Dominique Flint is a Licensed Professional Counselor. She has worked in the behavioral health field for 10.5 years, providing client-centered and collaborative care. She is now the owner of Free To Be Counseling Services, LLC, where she is committed to assisting Black women in identifying their traumas and mastering the art of living authentic lives.
"Black women have always been friends. I mean, if you didn't have each other, you had nothing." The incredible and brilliant Toni Morrison, an American novelist and editor who has been writing heartfelt, complicated, and familiar stories about the black experience for over 50 years, shared this quote. This quote shows how Black women have relied on each other's companionship for connection and survival. When I recall images of Black women's friendships, I think of shows and movies from the '90s and 2000s. Shows like Living Single and Girlfriends, or films like Waiting to Exhale and Set it Off. These depictions showcased tribulation, deep connection, conflict, loyalty, loss, the dynamics of workplace politics, divorce, and so much more.
Most recently, I have reflected on Black women's friendships and their impact on our happiness. In the past few years, a few books have focused primarily on the role of women's friendships, how to create and cultivate meaningful connections with them, and the enormous impact they have on our lives. Some of the books that come to mind are Sisterhood Heals: The Transformative Power of Healing in Community by Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, Platonic: How the Science of Attachment Can Help You Make--and Keep--Friends by Dr. Marisa G Franco, and Fighting For Our Friendships: The Science and Art of Conflict and Connection in Women's Relationships by Danielle Bayard Jackson. In my earlier years, friendship seemed simple. There were moments of cattiness that resembled the movie Mean Girls, the talking behind each other's backs like right out of a Moesha episode, the jealousy, the ruminating, the overanalyzing, and the gossiping. You know, the usual stuff. But there were also critical moments as well.
I can recall one experience in fourth grade that saved my life. If it was not for my big-mouth friend, who stepped in and protected me from an unspeakable set of circumstances, I don't know what I would have done. It was not until I was older, processing these experiences in therapy, that I truly understood how she stood in the gap for me. Little ten-year-old me. As a Black woman, the friendships in my formative years seemed so normal and par for the course, but those moments also remind me of the hurt and devastation I also experienced. So, like most of us, those friendships came with complexities. One of the things I always heard from older women was that the friends I would make in college would be the friends I would have for a lifetime. I am blessed to have a mixture of friends: one from middle school, a few from college, a few friends that were friends of friends that became friends, and friends that I made while starting my career.
What I have come to learn is that making friends as an adult requires strategy. As a preteen and adolescent, I had to be regularly in all the places I made friends. As we get older and have more responsibilities, we must practice intentionally creating community. The time I give to my friends has to be valuable. It has to be meaningful. Not only do I want to grow in those friendships, but I also want to be heard, seen, felt, and have a good laugh until my stomach hurts is the icing on the cake. Experiencing conflict in new and old adult friendships started me on this quest to learn more about myself and how to navigate the intricacies of Black women's friendships. Now, I am not opposed to interracial friendships as I share those; however, there is something so unique and illuminating about Black women's language and energy in spaces together. I want to share some tips and strategies I have acquired and utilized in this article. These strategies have helped me understand the dynamic of relationships (I am still learning) and have improved my ability to practice self-compassion as I learn to accept myself and accept the women I am blessed to call friends now and the women I will get to call friends in the future. These tips are not just for Black women; however, I believe that existing in multiple marginalized identities can significantly impact your life journey.
Tip 1: Self-discovery
Self-discovery is one of the best ways to deepen relationships with friends. Self-discovery includes a willingness and desire to understand our most authentic selves, including our needs, wants, values, beliefs, and perspectives. It also includes being willing to ask ourselves honest and transparent inquiries that help us understand ourselves, our actions and behaviors, the interactions or circumstances that cause many emotions and experiences, and the strategies that help us develop solutions. Now, this may sound illogical because self-discovery is rooted in understanding oneself. Taking the time to understand ourselves is also part of relationship building. The intimacy created through self-discovery can allow our friendships to go on a version of self-discovery. Self-discovery requires courage, bravery, and steadfastness that can only aid in the growth of our other relationships. Black women deserve the experience of self-discovery. Some examples of practicing self-discovery can be through self-discovery cards. I use a great set of self-discovery cards called My Therapy Cards by Dr. Ebony Butler. They have been instrumental in helping me understand myself. These self-discovery cards can help us uncover and explore the depths of our identity. As it relates to friendship, self-discovery is about accepting who we are and adjusting how we show up in our friendships.
Tip 2: Self-acceptance
Self-acceptance is about radically and wholeheartedly accepting all aspects of ourselves. This practice includes the traits that make us most desirable and elicit shame, judgment, and criticism. When we practice self-acceptance, we welcome the belief that no matter who we are and what we have experienced, we deserve an unconditional expression of love, kindness, and compassion. Many clients I see regularly struggle with burdensome and overwhelming life experiences. Those experiences include abusive childhoods, debilitation perfectionism, social anxiety, cognitive distortions, disconnection from family, and the like. These experiences can present challenges in relationships, and often, at the root of their suffering, these challenges are related to the foundation of their relational attachments with their caregivers. One of my clinical observations suggests that we desire to be someone different without first accepting ourselves fully and completely. Some want to be more outgoing without acknowledging and accepting that they are reserved and enjoy time alone. Others want to have practical communication skills while overlooking or ignoring that all they experienced growing up was silent treatment behavior and passive aggression. There is nothing inherently wrong with desiring to evolve in a way that elicits pride in oneself. Accepting ourselves can be challenging without a set of skills to assist us.
There is a skill that I often teach clients I work with called radical acceptance. This skill is from an evidenced-based practice and therapy model called Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), which psychologist Marsha Linehan created to assist individuals diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder. The skill suggests that we should accept our reality wholly and without judgment to have a life without continued suffering. When we acknowledge our reality for precisely what it is, we understand that acceptance does not mean we have to like the facts of our existence. It also means that we accept the limitations we present and the ones others present. When we radically accept life in the present, we also accept that the things that happen in life have a cause, even what we perceive as painful and traumatizing. We also accept that we can experience pain and discomfort while having a life worth living. In DBT, holding space for opposing realities is called Walking the Middle Path. So why is self-acceptance necessary to create meaningful friendships with Black women? Well, meaningful friendships require compassion, understanding, empathy, and openness. We will sometimes get along and sometimes struggle to see eye to eye. We may, at times, question our friendships. If we cannot understand and accept our humanity, accepting the humanity of others may be unrealistic. Black women already live in a world that denies us our humanity, as we are often judged for the way we wear our hair, the way we speak, or the moments we practice assertiveness, which is frequently perceived as anger. We deny ourselves of those fundamental rights as a form of self-protection. So, for no other reason, practicing self-acceptance may help us honor our humanity and help another Black woman who struggles to do it for herself. While connections are part of how humans thrive, everyone does not get to cultivate lasting friendships. Accepting ourselves first can nurture opportunities to build security, confidence, and self-assuredness that can transcend our relationship with self.
Tip 3: Understanding your attachment style
Understanding our attachment style can present another method for creating worthwhile friendships. Psychoanalyst John Bowlby developed attachment theory. Our attachment styles are designed, in part, in infancy and childhood by our relationships and connections with our caregivers. It is essential that during infancy and throughout childhood, a child's emotional needs are prioritized while also curating an environment that is nurturing and safe. These principles assist in creating a secure attachment in a child. Establishing a secure attachment helps children develop self-esteem, trust in their caregiver, resilience, independence, and more. The other attachment styles are called anxious-resistant, avoidant-dismissive, and disorganized.
For a child who experiences inconsistency in their caregiver's parenting practices, it can create an anxious attachment style. The inconsistency creates anxiety and confusion because the child is uncertain about what parenting approach they will be receiving, which causes difficulty in understanding the caregiver's behavior. Symptoms of anxious attachment style include fear of abandonment and rejection, being preoccupied with their relationships, and a fear of being alone.
When we talk about avoidant attachment style, we are talking about parents who presented as emotionally unavailable, dismissive of emotions, and/or disconnected from acknowledging feelings and created an environment for their child or children that fostered independence and self-sufficiency. When one hears characteristics like independence and self-reliance, it may be challenging to understand the problem. A child forced to be independent because of an emotionally unavailable parent is an area of concern because children in these particular situations with this level of responsibility also don't possess the emotional intelligence required to navigate adult-like decisions with efficiency. Avoidant-attached children may grow up to be adults who struggle with understanding and acknowledging their emotions, experience emotional disconnection from others, and may lack the skills necessary to be emotionally available and attuned to their emotional needs.
Now, for those who experience the disorganized attachment style or what is also called the fearful-avoidant, this often happens in childhood as a result of experiencing a childhood filled with terror and worry, abuse, and/or unpredictable and neglectful behaviors. Experts who study attachment theory state that this attachment style is formed through traumatic experiences and abuse. These experiences in childhood can manifest a constant presence of fear, which is foundational to many of their interpersonal interactions. A child with this attachment style most often experiences traits from avoidant and anxious attachment styles. The complexity of this attachment style lies in its development; the perceived fears that a child experiences are attached to the abuse of the caregiver, and because our caregivers are in our lives to help us navigate those traumatic experiences, it becomes an even scarier set of circumstances. Trust plays an enormous role in a child's perception of the relationship with their caregivers, primarily if it affects their ability to believe that they are reasonably safe. Adults who experience a disorganized attachment style want connection and relationships but also avoid them because of their fears of abandonment. Out of all the three insecure attachment styles, disorganized is the most challenging to experience and overcome. It is possible that insecure attachment styles can be improved through interactions that promote secure attachments. So why is understanding our attachment style essential to maintaining our friendships? Well, attachment styles are rooted in our emotional connections to our caregivers. Those experiences prime us for the other relationships we will have in the future. Understanding our behaviors can incentivize us to adjust what may be problematic for more intimate friendships. Acknowledging our relationship and attachment orientation can help us empathize with friends learning more about themselves. It can also improve our awareness and provide a roadmap to interpersonally relating to others. Those who recognize their attachment style will be closer to linking its influence to connection, vulnerability, intimacy, and trust.
Tip 4: Self-compassion
Self-compassion has been so pivotal to my healing journey. Learning to practice empathy and kindness with myself as I navigate my friendships and life has been influential. So, what is self-compassion? Self-compassion encompasses three components: self-kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness. Self-kindness requires we practice being gentle and empathic with ourselves rather than judgmental. Common humanity demands that we practice seeing ourselves connected to others during moments of suffering versus feeling isolated and alone. Mindfulness requires practicing being present in our current experiences while not over-identifying with them. Many individuals in the field of psychology have studied self-compassion. My introduction to it started with learning about Dr. Kristen Neff, a psychologist who was the first to define and measure self-compassion more than two decades ago (Self Compassion, n.d.). She has been a leader in developing and researching this construct that also helps individuals apply its framework in real-time. Now that there is context about self-compassion, why might this practice be beneficial to improve our friendships?
In the book Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself, there is a chapter entitled Compassion for Others, and it discusses a study of the mentality of someone who practices self-compassion and their perspective of friendships differing from those who do not apply self-compassion skills. The study shared that self-compassionate individuals have different goals in their friendships than those who lack self-compassion; those individuals are more likely to focus on helping and encouraging their friends as well as being more compassionate to their friends' mistakes and weaknesses (Neff, 2011, p. 190). Another important finding from this study stated that those individuals who are self-compassionate are also more willing to acknowledge their own mistakes and weaknesses to their friends; these individuals are better able to create close, authentic, and mutually supportive friendships than those who are self-critical (Neff, 2011, p. 190). Self-compassion is essential in our friendships because those who use self-compassion skills are better equipped to support friends and understand the value of vulnerability and authenticity. Self-compassion skills also focus on reducing shame and judgment. Self-compassionate people also understand the importance of empathy and taking the other person's perspective, even for a moment. People who practice self-compassion understand this because to engage in self-compassion correctly, you must acknowledge your perspective, which is often challenging and met with negative self-talk. Some use shame as a motivational strategy, usually creating more shame. We deserve to meet ourselves with gentleness. So, as you build meaningful friendships, consider how self-compassion can improve those connections.
Tip 5: Using nonviolent communication from a mindful approach
There are myriad ways to engage in communication with others. Through my experience of teaching clients and myself practical steps to engage in effective communication, the approach laid out by Oren Jay Sofer has, in my opinion, shared quality information about non-violent communication. Oren Jay Sofen is an author and a trainer of meditation, mindfulness, and nonviolent communication. In his book Say What You Mean: A Mindful Approach to Nonviolent Communication, he shares three components of effective communication, which include leading with presence, coming from curiosity and care, and focusing on what matters (Sofer, 2018, p. 5). He shares in the introduction of his book that presence is about being mindful and aware, coming from curiosity and care is about understanding our intention, and focusing on what matters is about honing our attention and training our mind to discern what's essential and shift its focus nimbly and responsively (Sofer, 2018, p. 5). There is so much from this book that can help improve communication. I want to share a few ideas, but I encourage a deeper dive into these concepts. Communication is about what we say and how we speak, including our tone, volume, and pace. These aspects of communicating also share many details about how we feel. Communication encompasses exchanging information, nonverbal communication, internal dialogue, emotional and affective experience, somatic and embodied experience, and personal, psychological, social, and cultural conditioning (Sofer, 2018, p. 22). When communicating, especially during conflict, we often struggle to exercise presence.
This aspect of nonviolent communication can be beneficial in maintaining focus and building connections. Presence is a concept that requires practice, and one way to practice presence is by exploring what helps us stay connected and what creates disconnection. Another vital perspective of nonviolent communication is acknowledging the person one communicates with. Presence also tells us that we communicate with someone with agency, choice, values, perspectives, beliefs, and desires that deserve protection. This reminder is important because we can forget that our needs are not the only most important ones. If we are the only people talking, we are not engaging in a dialogue of shared ideas and perspectives. When we are engaging in conflict with others, there are specific ways that we navigate those interactions. Sofer calls it habitual views of conflict. He stated that these views of conflict result in us engaging in blaming and self-protection behaviors. The four patterns of conflict that he shares include conflict avoidance, which means that a person avoids addressing conflict. Competitive confrontation describes someone who uses aggression or force during conflict. Passivity states that a person in conflict will engage in conflict by acquiescing, leading them to disregard their own needs. Passive aggression describes an individual expressing dissatisfaction indirectly while masquerading as if unbothered. Understanding the posture we take during moments of conflict can help us strategize to find effective ways of engaging. There is no shame in our method of managing conflict; however, it is our responsibility and duty to assess how to show up in our friendships. We must reflect on our energy and how it influences getting to a resolution. Sofer talks about curiosity and care in part two of the book. I love the concept of evoking curiosity and care in communication practices. With the idea of curiosity, I can remember how much more effective my interactions with communication and conflict became when I started to acknowledge that asking questions and being invested in the answers sent a message that I was willing to accept that I did not have all the answers, or more importantly, I was willing to learn. Care is about being willing to insert awareness and presence to see another person's humanity. When we can practice seeing someone else's humanity, it helps us to see them less as an enemy or an opposition and more like someone we want to win with. It also helps us to separate the person from the behavior we are dissatisfied with.
Empathy is often an easy concept to understand intellectually but difficult to apply when disagreements happen, and emotions are activated. Sofer describes empathy as the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from their point of view (Sofer, 2018, p. 99). He also shares that utilizing empathy is necessary, but the challenges to seeing its importance relate to our socialization; we shut down our ability to be empathic to fit in and protect ourselves. (Sofer, 2018, p. 100). In this chapter that discusses listening and empathy, a reference to a research study concluded that there is a correlation between those who spend more time on electronic devices having less empathy. The time we spend on social media and other content-creation spaces can begin to desensitize us. It can create a false belief that our differences are so disparate that seeing us and our experiences is impossible. There is a principle in the book that explores conflict and its starting point centering around our strategies, which is what we want, and that if we can identify our needs, which is all about why we want what we want, we can reduce the amount of conflict that we experience (Sofer, 2018, p. 128). I love this principle because it encourages us to explore, express, and acknowledge our needs without assumptions or negative connotations. Our willingness to gain insight and awareness of our needs helps us understand the needs of others, which allows us to find solutions together and work together toward a common goal. Connecting conflict to our needs can also direct the tension away from the person we are in conflict with. Learning effective and productive ways to communicate will help to enhance our friendships. As I stated earlier, this book has so many great concepts that I encourage you to check it out.
Tip 6: The removal of perfectionism as a concept among friends
I had a client say once that what they needed most in their relationships was space to get it wrong. That was so profound because it says that if I have to be perfect, I will fail, and I need to be able to fail sometimes and experience an opportunity to repair. If we create unrealistic expectations that our friends will never hurt us and that they should always behave in ways that make us feel warm and fuzzy, we're creating a massive amount of disappointment. In Brene Brown's book Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead, she describes Perfectionism as a self-destructive and addictive belief system that fuels this primary thought: If I look perfect and do everything perfectly, I can avoid or minimize the painful feelings of shame, judgment, and blame. Perfectionism is also described as a compulsive need to achieve and accomplish one's goals, with no allowance for falling short of one's ideals. Brene Brown also shares in Daring Greatly that Perfectionism is more about perception than motivation, and we do not have control of other people's thoughts and ideas about who we are or who we want others to think we are. As a Black child growing up in the United States, there are countless stories of Perfectionism. The messages associated with Perfectionism reinforced the idea that we always needed to exude excellence as mistakes and poor choices, while typical for others were luxuries we did not have access to experience.
I remember watching Scandal as Olivia Pope and her father had an intense conversation about the mistakes that she had made, underestimations, and her shortcomings. During this powerful scene, her father asks her to recall what he has always told her; "you have to be twice as good as them to get half of what they have." That message and many like it were said to be a means of survival. Those statements also represented strategy, pragmatism, and reminders of the harmful world that we occupy. Our parents and other elders we were in community with wanted to see us thrive and, frankly, do better than them, and they could not have known the type of complexity those messages might create, not just in a world filled with systems formed without us considered but also how we navigate friendships. Perfectionism asks us to engage in a performance of worthiness, this idea that the more we perform unrealistic expectations, the more worthy we are for love, connection, validation, and belonging. Perfectionism can also create stress and anxiety, all-or-nothing thinking patterns, fears of being rejected by others for being ourselves, and an attachment to our self-worth, among other things. So why is removing Perfectionism from our thinking applicable in maturing our friendships? Well, Perfectionism creates unreasonable expectations with little room for failure.
Friendships will go through peaks and valleys, and if we are more invested in the appearance of our friendships and not their health, experiencing long-lasting, purposeful, and expansive friendships may pass us by. As Black women, we deserve to remove the fear of failure from our being. Imperfection is part of the human experience. Recently, I heard someone share that they manage their urge to perform Perfectionism by seeing themselves in a consistent state of practice, reducing their ability to fail. This philosophy suggests that every moment we experience is an opportunity to reassess our behaviors without judgment. One definition of practice includes something done over and over to develop skills. It makes sense that seeing our daily interactions as practice, not failure, is one strategy to reduce the urge to practice Perfectionism. I am not suggesting that we navigate our friendships without standards, rules, and boundaries; however, what I am suggesting is we consider that our friendships evolve and grow, and that can only happen if we are willing to embrace the discomfort of imperfection, uncertainty, risk, and vulnerability.
So, as you journey through life and engage with incredible Black women, I hope these tips help you develop the essential and meaningful friendships you deserve. Zora Neale Hurston once said, "It seems to me that trying to live without friends is like milking a bear to get cream for your morning coffee. It is a whole lot of trouble and then not worth much after you get it.” At this point in my life, I understand that my existence is much more gratifying with the women I call friends. But for me, there is something profoundly unique about Black women. They know me in ways no one else could because we have a shared experience. We walk this Earth with a rich history and bright light. I have learned that I should embrace conflict instead of running from conflict. These tips have helped me hold on when conflict seemed exhausting, scary, or too burdensome. There is just something about being in fellowship with Black women. We hold each other up because sometimes we are all we have, and we hold each other down because no one understands the struggle better. Maintaining friendships may seem too complex and more troublesome than what they are worth. I want to invite you to consider that, as humans, one of our primal needs is social connection. Life can be challenging enough, so enjoy your days and make space for friendship.
Read more from Dominique Flint
Dominique Flint, Licensed Professional Counselor
Dominique Flint is the owner of Free To Be Counseling Services, LLC which is a virtual counseling private practice committed to providing mental health care to Black women. She started this practice understanding that Black women have unique mental health care needs. This practice is invested in meeting Black women where they are and empowering them to create the kinds of lives they desire. Her areas of expertise include anxiety, trauma, stress, PTSD, relationships, and women's issues. She is a Certified Clinical Trauma Professional with plans to continue growing her expertise as her priority is to provide interventions and services that are current, evidence-based, and individualized.
