Aphantasia Barrino…

Issa Rae reflects on how she shows up (and sometimes doesn’t) for her friends: “I am not a check-in everyday type of person. I'm a very much, when when I'm here, it's all about you, but I don't check in as often as I should with friends, and I've been told that in the past and I've adjusted. But you just have to tell me, but it's not a natural instinct. And so, with this, I understand like even being, like this is kind of a high-maintenance friendship in a way where I can't, I'm not going to be the same type of giving friend that you are to me, but I will show up in the ways that I can. If you need me, I will always be there. And so that is, that's that would make me consider like, oh, am I a bad friend because I don't think I think about you but I might not text you to be like, hey, I just want to make sure you're okay, but you should know that I would hope you would call me if you weren't okay and know that I would show up for you and be there for you, I'm just not considerate. I'm not a considerate friend in the way that I would like back to be. That's a that's pronouncement there. It's it's true. And it's like one of my biggest flaws because I'm just so work focused that I'm not like. I I'll think about you but not tell you that I'm thinking about you.” What stands out is not the admission itself, but the clarity with which she names the gap between intention and behavior. She knows she cares. She also knows that her default mode, intense presence when she’s present, relative silence when she’s not. It doesn’t always translate as care to the people on the other side of the relationship. This is a tension many high-achieving people quietly live with. Work becomes the primary channel through which they express discipline, reliability, and love. Outside of that channel, emotional maintenance can feel unnatural, even when the underlying affection is real. The result is often a mismatch: one friend experiences steady, proactive thoughtfulness; the other experiences deep loyalty that is more reactive than anticipatory. Rae’s response is mature in two ways. First, she refuses to reframe the mismatch as purely the other person’s problem. Second, she offers a clear alternative: if you need me, call, I will show up. It is an invitation to renegotiate the terms of the friendship rather than pretend the terms are identical on both sides. Not every close relationship can or should operate on the same frequency of contact. Some friendships thrive on low-maintenance reliability; others require consistent small signals to feel secure. The healthiest ones are usually those in which both people can name, without shame, what they can and cannot offer, and then decide together whether that is enough. Rae’s willingness to say the quiet part out loud is useful precisely because it models that kind of negotiation. Self-awareness does not erase the friction, but it does make the friction discussable. And in long-term friendships, that may matter more than perfect consistency.