Get In (my minivan), Loser!
just know when to hop off x
An October - November 2024 debrief on the impermanence of relationships —the beauty in it and learning to accept it.
As I decenter romantic relationship, seeking it, or hoping for it —I found my platonic relationships harder, not only to find but also to maintain. Here are the conversations that allowed me to sit with that truth a little better:
The mini-van theory
Many many many Fridays ago, my friend and I were sucked in our little running bubble way behind the run club. Within our breaths, we caught up about work, politics, and our feelings —and lately, the complexities of friendship had been an unavoidable topic.
I have been reflecting a lot on my relationships and the disappointment I have when there’s an imbalance on who shows up more for who. I find myself triggered lately, and it opened up wounds that cut deep since 5th grade.
As we plod our feet onto the rubber track, she explains to me the mini-van theory.
“There’s this mini-van theory, where you have these three sections right?
You have the gunshot —they have the aux, give you directions, and helps create the vibe. Then you have the middle seats, you can still hear them, and have full-blown conversations with them. Then there’s the back seat. You check up on them, they’re in for the ride, but they don’t necessarily tell you the direction, and they can even have their own thing at the back right?”
Prior to this conversation, she sent me this text:
“So, think about each connection, and let them fit naturally into your life without forcing more than what's there.” —this is a new perspective for me.
In the past, the label of being my friend requires a few boxes to tick otherwise, they're just mere acquaintances. There has to be a certain depth and acceptance to complement the compatibility of personalities and values. To maintain those friendships, I require reciprocation and consistency. I’m your ride or die, so you have to be mine too. Anything short, you’re out. I can blame parts of it in my personality disorder, but this kind of thinking left me nothing short of lonely. Perhaps a symptom of only-child syndrome? —no, there are things I can no longer excuse after turning twenty-five. I cannot use my “personality” as an excuse to choose a lonelier life. The life I want to build is something that requires work internally and externally.
I found friendships harder to gauge compared to relationships. When you date someone, there's always that conversation of defining the relationship, flagging the differences, finding common ground to make it work, and the conversation of ending it. It’s clear —at least compared to —friendships?
Just like the Charli xcx song “Girl, you’re so confusing”. It is a dance of values and actions that says "we’re each other's friends” —a dance of looking out for each other; of being there and showing up on both big and nothing days; of being supportive without comparison, without secret animosity, without competition; of being comfortable to talk but also enough care to listen. When there's an energy shift, and a party pulls back —usually it ends up causing resentment. That resentment builds. But again, friendships have nuances. Energy shift can arise from the fact that you're just growing as two different people, may it be by distance or circumstances.
That’s the beauty of friendship —the growth into these different versions of ourselves is something we can never stop from happening. We meet each other when our universe aligns and we part ways when it is no longer, eventually, we make space and meet new ones that fit better. It doesn’t mean that the love was not there or they’re easily replaceable. That isn’t true because friendship breakups are more heartbreaking than anything. When we know we’re outgrowing people whose presence we cherished so much, there’s grief. When we sit at a table full of our old high school friends and the jokes are not landing, no one is at the same wavelength anymore, some of them have their cruel inside jokes you’re not part of, and the eggshells we walk on feels so brittle —we often walk out of there with a deep hole, so freshly carved, and a sharp pang realizing this relationship has already ended even before we can keep finding excuses not to meet next time.
And that’s all okay. There are seasons where there is no one in our front seat but us, but the back is filled, and the middle row has space for more —but eventually, it fills up. All we need to be is prepared. To have gas in our tank, a working Bluetooth for the vibes, and some snacks just to be extra. Just know that it is all for the better.
That’s what I liked the most about the mini-van theory is that it doesn’t make you exclusive, it doesn’t require you to put up a wall, it doesn’t require you to be selective, and there are no cliques. It helps you be open to more people —to not overthink it, to be generous with sharing yourself, and to just let them in for the ride. It helps you detach while giving it your all. It helps you make friends without sacrificing your boundaries. It helps you create your community in all versions of you. It helps you live in a state of flow.
It’s not love if you have to weigh it
I recently read that “love and sacrifices are made out of feeling and not to imbalance the scale”
“Love is not a currency. When requited, love doesn’t require transaction. Sacrifices are made out of feeling, not out of a need to balance the scales. Love isn’t the sum of a series of exchanges, it’s a knitted fabric. The tits and tats are muddled over time and the parties are fine with that. I love you, so I require this in exchange is a paradox (within reason)”.
One of my biggest pain points in life is when someone counts the things they bought, and the efforts they made for me. Two of my major relationships in the past did that to me, and so everyone after them —may it be friendships or not, I’ve always had the urge to list down the efforts and as much as possible try to pay that effort back. It’s a habit I’ve been trying to remove, so I do my best to rewire my brain and simply accept and give love out of feeling. Since then, genuine generosity feels like something rare to come across with.
Our world has become so capitalistic that even friendships and love have been commodified. Being picked up and sent off to the airport requires a certain depth. Vulnerability is a currency —we count the number of pints and secrets shared to even help them move out or visit them in the hospital, to call them, and give one to two hours of our day to do nothing together but enjoy the presence of each other. You need to ensure there will be reciprocity even before allowing them to see who you truly are. An invite for an invite. An access to your close friends’ story for access to their inner circle. A tit for tat —that’s what friendships had become discounted into.
I used to feel irritated when I was inconvenienced. But that’s the thing, right? Friendships are inconvenient. You drive the minivan, you pick up these people where they are, accept them as your passengers, and enjoy the same journey together. You enjoy the company of each other under the red traffic lights until you wish for more. You take the longer route, so they can sit longer, and listen to the way they talk until you can hear their voice over texts. Love is inconvenient.
We have become so risk-averse in friendships that we leave during one red flag. Having boundaries is healthy but not allowing people to break out of their shells or understanding their circumstances in life is a disservice to what great relationship you can develop. Not everything requires a spark, codependence, or oversharing to have that instant click of best friendhood. Friendships also require a process of getting to know each other and letting each other feel seen and heard. Some people have a very different culture that making you feel understood can be hard at first. But ask yourself? do they show up for you the next time, do you still feel supported even after one bad day? —then keep them in your mini-van.
We don’t give them or ourselves a chance to have friendships, some people own household they grew up in, the circumstances they’ve faced, with whatever toxic behaviors that came from it—and TRUST ME, you don’t know how hard it is for them to rewire from it.
The hundred-soulmate theory
When I was down in the dumps after breaking up with my college sweetheart, a good friend of ours told me:
We have different soulmates, for different versions of ourselves. We meet these people, and if you’ve noticed, the next partner is always greater than before. It fits much better.
Ever since, this theory lived in me not only to comfort me during break ups with a romantic partner but also with the people that go in and out of my life. All forms of bond. I believe that there is not just one “the one” —I believe we have a perfect partner for each version. We can have millions of crazy, fun, and all-consuming love. We can also have more of the slow-burn romances. Life isn’t stingy you know?
We need to acknowledge that we had it good with them. We will also have it good for the next one. It just so happens that the past doesn’t fit right for this version, of the next chapter. It doesn’t discount or invalidate the love you shared —it simply is just the end.
Relationships are a wave
If you’ve watched The Good Place —you remember when Chidi explained to Eleanor this Buddhist idea that life is a form of wave, it breaks, it glimmers as it catches the sun, and eventually it collapses —it returns back to the ocean, where it came from. As a chemist and a spiritual person, the theory made sense. So let me show it visually.
Relationships are an exchange of energy. These energies bottled inside of us are meant to be shared with people who need them. I view relationships like a graph wherein my x-axis represents time while the y-axis represents energy. Think about two variables, one releases energy, one absorbs it and eventually, they reach a point, a dot. This can be in the form of an equilibrium where it remains constant and together, or it can be two lines simply intersecting and could intersect again in the future or could simply never do. That’s the beauty of relationships —you will never know what the future holds. All you know is if the energies are right, it works (and looks a lot like graph a).
The same goes for who sits in your minivan. Choose the ones who will meet you halfway, or more, or less, but at some point will always find their way back to intersect with you, even if it takes years, and a lot of activation energy —no matter what.
To those who are reading this with intent, thank you for hopping in.
always devoted, S