Rachel and Cami revisit a conversation about adult friendship, vulnerability, and the unexpected ways meaningful connections enter our lives. They talk about the courage it takes to approach someone new, why meeting in real life still matters, and how letting go of jealousy and comparison can help us appreciate the beauty in ourselves and others.

Connect with Cami:

Website (https://www.camianntalbot.com/)

Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/camianntalbot)

Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/cami.talbot/)

Learn more about The Best Friend Project:

https://thebestfriendproject.co

Discover your Friendship Archetype:
Take the Friendship Survey:
https://thebestfriendproject.co/signup

Stay in touch:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebest_friendproject/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheBestFriendProject

Questions? Hello@TheBFProject.com

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Why is it so hard to make friends as an adult—aren’t we supposed to know who we are by now?

When professional makeup artist Cami Talbot left the Mormon church at 14, she lost more than her religion—she lost her childhood tribe. Years later, an unexpected encounter with a stranger would challenge everything we assume about how adults make new friends.

But this conversation starts somewhere even more personal—the face in the mirror. Your face. After 15 years working as a makeup artist, Cami has noticed that what women dislike about their appearance sometimes has very little to do with beauty, and more to do with the features—and stories—we inherit. If your mom was always critical of you and you have her same eyes, do you see yourself or her when you look in the mirror? If your father was distant but you have his nose, is it really your nose you don't like—or the absent feeling it reminds you of?

Self-esteem, confidence and even the grace we give ourselves are deeply connected to how we think we look. And some of that may be tied to the relationships we had with our parents.

How much of who we think we are actually belongs to us?

This conversation explores what happens when we begin questioning the identities we inherited—from our parents, our religion and our past—and how changing the way we see ourselves can change the friendships we lose, the ones we keep, and the new ones we're brave enough to make.

Connect with Cami:

Website (https://www.camianntalbot.com/)

Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/camianntalbot)

Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/cami.talbot/)

Learn more about The Best Friend Project:

https://thebestfriendproject.co

Discover your Friendship Archetype:
Take the Friendship Survey:
https://thebestfriendproject.co/signup

Stay in touch:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebest_friendproject/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheBestFriendProject

Questions? Hello@TheBFProject.com

Chapters:

00:00 – Cold Open

01:20 – Why Even the Most Beautiful People Struggle to Feel Enough

07:29 – Why We Need to Be Our Own Best Friend First

11:22 – The People Who Miss Someone but Won’t Make the First Move

17:29 – What If Another Woman’s Beauty Didn’t Threaten Your Own?

23:08 – Leaving the Mormon Church at 14 and Finding Her Own Way

33:59 – The Note That Started a Nine-Year Friendship

41:30 – Are We Too Quick to Walk Away?

45:39 – The One Thing Women Need Most From Their Friendships

50:01 – What If We Started Going to Therapy With Our Friends?

50:18 – The One Conversation You Might Need to Have Before It’s Too Late

Coming Next Week:

Rachel goes solo for Episode 20 of The Best Friend Project, reflecting on what she’s learned and why social media relationship experts may be doing more harm than good.

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Getting ghosted by a friend makes you the victim. Until you hear yourself tell the story out loud. After Beth’s episode aired, I called her back. I wanted to know what it was like to hear her friendship breakup played back. Her answer surprised both of us.

We get into in this bonus content to explore why trying not to be a bother can push people away. Why receiving love can feel harder than giving it. And why two people who shared weddings, babies and decades never once called each other “best.”

I also share the book that changed how I see my mom, and the patterns we inherit in who we let close.

If you’ve lost a friend and still don’t know why, start here.

Mentioned: It Didn’t Start with You by Mark Wolynn

Take the Friendship Survey: thebestfriendproject.co

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After 25 years of friendship, Beth never imagined her best friend might break up with her. “I thought she wasn’t calling back because she was sick.” For a year, Beth kept trying to reach her. When they finally spoke, the conversation ended their friendship. More than 20 years later, telling the story still moves Beth to tears.

In this episode, Beth shares what she’s come to understand about that breakup, including the ways she may have hurt her friend without realizing it. She still loves her, but there’s hurt there too. Could they ever have a friendship again? And what would she need to hear before that could happen?

What makes this conversation especially personal is that Beth is an old friend of mine. I could hardly believe my eyes when I reached her name at the end of her Best Friend Project survey. We hadn’t spoken in almost 15 years. Seeing her again gave me the chance to tell her how much she’s meant to me—and to thank her for holding my infant daughter at my father’s funeral.

Learn more about The Best Friend Project:
https://thebestfriendproject.co

Discover your Friendship Archetype:
Take the Friendship Survey:
https://thebestfriendproject.co/signup

Stay in touch:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebest_friendproject/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheBestFriendProject

Questions? Hello@TheBFProject.com

Chapters:

00:00 – Cold Open
09:00 – The Friendship That Was Always There
15:40 – The People Who Showed Up After Rachel Lost Her Dad
21:22 – When a 25-Year Friendship Ends By Ghosting
26:08 – A Year of Calling, Waiting, and Wondering What Went Wrong
32:55 – Why Nobody Talks About Friendship Breakups
34:52 – Are We Too Quick to Label Friends as “Toxic”?
40:27 – “Will You Be My Friend?”
42:10 – How a Friendship Struggle Sparked a Bigger Mission
46:45 – What Beth Wishes Her Former Best Friend Could Hear
50:51 – Is It Closure She Wants, or Just Accountability?
51:48 – Why We Need to Create Our Own Rules for Friendship


Coming Next Week:

Rachel sits down with her newer friend, Cammy, whom I met at Comic-Con in Salt Lake City. She does makeup for some of the most successful women in the world, and you might be surprised to hear how much they struggle with friendship, too.

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The story of Laura and Lisa is living proof that love doesn't die. Special thanks to Laura for sharing her story with us, and for the reminder to donate and apply to be a match.

Hear our sweet, quick catch up on this episode of On The Phone with Laura Goodburn. Thank you as always for listening to The Best Friend Project podcast.

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When your spouse dies, you're a widow. But when your best friend dies, there isn't even a word for it.

Laura and Lisa met when they were three years old. They were best friends for over 30 years, until a fast and brutal fight with leukemia took Lisa's life. Laura hardly knew who she was without her.

Years later, Laura's life began to unravel. Her marriage ended. She lost her job and her home. She questioned if life was even worth living. But love, from a new friendship, helped save her.

And what she did with that love is the part I keep thinking about.

Talking to Laura forced me to reflect on all the trivial, petty, dumb stuff that can come between friends. Who got left off the group text. Who said what. Does any of it really matter?

At some point, we will all run out of time. This one life we've been given will end. Do we want to spend what's left of it replaying a comment, holding on to hurt, or staying guarded? If so, this episode just might change your heart and mind.

In this episode:

• 01:03 Rod Stewart, Oprah, and motor oil
• 04:20 The haircut she fought in a coma
• 06:55 Friday date night in a hospital room
• 11:38 "If love could save someone"
• 12:50 When people claim a grief that isn't theirs
• 16:42 Are work friends worth the risk?
• 21:57 "I thought she was going to replace me"
• 26:33 The girl who had no one to write down
• 33:31 How you could save someone's best friend

Content note: This episode includes discussion of terminal illness, death, and a moment of suicidal thinking. If you are struggling, call or text 988 in the US or Canada.

Links:

• The Empty Chair Project: https://www.instagram.com/theemptychairproject.ca
• Canadian Blood Services stem cell registry: https://www.blood.ca
• Honeysuckle Coffee, Tillsonburg, Ontario https://www.instagram.com/honeysuckle.coffee
• Take the survey: https://thebestfriendproject.co/friendship-survey/

Coming Next Week:

Rachel sits down with Beth, a woman she knows personally, after being completely gripped by the story Beth shared in the Best Friend Project survey. What happens when a friendship has a few things left to talk about?

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It's a funny thing when you know your own life story. Because it is your life, it's the only thing you know. So it doesn't seem unusual or possibly even interesting to you. But when you say it out loud on a podcast and other people hear it, well, it can make you see your whole world differently.

I hop on the phone with Kimberly to find out how she feels after a doozie of a trifecta episode starting with Brenda, then Kimberly's mom, and finally her story.

This is not exactly the call I thought we would be having.

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It’s 1982. You’re the new girl in eight grade, and you accidentally bump into Brenda, the school bully. She tells you she’s going to fight you after school.
You’ve never been in a fight. You barely know anyone. You’re terrified and alone, armed with the one thing you know how to use: your words.

Last week, Brenda told me what happened next. In this episode of The Best Friend Project, Kimberly Pomeroy tells her side of the story, 42 years later. This story brought me right back to Junior High. Whether I was the "Kimberly" or the "Brenda" we all knew these people. But did we really understand them?

Since speaking with both women, I keep wondering, What happens to a kid who’s always ready to fight because no one has ever fought for her? How does a mother decide whether to trust her daughter’s choice of friends? And what might the rest of us miss when we think we already know who someone is?

Listen to Kimberly’s side of the story, then go back and hear Brenda’s. Thank you for listening.

Connect with LovePeriod:
Website: (https://www.loveperiod.life/)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/love.period.life)
Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61579784172219)

Connect with Kimberly:
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/kimberly.pomeroy1)
Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/kimberly.t.pomeroy)


Learn more about The Best Friend Project:
https://thebestfriendproject.co

Discover your Friendship Archetype:
Take the Friendship Survey:
https://thebestfriendproject.co/signup

Stay in touch:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebest_friendproject/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheBestFriendProject

Questions? Hello@TheBFProject.com

In this episode:

- From a fight to a lifelong relationship
- Finding the person behind the bully
- The night that everything changed
- “I wanted her to know she mattered”
- When the friendship went both ways

Chapters:

00:00 Cold Open
03:26 — The Friendship That Started With a Fight
08:41 — Seeing the Good Behind the Mask
11:33 — “Brenda Has a Knife”
18:35 — “I Wanted Her to Know She Mattered”
21:51 — The Friend That Always Shows Up
25:33 — “Let Me Be the Person Looking in the Mirror”
29:50 — A Life Built Around Love
32:59 — Love Starts With Us
35:09 — Forty-Two Years Later, She Still Has the Bear
40:55 — Friendship Is More Than Most Think

Coming Next Week:

You'll meet Laura, who lost her best friend to leukemia. Along the way, she found a new friend who helped heal her heart.

Support the show