Get on the waitlist for THE book!
How to be a Bad Friend
The Hidden Life of Failed Relationships
Available Spring 2023
The Bad Friend Course will return soon…
Friend breakups happen when we need our friends the most.
On top of that, all our normal ways of connecting have completely disappeared. Is there any hope left that you can figure things out, or find someone new, while the world is falling apart?
What if there was a PLACE OF CARE FOR YOUR FRIENDSHIPS, DESIGNED for what you need in this exact moment?
Welcome to
the Bad Friend Course
You’re not alone and healing your friend breakup story has the power to change your life
(even if 2020 took out your friendships too)
Okay, but why is no one talking about it?
It’s like there’s a race for one friend to start calling the other “Toxic” before the rest of your group decides who to cancel. You can’t believe this happened. But even weirder is that after going through some crazy shit together you suddenly can’t even communicate with each other. What the hell is going on?
You start to feel desperate, like you’re the kid getting picked last on the playground, again.
You think about how many friends your one breakup is connected to and the confusion sets in:
Are people gonna pick sides?
Are you all just going to move on?
What if you lose everyone?
You never expected to feel annoyed reading posts on Instagram about how grateful people are for their “friends” cause you never thought this would happen, but now you’re alone.
The aftermath is physically painful.
Is it possible for your heart to feel any heavier? You wish you could just unzip the skin you’re in and step out to get a break, but the memories and questions won’t stop. Even years later they still come up, you’ve just gotten better at pushing them away.
"What if it happens again with someone else?”
“It must be me because I’m the common denominator.”
“Can I trust any new friendships when I’m not sure what went wrong
with the last one?”
“Isn’t friendship supposed to be easy? Or is it just easy for everybody else?”
How can a friendship that felt so good suddenly turn into a nightmare?
Not to mention you’re exhausted, because they keep making excuses when you try to hang out, but won’t say why—after you used to get together all the time. So you just live with this nagging feeling that you missed something, watching your “ride or die” person slowly drift away.
It’s disorienting, right? Whoever said doing “the work” is supposed to help you “find your people” needs a strongly worded email, because here you are just left with new ways to be lonely.
Or maybe you’re the one doing the breaking up.
And you’re stuck trying to figure out the “right way”. You know you could just be honest which would probably mean it’s over, so why do you keep shrinking away from the truth? Is it because it’s always been your job to fix it?
You feel tangled up in the ways they need you and you know they’ve been abandoned before, which just sucks because you still love them but if you say what you need to say it’s gonna break their heart. What do you do when you still care about someone, but the things that connected you before no longer fit in your life?
You can feel yourself changing but your friend isn’t.
And part of you believes the social media hype that you’re supposed to “outgrow” their friendship, but another part of you doesn’t.
Does that mean you’re sabotaging your growth?
Why is it so hard to figure out an in-between option
that’s not breaking up but won’t keep you feeling stuck?
What if they’re the only friends you have?
Are compromise or isolation really the only options?
Maybe you’ve been through friend breakups before.
The pain is gone now, you “learned your lesson” and you’re thinking “Oh this would have been nice then, but I don’t need it now.” You even think about your current friendships and compare them to your past ones to remind yourself how lucky you are that you made it. But every once in awhile those old stories peek through and you’re realizing that while the distance is healing, you’re starting to notice that some parts of you got left behind in that falling out years ago. You’ve never been able to trust again in the same way, and there are places in you that people know nothing about. And those places are asking to be seen.
And you might be thinking, "Oh great, another thing to add to the list of what I need to heal."
But if you’ve been through a friend breakup, you don’t need a quarantine in a global pandemic to tell you that isolation takes a huge toll on our mental health and quality of life. When we have mutually supportive friendships, being a human is SO much easier (not to mention more fun). And isn’t it interesting with community being a “no brainer” when it comes to health and wellness that there actually aren’t places where our friendships can be cared for?
Have you ever wondered why we offer specific care for every type of relationship…except friendship?
You’ve got therapy and online courses for partners, spouses, parents, kiddos, HR for coworkers, and even coaches or consultants for our businesses. But when it comes to friendship it’s like we’re handed this ideal that things should just vibe and you should feel good and you’ll be there for each other and, and, and… It’s no wonder we’re exhausted and being isolated *almost* seems easier. Of course having a good friend is lovely, and of course we want to be one, except that we don’t ask any other relationship in our lives to perform at the level we ask of our friendships without being supported in some way.
Look at what our friends, and we as friends, are asked to hold.
The obvious conclusion is, we aren’t meant to do this alone.
Hey there, I’m Kat.
These are the questions I started asking while losing multiple friendships and community spaces, and one thing I firmly believe about healing our friendship stories is that “We can never take anyone any further than we have been willing to go ourselves” -Dan Allender
I have been showing up to the work of my own story through 7+ years of trauma therapy, and pursued education with supervised training in the work of healing others’ stories for 5+ years, both alongside extensive personal study.
Things weren’t adding up when it came to how we handled friendship as a society and I began pouring myself into this subject, investing in feedback on my work from professionals in writing, philosophy, and psychology, while learning and observing everything through the healing of my own friendship story.
I believe what we are longing for at our core, is to experience friendships where we know when to stay, or how to end well, while evolving beyond societal structures that no longer serve us. I believe we hold a deep desire to step into the healing power of that unknown, together.
I’ve trained with The Allender Center in the evidence based model of therapy known as Narrative Focused Trauma Care, completing Levels I, II, & the Externship (currently pursuing my Masters in Counseling Psychology at The Seattle School), and also practice using the evidence based model, Internal Family Systems developed by Richard Schwartz. I have studied the work of philosopher Peter Rollins, and have written a book (not yet published) on the subject of friendship and friend breakups. This work is my life’s calling, and facilitating community healing experiences, one of my greatest joys.
You deserve a place of care for your friendships, designed to help you understand your unique story of connection and what you need in this moment to experience the change you desire.
This is why I created:
HOw to be a bad friend, the course
Over 12 weeks we are going to walk through what it means to be friends, have friends, lose friends, and how to find (and know when to fight for) the kind of friendships you long for. You don’t have to be perfect and, as Mary Oliver says, you definitely “do not have to be good”... so what if all these failures and losses that add up to being a “bad” friend actually mean freedom and real connection? What if friendship, by its very definition, never even meant doing everything “right”, and we’ve just been duped into thinking that way?
You don’t have to live this way, or figure this all out on your own.
Instead of feeling inauthentic
What if you could feel good about having different friends for different parts of you and know that you can connect with your full self without sharing all of yourself?Instead of using your friends for therapy
What if you could know how your inner work (and being supported in that with a therapist/coach) brings more freedom to your friendships, and you?Instead of believing that good friendships last forever
What if you could experience friendships that ended well?Instead of feeling afraid of, or weird after, conflict
What if you knew what to say and when the risk is worth it for you and your friend?Instead of feeling like it’s just hard to “find friends”
What if you could know what you’re really looking for in friendship through understanding your unique story of connection?
But don’t just take my word for it…
There’s another way to experience friendship, one that includes failure and is not out to “win” or “influence” people
Over three months we will cover:
Toxic and Unhealthy and other “bad” friend buzzwords. We’ll talk about what those actually mean and how to break free of the labels and/or the need to label others.
How to actually know, like IN YOUR BONES, that you’re not too much when you share how you actually are. We’ll engage what balance in friendship truly feels like and how to find a rhythm of give and take that works for you. Did you know you could stop worrying about this?
What it means to embrace conflict as a part of real life. Learn how and when it’s healthy and when it’s worth it, so you can stop rehearsing that perfect conversation in your head and just communicate—it might even be fun.
How to be honest in a way that honors your boundaries around vulnerability. Know what the heck boundaries even should be for you and know when someone is setting “boundaries” with you that are needed or just as a way to avoid their inner work.
How to work through hard things or choose to part ways.
Before you know it, you’ll be ready for the coolest friendships ever.
Ones where you both can be your awesome selves, inspiring each other to become your best selves no matter what. Friends do not have to be forever. Friendships do not have to be perfect. Are you ready?
I asked my clients if working with me has changed their friendships. Here is what they said:
What’s included?
Twelve weeks of connection, six weeks of content.
Live & Recorded teaching every other week for twelve weeks -Six Sessions total
Live Recorded Q&A, for pre-submitted questions followed by Live Conversation (not recorded) for twelve weeks -Six Sessions total
What’s the cost?
$797 (up front, or in four payments) and the first ten people get a free 1:1 call ($150 value)!
What should I expect to change?
Your relationship to yourself and your understanding of friendship. Permission to fail and try again and the confidence to do so well. Freedom to end friendships that are over and how to do that in a way that honors you both. A way to have, and experience, boundaries that feels authentic and grounded for you. Your why behind your desire for friendship. A greater kindness towards your own loneliness. Intuitively knowing where, and when, and with whom to pursue friendship. Oh—and little things like being able to say yes or no when you mean it without having to type out that text a hundred times or whatever other weird thing you’re doing just to make things work. There is a friendship badass inside you.
OMG WHEN DO WE START?
All calls will be 75 minutes on Thursdays 5pm-6:15pmMST starting September 2, 2021 through December 2, 2021. Teachings calls are live and recorded, for the Q&A/Live Conversation calls only the Q&A portion is recorded. (PLEASE NOTE: there will be no call on September 30th, or November 25th)
Still not convinced and wondering,
“Do I really need this?”
Isn’t it kind of a small problem in the middle of a global pandemic and revolution, to be talking about “friendship”?
Absolutely not. It’s actually the opposite and exactly why I’m launching this course again now. Friendship is what is going to allow us to show up consistently for all that our lives hold in this moment and what we have to do in order to keep going.
At the exact same time we need each other to lean into for sustainable action (for the revolution), our normal rhythms of connection have been disrupted (because of the virus). Things we may not have even known we’ve been suppressing may be surfacing in silent or abrupt ways, such as younger parts of us that feel fight/flight/freeze (or current realities for us—we are not all safe in the bodies/places we inhabit). All this creates a heavy but almost invisible impact on our friendships.
Listen closely, friend breakups usually happen when we need our friends the most (or they need us). That’s right now for many of us, so whether or not that’s how your life is being impacted—being able to be present in a pandemic, and a revolution is (as Glennon Doyle says) a “brutiful” place to be. And you deserve care. You don’t have to navigate this moment on your own.
This feels expensive, and I’m a little afraid of the price tag.
It’s often where we are at a point of desire (this course is speaking to what you already know you need) that ambivalence (resistance or objections that disqualify the thing that’s right in front of us from actually being a solution) comes up. So let me ask you, what coaching/therapy, or online courses have you invested in the past, and what’s coming up for you from those experiences?
Have you been disappointed before, or unable to engage the content in time?
Do you have a belief that if something were different about you, or your story, or the way your friend did/didn’t show up that you wouldn’t need to be paying for this and your life would be fine on it’s own?
Do you not believe that you showing up for this work will change anything?
Only you can say yes for the investment financially, and then show up for the work. What I can tell you is that your desire and ambivalence are both are welcome and honestly those two things always show up together when we are ready to heal. Bring it, let’s play.
I mean, can’t I just talk things through with a friend or find a coach/therapist?
I totally get it, why not—right? Okay, here’s the deal. One, addressing these things without support in your individual friendships holds a lot of risk. I created this course so you can experiment and have the conflict or conversations you want to have in your friendships and not the ones you don’t have to. There’s a lot happening behind the scenes that this course speaks to which will alleviate so much stress or misunderstanding and help you connect to each other with gentleness.
Two, a coach/therapist is great but spending money talking through individual relationship woes is EXPENSIVE. Take my word for it. How to be a Bad Friend is designed to help you understand your unique story of connection and what you need in this moment to experience the change you desire, with greater accessibility (and expediency) than individual care.
And—just a note from my heart to those of you that are reading this who are in the middle of, or familiar with, what I call “the desert of loneliness”. I want you to know this course is not about how I went from losing friends to finding them again.
Because we don’t need more formulaic “rags to riches” stories in healing, we need care that meets us exactly where we are at, the place in between where we've been and where we want to be.
I want you to know that I see you, I’ve been there, and How to be a Bad Friend exists to care for you in that exact space.
This is my invitation to a road trip through that desert so you don’t have to walk there alone.
Need more info? Let me answer some FAQs
+ If I can’t be there live, how long will I have access to the recordings?
Great question. You’ll have access to the recordings, slide decks, and a few other surprise goodies, for the duration of the course plus one month.
+ Okay, but will I be able to keep pace with the content?
1000% yes. Not to brag or anything but as a low-energy mom of four little kids with no childcare and working full time, I get time scarcity and limited capacity like nobody’s business. That’s why this is set up as twelve weeks of connection, six weeks of content. Your time commitment each week is —at max, 1.5 hours, and the way the information will be delivered is designed to offer care. I’ve mapped out the content such that it supports the need for space. That’s why every other week is focused on what is coming up for you so that you can be supported as you learn. It’s less of a typical “course” and more of an experience. You’ll also have access to an audio only recording for each talk, so you can pop in your earbuds and do the dishes or take a walk and enjoy the workshops podcast style. For some of the participants last round, this was their preferred way to engage the content.
+ Why not give lifetime access?
So glad you asked. The definitive start and end date are in and of themselves a part of the work of learning How to be a Bad Friend. In healing our stories around Friendship and Friend Breakups, we need real time live care in order to tend to those spaces well. We will begin, share, and end this journey together. The content will then have time to settle within you over the coming weeks and months in a way that is YOUR OWN and not you coming back to me as the authority. My job is to connect you to your inner wisdom in this process and limited access to the course materials is one way to support you in that work—among many other things, but for that you’ll need to sign up. wink
+ Will there be workbooks, or additional materials supplied in addition to the recorded live teaching and Q&As?
In teaching a course that asks you to engage your own story, this type of content is customized to each cohort. This course is set up to heal your heart, and connect your body and mind. We don’t heal with a workbook harm that happened relationally, which is why this course will be taught live with the ability for you to submit your questions, and you’ll have the option to show up for unrecorded conversation every other week with other participants. That being said, with the Q&A’s each week, you have access to me for what you need and I create unique content each week to care for what’s coming up for you and the group.
+ So, is this kind of group coaching?
Not quite. Our friendship stories are some of the most surprisingly vulnerable places in our hearts. As such, you’re invited to participate as much or as little as you like. This course is the foundation for another level of group coaching where individuals who have completed How to be a Bad Friend can join one of my Story Circles focused on healing their friendship stories in a safe and nurturing space. The opt-in (live conversation) community piece of this course is set up to support the reality that when we have been wounded in friendship we need to be nurtured in some form of anonymity before we feel safe to find community again. The live format, submitted questions, and optional conversation holds space for exactly that.
+ Is this course exclusive to friendship, or will what I learn apply to other relationships as well?
OMG YES IT ABSOLUTELY WILL. A quote from my book (in process) is that friendships “form more of the fabric of our lives than we realize, in fact while the majority of our relational ties might include friendship (family, colleagues, acquaintances) it’s the nuance and the fluidity and to an extent, polyamory of it, that make friendship the connection we love.” What we will discover and explore about friendship will not only serve and tend to our hearts in other connections, but the support of being able to find and experience fulfilling friendships, in turn, enriches every other relationship in our lives.
And Since you’ve scrolled down this far, here’s some more beautiful words from someone on what working with Me brougHt them (in case you’re still undecided)
See you in September! Until then, STay tuned for more on INstagram…
