another time because right now I have and tell them what you have.

And they tend to respect that if we're open about it, right? Oh, yeah, absolutely. And I think the way you said that was so perfect because you're telling them, hey, I really want to hear what you have to say. And I want to have the time to feel relaxed where I can really just focus on you. You know, but right now I've got to do X, Y, or Z, but then let's circle back.

Yeah. Now you also write about what you call over functioning in friendships. What is that and what should someone do if they recognize this pattern in themselves? Yeah, over functioning is similar to the whole boundary conversation, but it's basically over functioning is when you try to do something for somebody that they really can do for themselves.

So let's say you feel your friend needs counseling with a godly Christian therapist. You know, you take initiative, you call the counselor, you set up an appointment, you know, you got to stop because that's overfunctioning. This really happens, I feel. A lot within the realm of marriage, you know. Maybe a wife is concerned about where her husband is spiritually, so she overfunctions.

You know, she signs him up for the men's group at church, or she over functions and you know, buys him a million devotionals, hoping that he's going to get into the word. And, but, but really, you're over functioning, and we have to stop. Over functioning, really at the root is about control. And we can't control other people. And when you overfunction in your friendships, there's a codependency that develops, you know, where one person takes a more passive stance and just lets you do all the things.

And it, it could even be as simple as, um, Know school projects for your kids. Your friend does all the school projects for your kids so that you don't have to.

Well, your friend is overfunctioning, you know, because really you're the parent. You need to step up and help your kids with those projects.

Now, sometimes we need to say, Okay, I need a little help here. You know, I'm thinking about my daughter. Actually, my daughter has five little boys, and she got a school project for she has identical twins, you know, kindergartners. They got a project from the school that it was a hundred-day, so they had to each come up with a poster with a hundred things on it.

So last night, She was making dots on poster boards, and these little twins were gluing smarties to the dots so they could even bring a poster in with 100 each, you know.

So she had her other sons help with the gluing, but that's a little different than stepping in and taking care of your friends. stuff so that she doesn't have to, you know, because we can't over function. We can't assume that somebody can't do something without us because that's really unhealthy thinking. Yeah. Would it be advisable for a person who sees this tendency in themselves?

And that gives them a chance to say, I really appreciate the offer, but no, I'd rather not. Rather you not do that. Yeah, it is helpful, but sometimes if a pattern has been there, the other person leans on the other friend too much. You know, I know of two women where one helped the other with finances for a long time. And then the woman that had been helped with her finances, she kept running out of money and the other friend kept bailing her out, bailing her out.

That becomes a codependent relationship. You have one who's over functioning, and you have one who's under functioning.

Sometimes that can happen even in the parenting journey. I mean, I'm sure you guys have seen this, you know, where maybe the wife is going to be the gatekeeper of the strict schedule. And when her husband isn't doing things quite the way she wants them done, she just takes over consistently. And gradually, the husband just lets all that go to her, and it becomes a codependent relationship, you know.

So we can't overfunction.

Well, I'm glad I'm glad that you deal with these kind of issues in the book because I think these are factors in a friendship, and often we don't we don't hear much about these kind of things.

So thanks for including these.

Now let's change the topic and let me ask this. How important is listening? and a friendship. Oh, it is so important. You know, everybody out there wants to be heard, whether you're in a marriage relationship, whether you're in a friendship, you know.

So, when I'm going to lunch with a friend, or if I'm going to coffee with a friend, I try to think back what was going on in their life the last time we were together. It might have just been a few weeks ago, right? Or a week ago. And so, I purposely set that in my mind and I pray on the way that I'm going to be a good listener to that friend. And then I take the initiative to ask them about that situation, you know, and just sit back and listen because everybody out there has things in their lives that they need to process with somebody, or things they're excited about, or things they're burdened about.

And so, learning to listen well is everything in friendship. Yeah. Well, and how do we develop that ability? Because I don't think we're really, many of us at least, are not listeners by nature. Yeah, we learn to focus on the other person.

You know, I have, I'm doing a party this Saturday, actually, in honor of this book. And one of the party favors that I'm giving the people that are coming are these little conversation cards that I developed that'll help them. They can carry them in their purse. And they're questions that they can be prepared to ask their friend when they're together. And they're not yes, no questions.

They're questions that will, you know, bring a longer response. And so I think just being intentional again is everything. You know, set your heart to listen. Ask the Lord to help you. Write out some questions you're going to ask and think about it and pray about it before you get there.

What types of party, Becky? 'Cause I'll drive over and pick up Gary and come over. It's from three to five, Chris. You're welcome.

Okay. They're going to set my alarm. You be ready, Gary, okay? I just think that's a huge issue in initiating friendships. We're probably not going to have a friendship if we don't ask questions of people often.

That's the beginning stages of the whole thing. And I think it's sad because I think there are men that don't have friendships. I remember a number of years ago, Clarence Schuler and I were working on the whole concept of cross-cultural friendships, trying to help guys develop relationships with people of a different race or a different culture. And there was a man in the restaurant. I don't remember where I was, but I was by myself.

And he was by himself. And so after I'd finished, I walked up to the table where he was sitting. He looked like a businessman. He was kind of dressed like that. And I said, excuse me.

I said, I'm doing some research on cross-cultural friendships. That is, you know, friendships with someone of a different race or culture.

Well, I first asked him, I said, I'm doing a little research, and could I ask you a personal question? And then I said to him, could you give me the name of a close personal friend of a different race or culture that you have? And he was silent for a moment. And then he said, I don't have a close personal friend in my own race. Oh wow.

And that's all If a m if a lot of men were honest, They would probably say the same thing. They don't have a close personal friend. And if we're going to, if we recognize that's true about us, then. Learning to ask questions of people that you do have some kind of. informal relationship with, because friendships are built on showing interest in the other person, right?

Absolutely. And, you know, learning how to ask questions, frankly, I think every parent needs to teach that people skill to their kiddos, you know, because that is such an elementary social skill. And, you know, so when you're at dinner with people, when you're in a small group, just learn the art of asking questions. You know, there's plenty of stuff online that'll give you some tips on how to get started asking questions. But, you know, the power of good questions helps you connect, you know.

Becky, uh How about envy and jealousy? It seems like they can kind of slowly break into a friendship. How can we recognize envy in our hearts? And how can we eliminate jealousy in a friendship? You know, this is such a big issue.

I I wonder sometimes whether this issue might be Stronger for women. I can't prove that. But I think in the Instagram culture in which we live, you know, where people again are scrolling and they see that, you know, one husband is bringing flowers to his wife and maybe you haven't gotten flowers in five years, or, you know, you see that this person is really highly successful and it's something you're longing for, or infertility with pregnant, and your friend is pregnant. There's just a lot of things that can create jealousy for women. And so I think we need to ask ourselves some hard questions.

I think we need to ask: am I hesitant to celebrate with my friend? Because if I'm hesitant to celebrate, What my friend has, or is going to, or is doing it's likely that I'm a little bit jealous. And the problem with jealousy is it just wrecks havoc in your relationships. You know, I think of the Old Testament story of Rachel and Leah and all the mess that came out of that. You know, you had one sister who was getting pregnant every other day, it felt like, and the other sister wasn't getting pregnant at all.

And there's such envy and jealousy there. And it destroys relationships. And it also really creates havoc in our relationship with God. Jesus told an amazing story about sending workers out in the field. And at the end of the day, whether the person started at nine o'clock in the morning or whether they joined at like 4:30 in the afternoon, everybody got paid the same.

And so, like, a riot breaks out, right? But Jesus says these profound words. He says, it might not be. The landowner? Can I not be generous if I want?

And so, when we are tempted to feel jealous of our friends, we have to remember that God is the one who lifts up one and gives another a different difficulty. God is the one that brings success and maybe doesn't bring success to another. And we have to learn to celebrate with our friends and say, Lord, give me a pure heart in this area so that I can truly celebrate my friends' win, even if I'm not having or experiencing that win right now in my own life. Yeah. The whole thing of comparison comparing our situation and theirs and you know, that can be easy.

How about the whole matter of laughter? How does that figure into a friendship? Laughter is everything, you know.

Well, not everything, but it is, you know, life is hard, right? Life is serious. The news reports are hard. And laughter with friends is just so refreshing. I mean, Solomon wrote that, that a cheerful heart is good for us.

And, you know, I think about my different friendships. And I got to tell you, if I'm going to be really close friends with somebody, it's going to be somebody that has a sense of humor. And, you know, thankfully, God has brought me those friends. I think about being with a friend about a year ago, and she told me the absolute funniest story. I thought I was going to die.

She was praying over somebody at a conference and she had gum in her mouth. And the person she was praying over had long hair. And to my friend's horror, the gum came out of her mouth and got stuck in this woman's hair. And my friend kept praying, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, trying to get the gum out of the lady's hair. And finally, She said, Amen, and popped the gum back in her mouth.

She got it out of the hair. But I just thought, mental note to self: don't chew gum when you're praying over people. But it was such a funny story, you know. And when you laugh together, I have another friend, and she's a close friend. We've been friends for years.

And at the time, I was living in Denver. She was living in the Springs, and we had made a date to. Have lunch together at California Pizza Kitchen, and we each got to the restaurant and were texting the other, like, Where are you? And I'm here, I'm waiting for you, I'm here too. And we realized we were in, I was at the California Pizza Kitchen in Denver, and she was down in the springs.

We hadn't clarified which restaurant to be in, you know. But the great thing about stories like that is it gives you a shared history. Laughter connects, it lightens the load, it gives you a shared history, and really, life's too short not to laugh. What did you do? How did you bridge the gap?

Did you meet in Castle Rock? No, we I think we gave up that day because we both had other things going on in the afternoon, but we still laugh about that today.

Now we both live in the spring, so it's a lot easier. Becky, how important is vulnerability in a friendship? You know, vulnerability is really important in a friendship, Gary, because if you are going to be genuine friends with people, they have to see truly who you are, both your strengths and your weaknesses. And my deepest friendships are with those with whom I can pray.

So I have friends that I can go to and say, Hey, I'm really struggling with this, that, or the other thing in my life. And immediately, my friends and I will get on our knees and we'll start praying together. You know, Paul told us that we are to carry each other's burdens.

Well, you can't carry the burden for another if you don't know it's there, right? And so we have to learn to cultivate vulnerability. You know, we are living in an age where a lot of times people are living a double life where they're trying to put their best foot forward and prove that they're all that when underneath their lives might be a wreck. But the whole point of deep friendships is so that we journey close. Closer to Christ together, and we grow as we are willing to be vulnerable, you know, because then we're not hiding things, and the friendship becomes authentic, and your friend becomes available to pray for you.

You pray for your friend, and there's real strength in those kinds of friendships and accountability. Yeah, and the other thing is that we don't want to share confidence. If they share something with us in confidence, we don't want to be go telling somebody else, right? Oh, absolutely. You know, we have to constantly come back to that issue and reaffirm: hey, whatever you say here is just between us, and I'm going to hold that in trust for you.

You know, if you break somebody's confidence, it takes a long time to gain that trust and credibility back.

So you need to apologize profusely and really own that you broke the confidence and then form a new commitment that you are not going to do that again.

Well, Becca, this has been a great conversation, and this is a super, super good book. And I think our listeners who are hearing this are going to get the book because it will help them develop friendships, and almost all of us can use some help in that area.

So where can our listeners learn more information about you, about FriendWise, and your ministry? Oh, yeah, great question.

So, they can come and visit me at www.beckyharling.com. I have some free gifts up there, and I send out a weekly Monday morning devotional blog. It lands right in your inbox to get you started for the week. And then, as far as Friend Rise, you can buy it wherever Christian books are sold. Definitely MoodyPublishers.com, Christianbooks.com, Amazon.

I mean, you can buy it anywhere.

Well, I want to thank you for writing the book, and I want to thank you for being with us today on Building Relationships. And I pray that your friendships will continue to enrich your life as you enrich others.

Well, thank you, Gary. It's been a joy to be with you today. And we'll see you at three o'clock.

Okay, Becky. Great. I'm on my way pick and carry up.

Well, I hope that what Becky has been talking about here today has given you a little bit of hope for your friendships. We have no idea what you're going through. God does. And if this conversation has intrigued you, go to the website buildingrelationships.us. You can see more about the book that we've been talking about: FriendWise: Practical Ideas for Richer Relationships.

Just go to buildingrelationships.us.

And coming up next week, a conversation about emotional hoarding. How do you let go of the stuff in your life that keeps you stuck? Don't miss a conversation with author and former journalist Laurie Davies in One Meet. Before we go, let me thank our production team, Steve Wick and Janice Backing. Building Relationships with Dr.

Gary Chapman is a production of Moody Radio in Chicago in association with Moody Publishers, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute. Thanks for listening.