The Friend-Making Superpower: How Rachel Magario Connects With Anyone

Fernanda: Welcome to the Connectedness Podcast. We are in person today. I'm speaking to you from Denver, Colorado—beautiful Denver, Colorado. I'm staying at my friend Rachel's house. This is Rachel right next to me.

You're going to hear all about her story in a little bit. Rachel is a motivational speaker and AI strategist, and she's been a friend of mine for the last 29 years. We take any opportunity to meet and to see each other.

I've also been very good friends with her sister and her mother when she was still alive, so Rachel is practically family. You'll see she's a very special person. We're going to be talking about all sorts of things today, and I hope you enjoy this. If you want to hear more from Rachel, let me know and we'll bring her back!

Rachel Magario: Well, welcome! Thank you for having me on. It's so great to always talk about connection, right? We have connected for so long, and that's what keeps connection alive—it's real friendships and real connections.

Fernanda: Yes. So Rachel, for our viewers who may not know you, tell them a little bit about yourself, your story, and what you're up to these days.

Rachel Magario: Well, I'm up to a lot of things, but let's see—where do I start? I was born in Brazil like Fernanda, and then I came to the U.S. at the same time she did for college.

I lost my sight when I was six years old in a car accident with my dad. Then, when I was in college, I had a lot more to overcome—not just as a blind international student, but I got run over by a car when I was about to go into national judo competitions. Martial arts had always been a big part of my identity.

So when I had that accident, I broke my lumbar spine, I lost my kidneys, and my life completely transformed. I was a little bit lost for a while and lost connection with myself because I couldn't do judo anymore, nor could I do any contact sports.

I continued with rowing—which was something I loved so much—and singing. But then in 2001, I lost all of it. It was a major effort trying to stay in school so I wouldn't lose my scholarship and trying to finish college.

With all that, I was able to push through because I had great friends like Fernanda and many other college friends who are still close with us today. I had a lot of support getting through it. Community is the number one thing, but so is developing that connection and relationship with yourself—reinventing your identity and not holding onto your past self so hard that you're unable to overcome.

This year, I'm launching my Greater Than Your Condition newsletter on Substack, so you can find me there under Rachel Magario. I'm going to start sharing all the stories, methods, and practices that made a difference in my life regarding connection and finding my authentic self. At the end of the day, our goal in life is to learn how to love and to be loved.

Fernanda: Oh, Rachel, that's amazing. For our listeners' context, what Rachel said about powering through with the help of community—I witnessed that when you had your first health crisis with your kidneys 25 years ago, back in September 2001.

Rachel has always been an expert at making friends. It's very natural for her. She's warm and quick to bring good people into her orbit. She had her family support, her friends' support, and she went through things that most of us will likely never experience in the prime of our lives.

On top of that, there's the blindness, which is something she's managed since she was six years old. It was a really hard time, but it was also beautiful to see the community rally around her. And we still had fun times—don't forget the party!

Rachel Magario: The party lives on, right? Tell them why we are together this weekend. It is about connection, but there was a party element, too.

Fernanda: It was actually a special weekend because I combined visiting Rachel with going to a salsa, bachata, kizomba, and zouk dance convention. She hooked me into Brazilian zouk, and Rachel wanted to come with me.

On Friday we went, she did great, and she fell in love with Brazilian zouk—I mean, who wouldn't, honestly? It reminded me of college before her kidney issues, when Rachel and I used to go to parties all the time. She was my party buddy!

The fun fact is that because she's blind, her other senses are much better developed. Before smartphones or text messaging, when nobody could text us where the party was, Rachel would locate the party by sound!

So 29 years later, here we are, partying again. I'm very thankful. Rachel has overcome that initial crisis alongside other health issues over the years, and she's sharing much of that journey now.

Rachel Magario: Definitely. I just had heart bypass surgery and I feel great. It's been a long 25-year track for me to really figure out what was wrong and fix it, but now I'm able to party and row again.

Fernanda: You're feeling good and energetic!

Rachel Magario: Yes, feeling like myself again. I also want to talk about overcoming depression. I'm not a doctor, so I'm just sharing my lived experiences and the things that worked for me that might help others.

Fernanda: The funny thing is that when Rachel says she has her energy back, take a normal person's energy level and multiply it by a hundred—that's her baseline. She's a dynamo. She has two master's degrees, loves learning, and she even told me she's making her own music now!

Rachel Magario: That's the ADHD in full effect!

Fernanda: She has ADHD in the best way—lots of ideas and passion.

Rachel Magario: It's all about being able to capture that energy. I was actually writing this morning about how our brains aren't broken, they're just different, and you have to learn to work with them.

I do have my lows. ADHD goes 180 miles an hour, and then suddenly 8 miles an hour. You have to learn to work with your natural cycles and not blame yourself when you drop to 8 miles an hour. You just have to slow down, take a nap, and avoid berating yourself.

Fernanda: That's such an important point. A few of my friends have ADHD as well, and when they hit a low point, they blame themselves or feel shame. Having self-compassion is crucial.

Rachel Magario: It's about self-awareness and giving your body what it needs. Right after my heart surgery, it would make no sense to berate myself for not getting out of bed. It was major surgery! I slept for a whole week because my body needed to recover.

Respecting that internal connection means asking your body, "What do you need right now?" If it needs to rest, there's no point in getting mad at yourself. That only makes things harder.

Fernanda: Thank you for sharing that. Rachel, can I ask you about your friend-making superpower? On Friday at the convention, by the end of the day, we had made at least five new friends—all because of Rachel. Some of them feel like friends for life now. What's your secret?

Rachel Magario: Gosh, I've never been asked that before! I don't think of it as a superpower, but I think I was trained for it because my family moved every 18 months on average. I moved 29 times in my life and attended 14 schools in 12 years. People from military families learn this too—you have to make connections fast.

It's like grappling: you shoot your line out, and sometimes it sticks to the rock, sometimes it doesn't. You keep shooting it out to anchor yourself. To me, making adult friendships comes down to three main principles.

First, develop that relationship with yourself so you have self-respect and self-awareness. When you're grounded in yourself, you can open your heart to others without fear.

When you're stuck in your head, you're constantly worrying: "Are they going to like me? Am I dressed right?" Take that salsa class we were in—the instructor gave rapid directions and I had no clue what was being said. So I stayed in the follower position, trusted my ability to follow, and let people lead.

I quickly noticed that some leaders knew what they were doing and others were still learning. I didn't set my expectations in stone on the first try; I just collected information. By the 40th turn, I had pieced together the correct movement from observing different leaders.

Friendship works the same way. You put yourself out there and say, "Hey, how's it going?"

I'll be walking down the street and say hi to people, but many wear AirPods and don't respond. At first, I'd wonder what I did wrong. Then someone pulled their earbuds out and I realized they simply hadn't heard me. It had nothing to do with me and everything to do with their environment.

Now, that's my approach: I put myself out there. If people connect, awesome—we play! If they don't, I don't blame myself.

So the first principle is developing a relationship with yourself, the second is sharing that openly with others, and the third is bringing fun, enthusiasm, and authenticity.

There were times in my life when I lost my friend-making abilities—like at business conferences where I was stuck in my head worrying about navigation, sharp attire, or my company pitch. When everyone is in their head, connections don't form. I went through a cold spell like that for three or four years.

Fernanda: If I can summarize that third point: it's about being present.

Rachel Magario: Yes, being present! Not overthinking what you're going to say or trying to control the outcome, but just being in the moment.

Fernanda: Remember that moment in dance class that could have ruined the mood? We walked into an advanced class, and when it was time to rotate partners, I mentioned to the leader next to you that you were blind, just to give her a heads-up so she could take your hand.

That woman completely skipped Rachel and walked away. In that moment, Rachel had choices. She could have generalized everyone as rude, assumed no one would dance with her if they knew she was blind, or gotten upset.

Rachel Magario: But she didn't deserve my attention. Some people are like smooth walls with no foothold—there's no point in letting their attitude ruin your day.

We see this with friendship ghosting, too. If someone ghosts you, they aren't offering real connection. Let them deal with whatever they're going through—it's about them, not you. If it's a close friend, you can reach out and ask how to help, but if they don't respond, it's not your burden to carry.

Fernanda: That's so helpful to hear because ghosting is very common now. I was ghosted earlier this year by someone I considered a close friend of three years. It's painful, but as Rachel said, we have to care for ourselves and not let external reactions dictate our worth.

Rachel Magario: Exactly. All the other guys danced with me without issue. One Brazilian zouk instructor told me later that he initially sensed something was different, but once he realized I couldn't see, it didn't stop us from connecting and having fun. Now we're friends!

I also want to extend grace in both directions: I've had to pull back from people when I lacked the bandwidth or was dealing with health issues. We don't always know what someone else is going through.

Fernanda: Absolutely. Thank you for coming on the Connectedness Podcast, Rachel!

Rachel Magario: Thank you for having me in real life instead of over Zoom! We can always dive into specific topics next time.

Fernanda: Be sure to check out Rachel's Substack (Greater Than Your Condition) and her LinkedIn—I'll link both in the show notes. If you enjoyed this episode, please like, subscribe, and leave a comment to send Rachel some love!

Rachel Magario: Sharing is caring!

Fernanda: See you next time, everyone!