How to Stay Connected Between Weddings and Funerals

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Why do we only see each other at weddings and funerals?

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And a sentence that has been uttered to me at almost every wedding or

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a funeral I have ever attended.

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I'm sure you've heard it too.

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Maybe you've been the one to say it.

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Welcome to episode 1 25 of this shit works.

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A podcast dedicated to all things, networking, relationship

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building and business development.

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I'm your host, Julie Brown professional speaker.

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Author and networking coach.

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And today I'm discussing.

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Why we don't have to wait for someone to die or get married to come together.

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I unfortunately have had six deaths in my family and friends

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circle in the past 18 months.

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Not one wedding though.

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Maybe I'm getting old.

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Maybe by the time you're 46, all of your friends have gotten married.

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Remarried.

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Or decided not to get married at all.

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There has been a number of deaths outside of my family as well.

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Celebrity deaths.

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People I seemingly grew up with or were part of chunks of my

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life through movies and song.

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Kirsi, Allie Ray Liotta Christine McVie, Olivia Newton, John

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Irene, Cara, Bob Saget, Coolio.

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The queen.

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And Julie Powell who, if you don't know, was the inspiration behind

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the movie, Julie and Julia, which was based off over food blog, where

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she attempted to make every recipe.

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All 524 of them.

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And Julia Childs, the art of French cooking cookbook.

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In one year.

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She died of cardiac arrest at her home in upstate New York.

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She was 49 years old.

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49.

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Just three years older than me.

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We don't know when our lives are going to end.

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We don't know if we will have the chance to get together again or to celebrate.

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Or to mourn.

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Don't waste your life waiting for the next funeral or a wedding to tell someone that

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you love them to celebrate with them, to dance and sing and hug and laugh and cry.

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Don't wait until someone is hurting to tell them that you are there, that you

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love them, that they can count on you.

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You see, we rally around people who are going through hard times.

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But sometimes the every day is a struggle too.

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It's just not as obvious.

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You reaching out and checking in on them just might change that day for them.

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I changed that they desperately need.

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But life gets busy.

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I know.

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So.

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How can we learn to make time for each other in between the

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weddings and the funerals?

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Before it's our own funeral.

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According to thrive global, there are eight tips to make time for

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the people that matter most to you.

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And.

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Maybe even just the people you've lost touch with, but you still love them.

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Here they are.

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One.

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Get out of your own way.

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Meaning stop making excuses stop saying it's a work night or it's too far away.

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Or the flight prices are too high.

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You will always be able to find an excuse.

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So stop making excuses and get out of your own way.

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To be relentless.

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With yourself and with the people you want to connect with all the excuses that

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you make, that keep you away from people are the same excuses that others are

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facing as they try to reconnect with you.

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So be the squeaky wheel.

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Keep reaching out and saying, what are we going to get together?

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Naked calendar invite and send it to them.

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So they don't have an excuse.

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Three.

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Expand your circle.

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I get to know the people that are important to the people.

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Who are important to you?

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I know.

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This sounds counterproductive.

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You already know more people than you can keep in touch with.

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And I'm telling you, or this article is telling you to expand your circle.

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Listen.

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The more interconnected you are to the people in your life.

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And in your network, the easier it will be to stay connected.

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To be able to make plans, to gather, to know what's going

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on in each other's lives.

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For.

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Find a simple activity that brings everyone joy.

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It doesn't have to be a big grand event.

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It's just the time you spend together.

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Each year, a group of us from all over the country, get together to

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go to a Notre Dame game together.

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It's usually about 10 of us and the planning of this keeps

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us all together and connected.

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As we pick the date, the game that we're going to go to coordinate

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sleeping arrangements, like who's going to be in whose car.

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It's so fun.

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This one day that we planned together, it keeps us connected

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through the entire year.

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Or like my friend Haley and I, we have a Christmas tradition

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going on 20 years for each year.

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We do something together for Christmas.

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We see in musical, go on a Christmas light tour, good or reef decorating class.

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It doesn't matter.

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The only year we missed was COVID and we have years of memories

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from this simple tradition.

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Or you could just create simple excuses to be together.

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Ask someone to go for a walk or a coffee, or like the little girl who lives next

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door to me asked me the other day, Julie.

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Can we make Christmas cookies together?

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Yes, Matilda.

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Whenever you want.

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I will be here to make Christmas cookies together.

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Even in fucking July.

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I love that kid.

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It doesn't have to be grand.

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It just needs to be you guys together.

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Five.

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Make it purposeful.

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And what I got from this tip was to be fully present.

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Don't spend time with people distracted by your phone when you were with them.

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Be with them.

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I can't tell you how many times I've spent time with somebody

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in every fucking three seconds.

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They're on their phone.

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They're looking at their phone and I feel like we're not even together.

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I don't do that.

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Don't make someone feel that way.

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Six.

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Have a backup plan.

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Yes, life does happen in your plans may fall through, but

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make sure they get rescheduled.

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Don't let a busted plan be yet another excuse for not getting together.

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Work to reschedule it ASAP or when you set the date, have a rain date.

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See, okay, this is the day we're going to get together.

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If anything happens, meteor, shower, whatever.

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I don't know, asteroids, whatever alien vision, like.

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Our backup date is our rain date.

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Is this date?

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At seven.

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Share family meals with friends.

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What I took from this tip is to invite friends into your regular routine.

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Invite people over for dinner or spend holidays together.

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My friends are as important to me as my blood related family.

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So I include them in family things because to me, they are family.

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An eight.

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Find what works find a way of keeping in touch that works for you.

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Is it phone calls, text messages, emails.

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How can you stay in touch?

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So that you can plan ways to be together in person.

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If you lose touch, you won't make plans plain and simple.

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I hope these tips are helpful.

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When I mentioned to my friend Lauren, that I was going to be

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covering this subject for a podcast.

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We somehow went down a wormhole and to funerals.

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And what would we want our view?

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Funerals to look like.

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I for one.

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What mind to be a party?

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No white lilies for me, please.

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I want a playlist in loud colors and what people drinking and

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laughing and remembering me.

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As the crew.

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Crazy person.

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I am.

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Which makes me think.

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Perhaps we should live our lives for our eulogy and not our obituary.

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You're a, bituaries what you do.

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Your eulogy is who you are.

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I want to live my life for who I am.

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Okay.

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Like any Irish funeral, we're going to have some drinks, so onto the

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drink of the week, and you can find.

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There is a cocktail named the eulogy.

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It's perfect.

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Right?

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And morbid.

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All at the same time.

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But before I get to that, I want to let you know that I am once again.

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Really saying 10 only 10.

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One-to-one 60 minute breakthrough sessions again for January.

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These are zoom meetings with me.

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One-on-one for 60 minutes, go over.

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Anything you're struggling with in regards to your networking business development,

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lead generation or your business strategy.

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Last year, the you sold out in one week.

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There are only 10 spots and I'm only scheduling them

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during the month of January.

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And when they are gone, they're gone.

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So, if you would like to sign up to get on the wait list for one of

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these breakthrough sessions, there is a link to that in the show notes.

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Okay.

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Onto the eulogy cocktail.

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Here's what you're going to need.

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Two ounces of dry gin, a quarter ounce of extra dry vermouth,

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one and a half ounces of absent, which might put you in your grave.

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Um, what you're going to do is you're going to start all of these

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ingredients with ice and then strain into a chilled coupe glass.

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All right, friends.

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That's all for this week.

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If you like what you heard today, please leave a review

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and subscribe to the podcast.

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Also remember to share this podcast to help it reach a larger audience.

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If you want more.

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Julie Brown.

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You can buy my book.

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This shit works on Amazon and Barnes and noble.

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You can find me on LinkedIn at Julie Brown BD.

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Just let me know where you found me when you reach out.

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I am Julie Brown underscore BD on the Instagram, or you can

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just pop on over to the website.

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Julie Brown, bd.com.

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Thanks so much for being here.

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Until next week.