The Friend Lab

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What do you do when life doesn't wait for you to be ready?

In this episode of The Friend Lab, Bryce and Liz record through one of the most honest conversations the pod has had yet — and a lot of it was unplanned. The recording drops mid-session. Bryce's Grandma has passed. There's grief, family conflict and a partner who just got rear-ended on the freeway on the way to dance practice. And through all of it, Bryce shows up.

They get into what it really means to keep going when you don't have the equipment for what you're facing — and why asking for help isn't weakness, it's the skill your younger self built for you. They talk about the "Council": every version of you that got you to where you are, and why that council is always taking new applications. About what it means to find your people in a new city. About why nobody wants to hear about resilience when they're actually in it.

This one doesn't wrap up neatly. Neither does life. But it's worth showing up for anyway.

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About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

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Overwhelmed, overstimulated, and still trying to show up for everyone — sound familiar?

In this episode, Bryce and Liz get into what happens to your relationships, your body, and your sense of self when too many big things happen at the same time. Liz breaks out in hives. Bryce comes home from a trip carrying more than he expected. And together they unpack what it actually takes to let people check in on you — and why that's harder than it sounds.

Topics include: the difference between checking in and checking on, what the reticular activating system has to do with healing, parenting an adult child while still figuring out your own father, and why learning that "you were never safe" can actually bring relief when you're finally ready to hear it.

Real talk. No framework. Just two friends figuring it out in public.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

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Liz gets told to "calm down" mid-livestream — and it cracks open a lifelong wound about being "too much." Bryce and Liz talk being a lot, not being enough, and why that combo makes you exactly who your people need. 🩵

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

Text us to be featured on the show!

Bryce receives a mysterious "Best Buddy Ever" shirt in the mail... and has absolutely no idea who sent it.

What starts as a hilarious detective story turns into something much deeper.

Bryce and Liz explore what it means to let people know they've changed your life while you still have the chance. From moving away and saying "see you later," to teaching in jail, parenting teenagers, surprise birthday parties, and learning to risk vulnerability, this conversation is about choosing connection over self-protection.

Because maybe the greatest gift isn't receiving love—it's telling someone they mattered before it's too late.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

Text us to be featured on the show!

Birthdays are supposed to be exciting. So why do they feel so complicated? Bryce and Liz get into time, identity, expectations, and why the best birthday Bryce ever had may have been the one where nobody even knew it was happening.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

Text us to be featured on the show!

Liz is moving. Again. 

What does packing up your life and starting over teach you about the relationships that actually last? Bryce and Liz get into identity, geography, and why the real ones stay tapped in no matter the zip code.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

Text us to be featured on the show!

How do you show up fully for the people you love without losing yourself in the process? In this episode of The Friend Lab, Bryce and Liz get into one of the most honest conversations the pod has had yet — the real tension between being a considerate person and being a self-advocate.

Liz opens up about how recovery literally forced her to break through a lifelong pattern of people-pleasing, and how "life or death" became the threshold that finally gave her permission to choose herself. Bryce reflects on what it means to move through the world rooted in self-inventory — and why staying too long in spaces where you're seen as inconsiderate can quietly erode how you see yourself.

They also get into the difference between guilt and shame (thanks, Brené), what it looks like to repair a relationship without abandoning your own truth, and why the messiest, most honest version of growth happens in the brackish water — that murky in-between where the people who challenge you and the people who know you end up in the same place.

This one is for anyone who's ever apologized when they didn't need to, stayed silent when they should've spoken, or wondered if caring about others and caring about yourself can actually coexist. Spoiler: they can. But it takes work.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

Text us to be featured on the show!

Sometimes friendship looks like family counseling. Sometimes it looks like catching a stranger in a mosh pit. This week on The Friend Lab, Bryce and Liz unpack a Baby Keem concert that went sideways (in the best and worst ways), talk about the "scrolling season" ( are you a SCROLLy Polly??) we all fall into, and remind us that real conversation is still the best antidote for feeling stuck. Welcome to the buddy hood.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

Text us to be featured on the show!

Bryce walked out of the movie Obsession and immediately needed to talk about it — so naturally, he hit record. The premise: one wish, and someone is magically compelled to love you. Sounds like a fantasy. Turns out it's kind of a horror story.

In this episode, Bryce and Liz use that as a jumping-off point to dig into what real connection actually requires — and what gets lost when you try to skip straight to the good part. They get into consent and autonomy in relationships, the difference between being loved and being truly known, and why the weird, awkward, unpredictable in-between is not just part of the process — it is the process.

They also get into the full spectrum of connection — from your ride-or-dies to the gym friend who noticed you were gone, to the neighbor you only ever wave at — and why demanding everything from one person might be the thing standing between you and a real community. Plus: parasocial relationships, the highlight reel self vs. the actual self, Liz's third-grade best friend ranking system, and a brand new segment: Buddy Questions.

You can't snap a stick. But you can do the work. Welcome to the lab.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird

Text us to be featured on the show!

Bryce hit record mid-conversation — and this is what came out. In this episode, he and Liz dig into something we've all felt but rarely talk about: why the same information hits completely differently depending on who's delivering it. When it's someone you trust, someone who knows your heart and your history, even the scary stuff feels manageable. When it's not? You're out. Turkey leg dropped. Gone.

They talk about what it actually takes to be a person someone lets past their defenses — the kind of trust that makes hard conversations possible, what it means to do the work on both sides of a friendship, and how knowing yourself is the whole foundation. Plus: protecting your peace without disappearing from the world entirely, what season you might be in right now, and why the buddy hood might just be saving lives one honest conversation at a time.

Welcome to the Buddyhood. Pull up a chair.

Follow The Friend Lab on Instagram

About Liz McKean: Liz is a hypnotherapist, yoga teacher, and creator of spaces where people can unshame their coping tools and finally feel better.

About Bryce The Third: When it comes to the most authentic and impactful voices rising out of Detroit, Michigan, Bryce The Third is a name you can’t afford to leave out. Not just an artist, he’s an emotional engineer with a live show that a mix of performance art, storytelling, high level lyricism and community building. Not only does Bryce have a story to tell, when you witness it, you’ll wanna tell yours 

Join The FriendLab Community! → https://substack.com/@friendlabpodcast

Call into the show to be featured → https://www.speakpipe.com/TheFriendLabPodcast

More about Liz → lizmckean.com

Follow Liz on Instagram → @liz.mckean

More about Bryce → BryceTheThird.com

Follow Bryce on Instagram → @brycethethird