… no, not those kind! I’m talking about friends with different skills and networks from you. Being single brings many joys and a few challenges, not least if you’re a bit challenged on the DIY front like I am. Over the years I’ve taught myself to decorate, how to mow the grass and look after the mower, put up pictures (some of them are even straight) etc. However, even I can see that my enthusiasm usually outstrips my skill levels and I guess I’m now at age where I don’t want to be doing everything by myself, making a hash of it and then getting the delightful handyman in the village to come in to fix it. I think even he is getting a bit fed up of my ad hoc requests as his prices seem to be outstripping inflation at the moment!
I think all of us are skilled in areas that some people aren’t, or are at least better at something that friends struggle with. So we should definitely never think we are ‘stuck’. Looking around my eclectic network I have some brilliant and talented friends. For example, my friend Judith is an ace cook and offers me cheffing advice, Richard is a technical genius, Gill is a literary expert and great at copy-editing, Navin helps when I have a car question, Rob is a modern art expert, the chaps next door help me when I need some muscle to shift the heavy stuff and we water each other’s pots during the holiday season. I’m not sure what skills my friends think I have, but hopefully they know that I’m loyal, dependable, solutions biased and make a great cuppa! I think you get the picture; we all have something that someone else needs at some point in their lives; being single means that we probably need to ask for help more often, but sometimes don’t because we ‘don’t want to be needy’.
I therefore proclaim I am here to put an end to all this and hereby launch the ‘Friends with Benefits Exchange’ – FWBE. I probably need to work on the title before I get myself in a whole load of trouble but I think you get the gist. The rules are simple:
- No money changes hands
- Value is in the eye of the beholder
- No complaints allowed (even if you secretly resort to getting in a professional in to sort out the problem once and for all if their attempt doesn’t succeed) 😊.
Value can be determined by many things and time taken to return the favour doesn’t have to be commensurate with the original favour given. Favours don’t have to be returned within a given time frame, they can sometimes take years to be repaid, but that isn’t the point. FWBE (pronounced Fwiiibeee) is an open-ended benefits exchange system similar to that from the dark ages when bartering was a ‘thing’, but with FWBE, the value truly is in the eye of the beholder. Fixing a printer might be a small challenge to the skilled technician, but to the person with the issue, the frustration-ometer might have been off the scale and therefore worth a 3 course meal in exchange.
Being single means we just have to be more aware that asking for help isn’t a bad thing, it’s actually a strength and we all need to be more open about the fact that no one person is complete or perfect.
We can also practice FWBE by doing good deeds and paying forward our goodwill by putting it out there into the universe and not expecting an immediate return. For example, I’m nearly 6’ tall and when I’m doing the mundane grocery shop, I’m often approached by little old ladies asking me to reach something off the top shelf. I do this willingly and with a smile and assurance that it’s no bother. I like to think I’d do this anyway but I add extra smiles because my mini mum often has to ask for the same help 150 miles away in Lincolnshire (although she somehow always manages to approach a good looking chap to do it for her, bless!) The exchange in this case is via the universe and I don’t need to know the stranger helping my mum, I’m just grateful that the pay it forward approach to FWBE is working.
FWBE is sometimes more rewarding when you do a random gift of kindness without expectation of reward; I must admit that akin to my saying hello to strangers, particularly if they are old age pensioners looking a little glum, I like to surprise friends and neighbours. The feel good factor of having done something nice lives on for longer than the time the favour or kindness took to do in the first place – although do check that they haven’t got CCTV and therefore know it’s you who put the flowers on their doorstep to cheer them up during the first Covid lockdown!
I think one of my first examples of a random act of kindness stems from many years ago, when a very dear friend was set to endure her first birthday since splitting up from her husband. She had been dreading it for days as the thought of getting up on her lonesome on her special day without any other human contact was sending her into a dark fug even though we were due to meet up later in the day. To put this into context, this was way before mobile phones and Skype etc. On the morning of the aforementioned big day, I had an epiphany and decided to surprise her with a breakfast so that she wouldn’t be alone opening her cards. I carefully constructed a birthday breakfast tray consisting of everything I could find in the kitchen cupboards and a flower out of the garden. I optimistically loaded it on the front seat of my second hand Ford Escort and steadfastly drove across Sheffield, braking carefully so as not to spill everything – with only moderate success! When I arrived at her flat and knocked on her door, proffering the somewhat sorry looking breakfast fodder, the look on her face was hilarious. I know Gill remembers this event fondly and the ‘readybrek’ glow I got from doing it took me by surprise, even writing about it now, makes me smile. It had very little material value as the breakfast food itself wasn’t noteworthy, but the random act of kindness was priceless; whilst we were friends and work colleagues already, we became the very best of friends, which we still are over 30 years later.
So, dear singleton, whilst I go to work on a more ‘PC’ title for FWBE, I hereby challenge you to start reaching out to your network as part of my FWBE challenge – because you need a favour, or as a giver of a direct favour, or as a random act of kindness. I promise you, you will feel better for it.
Please do drop me a line and let me know if FWBE or doing a random act of kindness improves your life, even momentarily.
With love
Julia, AKA Just Me