Welcome back. It's your friend Mel Robbins, and you and I are talking about the American Time Study and six shocking statistics on who you spend your time with over the course of your lifetime. You've already learned that at the age of 18, the time you spend with your parents and siblings drops off a cliff. Unless you do something about it. I hope you have already forwarded them this episode. You're probably thinking also about the fact that statistic number two, 40 years of your life, you're going to spend it with your coworkers, and now you're thinking as you're driving to work, Oh, Oh, my God, I got to look for a different job. Or hopefully you're thinking, I'm the luckiest person on the planet. I work with people that I love. How cool is this? We've also just unpacked the third statistic about friendship and how friendships basically peak at the age of 18, meaning the amount of time you spend every day with them. And as you get older, it gets harder and harder and harder to spend time with friends unless you pay attention to the two P's I taught you. What are the patterns in your life?

And who are you making it a priority to spend time with? Take the initiative. And I just want to remind you again that this awareness of these trends of how you're spending time Self-awareness is the foundation of creating a better life, because if you don't know what the issue is, you're never going to be able to solve it. And the issue is simply that we all just go through life and let time pass us by. You have It's the opportunity from this moment forward to be the architect of building a life that makes the most of the time that you have. Just because these are the trends in data, and these reflect what most people are experiencing, it doesn't mean that these need to be the trends in your life. I was so personally moved by this data that I wanted to share it with you because I believe that knowing this, it will empower you to make very meaningful changes. I think everybody needs to hear this. I think everybody is struggling with this and feeling it, but not really understanding the context. To me, when I look at the stuff that we've already talked about, no wonder, loneliness is an epidemic.

Pandemic because nobody understands why it's happening. When you see it over the course of a lifetime in terms of the trends of how you're spending your time and who you're spending it with, you start to see, Oh, of course you become lonely. Earlier, unless you do something about it. If you don't understand what's happening in the background, you think you're the problem, and you're not the problem. It's not true. The problem is that time is passing, and the more that time passes, the more you just go with it. I want you to do the opposite. I want you to feel inspired and empowered to get intentional about how you're spending your time, because how you spend your time is what your life is all about. And that brings me to the fourth takeaway, which is that your life partner is probably the single most important decision you will ever make. This is that statistic at about age 29, there is a person that enters your life or multiple people as you're dating around, that you start to spend more and more and more time with as you age. And here's the thing I I want you to understand.

Do not rush this decision. Do not get married to someone who you know in your gut is probably not the right person, but you feel like you should do it because everybody's getting married and you're getting to be that age and you're starting to get a little worried. Do not settle, because the time you spend with your partner increases every single year until the day of your death. And after age 60, this person that is your life partner, they really matter, because because it's the person you will spend the majority of your time with for the rest of your life. And that's a great test. If you're dating somebody right now, don't look at the person who's standing in front of you right now, with the nice car and the fake tan and the group of popular friends and the really cool profile on a hinge. No, ignore what's in the present. Close your eyes and ask yourself this, is this person at their core? Is this person person on the inside, who I would want to be alone with every day, day in and day out, when I'm 60. I want to remind you of the questions about naming your five favorite memories with friends or family.

What do they all have in common? Those memories about your favorite friends or the people that make you laugh the loudest or memories with your siblings, they're all about how someone makes you feel. When you are choosing a partner, dear God, focus on how they make you feel. The looks are going to fade. The friends that seem all shiny and popular, they're going to disappear into the background. You know that happens in the '20s, and it's hard to keep up with friends as you're an adult. But this human being and how they make you feel, this is what you're signing up for for the rest of your life. And if you're single, what we're about to talk about next is really important to embrace right now. Because the very best relationship advice I can give you about choosing a partner to do life with is to choose life with yourself first. And by that, I mean, do whatever you need to be doing in your day-to-day life right now so that you really like yourself and that you are proud of yourself as a person. You're proud of your character. You're proud of how you take care of yourself, how you talk to yourself, the way that you spend your time.

Because when you get the inside right, that relationship with yourself in terms of how you feel about yourself, you're not going to be swayed by the bright, shiny, popular people. You're going to be attracted to people with true character, someone who is worth going the distance with. And that brings me to the fifth statistic about who you spend your time with over the course of your lifetime. And it's this. That when you hit 40 years old, the amount of time that you spend alone, climbs and climbs and climbs. That means from 40 on, the number of hours per day that you are alone is going to increase. Those 30 years, every single year from the age of 50 to 80, based on the data, you are alone every day more often. For most people, after age 70, you're alone most of the time every day. Well, not me. I am going to an old person's home, like one of those places that's like college for old people, back to dorms, hanging out with people. I'm not going to sit alone in this house. But joking aside, this is a huge takeaway. And the first takeaway is I want to normalize that it is normal to find yourself spending more and more time by yourself.

And for me, this can be a really positive thing, because this is not a message about you needing to look out into the future and going, Oh my God, I'm going to be alone and I'm lonely. No. This is about the need to learn to Enjoy time with yourself. Because when you're really present to being with yourself, whether you're making a cup of tea, or reading a book, or taking a walk in the woods, think about it. You're not by yourself. You're with yourself. I'm with myself a lot. I'm in my car driving alone. I'm often at my house or working remote alone. I'm down in my kitchen making lunch alone. I'm heading out the door to go for a walk, and yeah, maybe Maybe Yolo and Homi, my dogs may be there, but there's no other human being. I'm spending time with myself. But here's the thing, and this is what the opportunity is for you. I don't feel lonely. I enjoy spending time with myself. And that's what's available to you. And when I do start to feel like something's missing, or I feel a little lonely because I have a good relationship with myself, I can see that, Oh, wow, I'm missing connection, and I can go back to the two P's.

I I got to change my patterns of behavior, so I start bumping into people again, or I've got to prioritize reaching out, and that almost always solves the problem. So the big takeaway here is learn how to love yourself and enjoy yourself and be kind to yourself. Learn how to sign yourself up for a yoga class and take yourself to it. Learn how to reach out to friends when you're feeling a little lonely, and be the one that is doing that for yourself. Do that for yourself. Learn how to take yourself out to lunch or for a manicure. Learn how to be kinder to yourself. Learn how to find happiness in the time you spend alone, and you will enjoy the time that you have. Now, the final statistic on who you spend the most time with over the course of your life. This one is about kids, and it broke my heart. When you become a parent, depending upon when you first become a parent, the majority of the time that you have with your kids will happen in your 30s and 40s. And For most of us, there is a precipitous drop that happens in your 40s.

As your kids enter high school and they become more and more independent, you see less and less of them. The busier they get, the less and less of them. That's supposed to happen. I mean, they're supposed to make friends. They are supposed to go build a life of their own. Then they turn 18. A lot of them go off to college or a trade school. Here's the sad news. Based on the data, when you turn 52, that number, which is the amount of time you spend with your kid, flat lines. And that's where it stays the rest of your life. And it is shockingly similar to how little time you spend with your own parents or siblings. Now, when I first read that, I beat myself up because I'm 55 right now. That window of time is closed. It's My kids are launched. Oakley leaves for college in the fall, still trying to figure out where, but he's going. If I reflect back on those 0-18 years, I spent way too many years of their childhood working. I was traveling for work. I missed out on so many milestones, so many sports matches, so much in-person time.

However, I love knowing this statistic, and here's why. I'm not allowing myself to become a statistic in this regard, because here's the thing: there is something you can do. You can become more proactive about going to your kids. You can become more proactive about creating and sustaining that relationship with them as adults. Yes, the whole point of parenting is to help your children grow up and become who they're meant to be, which means your job is as a guide and a coach through life. It means helping Helping your children understand who are they, what do they value? What are the implications of their decisions? What are their passions? Who do they want to be? If you take that approach, that your kids are supposed to become independent human beings who are going to leave you and go build a life, that's what success looks like. You can still do that and not lose connection. And how do you do that? Well, based on every expert that's ever been on this show, it seems like the advice is the exact same. Do your kids feel seen, do they feel safe, and do they feel supported by you?

Because if your kids feel seen and safe and supported by you, guess what? They're not going anywhere. I want you to stop and think about your own experience with your parents. When you think of your fondest memories as a child, I bet it's in those moments where you felt safe or seen or supported. That's the glue. The same is true with your kids. If I were to ask your kid, What are your fondest memories of childhood? I guarantee you at the top of the list are those moments where you made them feel safe, seen, and supported. That's the secret to everything. If you have a complicated relationship with your parents or a sibling right now, I bet you feel none of those things with them. It is all about how people make you feel. And that means you have some control here. The interesting thing is that, I don't know about you, but I found that the older that my kids get, even though they've physically left, they have not left emotionally. It's like they need me more, but they need me in a different way. They don't need me to drive them somewhere. They don't need the money.

What they need is someone that they trust, somebody who they know they can go to and get the support that they need, that they can talk to, run ideas by, to call, to laugh, to talk through an issue with. It's a different relationship. And honestly, I enjoy this part of parenting way more than when they were little. I am not the best parent for little kids, but I'm loving this adult parenting thing, which, by the way, here's my secret plan to not be a statistic. I'm going to rope my kids into business with me because then I can turn them into my coworkers, which means I'm going to see them a ton between the ages of 20 and 60. See how you can make the data work for you or against you? It's never too late. And that's the other thing here. When you know what you're dealing with in terms of what the actual issue is, you can solve the right problem. The more that your kids or your parents or your siblings feel seen and supported, the closer you're going to be. And by the way, it's never too late to apologize. I feel personally like I apologize all the time for things that I screwed up way back when or screwed up yesterday or could do a little bit better.

And it doesn't weaken your relationship. It actually makes it stronger. So there you have it. Six surprising statistics about who you spend your time with over of your lifetime. My intention is to wake you up, to wake you up to the reality of how time is passing you by and how much of your time you're probably spending on things that are not important to you.