0:00

We think that we're going to be happy by getting

0:02

a person, but you'll never be happy by getting

0:04

a person that doesn't meet your needs. It doesn't matter

0:06

how impressive you think they are. And that's the

0:08

danger, right That's the trap people fall into.

0:10

I've fallen into it. One of the world's leading

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dating in a relationship coach here has helped

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millions of people find love, Matthew Hussey.

0:17

We write people off at lightning

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Jay set Jay Shetty Sly.

1:14

Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose,

1:16

the place you come to become happier, healthier,

1:19

and more healed, whether it's your relationships,

1:22

your work life, or everything in between.

1:24

I'm glad that I get to sit down and talk

1:26

with fascinating people who are sharing

1:29

vulnerable journeys, powerful insights,

1:31

and great habits. If you've been

1:33

struggling in your love life, this

1:36

episode is for you. If

1:38

you've been going through a tough breakup, if

1:40

you've been struggling with dating, this

1:42

episode is for you. And if

1:44

you're someone who's just trying to understand

1:47

how to unlock love within yourself,

1:50

love in every interaction and create

1:52

a space where each and every one of

1:54

your relationships are fulfilling

1:56

and full of harmony, this episode

1:59

is for you. I'm sitting down with

2:01

one of my great friends and amazing

2:03

thought leaders, Matthew Hussey, New

2:05

York Times best selling author, speaker,

2:08

and coach specializing in confidence

2:10

and relationship intelligence. Matthew

2:13

is the host of the podcast Love Life

2:15

with Matthew Hussey that I've got the honor of

2:17

being a guest on, so check that episode

2:19

out, and over the past fifteen years,

2:22

Matthew's proven approach has inspired

2:24

millions through authentic, insightful,

2:27

and practical advice that not only

2:29

enables them to find love, but

2:32

also feel confident in control

2:34

of their own happiness. Today, we're talking

2:36

about his new book, Love Life. If you

2:39

don't have this book, make sure you go and

2:41

grab it right now. How to raise

2:43

your standards, find your person

2:46

and live happily no matter what. Please

2:48

welcome to the show. The author of Love Life,

2:50

Matthew Hussey.

2:53

What's up. It's so good to see you, So

2:55

good to see you. Missed you. It's been a while.

2:57

I know, I know, we find it hard to catch each

2:59

other. One of us is always traveling.

3:00

I know, but it's so nice to be together.

3:02

I'm excited about this conversation.

3:04

Man, me too, Me too.

3:05

Last time you were on, people absolutely

3:07

loved it. And when I was reading through

3:09

your book, I was blown away because

3:11

I know that you've put five years

3:14

of work into this. This has been a

3:16

real labor of love, and

3:19

we all know how hard it is to write books and

3:21

how much effort it takes. And when I

3:23

saw the amount of honesty, the amount of self

3:26

awareness, the amount of openness

3:28

that you approach this book with I think

3:30

anyone who reads it is

3:32

going to walk away feeling like

3:35

they feel heard, they feel seen, and

3:37

they actually know how to be

3:39

honest and open with themselves through the journey

3:42

of love, which is what you've done.

3:43

That's that's how I feel anyway.

3:44

So I'm really excited for be able to

3:46

read it, and I've got so many questions

3:48

for you.

3:49

So I'm going to die right Yeah, yeah,

3:52

awesome.

3:52

So I want to start with this idea

3:55

because everyone that

3:57

we know, since we're young, wants

3:59

to fall in love, and we've

4:01

all heard so much advice on

4:04

love that has somehow become

4:07

our version of what love is. Or we've all

4:09

seen so many love stories, whether

4:11

it was a bad love story with our parents, whether it

4:13

was a good love story with our uncles and

4:15

aunts, whether it was our older

4:18

brother or older sister, whoever it was. Where

4:21

did your earliest ideas of love

4:23

come from? And which ones

4:25

do you still agree with and which ones do

4:27

you disagree with?

4:29

I suppose on some level

4:31

some of them must have come from

4:34

my upbringing. You

4:36

know, my mum talking about

4:39

you know, the kind of giddiness that

4:41

she felt for my dad when

4:44

they first met, and you

4:46

know, the attraction.

4:51

I'm sure so much of it was

4:54

songs and movies. I

4:59

suppose the

5:01

thing that

5:03

I think about now is like,

5:07

what I value today

5:10

is different, I think, than

5:12

what I might have valued at twenty

5:15

one. It's still you

5:18

know, I very much value attraction and

5:21

chemistry because I think it's going to be a long road

5:23

if you're in a relationship that doesn't

5:25

have those things. But the

5:30

things that became kind of non negotiables

5:33

for me changed, like

5:36

finding someone who brings me

5:38

peace and being in a relationship

5:41

that felt peaceful. That

5:43

was something that made its entrance later in

5:46

my life, and I paid the

5:48

price for it not making its entrance sooner.

5:51

You know, I was in multiple

5:53

relationships that really robbed me of my piece,

5:56

and so I think that probably early

5:58

on I wasn't seeking peace.

6:00

I was seeking just the ride,

6:03

you know, the experience of feeling

6:06

these incredible feelings for somebody

6:08

and and also perhaps

6:11

being heroic

6:15

to that person. I think

6:17

that was probably an early idea that

6:20

you know, I was the there had to

6:22

be something heroic about the way that I

6:24

showed up or presented myself. And

6:28

I think that for a long time that

6:32

that prevented me from ever really

6:34

being seen. You

6:37

know, I if you'd have asked me at twenty five, are

6:40

you vulnerable? I would have been

6:42

like yeah, I wouldn't have said no. I

6:45

wasn't self aware about it. But like, there was

6:47

a lot that I never really brought forward

6:49

about myself. I think that we are

6:52

very good at like, you

6:54

know, we all tell the hero's journey of

6:56

our life, and we love that, right because it's

6:58

a kind of here's where I was and here's where

7:00

I am now. You know, whenever you hear like a rags

7:02

to riches story, it's

7:05

back then I was in a bad

7:07

spot. Now I'm in an amazing

7:09

spot. And I remember I used to tell

7:12

stories like that in my life. I could be

7:14

dating and telling stories like that of

7:16

where I'd come from and where I am now, and

7:19

there was nothing really vulnerable about those stories.

7:21

There was still the story of like how I'm

7:23

awesome, because

7:26

it's a hero's journey, you know. But it's a

7:28

lot harder to be like here's what

7:30

I'm struggling with right now, or

7:33

that thing that you just did just made me really

7:35

jealous and insecure, or

7:38

you know, I'm feeling emasculated right

7:41

now, like those things, my

7:43

God like that to bring that

7:45

stuff forward for me was was

7:48

I didn't realize how hard it

7:50

was and how terrified I must have been of

7:53

doing that, and how deeply unworthy I felt

7:58

to be able to really show someone who I

8:00

was and still feel like I'd

8:02

be loved afterwards, you know, I'd

8:04

get like, you know, vulnerability

8:07

hangover at the end of and by

8:10

the way, sometimes sometimes it

8:12

did backfire. I remember, you know, when

8:14

I was trying on the whole vulnerability thing. I remember

8:16

saying to someone about

8:18

a moment in an evening that had made me insecure.

8:21

I remember talking about like I didn't

8:24

want to, but I could tell I

8:26

was being passive, aggressive and cold,

8:29

and the walls had gone up, and

8:31

so I was like, I'm not being

8:34

That's the hard place to be, right when you know you're

8:36

not being your normal, fun,

8:39

loving, happy self, but you're also

8:42

not being honest about what you're feeling.

8:44

So you're just in this weird no man's land

8:47

of like being unpleasant to be around.

8:50

And I realized, like

8:52

this, I can't hide how I'm feeling right

8:54

now, and instead

8:58

of like gaslighting this person

9:00

and that I'm fine and I'm not let

9:02

me just share something that made me insecure,

9:05

and it really backfired,

9:07

like this person said to me, I find that.

9:10

This is the literal words that were said to me, was

9:12

I find that really unattractive And

9:14

it crushed me because I thought

9:19

I was like in my head, I was like, I'm never doing

9:21

that again. I remember

9:23

living with my friend at the time and I walked to his room

9:25

and I was like, I can't believe what

9:27

just happened, Like I'm such an

9:30

And I didn't say I didn't say

9:32

wow, that was really lacking in compassion

9:35

from her side. That was like the depths

9:37

of my own like lack of compassion,

9:40

self compassion. Was that instead of saying wow,

9:42

that was a really that

9:44

was a kind of a mean and response

9:47

lacking compassion. Instead, I went, I'm

9:51

such an idiot. I can't

9:54

believe I said that out loud, Like

9:56

why did I reveal that weakness? And

10:00

it took me a little while to recover from

10:02

that because it kind of it

10:04

reinforced That's that was the dangerous

10:06

part. Is it reinforced this idea that I

10:08

needed to be heroic at all times and

10:11

not to have those weaknesses, and

10:14

that it was those parts of me were contemptible

10:17

if people knew about them. So

10:19

that was a that was a big That was a big thing

10:21

for me. I think thinking I had to be a hero all

10:24

the time and not realizing

10:26

that a real relationship is so much more

10:28

interesting than that.

10:30

Wow, man, so powerful. So many things to unpack,

10:33

so many things to unpack. One of the things I want to

10:35

start with is what is the difference between

10:38

a peaceful relationship and

10:40

a boring relationship?

10:42

Because I think.

10:43

That great question.

10:46

That's a great question because.

10:48

I think a lot of people think of peaceful

10:52

as boring when we're not emotionally

10:54

mature. So I can relate to what you're

10:56

saying, where you actually want a relationship

10:59

that's kind of like Chao and up and down and

11:01

passionate and then we love each other we hate

11:03

each other, you know, there's that kind of energy, there's something

11:05

and we kind of do that in a lot of our lives.

11:08

And by the way, we do that even in marriage

11:10

and relationships where we can often invent

11:12

drama because it's too peaceful.

11:15

And I've had friends who've reached out to me and said, Jay, I keep

11:17

creating drama in my life because that's

11:20

what I'm used to. And I don't know what to

11:22

do with this guy or this girl because they're actually peaceful.

11:24

So people are scared that peaceful

11:26

means boring. But you've just said you like a

11:28

peaceful relationship. I know you're not a boring guy,

11:31

So what's the difference?

11:33

I you know, So when you was just saying

11:35

that, I thought to myself, I

11:37

there are days where I'm on time

11:40

for something and I

11:42

will kind of go

11:44

and do one more thing before

11:47

the meeting that

11:49

makes me late, so

11:52

that I have to like make a game

11:54

of getting in the car and like finding

11:57

a way to like how can I still like

11:59

other GPS says I'm going to be there and that two minutes

12:02

before, but I'd like shaving off

12:04

a minute like I

12:06

was on time? Yeah, why did

12:08

I do the one more Nothing was gonna nothing

12:11

was going to go wrong if I didn't do that one more

12:13

thing?

12:14

Yeah?

12:14

Why did I do one more thing? That made

12:16

me late? And I had like I

12:19

had to realize at a certain point that

12:21

that was like my nervous

12:24

system. I I you

12:26

know, I grew up around like my dad

12:28

was always late for everything. I learned

12:30

that from him. I used

12:33

to hate it, by the way, but like I

12:35

had, I had also then adopted

12:37

it and I'm not that way anymore

12:39

in my life. But like it, I

12:42

realized, like I have an addiction to

12:44

this feeling, this like mini

12:46

drama of am I going to get there on time? Which

12:49

creates this little mini drama in my day for

12:51

like ten minutes. It's like an adrenaline rush and like you

12:54

know, and it's a horrible feeling. Really,

12:56

it doesn't feel good. It feels like stressful

12:59

and anxiety inducing. And now I'm going to come

13:01

across as rude and disrespectful. Is someone's

13:03

time and I'm like stressed.

13:06

But it's like a my body is

13:08

used to that I'm not used to like getting

13:10

somewhere on time and like have ten minutes

13:13

to just chill and like it's there's

13:16

a new feeling that can feel

13:18

boring. So in terms

13:20

of a relation, I think we do it everywhere in our

13:22

lives. In terms of a relationship,

13:26

I knew when I met with my wife Audrey

13:28

that I had found peace that

13:30

wasn't by any means boring

13:34

because I felt at

13:36

home. I didn't,

13:39

you know, I didn't just feel safe. We

13:41

can feel safe and very bored. Right,

13:43

we can feel like I'm with someone who

13:46

is very non threatening. I feel like, I,

13:49

you know, this person's not going to leave

13:51

me. I feel like I'm very safe in this situation.

13:54

But I don't really like

13:56

this doesn't feel like my person. I

13:59

just feel same. And when you haven't felt

14:01

safe for a long time, sometimes that's a very lovely

14:03

feeling on its own. Just to feel like I'm no

14:05

longer in an abusive relationship,

14:08

or I'm no longer in a relationship with someone

14:10

that makes me second guess myself all the time

14:12

or feels like they're going to leave me at any

14:14

moment. But eventually we

14:17

will get bored in a situation where

14:19

the only thing that's presenting as a positive

14:22

thing is the safety we feel. But

14:25

in this relationship, I felt at

14:27

home and I felt

14:29

like I felt more seen

14:32

than I'd ever felt before. You

14:34

know, I really was

14:36

astonished to the extent

14:39

to which this person got me and

14:43

that we seem to get each other. And

14:46

you know, the first night we met, we spoke for eight

14:48

hours straight, literally

14:50

like everyone else was like partying

14:53

and doing that, and we were just we talked for

14:55

eight hours the first night we met, there

14:58

was an attraction there that made

15:00

us talk to each other. It's not like we

15:03

started talking to each other on the in the first

15:05

second because we knew we were such great conversational

15:07

lists. Like, we started talking because

15:09

there was a there was an attraction. But

15:12

then it felt easy,

15:15

it felt like home. Somehow.

15:17

It took me a minute to realize that. By the way, I'm

15:19

not this wasn't a love at first sight story

15:22

of like and then everything was smooth sailing, but

15:24

it it did. It

15:26

took me a while to realize, Oh,

15:29

this is like, this is this feels like home.

15:31

I'm more of myself around this person.

15:35

And I think that's a beautiful thing to find, is

15:37

someone who makes you more of yourself. And

15:40

of course I think you know you

15:42

can't if someone says

15:44

to me, I've got zero sexual attraction

15:46

to this person, that's a problem. It's

15:49

a genuine problem. You

15:52

have to have some form of attraction to the person

15:54

you're with. Now, by the way, does

15:56

it need to be the greatest attraction you've ever

15:58

felt for anyone in your life? That

16:00

trips a lot of people up. Because

16:03

I always say, don't comparison shop for chemistry.

16:05

It's one of the things I talk about in the book, because I think

16:08

we were

16:10

always comparing whatever is in front

16:12

of us with the peak of our chemistry that

16:14

we've had with someone that we can't seem to get

16:16

over. But you only have to take

16:18

a look at what are the situations

16:20

that we find hard to get over, Like

16:24

what was that peak of chemistry

16:26

and attraction? And it's often in situations

16:28

that were entirely unsustainable. It's

16:31

you know, you go, you have a holiday romance

16:34

with someone and oh God, like if

16:36

i'd love to fill that animal

16:39

attraction for someone who was good for me and who

16:41

I had a long term relationship with. And it's like, well,

16:43

how long did you know that person? Two weeks? They

16:46

didn't have to do very much, Like it's easy

16:48

to create the conditions for chemistry in

16:50

that kind of a situation. The same

16:53

is true of people who have a

16:55

three month fling with someone

16:58

where there's like it

17:01

becomes more interesting because it's

17:03

flaming really hot, and then it disappears.

17:06

You know the woman who I coached who

17:08

said, you know, this person was the

17:10

one we had this amazing three month thing,

17:13

And I said what happened? She was like, well, he went

17:15

traveling and he said he didn't want to continue

17:17

the relationship. And

17:19

for me, that's like literal

17:22

fireworks. You know, they fireworks.

17:25

We look at them and they're really exciting and

17:28

we get we're like, ah, isn't this magical?

17:30

And you look at those fireworks. But if those fireworks

17:32

carried on for three hours, aha, you'd

17:34

be like this is I want

17:36

to go home now? You would be bored.

17:39

Yes.

17:39

Right, for fireworks to be exciting

17:42

left end, they have to end. So

17:45

we have to be very careful about

17:47

comparing the like slow burn

17:50

energy of a real relationship

17:53

with like that fast twitch muscle

17:55

of a short term encounter

17:58

or an affair that is naturally exciting

18:00

because it's an affair. It's like, you

18:03

know this serious. Yeah. So

18:05

I don't think you should

18:08

absolutely have chemistry, but we

18:11

have to be really careful with comparing chemistry

18:14

with previous chemistry because that

18:16

chemistry may not have lasted either if you'd

18:18

actually got what you wanted.

18:20

Yeah, And it makes so much sense. The idea

18:22

you just the analogy you painted

18:24

of the fireworks is a brilliant

18:27

one because a

18:30

real relationship is one that you don't

18:32

want to end, and the

18:36

chemistry based relationship is one that has

18:38

to end, right, It has to come to an end,

18:41

and for it to feel meaningful,

18:43

and a real relationship, you never want to end. And

18:45

that's why it feels meaningful. And that's

18:47

where we're kind of stuck in between.

18:49

And the thing I hear the most, and I asked

18:51

my audience and my team a lot of questions before

18:54

this interview because I know a

18:56

lot of my audiences dating trying

18:58

to figure it out. And one of the biggest things which we touched

19:00

on here, but I want to ask you about, is that

19:02

people find it overwhelming with

19:05

the number of options they have today. And

19:07

I've spoken to friends who are like, well,

19:09

this guy's great, but maybe

19:11

there's someone greater, right, and we're constantly

19:14

living in this They're good, but

19:16

maybe they're fifty percent, and maybe there's

19:18

a fifty one, and then maybe there's a seventy

19:20

nine, and maybe there's a ninety nine, because

19:23

I can see someone else over there has a ninety nine,

19:25

and so we keep second

19:28

guessing even the person in front of us, even

19:30

if they are fulfilling our needs because

19:32

of the overwhelming number

19:35

of options.

19:37

Hey, everyone, it's Jay here.

19:39

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20:18

how when you said you fell at home and you

20:20

know, I think that's what people want to feel. They want

20:22

to feel at home, they want to feel more than safe.

20:25

But how do we know or

20:27

would have been the best signs and indicators

20:30

that people can look out for that they're

20:32

actually making things harder for themselves

20:34

by wishing, hoping, wanting someone else?

20:37

Or is that a sign that you're not with the right person,

20:39

that you feel that there is someone who has

20:41

more.

20:42

It's such a tough question because I think it's

20:46

sometimes we're wanting

20:49

something else because there's you

20:51

know, the person that's in front of us isn't compelling

20:53

enough. There really is something lacking

20:56

in that relationship. But

20:59

I do think we have to ask ourselves what

21:02

are the things I really must have for

21:04

an amazing relationship? Like I

21:06

For me, when I when I was

21:09

going to ask Audrey to marry me, I literally called

21:11

up a friend and told him, and

21:14

he was like, you know, why are you doing

21:16

that? I'm just curious, Like what he

21:18

was it was almost like his way of testing whether I was

21:20

ready or not, you know, whether I was just in some crazy

21:23

like infatuation or

21:26

and I said, you know, I'm I'm ready

21:28

to build something in my life. I

21:30

feel like for

21:33

me, my my dating life was

21:36

just like hitting reset all the time, and

21:39

it was honestly at a certain point making me anxious

21:42

like dating and being with

21:44

different people, and it just didn't

21:47

you know, there was a time in my life where that was really

21:49

exciting, and then it started to just

21:51

go the other way and

21:53

I and I had to listen to that and go,

21:55

this isn't this

21:57

isn't going to work, Like I,

22:00

this isn't where it's at this isn't making me happy,

22:02

this isn't bringing me peace. The

22:04

way that I was dating was it

22:06

had almost like an addictive quality

22:09

to it that was really

22:11

unhealthy. And I thought, this

22:13

isn't going to be a good look ten years

22:16

from now. It's not going to make me feel good. It's

22:18

not going to bring me more peace, which

22:20

is a different By the way, that doesn't mean that you know

22:22

how to give something up. When you

22:24

have those realizations, you might realize eating

22:27

healthier would be better for you, but it doesn't mean that

22:29

you've trained yourself to

22:31

be able to do that. But

22:35

I got to a point where I said, I want

22:37

to build something now, and

22:42

with Audrey, I thought, I in

22:45

my head, I was like, I'll never find a better builder.

22:47

And I said that to him, like I'll never find a better

22:49

builder.

22:49

This is.

22:51

The builder for me. Like we're going to be able to

22:53

do such amazing things together and

22:55

the life will have and the you know, the

22:58

high level of empathy and compassion,

23:01

and you know, the person that

23:03

I am with this person it you

23:05

know, the way she makes me feel

23:08

like that's that's truly special.

23:11

And I'm not a you

23:14

know, there's the one out

23:16

there kind of a person. I've never been that

23:18

way if you look anyone looks back through my videos,

23:21

and you know this because we've spoken about it back

23:23

when I was single. You know, I've

23:26

never been a person who

23:28

believes in the idea of the one. So

23:31

I think that it's finding

23:33

someone that we've you know, we

23:36

look at what's really important to us,

23:39

not what's important on an egoic level,

23:41

because I think a lot of the things that make us question

23:43

whether this person is right

23:45

for us are ego based. I don't think they're

23:48

based on how we feel around this person.

23:51

We worry is this the kind of person my friends

23:53

think that I should be with? Do

23:55

they look the part? Are they

23:57

my type? My normal type?

24:00

Do they make the right amount of money?

24:02

Yeah? Like, is this has this

24:04

person come in the package that

24:06

I had always told myself they would come

24:08

in? And those things can be

24:10

really, really limiting, and

24:12

they can have us like constantly trying

24:15

to optimize for some version

24:18

of something that we think we're supposed to

24:20

be with, which is a very dangerous

24:22

way to go about finding love. You can't

24:25

optimize for human beings.

24:28

You can optimize for a lot in life,

24:30

but you're dealing with people. And by the

24:33

way, even if you let go of this person, you're going

24:35

to find someone else who's also imperfect,

24:38

and they might Okay, this person

24:40

is, you know, scores a seven in this

24:42

area, and they score a nine. But guess what, they

24:44

score a three in this other area

24:47

that you didn't even know was

24:49

great in this relationship because you took for granted

24:51

how amazing that person was in that way, Like,

24:54

it's

24:56

very dangerous to optimize in

24:58

that way in our love life life. And I've

25:01

come to really believe in life that if

25:04

you find a connection that

25:06

has all the right raw materials

25:10

and you both have the same level of commitment,

25:13

then you can build something extraordinary

25:16

together. And actually the extraordinary

25:18

is the thing you sculpt together. It's

25:20

no different from a career. You

25:23

know, neither you nor I

25:25

started by doing our dream version

25:27

of this. It's evolved

25:29

and evolved and evolved and evolved, and every

25:32

year you sculpt it a little closer to your

25:34

ideal way of doing it all. And

25:36

along the way, you do a lot of things that you don't

25:38

necessarily You're like, oh my god,

25:40

I couldn't do this for a lifetime, and this

25:42

part I thought I would enjoy and I didn't enjoy it nearly

25:45

as much as I thought I would. I'm going to stop doing that.

25:47

And you, you know, you you

25:49

sculpt it like dream careers

25:51

are sculpted, they're not found. And

25:54

I think that that's true of relationships

25:57

as well, Like I'm more grateful for my relationship

25:59

with Audrey the more time goes on, Yes, because

26:01

we keep sculpting it into something

26:04

that's better and better what that requires,

26:07

which is really hard for a lot of us, myself

26:10

included for many years. And

26:12

this was one of the things that I think really hurt

26:14

me was I got myself

26:17

into an incredibly indecisive

26:19

state where I

26:21

was constantly second guessing myself.

26:25

And I

26:27

you know, when we talk, when we when

26:29

we think of what's like, what are we worried

26:32

about in our love life? For so many of us, it's that we're

26:34

going to settle. Yes, I'm

26:36

going to settle for the wrong person. Well,

26:39

I think we can actually start to reclaim

26:42

the language of settling and

26:45

make it into a very positive thing that what

26:48

if it wasn't settling for

26:50

what if you decided to settle on

26:53

Because when you settle on someone, there's

26:55

a power to that it's like you resolve

26:58

to say, I'm going to settle on this. It's

27:01

like people crossing a country

27:03

when a country is you know, it's like people

27:05

crossing America and deciding when

27:07

to stop. At

27:10

what point did the early settlers say

27:12

this is good enough, I don't need to keep

27:14

going, like I've found an amazing

27:16

place. And when you find

27:19

that place, you go I could live

27:21

here. Then you settle on it. And

27:23

it's only by settling on it that you can make

27:25

it great. It's only by putting your attention

27:28

on it like a laser, that you can see what it

27:30

becomes. And I

27:32

don't think that I ever really settled

27:35

on anything in my love life

27:37

in a way that gave it a chance

27:39

to see what it could really become. And

27:42

in this situation, I really

27:44

gave myself that chance by saying

27:47

I'm gonna I'm going to go all

27:49

in on this. But or she was

27:51

smart because she also saw

27:54

that Audrey is ridiculously perceptive

27:57

and in tune with people, and she

27:59

saw in me early on like, oh,

28:01

this is a pattern for him,

28:04

and that doubt and that what

28:07

do I want?

28:08

You know?

28:08

Is this right? And that she saw that

28:10

early on and One of the things

28:13

that she did was she

28:17

she called me out firstly, and she was like, look,

28:21

if you're I'm

28:23

willing to like really see what this could be,

28:26

and you don't seem

28:29

to be in that place

28:31

where you're like actually going

28:34

all in and seeing what it could be. She

28:37

said, So I don't want to continue

28:40

if you're not going all in because I'm

28:42

not like, I'm not here for

28:45

someone half of someone's energy. And

28:48

the way she phrased it was amazing because

28:51

she said to me, look, that

28:53

doesn't mean like six months

28:55

from now we could break up. Yeah, you

28:58

might decide this is wrong for you. I

29:00

might decide it's wrong for me, and

29:03

no one's the villain if that happens. But

29:06

if you're not willing to go all in right

29:08

now to at least see what it could be

29:11

and give it your real effort, then

29:14

then this has to end here for me. And

29:17

what was for me what was amazing

29:19

about that is that it lowered

29:21

the stakes for me, especially when

29:23

she said because I felt like, you

29:26

know, in the past I had hurt well, I didn't

29:28

feel like I had hurt people and

29:31

I had been the villain, and

29:34

I was like, I can't do this anymore because I also

29:36

suffer from ridiculous guilt. So

29:39

it was like, I can't do this again. I can't.

29:41

I was like avoidant because I was like, I don't want

29:43

to get close enough to anyone to hurt someone. If

29:45

I hurt someone, I'm going to feel sick and that's

29:47

going to haunt me, and then you know, I'm

29:50

just making myself miserable and them, And

29:52

so I had all this like stuff. And when

29:54

she was like, you're not six

29:57

months from now you decide this isn't for you, that's

29:59

okay, You're

30:01

allowed to do that. That lowered the stakes

30:03

for me. But by also

30:06

demanding as a standard, And that's what so

30:08

much of this book is about how to raise your

30:10

standards and what that looks like in practice, because

30:12

I think the reason so many people never reached

30:15

the point of real relationship is because

30:17

they don't have standards

30:19

for what they expect and how to communicate and know

30:21

how to communicate those standards. But because

30:23

she had a standard that she lowered

30:26

the stakes, but she also had a high standard and

30:28

said this is the price of entry for continuing.

30:32

That allowed me to fully invest.

30:35

And when I fully invested, that

30:38

thing started to actually realize

30:40

its potential and to we got to

30:42

see what it actually was when I was showing

30:45

up fully and she was showing up fully. So

30:48

I sympathize with anyone who

30:50

is struggling with those

30:53

decisions in their love life. I don't judge anyone

30:55

for it, because I struggled

30:57

in my love life with this. I wrote a whole chapter

31:00

of the book called never Satisfied because I related

31:03

to that idea that you know, you find someone

31:05

who you chase, who feels exciting to you, but

31:08

they break your heart, you

31:10

know, Or you go for someone who feels safe

31:13

and you're bored. You're

31:15

doubting yourself, you're doubting whether this is the

31:17

right person, and you just sort of,

31:19

you know, cycle between those

31:22

two different extremes. And

31:24

it became the not just

31:26

a goal for me to help other people, it became a

31:28

goal for myself to go I

31:31

need to figure out how to be happy here,

31:34

because otherwise I'm going to constantly oscillate

31:36

between feeling suffering

31:38

because I'm chasing someone who doesn't want me, or

31:42

being with someone where i feel like I'm

31:45

not fully there, and that's not fair to them,

31:47

and it's not fair to myself, like I need

31:49

to figure out a way to be happy here.

31:52

So so much of this book is about

31:55

finding that peace and that happiness

31:57

that I feel really really

31:59

lucky to have been able to find in my

32:01

own life because it's it.

32:05

You know, I wrote this book single,

32:08

heartbroken, then

32:10

dating, then you

32:13

know, falling in love, and then the last

32:15

edit, I did you know for two days on my

32:17

honeymoon, Like that was a crazy

32:19

arc for me. So it wasn't something that was created

32:22

by a married person who was just like, here's all

32:24

the answers. I was like, some of these chapters

32:26

I wrote in the worst possible

32:28

pain of my life.

32:30

You know, you talked about standards then, and obviously that's

32:32

such a big part of what you felt with Audrey

32:34

in that moment. I think

32:37

what scares us about setting standards

32:39

is that we think it's going to scare someone away. So

32:42

Audrey saying that to you requires

32:44

so much self worth

32:48

in her saying I may

32:50

lose this guy if I say this, but

32:53

I know that's where I'm at,

32:55

you being vulnerable with that

32:58

person many years ago saying I'm

33:00

going to open up about my life and them

33:02

saying that's not very attractive. I don't find

33:04

that attractive. That was you, again

33:07

trying to demonstrate and

33:09

be vulnerable, but because

33:11

you were with someone who wasn't

33:14

emotionally compassionate enough to

33:16

receive that, and because you

33:18

didn't have enough self worth, you made it a weakness

33:20

in yourself. It sounds like when Audrey

33:22

said that to you, if you would have said,

33:24

well, I'm not in, she would have been like, okay, cool, we're not in,

33:26

then it's not happening. It doesn't sound like she would have been

33:29

like, oh my god, he doesn't like me. I'm not good enough

33:31

because she had a certain standard and

33:33

that's what standards, whereas when you were trying to be vulnerable,

33:36

it was like trying to be vulnerable, but it wasn't

33:38

a standard yet.

33:39

Well, I would say, no, it wasn't a standard.

33:42

Tactics are different from standards.

33:45

That's why I'm not that when I was being vulnerable, that

33:47

was a tactic. But like

33:50

we do constantly employ faux

33:53

standards that aren't really

33:55

standards. They're just a tactic. So she's

33:57

like, I'm not going to text this person back so

33:59

that I generate interest, and

34:02

then if it doesn't generate interest,

34:04

three days later we text them anyway. That's because

34:06

it wasn't a standard, it was a tactic. Well,

34:09

yeah, when something as tactic, we

34:11

do to try and get a result, and if it doesn't work, we

34:14

go for a different tactic. A standard

34:16

is who we are

34:18

and we don't change

34:20

it. Like if my standard for being

34:23

open and vulnerable was what

34:25

I did in that moment with that person, I

34:27

wouldn't have stopped doing that just because I

34:29

didn't get the result that I wanted, which

34:31

was connection. I would have said, well,

34:34

this is how I want to be. And come

34:36

to think of it, one

34:39

of I would have said, if I was in a better place,

34:42

one of my greatest standards is to find

34:44

someone who really accepts me. And

34:47

if this person doesn't accept me, then

34:50

my standard is going to be that, well, maybe

34:52

this relationship isn't for me. You

34:55

know, I want to be this vulnerable in

34:57

a relationship. I want to be able to share from

34:59

the heart both the good and

35:01

the and the bad, and

35:03

my flaws and my insecurities. And

35:07

if I'm not accepted, then okay,

35:09

maybe maybe it's not right. But instead

35:12

what I did was I went down a very

35:14

masochistic rabbit hole of

35:16

going I'm not good enough. It's just

35:18

been proven. I'm never going

35:20

to reveal those weaknesses again. And

35:23

I stayed right. So

35:26

you're right about Audrey because I can

35:28

guarantee you if I

35:30

had not then said all

35:32

right, I'm going to show up differently, she would

35:34

have been out of there. And the big difference is

35:37

we have to make the goal

35:40

our happiness, not a person. You

35:43

know, we think that we're going to be happy by getting

35:45

a person, but you'll never be happy by getting

35:47

a person that doesn't meet your needs. It doesn't

35:49

matter how impressive you think they are. It doesn't

35:51

that's the danger, right, that's the trap

35:54

people fall into. I've fallen into it. Someone's

35:56

particularly exciting, impressive,

35:59

charismatic, gorgeous, there's

36:01

something they have, all these things

36:03

that you go, this makes them a

36:05

very valuable person. And then you

36:08

say, well, my needs don't really matter anymore.

36:10

The only thing that matters is I can get this person.

36:13

Because we think if I can get this person, then I'll

36:15

be worthy and I'll be happy and it'll all

36:17

work out. But everyone

36:20

out there, you know, most people

36:22

out there have been in a relationship where

36:25

they thought it would be heaven to get someone,

36:28

and then they experienced

36:30

what the relationship was actually like

36:33

when their needs weren't being

36:35

met, when they didn't feel safe,

36:37

when they didn't feel acknowledged, when they didn't

36:39

receive someone's empathy, when they

36:41

felt like they couldn't really be themselves around

36:43

that person, when they felt like they were constantly

36:46

clinging onto the relationship because

36:48

they never you know, they're in a relationship

36:51

with the person, but they never really felt like they had them.

36:53

You know, there's a special kind

36:56

of hell to be in a relationship

36:58

like that, and at a certain point

37:01

we have to come to realize that this is this

37:04

is this relationship. I keep telling myself,

37:06

I'm going to die if I lose. It

37:08

is worthless if

37:11

I don't get these couple of things

37:13

that are missing. And

37:16

so for me, one of the greatest

37:18

ways to have a standard next time round is

37:20

not you. There's a whole

37:23

you know. I wrote two massive

37:25

chapters in this book on how to be confident,

37:28

But you don't even need confidence

37:31

for standards in the beginning. Yes, you

37:33

just need to know that I can never

37:35

experience that again because it's

37:38

too painful. It's like you don't need to if

37:40

I put your hand in a flame, you

37:42

don't need a standard or confidence to get

37:44

out of it. Yeah, you just you don't need

37:46

self worth to get your hand out of the flame. It's

37:49

just too painful. I can't do that again. And

37:52

a lot of people, especially people who leave really

37:55

abusive or difficult relationships,

37:57

a lot of them, when they have enough time

38:00

them away from it and they

38:02

start to their nervous system

38:04

calms down and they start to experience

38:06

a different reality.

38:07

Yeah, they look.

38:09

Back and they're like, no

38:12

matter how much I still may dream about that person

38:15

or fantasize about that person, or you

38:17

know, get sentimental about that relationship,

38:20

when they really think about what it was like to

38:22

be in it and what that person was like, they're

38:24

like, I could never go back to being

38:27

in that kind of a situation. So

38:29

the necessity is the birthplace

38:32

of standards before you ever increase your

38:34

self worth.

38:35

Yeah, And I love that because I think we get so locked

38:37

into like self worth, self confidence, self esteem,

38:40

and because that's a lifelong journey

38:42

and a lifelong pursuit, you feel

38:44

you can't have standards. But I want to go back to something

38:46

you said, because I think this is we're really

38:49

I'm really enjoying this conversation because I feel like we're

38:51

really getting into this kind of subtle,

38:54

nuanced space of what's really holding

38:56

people back from having love

38:58

in their life. And it's something you

39:00

said earlier which I'm kind of connecting to what you're

39:02

saying now, this difference between

39:04

an egoic standard in

39:07

your words, and then an

39:09

emotive standard or an emotional

39:11

standard. And maybe there's a better word for

39:13

it that you've developed or come across, but I'm

39:16

trying to separate it because I think

39:18

an egoic standard is, well, yeah,

39:20

that if they asked me out, they

39:22

have to pay on the first date, so we start

39:25

getting lost, or like an egoic standard

39:27

is they should message me first, Like

39:29

I don't think those are the types of standards

39:32

that Audrey said to you or the kind of standard

39:34

that you're recommending. There's this great

39:37

my favorite TikTok page to follow in the world

39:40

is called Guy with the List.

39:41

Have you seen this guy?

39:43

So what he does is he will take random

39:45

videos of girls

39:47

who share their X and

39:50

they are hilarious, right,

39:52

they are the most ridiculous things. Like it's

39:54

like I don't like guys who work

39:56

out with their mates all the way through

39:58

to I don't like eyes with

40:01

a big bum right, whatever it may be. And

40:04

this guy, what he'll do is he'll take the clip of a

40:06

girl saying that, and then he'll go to

40:08

his notes page in Apple and additors

40:10

list and things have not to be it's

40:13

the best page in the world.

40:14

So it's just the longest list.

40:16

He's on seven hundred and ninety four the last

40:18

time I saw, and it's like a guy

40:20

with the list.

40:21

It's brilliant.

40:22

And the reason I bring it up is because I think

40:24

that's what we think standards are now,

40:27

and I think to your point earlier, I think

40:29

you labeled it an egoic standard.

40:32

So walk us through how we

40:34

transform our egoic standards

40:36

into I'm calling them emotional

40:39

standards whatever the right word is. How

40:41

do we transfer them over because I

40:43

think we think we're setting standards, but

40:45

their standards like he's got to pay on the

40:47

first day, she better text

40:49

me first. I won't reply for a week

40:52

the example you gave, And I think that's what's

40:54

tripping us up.

40:55

Yeah, I think that it's almost like there's standards

40:57

that arise from ego and there's standards arise

41:00

from what's going to make us happy, and

41:03

that the two are often

41:05

completely different, right,

41:08

because actually the things

41:11

that make us happy can be much more subtle

41:14

and less prescriptive than the things

41:17

that feed our ego in some way. There's

41:20

two points I want to make about this. The

41:23

first one is in

41:25

relation to the

41:27

kind of inherent judgment

41:30

that is in so many of those X

41:34

and so many of those things.

41:36

I would never want someone who's like this. I would never want

41:38

someone who does that.

41:39

I would.

41:41

We write people off at lightning

41:43

speed, and not just

41:46

entirely superficial things, but ways

41:48

that people are not like us. Right,

41:51

So you've got people who are like, oh,

41:53

if they're not into especially like you

41:55

know, your audience is into self development.

41:57

My audience tends to be into self development.

42:00

It's very easy for someone who gets into self development

42:02

to suddenly be like, I want somebody else who's

42:04

into self development? Yeah, right, And I

42:06

get that question all the time, Like, now that I'm doing all

42:09

of this growth work, I want someone

42:11

who can keep up. I want someone who's on my

42:13

level. And

42:15

I want to remind people like you weren't

42:17

doing this two years ago, Like

42:20

this is in a way, this

42:22

is like a complete contempt

42:24

you have for you two

42:27

years ago, well

42:30

before like a certain mentor

42:32

or influence or something

42:34

came into your life and turned you

42:37

onto something. There's also a

42:39

slight arrogance about the

42:41

standards, you know, these things we

42:43

have because it's you

42:46

know, someone could have lived on a farm their whole

42:48

life, and I have no

42:50

idea what self development even is

42:52

as a kind of idea a

42:55

concept, let alone that there's this

42:57

entire industry around it. And

43:00

they may have a wisdom that you

43:03

never picked up on in the world that you grew up

43:05

in, and that might be one of the greatest bits

43:07

of synergy between the two of you, is the

43:10

wisdom you bring and the wisdom they bring that's

43:12

different and it has come from a very different place,

43:15

a very different way of living. So,

43:18

you know, I think there's a lack of humility

43:20

sometimes in thinking that people have to

43:22

be like us and

43:25

then judging them for the ways that they're not like

43:27

us. And a

43:29

lot of the way we judge other people arises

43:32

out of a lack of self compassion because

43:34

we haven't really accepted ourselves.

43:36

We haven't really you

43:38

know, I know, every

43:40

time I got punched in the face by life,

43:43

every time, like I took a big

43:45

hit and I,

43:48

you know, experienced a really bad heartbreak

43:51

that was a big one for me, like a very

43:53

humbling experience for me. I

43:57

experienced years of chronic physical

43:59

pain, and when that happened in my

44:01

life, I like truly

44:04

just hit a kind of bottom because

44:06

I just didn't know how I would ever. I

44:09

tried everything in the world and

44:11

I couldn't make this pain go away. And

44:16

it started to basically not

44:18

just ruin my life because I felt like I couldn't

44:22

experience joy anymore. I was just thinking about

44:24

my pain all day every day.

44:26

But it also robbed me of my confidence

44:29

because I started to feel like, Wow, no one's

44:31

going to be attracted to this version of me that is

44:33

so frail and fragile and doesn't

44:36

feel like I really

44:38

didn't identify as the heroic version

44:41

of me anymore. I was like, this is

44:44

I'm going to be perceived as pathetic by

44:47

someone who wants like a strong person

44:50

because I feel so on the edge of breaking

44:52

the whole time, because anyone with chronic physical

44:55

pain knows that it's so centralizing

44:58

and even doing basic

45:00

things can feel like it's too much. But

45:04

my point is that that going

45:07

through those things in life.

45:10

It allowed me to access a

45:13

level of compassion for

45:15

other people because I was like,

45:17

God, how many people have I written off in

45:19

my life because you

45:21

know, they're this

45:24

way or they're that way, or they're you know,

45:26

and look at me right now,

45:28

I'm like on the floor.

45:30

Yeah.

45:31

And I found that

45:34

as I came to accept more of myself

45:36

and be honest about my own stuff and

45:38

not just the things going wrong in my life, but even

45:41

just difficulties. Like if you have a jealous moment

45:44

and it makes you a little crazy, then

45:47

you're not so quick to call other people crazy

45:49

when they you know, react

45:52

to insecurity they

45:54

have and it makes them do something extreme

45:57

in that moment, you know, like that, well, you

46:00

she's crazy. You can't believe

46:02

what she did, Like she's so she's crazy.

46:04

It's like you don't. You don't throw that around

46:07

when you know you've

46:09

done your share of like crazy

46:12

because you were in pain and you

46:14

didn't know how to how to cope

46:16

with it, you know it.

46:19

So I've I've found that the

46:21

more the more I've

46:24

like been humbled in life, and

46:27

the more I've become accepting of myself

46:31

and compassionate towards myself. Actually,

46:33

the more it's made space

46:35

for everyone else, because now I wouldn't if

46:37

I was single again, I wouldn't be writing off

46:40

people on all of those things

46:42

that I might have written people off for

46:44

eight years ago or ten years ago. I

46:47

actually think I would have more options, not less.

46:50

People say I'm growing so much, I've got

46:52

so few options now because so many few people

46:54

are on my level. I'm like, if you're really growing,

46:56

I actually think it makes space for more people

46:58

because you've become more compact and

47:01

more accepting, and you

47:03

see the soul of that person underneath

47:05

those behaviors and the way they are, which kind

47:07

of brings me on to my other point, which

47:09

was when you know the

47:11

person says they didn't pay

47:13

on the date they invited me, and then

47:16

you know they didn't pay for the whole check or whatever.

47:21

I think. We're we're

47:23

not always good at getting behind why

47:26

someone is the way they are, Like,

47:28

what's really driving

47:31

the way they are? Does this person

47:34

have the same values as me? They might do

47:36

something different on the surface, but

47:39

underneath that might be the same value.

47:42

We just have arrived at different

47:44

points, Like my wife's a vegetarian,

47:48

I eat meat, like we both

47:50

love animals.

47:52

Sincerely, I love animals. She makes jokes

47:54

about me, you know how much. You

47:57

know how I am with animals is one of her favorite

47:59

things in the world, eat them, and she doesn't

48:01

like We've arrived at different places,

48:05

but underneath

48:07

it all is like the same beating heart. And

48:10

I think that's the thing we're quick to write

48:12

off when we make those really quick judgments

48:14

about people. And that's not to say

48:17

like there are certain you know, red

48:19

flags that might come

48:21

up with someone where you go, you know what, not

48:24

worth finding out what's behind this because

48:26

it's just too severe and I don't,

48:28

I really don't like this, and it has been a major

48:31

warning sign for me in the past. But

48:34

I think that's that's different than

48:37

taking something like you know, someone

48:39

someone didn't pay half

48:42

the bill, or someone didn't pay the whole

48:44

bill, and like I I know that.

48:46

I used to think to myself, I really enjoy

48:48

paying the bill, but if

48:51

someone didn't offer for

48:53

me, I would be like it.

48:57

And this is even my judgment, right, because

48:59

that for them, it might just be conditioning

49:01

and it might be even There were times

49:03

where even spoke up about it where I

49:06

found myself paying constantly, and I

49:08

got brave enough to say, hey, it makes me feel

49:11

kind of taken for granted that you don't

49:14

ever offer to pay. You know, I've been in

49:16

situations like that in the past, and sometimes if

49:18

you said that to someone, they'd be like, oh my god,

49:20

I feel awful, like they're so embarrassed,

49:22

and they're like they will then

49:24

feel shame about it and be like, god, I you

49:27

know, they look at themselves and they're like, oh, I slipped

49:29

into a pattern there that I don't like, especially

49:31

if I expressed that it's not that I hate

49:33

it's not that I don't like paying, it's that I don't

49:36

feel like we're a team. You

49:38

know, that might make someone go well, I value

49:40

being part of a team as well, and

49:43

I actually don't like that you don't feel like

49:45

I'm a great teammate. That's the last thing in the world

49:47

I'd ever want to be. So now like

49:50

you can actually come together because of a moment

49:53

where you say something like that. But

49:56

I know if I was on a date when I was single

49:58

and someone didn't even offer, and

50:01

by the way, I would still pay. Yeah, I

50:03

still wouldn't let them. But if

50:05

someone didn't offer it,

50:08

it would be there would be a little piece of me

50:10

that would be like, that

50:13

doesn't feel like teamwork. And

50:15

maybe you know, maybe fine, if someone

50:18

invites you on a date and they let you

50:20

pay half, Okay, maybe you say I don't

50:22

I didn't love that, but maybe you see

50:25

like maybe that needs to play out once or twice

50:27

more before you decide everything that means

50:29

about the person.

50:31

Yeah, well, I think you just said the nail on the head.

50:33

It's like actually having and I know this

50:35

isn't sexy and it's not popular, but

50:37

it is what you're trying to say that having

50:40

the clarifying conversation around

50:43

why someone behaves the way they do is

50:46

far more useful as to whether this relationship

50:48

has a future than what they do. So

50:51

the fact that you're paying or someone's

50:53

not paying actually doesn't show

50:55

anything unless you had a conversation about why

50:57

that's the case, and actually how they

51:00

deal with that conversation and

51:02

how they respond to it is going to give

51:04

you all the notes you need as to whether

51:06

this relationship has a future or not. Because what ends

51:08

up happening that's with a very tangible

51:10

thing with paying, There could be something that person

51:12

does that annoys you, and you let it go for the first month.

51:15

You let it go for the first three months. Now you move

51:17

in and it triggers you and you're like, God,

51:19

can you just stop doing that? You've been doing it for nine

51:21

months now. And they're like, well, wait a minute,

51:23

why didn't you just tell me that? And it's like, well, if

51:25

we actually talked about it on month one.

51:28

I know Ridley and I have had so many conversations

51:30

like that, And it is true that as

51:33

you spend more time together, a you discover

51:35

more things you disagree on, and B

51:37

you discover more things you're grateful for. They're

51:40

both happening at the same time, and

51:42

the disagreement doesn't turn into a

51:44

disconnect because you have the skills

51:46

to say, I know how this person deals

51:49

with challenging conversations because

51:51

we've had them for so long. We're not waiting

51:54

for three years to hear to have our first

51:56

challenging conversation because we've already

51:58

had them about less important things. And

52:00

now that we're growing up together, they're like, you

52:03

know, I think a lot of people aren't having

52:05

the early conversation. So when it comes to that, how do we

52:07

want to raise kids? Where do we want to live?

52:10

What do you want to all? These are harder conversations

52:12

if you haven't talked about who should pay for the

52:14

bill, because these are much more, bigger,

52:16

emotional conditioned

52:18

decisions where people have far more stuff

52:21

to pull from as to how.

52:22

They make it.

52:23

So it's so much to say about all of God, Yeah,

52:27

you're absolutely right. And Christopher

52:30

Hitchins used to say, it's more important how someone

52:32

thinks than what they think, And

52:35

I think that we never when

52:37

we're being too judgmental or assumptive.

52:39

We don't necessarily learn how someone thinks. We

52:41

learn what they think, and then we discard

52:44

them based on what they think or what they do. You're

52:47

absolutely right that by having the conversation,

52:50

you see how they deal with the conversation itself,

52:52

which should, by the way, for anyone wanting

52:54

a serious relationship, it should that should

52:57

be like, one of your baseline needs is

52:59

that I need someone who is

53:02

willing to have real conversations

53:04

with me where we can acknowledge

53:07

things, because someone who can't acknowledge things can't

53:09

grow right. It's like one of the key

53:11

features of narcissism is

53:14

the inability to admit wrongdoing

53:17

and that breeds incompetence, by the way,

53:19

because if you can't admit wrongdoing and take ownership,

53:22

you can't get better at something.

53:24

So you know, whether you're dealing with narcissism

53:27

or just someone who can't see

53:29

themselves clearly or can't acknowledge

53:32

the way you feel or the way something

53:34

they've done has made you feel. If

53:37

you're in that situation, it's going

53:39

to be a rough relationship. So how

53:41

soon do you want to find out? The way the two of you

53:44

engage on that level? But

53:46

it's also engaging on that level

53:48

is a form. This is I think what we've

53:51

what we forget is that well, let

53:53

me make two points about this. That I

53:55

wrote an entire chapter in this book on hard conversations,

53:58

not just because we tend to avoid them at

54:01

all costs because we don't like

54:03

them. Like it's like, you know in fight Club, where

54:05

you know, he says, like most men will

54:07

do anything to avoid a fight, Like it's

54:10

like most people will do anything to avoid

54:12

a hard conversation because we just hate it's

54:14

awkward, it's embarrassing. You know, we probably

54:17

many of us grew up not being good at confrontation

54:19

or not being taught how to have healthy confrontation,

54:22

and so we avoid it and we

54:24

hold on to it, and we hold onto it, and

54:27

we're afraid what will happen if we speak up

54:29

about our needs. I know that one thing I did

54:31

a disservice to people that I

54:34

had in my love life in previous

54:37

times of my life because the

54:39

times where I might have really needed some time

54:41

to myself, I didn't

54:43

express it. And then by not

54:45

expressing it because I was

54:47

afraid, I then became

54:51

like resentful and avoidant

54:54

and started to push that person away because

54:56

I had just decided my needs couldn't be met in this

54:58

relationship with giving them a

55:00

chance to even see that part

55:03

of me and show up for me in that way.

55:05

So we do that all the way to the beginning

55:07

of dating. You know, we do that when we see

55:10

you know that I joke in the book about

55:12

red flags because I'm like, if

55:15

we listen to every single piece of advice

55:17

on the internet about what's a red flag, not

55:20

only would everyone be undtable,

55:22

so would we like I'd

55:24

be excluded from the dating Paul,

55:27

because I for sure have some of those

55:29

red flags or have at some point in my life.

55:31

So, you know, we and

55:34

that's I don't want to be hypocritical. I've been a

55:36

contributor to the advice on red flags,

55:38

but like when you start adding them all up, you're like,

55:40

oh my god, is there any room for mistakes? Is

55:42

there any room for someone to do something

55:45

that you know isn't

55:48

them on their best day? Now, Robert

55:52

Green, I heard him say, you

55:55

know, if someone does something, pay

55:57

attention to that, because nobody

56:00

ever does anything once. If they did

56:02

it once, it's a pattern. I

56:05

think that's an amazing Like

56:08

if I was creating a survival guide for life,

56:10

that would go in it because it's great advice.

56:13

But I also know that there's things

56:15

I've done in my life or my relationship

56:18

that I did once, especially

56:21

after a hard conversation I felt bad about

56:23

and decided I don't want

56:25

to be that person or I don't want to do that again. So

56:29

we do want to reserve some space in

56:31

life for the fact that we

56:33

can learn, we can adapt, we can progress.

56:35

What I know for sure is that people don't

56:38

progress without the hard conversations. What

56:40

we ignore, we tacitly approve,

56:43

and what we point out bravely,

56:46

albeit there are elegant ways to do it and

56:48

I show people elegant ways to do it in

56:51

the book. Yeah, that to

56:53

me is then you're looking for

56:55

progress, like is when

56:57

I've mentioned it is does it

57:00

bring us closer together? Because in the right situation,

57:02

communicating should actually bring you closer together.

57:05

It shouldn't. Then you shouldn't feel gas lit, you

57:07

shouldn't feel like you're called

57:09

crazy or difficult, or that

57:12

should actually bring you together. And

57:14

then our standard has to be that

57:18

by having that conversation, I need to see

57:20

progress in that area. And if I don't see progress

57:22

in that area, I'm not going to ignore the fact

57:24

that there's been no progress in that area. But

57:27

if there's no progress now

57:29

it has become a kind of a

57:32

delusional thing to expect that they are

57:34

going to change. But I can't stress

57:36

this enough. We in our

57:38

love lives today, everyone is really

57:41

really good at and rightly

57:44

so I'm not this is what

57:46

they're talking about is real. But we're really

57:48

good at complaining about what dating is like today

57:52

and how hard it is, And it is

57:55

like it It is hard.

57:57

Finding love is hard. It

58:00

is the wild West. There

58:02

is so much bad behavior, there's

58:05

so many ways to just God, there's just

58:07

so many ways for it to be bad, and

58:10

unfortunately for us, our love life is

58:12

an area we can influence, but we can't

58:15

control it to the level of precision that we can

58:17

other areas of our lives. If we want to lose weight,

58:20

we can eat better and we can work out, and our body

58:22

will change. May not get to our perfect

58:24

weight, but it will change reliably.

58:28

In your love life, you can go on a day every day

58:30

for the next year and still not find love,

58:32

or you can find love and six months later that

58:34

person cheats on you and leaves you, and you're back

58:36

to square one. It's a maddening

58:39

area in many ways because

58:41

we deeply want to find love. It is one of

58:43

the most human of desires

58:46

is to find love, and it panics

58:49

us at first.

58:51

It frustrates us, and it makes us angry.

58:54

But at some point, for many people it panics

58:57

them because they're worried I'm never going to meet anyone. We

59:00

can't just decide

59:03

I'm going to find love in the next three months

59:05

and make it happen. But what

59:09

we have to start taking ownership

59:11

of and where we have to start taking our power back,

59:14

is that you can go into

59:16

your dating life from a place of leadership,

59:20

and so many people I think go in with a state of

59:22

following. What's the

59:24

level right now of people's effort,

59:27

what's the level of men's chivalry,

59:30

what's the level of whether

59:32

people pick up the phone or not instead of relentlessly

59:36

texting. What's the level

59:38

of communication between dates or what

59:41

I can expect from someone in terms of assurances

59:44

that we're just seeing each other. Like

59:48

there's all this rhetoric about

59:50

where things are and people don't try anymore

59:52

and no one wants to commit and so on. But if

59:54

you're not careful, you can get into a really passive state

59:56

about all Mitch Albums

59:58

said, if you don't like the culture,

1:00:01

you have to be brave enough to create your own. I love

1:00:03

that, and by the way, that's what we

1:00:05

do in business, right. That's what you've done in your

1:00:08

business, is that you've created a culture that you

1:00:10

love, that is right for you,

1:00:13

and that's what you you

1:00:15

know, in the most positive way, infect your

1:00:17

team with is that beautiful culture

1:00:20

and that amazing way that you see

1:00:22

the world and the way that you do things,

1:00:24

and it makes your organization

1:00:26

unlike any other in the world. It's got

1:00:28

your thumbprint on it. That's

1:00:31

the beauty in a way of starting a business is

1:00:33

that you get to do it your way and

1:00:36

our love life can be the same. We

1:00:38

can decide what's the culture that

1:00:41

I want to have instead of commenting

1:00:43

on culture, what's the culture

1:00:45

I want to create in my love life? If

1:00:47

someone you know, if I'm sick

1:00:49

of this whole constant texting thing, or

1:00:52

why don't I be the one to leave someone a voice note

1:00:54

today? Like why if someone's

1:00:57

just sent me the fiftieth text, why

1:01:00

don't I send them back when they ask me how

1:01:02

am I doing today? Why not just

1:01:05

say maybe it's too scary to call them,

1:01:07

but maybe I just leave a voice note and say, hey,

1:01:10

how you doing. I thought i'd you know,

1:01:12

I thought i'd leave you a voice note. I'm out with my sister

1:01:14

right now. We're in Ikea. We're trying

1:01:17

to find furniture for this thing. I'll send you a picture

1:01:19

because I am dreading getting home and having to actually

1:01:21

make this. Tell me about your day,

1:01:24

like how you doing? Blah blah blah. Like you know, you can

1:01:26

inject a different level of energy and enthusiasm

1:01:30

or sexiness or flirtatiousness or

1:01:32

whatever it may be. A little laugh here, that's

1:01:34

endearing. You can do all of

1:01:36

that in a voice note in a way that when someone

1:01:39

listens to it, now it's not just

1:01:41

another text on their phone. You're like attacking

1:01:44

a different sense. And that

1:01:46

will increase the level

1:01:48

of intimacy even just by one percent

1:01:50

two percent, And that

1:01:53

might just make you like, that's

1:01:55

leadership because you're not just we spend

1:01:57

so much time mirroring people like

1:02:00

I'm going to mirror how someone else is, what

1:02:03

someone else is giving me, and this this person

1:02:05

I'm seeing, But we have to start modeling

1:02:07

more like it. Don't get me

1:02:09

wrong. If you model behavior that you

1:02:12

want to see by being the one who

1:02:14

picks up the phone first or leaves the voice note

1:02:16

and then they don't meet you there,

1:02:19

then you can say, Okay, I'm going to start

1:02:22

to mirror their lack of investment.

1:02:24

I'm going to start to back off. But you

1:02:26

can't just be in a state of mirroring

1:02:28

all the time.

1:02:29

Like this is such a good point.

1:02:30

It works on every level. Man, I was at

1:02:33

my coffee shop this morning and there's a guy there that

1:02:36

really like we always have like a really nice,

1:02:38

like three minute conversation, and

1:02:41

this morning like it never goes further

1:02:43

than that. But this morning as he was

1:02:45

going to the coffee bar, he said, can I get you

1:02:47

a coffee?

1:02:49

Now?

1:02:50

Like I remember in that moment, I thought

1:02:53

that was like a little moment

1:02:55

of like vulnerability and leadership.

1:02:58

That was like had the potential

1:03:00

to upgrade the relationship.

1:03:02

Do you know what I mean?

1:03:03

Like this is just another guy in a coffee shop,

1:03:05

but it was like, oh we might hear you

1:03:08

offered me a coffee. I say yes, And now like

1:03:11

our relationship is one way, you got me a Coffeeah

1:03:13

yeah, and now we might sit for ten minutes so on. That's

1:03:16

how things move, but they can't

1:03:19

move if you're in this like fearful protectionist.

1:03:21

I don't want to get hurt. I don't want to give

1:03:24

more than the other person. I don't want to That's

1:03:26

not a good standard to have. A great

1:03:28

standard to have is lead and

1:03:31

model the kind of culture you want

1:03:33

to see. And if someone doesn't

1:03:35

meet you there, that's where the standard

1:03:37

comes in. Yes, that's where you of

1:03:40

course the standard is modeling. But the counter

1:03:43

standard if they don't meet you there is to

1:03:45

say this isn't someone I'm going to continue

1:03:47

modeling that kind of investment for because

1:03:49

they're not meeting me there.

1:03:51

Yeah, that is Oh man, that is so well

1:03:53

put. And I'm so glad that you made

1:03:56

that so clear because I

1:03:58

couldn't agree with you more. I feel like we're

1:04:01

limiting ourselves so much and

1:04:04

we're actually creating what you just

1:04:06

ended on there. It's a really powerful point. We're

1:04:09

actually creating a culture that even

1:04:11

if this relationship lasts, it will be set

1:04:14

at the wrong level. So the culture of that

1:04:16

relationship now is we sometimes text,

1:04:18

we rarely call, and now, even if the relationship

1:04:20

lasts and we do like each other a little bit, it's

1:04:23

never going to change from that. So you're way

1:04:25

better off setting the standard and

1:04:27

the culture from day one and seeing if

1:04:29

it develops and grows. And I find

1:04:31

what most people do, and I think we've all experienced this is

1:04:34

for three to six months we try and not disrupt

1:04:36

the culture, and then six months later we're

1:04:38

like, no, no, no, but I always wanted this, and I thought we

1:04:40

were going to get there, and the person's like, no, no, no,

1:04:43

but this is what we are. And I

1:04:45

remember that Radi, who's

1:04:47

the only person I've ever been with since I left the monastery

1:04:49

like it was like she was the person that

1:04:52

I was fully clear with about

1:04:54

who I was, what are my expectations were, where

1:04:56

we were, and thankfully she was

1:04:58

that back too. And we had some

1:05:01

really hard conversations early on about

1:05:03

some big things that were important to her, not

1:05:05

important to me, important to me, not important

1:05:07

to her. And what I loved was how we talked

1:05:09

about those things and how we kind

1:05:12

of navigated those things. And it's

1:05:14

not that we're perfect and we don't have issues.

1:05:16

We have so many challenges. You know, we've been together for eleven

1:05:18

years now. There's so many things

1:05:21

that have come up over the years that have given

1:05:23

us different challenges. But

1:05:25

the difference is we set a culture of

1:05:28

how to deal with difficult things early

1:05:30

on. And I think what

1:05:32

I hear time and time again, and I know you hear this probably

1:05:35

ten xt the amount I hear this. It

1:05:38

all comes down to the fact that we want

1:05:40

people to like us

1:05:43

so bad that we're

1:05:45

willing to act unlike ourselves

1:05:48

in order for them to like us. Because

1:05:51

if they can like a version of us, then

1:05:53

that's good enough for us. And so if

1:05:55

the version is I never bother you, I never

1:05:57

text, I never call you, We

1:06:00

will be that person for you because

1:06:02

that makes you like me. We all love

1:06:04

to be referred to as that person who's like, oh,

1:06:07

yeah, they're low maintenance, and we love that label.

1:06:09

We're like, yeah, yeah, I'm low maintenance, and inside

1:06:11

we're like, yeah, I've

1:06:14

got way more needs than this. But

1:06:16

guess what I've set the culture of being low maintenance.

1:06:19

Now a year later they're like, wait

1:06:21

a minute, you were low maintenance here ago. Why are you high

1:06:23

maintenance? Yeah?

1:06:24

And there's two problems with that. One is that

1:06:26

it can actually make it so that someone

1:06:29

can't even really read us or our intentions.

1:06:31

It's a bit like when someone is like, wants

1:06:33

to be calling indifferent. Well,

1:06:36

if there's a story I tell in the book

1:06:38

of a friend of mine who was dating someone

1:06:40

and then went on a trip and

1:06:42

he didn't really reach out to her on that trip, and

1:06:46

by the time he got home after a few days,

1:06:49

she said to him on

1:06:52

the phone. It the fact

1:06:54

that you were away and you didn't

1:06:56

really speak to me made me feel

1:06:59

funny, made me feel like you may

1:07:01

have been sharing your bed with someone else and

1:07:04

they hadn't been on Like this isn't two people who had

1:07:06

been dating for six moneys. They'd been on a couple of dates,

1:07:08

but that was the

1:07:11

moment when he said to me, I think I liked this person

1:07:15

because there was an intentionality

1:07:17

to it. She didn't go, I'm being high

1:07:20

maintenance by saying this, she

1:07:23

just communicated what she was feeling. And

1:07:25

by doing that, instead of being cool

1:07:28

indifferent girl like chill,

1:07:30

I'm chill, Like I don't care that you didn't text

1:07:32

me while you're away, she went, no, no, no, no. It

1:07:35

made me feel funny, Yeah, because

1:07:38

it would. The subtext is it would hurt

1:07:40

me to know, like maybe we haven't

1:07:42

known each other that long, but it would still make me feel

1:07:44

something to know that you'd shared your bed with someone else while

1:07:46

you were away. That's

1:07:48

a very powerful thing to

1:07:51

do, because if he's

1:07:53

seeing multiple people in that moment, all

1:07:56

of them playing cool, indifferent whatever, he

1:07:58

now sees someone who who is

1:08:01

actually telegraphing the kind

1:08:03

of person she is, that she's a

1:08:05

three dimensional person with

1:08:08

real feelings and that

1:08:11

she wants something more. She is

1:08:13

not the kind of person to date

1:08:16

if you don't want something more. And

1:08:18

by the way, even the first time someone gets

1:08:20

like it's just a little bit jealous of

1:08:23

something can be a moment of intentionality

1:08:25

in a relationship because you the moment

1:08:28

you see someone's a little bit like, they

1:08:30

convey a little bit of even if it's playful jealousy.

1:08:33

I don't like that made me feel funny. You're

1:08:36

not allowed to text that, but whatever, you

1:08:38

can go you it almost can make you like

1:08:40

that person more because you can go, oh,

1:08:42

that's like it's almost

1:08:45

like you've telegraphed that we've gone to a

1:08:47

new level where jealousy is even possible.

1:08:50

Yeah, because at the beginning, jealousy wasn't

1:08:52

even possible, and now it is. You must like

1:08:54

me. I think I like you too. You know. It's like there's

1:08:56

a we're so afraid of

1:08:59

saying these things that actually telegraph

1:09:02

intentionality, which

1:09:05

is a really really powerful thing.

1:09:07

Yeah, but it all comes down

1:09:09

back to the root of we're so scared

1:09:12

because we're scared that that person will leave,

1:09:14

and often they will because their friends

1:09:17

saying to them, oh yeah, man, their psycho

1:09:20

are their obsessive leave right,

1:09:22

And so we don't want these extreme labels,

1:09:25

and I think often so we're scared

1:09:27

of looking unattractive, we're scared

1:09:29

of being unwanted. We're scared of being

1:09:31

rejected, right, That's the reason we don't say

1:09:33

any of this because we're like, if I say that, they're

1:09:36

going to think I'm psycho crazy, obsessed,

1:09:39

and I don't want to come across that way, and so

1:09:41

I won't say anything until one year on

1:09:43

which, by the way, they're going to think the same exact thing

1:09:45

when it's a full surprise. So I want to talk

1:09:47

to you about that. And then the other idea

1:09:50

that I see a lot of that people get stuck

1:09:52

on is when they say

1:09:54

something, they say it as a demand

1:09:58

or a command, where it's like, well,

1:10:00

I expect you to do this. And that's

1:10:02

where I think it's unhealthy because

1:10:05

I like someone being honest with me, but I

1:10:07

also don't want that to be my progress report

1:10:10

because I may have a really good thing to say

1:10:12

back. And so if I'm going to say back, if

1:10:14

someone was like if someone said that to me, like you didn't

1:10:16

contact me, I'll be like, yeah, you know what. When I

1:10:18

travel, I actually really struggle to stay

1:10:20

in touch with anyone because I'm really trying to be present.

1:10:23

I'm really trying to immerse. But now that I know that's

1:10:25

a value for you, next time I go away, let's

1:10:27

talk about how often we can both keep in touch

1:10:29

realistically, because I'm also not going to promise

1:10:31

I'm going to call you every single day, even if

1:10:33

I'm really excited about you, because I'm also

1:10:35

going to set my standard back. And I think often

1:10:38

people don't want to hear that.

1:10:39

Either.

1:10:39

They want to hear someone say, oh, of

1:10:42

course, I understand everything you're saying, and I'm

1:10:44

going to call you every day when I go away again. And so

1:10:46

one side is you're scared of getting fully rejected,

1:10:49

and the other side is you're scared of not getting

1:10:52

exactly what you want. And I don't think

1:10:54

both those expectations are useful because

1:10:57

you might get rejected and you're never

1:10:59

going to get exactly what you want in an authentic

1:11:02

way.

1:11:02

No, And I think that's why we if

1:11:04

we're the one who wants something,

1:11:07

we have to zoom out enough to look

1:11:10

at whether this person

1:11:13

and what they bring to our life and what

1:11:15

this relationship is like

1:11:18

holistically is enough

1:11:20

for us. Because we

1:11:22

may say I want this person to

1:11:24

call me every day, but that may

1:11:27

genuinely not be their style, right.

1:11:29

It's they're not someone who enjoys sitting on the phone

1:11:31

as much as you do. They

1:11:35

might pick up the phone and call you every couple of

1:11:37

days, but in the meantime they will text

1:11:39

you or you have to

1:11:41

It's like you have to zoom out and go. How

1:11:43

much of this relationship, not these

1:11:46

moments, whether they call or not. How much of this relationship

1:11:49

correct meets my needs? You

1:11:52

know, what are the fundamental

1:11:54

things? Well, I need to feel safe with someone,

1:11:57

like I need to feel like they actually want me and

1:12:00

that I'm not kind

1:12:02

of investing under a misapprehension

1:12:05

about what this is. I need

1:12:07

to know at a certain point that regardless

1:12:10

of our differences, we're giving this a go and

1:12:12

we're exclusive. So that

1:12:14

might be one thing. Another thing is I need to

1:12:16

feel like whether it's on

1:12:18

the exact platform I might have hoped, I

1:12:20

need to feel like I get enough communication,

1:12:24

you know, holistically in this relationship to

1:12:26

feel like I'm

1:12:29

actually connected to this person. You

1:12:32

know, if someone very very rarely travels

1:12:34

and then they go away and you don't hear from them a lot

1:12:36

when they travel, that may not be a big deal. If they're

1:12:38

on the road half the year and

1:12:40

then they're not really connecting with you while they're

1:12:43

traveling that's going to have a much bigger impact on

1:12:45

your life. It doesn't make them wrong,

1:12:48

but it might not be enough for you. Yeah,

1:12:50

and that's where we have to start getting

1:12:53

really honest with ourselves. We get so

1:12:55

caught up in who's

1:12:58

right and wrong, and we don't spend enough

1:13:00

time just asking is it right

1:13:02

for me? Does

1:13:05

this person work well with me? Are

1:13:07

we compatible? And compatibility

1:13:11

is everything you know you can't.

1:13:13

I talk about four levels of importance in any

1:13:16

relationship or any person, any

1:13:19

dynamic you have with a person. The

1:13:21

first one is admiration. That's

1:13:24

just you admiring someone. It doesn't mean very much.

1:13:26

They may not even know you exist. The second

1:13:28

one is mutual attraction. That's

1:13:30

when you actually know you like each other. The

1:13:32

third one is commitment. That's when you don't just like

1:13:34

each other, but you're actually saying yes to

1:13:37

the relationship. And the fourth one is

1:13:39

compatibility, because actually

1:13:41

love isn't all you need. You

1:13:44

need two people who actually work

1:13:46

well together. You know, is it's

1:13:48

not is this person you

1:13:51

know? Am I good at handling them? And

1:13:53

are they good at handling me? Like

1:13:56

that's a pretty I think that's a pretty good barometer

1:13:58

of a relationship I came.

1:14:01

To this is a great one.

1:14:02

Yeah, because you're gonna come with your stuff. This nonsense

1:14:05

of like we have to come to a relationship fully healed.

1:14:07

Who does No one who likes

1:14:10

an it's a it's this idea

1:14:12

that gets talked about that no one actually

1:14:15

does. No one comes to it.

1:14:17

Ever.

1:14:17

I'm to make myself whole and healed

1:14:19

and everything before a relationship. Good luck.

1:14:22

And by the way, half the people who say that

1:14:24

stuff, who have been married ten years, they

1:14:26

weren't that way when they met their partner. So

1:14:29

we find imperfect people.

1:14:32

You know that we are

1:14:34

damaged vessels that somehow

1:14:37

still work, and that's

1:14:39

beautiful. And we're trying to find another

1:14:42

damaged vessel that we

1:14:44

go. Oh, I understand the I

1:14:47

understand the fabric of their challenges

1:14:51

and what they struggle with, or

1:14:53

at least it makes sense to me when I

1:14:55

hear it. And you know, I have compassion for

1:14:57

it, and I have empathy for it, and I have affection for

1:14:59

it even and vice

1:15:02

versa. And so now when

1:15:04

we go through our inevitable

1:15:06

things, we're just good at handling

1:15:09

each other. So it's

1:15:12

when we when we have a standard

1:15:15

we may not end up exactly where we want

1:15:17

to be, but the ultimate

1:15:20

standard of holistically, are

1:15:22

you getting what you need from this relationship.

1:15:26

That's a really important question

1:15:28

that not enough people ask and

1:15:31

as a result they suffer in unhappy

1:15:33

relationships.

1:15:35

Yeah, it's so interesting to get into

1:15:37

that kind of you know, to

1:15:39

go beyond that superficial conversation of make

1:15:41

a list of what you want and like, you know,

1:15:44

try and find it out and you know that that kind

1:15:46

of ego centric list that we get. Let's let's

1:15:48

talk a bit about breakups, because I

1:15:51

think the challenge is that everyone in their

1:15:54

life goes through at least one or two maybe

1:15:57

more, really painful breakups.

1:15:59

Whether it's fidelity, whether it's out

1:16:02

it feels out of the blue, someone just

1:16:04

goes Yep, not working out for me anymore, whether

1:16:07

it's different goals and different

1:16:10

plans and priorities that emerge over time.

1:16:12

And I think everyone who goes through a breakup

1:16:16

blames it on themselves. Often thinks

1:16:18

that this is the end, there'll never be another

1:16:21

person, and it feels like a really

1:16:23

dark, dark, dark empty road

1:16:26

and a lonely road. And

1:16:30

I think it's really interesting because there's so many piece

1:16:33

of advice and everything about like how to get over a breakup,

1:16:35

and I've talked about that as well myself,

1:16:37

but I just find that it seems to be a

1:16:39

path that you have to walk and have to take

1:16:42

and there's no real acceleration or

1:16:45

there's not, as you said, there's not like I'm going to get over

1:16:47

this breakup in three months, right, there's no timeline

1:16:49

or deadline that you can set on it. But

1:16:52

it's just uncomfortable, and it's almost like sitting

1:16:54

in discomfort. What do we

1:16:56

do when we're sitting in that discomfort?

1:16:58

Well, when you're you're in the

1:17:01

depths of it, because there's different phases,

1:17:04

right, Like there's certainly a phase

1:17:06

of any heartbreak when it's genuine

1:17:09

deep heartbreak where you are

1:17:12

just questioning your existence, where

1:17:14

you are like.

1:17:16

This.

1:17:17

You know, I remember having my own heart broken and sitting

1:17:19

on the door the doorstep

1:17:22

of my house with a friend of mine

1:17:26

and just with tears in my eyes saying

1:17:28

to him, I just feel like I'm not

1:17:31

good enough. Like that

1:17:33

was my deep sense, was

1:17:35

that I am not good enough, and if I was

1:17:38

good enough, I would have been able to

1:17:40

make this work. And that's

1:17:45

it's a horrible place to be, and

1:17:48

you you know, we have to have compassion for

1:17:50

ourselves in those times because it's

1:17:54

brutally difficult. It's

1:17:57

a time where we just need love

1:18:00

and we need to celebrate

1:18:02

the fact that we got through another day

1:18:05

and that we got I managed

1:18:07

to get out of bed today, and

1:18:10

you know, it was an act of it was

1:18:12

a heroic act for me to just get out of

1:18:15

bed. We then have to

1:18:17

you know, I always think that all

1:18:20

of these moments give us gears

1:18:22

that we wouldn't have had otherwise. And

1:18:25

the worst pain of my life has given me access

1:18:29

to gears that I didn't know I had.

1:18:33

And as much as no one wants to hear

1:18:35

it when they're in it, those gears

1:18:37

turn out to be really valuable. They

1:18:41

really do. I mean, we

1:18:43

all choose suffering in our lives. Like

1:18:46

we choose to go to the gym that's

1:18:48

choosing suffering. We choose

1:18:51

like to write a book choosing

1:18:53

a form of suffering. We choose to make

1:18:56

a podcast, or we choose to climb a literal

1:18:58

mountain, or like we choose pain

1:19:02

in our lives regularly because

1:19:04

we know that it gives us. There are benefits

1:19:07

to be had I have to argue

1:19:09

that the benefit I have gotten from the pain

1:19:12

that I didn't choose has

1:19:14

been no less valuable than the benefit I've gotten

1:19:16

from the pain I did choose. In fact, actually

1:19:19

I think the most valuable pain I've ever had is

1:19:21

the pain I didn't choose. And

1:19:24

when you realize that, you

1:19:26

can kind of almost I think,

1:19:29

look at some of the worst moments of

1:19:31

your life as

1:19:33

like a menu of pain, and

1:19:36

beside the item on the menu is

1:19:38

the very specific, unique benefits

1:19:40

that can only come from this kind of pain, and

1:19:45

you can kind of imagine yourself choosing, like

1:19:48

retroactively choosing that pain, which

1:19:51

is a very valuable thing to do. Because

1:19:53

I was told by a psychologist about an experiment

1:19:56

on rats where one

1:19:59

rat was on a wheel

1:20:02

and was just given, you know, like

1:20:04

the free reign to just run whenever

1:20:07

it wanted to run. There was another

1:20:09

rat, this was Rat A. Rap B

1:20:12

was connected to that wheel. He

1:20:14

was on another wheel that was

1:20:16

connected to Rat A's wheel, and

1:20:20

any time Rat A chose to

1:20:22

run, Rap B had to run

1:20:25

right, so both doing the same

1:20:27

amount of exercising. But

1:20:30

at the end of the experiment, Rat A shows

1:20:32

all the positive markers of exercise and

1:20:35

rap B shows all the negative markers of stress.

1:20:37

Oh wow, same

1:20:40

amount of exercise was the difference?

1:20:42

Well, rat A chose to run, rat

1:20:45

B didn't. And there's

1:20:48

something profound about that to

1:20:51

me, because if we can take a situation

1:20:53

that we didn't choose, who would choose to be heartbroken?

1:20:55

Right?

1:20:55

It's the worst, it's a terrible pain. But

1:20:59

what if in that pain

1:21:01

you did realize, like, there is something

1:21:04

here that I'm going to gain

1:21:06

from this experience that

1:21:09

I couldn't have any other way. That

1:21:11

if I look on that menu of pain, this

1:21:14

one has some really good benefits, Like

1:21:16

this one has some really amazing stuff.

1:21:18

Who I'm going to have to become to get through this. What

1:21:21

I'm going to have to learn, The way

1:21:24

I'm going to have to get comfortable even just to get through

1:21:26

a weekend right

1:21:28

now on my own is

1:21:31

it is going to be this unbelievable

1:21:34

feat and to get comfortable

1:21:36

in my own company and to sit in this pain,

1:21:39

and there are such

1:21:41

profound benefits from that. What if

1:21:44

I did actually look at those benefits

1:21:46

and say they're so powerful that

1:21:49

I'm going to choose this pain so that I

1:21:51

can experience those benefits, and so

1:21:54

you turn yourself from rat B to

1:21:56

rat A, and all of a sudden, you're not a

1:21:58

victim of that pain any more. You're

1:22:01

the beneficiary of

1:22:04

these exquisite gifts that you could only

1:22:06

get this way, and that

1:22:09

only there's one tool I've used

1:22:12

to get through some of the worst, worst

1:22:14

pain of my life. And then

1:22:16

on a practice and on a psychological

1:22:18

level, with heartbreak, what

1:22:21

I always remind people is that

1:22:24

if anyone who doesn't

1:22:26

choose you cannot be for you.

1:22:28

They if they don't see you like

1:22:31

what is a relationship. It's someone sees

1:22:34

you, they accept you, and they

1:22:36

want that. That's

1:22:39

the most beautiful part of a relationship. So

1:22:41

if someone doesn't see you and accept

1:22:44

you and want what they see, then

1:22:46

this relationship is missing the most beautiful

1:22:49

part of any relationship. It shouldn't

1:22:51

even be you know, it shouldn't be desirable

1:22:53

at that stage because it's not. It

1:22:57

has failed the fundamental test

1:22:59

of what makes a relationlationship worth having. We're

1:23:01

not talking about a person who you

1:23:03

know, in at least the case I feel,

1:23:05

we're talking about the person who was taken

1:23:08

from us by life. We're talking

1:23:10

about a person who's just walking

1:23:12

around somewhere, still existing

1:23:15

on the planet, but choosing not to

1:23:17

be with us. That

1:23:19

should lose its romance to us, you

1:23:23

know, and to say, well, if that's

1:23:25

the other game we play is if it was a different

1:23:28

time in life, if they were a bit older, they

1:23:30

would have been ready to commit, If they

1:23:32

had been in a different phase where they weren't so busy with

1:23:34

their work, they might have had the space to really give

1:23:37

to this relationship. But they said their work isn't

1:23:39

allowing them to. If it's like,

1:23:41

we go through all these scenarios where

1:23:45

it forces us into this sad

1:23:47

love song of right person, wrong time,

1:23:51

and that's a really like

1:23:54

pernicious story. That's

1:23:57

a very dangerous story because

1:24:00

it takes what

1:24:03

belongs in the realm of science fiction and

1:24:06

brings it into our reality. Like

1:24:09

when we're thinking about an X from like five years

1:24:11

ago and we're like, I miss them.

1:24:14

I don't know why, you know, you don't even

1:24:16

know who they are anymore. That

1:24:18

was five years ago. They're a different person

1:24:20

now in many ways. You're a different person now. In anyway if

1:24:22

you've got together now, you'd be getting together

1:24:24

as different people you miss. A ghost

1:24:27

person doesn't exist anymore in the way that you think

1:24:30

they do. You know, and when you're saying,

1:24:32

oh, if only we met five years from now,

1:24:34

it would have worked in what parallel

1:24:37

universe? It's a this is science

1:24:39

fiction like, it's not. It

1:24:41

didn't happen in this universe. So it's

1:24:44

it's like it is wishing for

1:24:48

a parallel universe where everything

1:24:51

all the Domino's unfolded in a different

1:24:53

way. It's not this universe. So

1:24:56

we just we have to get out of

1:24:58

this mind because it

1:25:01

gets us bought into a

1:25:04

science fiction story that doesn't

1:25:06

really exist. I don't believe in the right person

1:25:09

at the wrong time. It's the

1:25:11

right person is right in

1:25:14

their personality, they're ready,

1:25:18

and their life is compatible with yours.

1:25:21

If you're missing one of those three things, then

1:25:24

it's not the right person. The right person has

1:25:26

to be more than someone who you have a great time with and

1:25:28

you like who they are and have great conversation

1:25:31

and and and great intimacy. That can't

1:25:34

That's not the only criteria for someone

1:25:36

who's right. So we have to stop telling ourself

1:25:38

the story that someone

1:25:41

who you know broke up with us,

1:25:43

or it was bad timing or whatever. Is

1:25:45

the right person for us. That is a that

1:25:48

is just a story. It

1:25:50

is not reality. The

1:25:52

right person is the person it happens.

1:25:54

With Matthew Asi books

1:25:56

called Love Life. That was that hit

1:25:58

right there, man, that have resonated

1:26:01

so deeply. If you haven't already gone

1:26:03

and ordered this while you're listening or watching, please

1:26:06

please please go and grab this book. As you can tell, Matthew's

1:26:09

just woven beautifully his own experiences,

1:26:11

his own challenges, mixed with insights,

1:26:13

lessons, research, practical

1:26:15

steps.

1:26:15

I mean, it's all in the book.

1:26:17

And today we've just given you a little tip

1:26:19

of the iceberg of And this

1:26:22

was genuinely just a real conversation of me and Matthew

1:26:24

going back and forth, which we need to do a lot more of, but

1:26:27

just sitting here with you today, Matthew, I've gained

1:26:29

so much, so much,

1:26:32

honestly, and as someone who's written

1:26:34

a book about love too, there was so much today that I feel like we

1:26:36

uncovered and unpacked, and so I can't wait

1:26:38

for people to dive into Love Life, how

1:26:40

to raise your standards, find your person, and live

1:26:43

happily no matter what. Grab your copy

1:26:45

now, Matthew. Thank you again everyone

1:26:47

who's been listening to watching, share and tag your

1:26:50

greatest insights with me and Matthew on Instagram

1:26:53

on TikTok. I know you guys are cutting up all these amazing

1:26:55

clips.

1:26:55

Keep them coming.

1:26:56

Let us know what resonated with you, what you're

1:26:58

trying out, what you're practice seeing, what you're implementing,

1:27:01

what's working for you, and something that

1:27:03

you're struggling with as well.

1:27:04

Let us know so that we can.

1:27:06

Try to create more conversations and more

1:27:08

content that can support you on your

1:27:10

journey.

1:27:11

Matthew, thank you. Any last words you anything you want

1:27:13

to share.

1:27:14

No, I would just say if people

1:27:16

go to lovelifebook dot com, not only can

1:27:18

you get the book there from any retailer you

1:27:20

want, but I'm doing an event on May

1:27:22

fourth called Find Your Person is

1:27:24

designed to be this It's a virtual event, so

1:27:26

you could do it from wherever you are in the world, wherever you

1:27:28

buy the book from. But

1:27:31

we're all going to get together and I'm going to take everything

1:27:33

that you learn from the book and apply it to a

1:27:35

year plan with you. I love that anyone

1:27:37

who is like finding my Person is

1:27:40

a real priority for me in my life

1:27:42

is what I deeply want. I'm not ashamed

1:27:44

of it. I want that for myself. This

1:27:47

is going to take all of the knowledge and the awareness

1:27:49

and the ideas you have from the book and

1:27:52

actually put you on a path in this live event

1:27:55

to getting that over the course of the next.

1:27:56

Year of our life Love livebook dot Com.

1:27:58

Yeah, if you go to Love Lifebook dot you can not only

1:28:00

get the book, you can use your receipt from the

1:28:02

book to get a free ticket to this event.

1:28:05

It's not a you know, it's not a paid for event.

1:28:07

No one can come just by buying their way

1:28:09

onto it. It's literally something that's just reserved

1:28:11

for everyone who's getting a copy of the book.

1:28:13

I love that. That's a beautiful idea. Man. Well,

1:28:15

yeah, lovelifebook dot com everyone, that's the place

1:28:17

to go.

1:28:18

If you love this episode, you're going to

1:28:20

love my conversation with Matthew Hussey

1:28:22

on how to get over your ex and find

1:28:25

true love in your relationships.

1:28:27

People should be compassionate to themselves that

1:28:30

extend that compassion to your future

1:28:32

self, because truly extending

1:28:34

your compassion to your future self is doing

1:28:37

something that gives him or her a shot

1:28:39

at a happy and a peaceful life.