Jerri Kelley

I shared a video earlier about a woman (Anne Hathaway’s character) who is bipolar. In the video, she is explaining this to a colleague, whom she respects and is trying to build a friendship with. It’s a beautiful video, and almost every time I watch it, I choke up.

I want to clarify, this is not a video about showing up at lunch and listening.

This is a video about someone taking time to invest in and grow a friendship with someone whose behavior seems erratic and possibly disrespectful.

Now, there is a lot of talk about taking time to listen. I’m for that. I love lunches and phone conversations, online convos, or texting where someone can talk when they are having a bad day, week, year. However.

Yep, full stop. However.

That is not what this video is about, and honestly, I think it has become a type of justification for not actually building friendships.

See, there is a huge difference between someone who takes time out to listen every so often, and a friend. Someone who listens can definitely deescalate a moment, but belonging is the key to that moment not even happening.

The Bible says that what a man wants is unfailing love.
It isn’t lunch and vent time. It isn’t someone turning off the TV or computer or scrolling to mumble “mhm” at regular intervals.

What a person wants is someone to hang out with, go to museums, go camping, visit weird cafes, take road trips, play board games, talk about the latest action flick or romance novel. What a person wants is to be valuable and have someone who enjoys who they are enough to make time for them.

That is hard for most people. I certainly struggle with having someone to hang out with and do stuff I enjoy, and I am a pretty outgoing, friendly, stable person. Imagine someone who struggles with the ups and downs of depression, who may feel like going to dinner at 10 am but gets trigged at 1 pm and suddenly doesn’t want to leave the house…but doesn’t want to be a bother. I have never met anyone with actual self-confidence who struggles with depression. The immediate depressive default mode is, “I don’t want to be a bother.” So if you are the friend they are hanging out with, are you okay upending your plans to pick up food and show up at their probably messy house and watch a movie while they sit on the couch under a blanket and don’t talk to you? Are you willing to not go to that party and instead maybe go sit in your car with them and have a picnic in a parking lot?
The truth is most of us don’t put in the effort for folks we actually enjoy. The act of doing things together is hard to find unless you’ve been friends for a long, long time, and even then, we make excuses about how life just has us so busy.
No. Life doesn’t have us busy.

We have just forgotten how good authentic belonging feels, not just to us but to the person we are showing up for and making the effort for.

And the fact is friendships, even really healthy ones, take effort. It’s a choice.

But as I was saying at the beginning, the video I shared isn’t about a “there for you” and go back to life lunch. It’s about a woman willing to take on the responsibility of friendship with someone who is struggling but like every human needs “unfailing love.” She is willing to be that unfailing love, and that is where lives are changed, healing happens, and belonging lives.

Jerri Kelley

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