Latest / INSPIRE STORY / How to Get Over Your Ex and Find True Love in Your Relationships.

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How to Get Over Your Ex and Find True Love in Your Relationships. · INSPIRE STORY

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: If you're listening to this and you're in an unhappy situation,
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  I get it. I get how hard it is. One
• 0:05
  of the things that can help is to say this
• 0:08
  demon would come out with another person too.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the number one
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  health podcast in the world. Thanks to each and every
• 0:23
  single one of you that come back every week to listen, learn,
• 0:27
  and grow. Now you know that I love sitting down
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  with experts, people that have dedicated their life, their time,
• 0:32
  and their years to understanding more about human behavior, human dynamics,
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  and understanding how our mind works. And today I'm sitting
• 0:40
  down with someone that I wanted to meet for a
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  long long time. I've watched his YouTube videos for years.
• 0:45
  I've been a fan of his content for many many
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  years on Instagram and other platforms. We've been trying to
• 0:50
  get together, and we finally made it happen. I'm talking
• 0:53
  about none other the New York Times best selling author,
• 0:56
  international speaker, and dating expert math Hussy Matthew. Thank you
• 1:01
  for being here.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: That's up man, Thanks for having me. I share the sentiment.
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  I wanted to do this for years, and somehow they
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  the planet's never aligned until now I know.
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  Speaker 2: I remember messaging with you on Instagram. I think I
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  was actually in London at the time a few years back,
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  and there was a video that we were going to
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  do together. It was one of these dating videos that
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  you were doing and you're like, oh, do you want to?
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  And I was in London, but I don't know how
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  we kept missing out.
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  Speaker 1: We even had a brief phone call where we were
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  like connected and got on really well and yeah, I
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  know we're both mutual friends of Lewis Howees and it
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  just yeah, it's fun though, to finally be in the
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  same room and do this, it's fun.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I feel like it's a momentous occasion because
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  England's playing in the final on Sunday, Like we've been
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  brought together as two Brits. And have you decided where
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  you're watching the final? You don't know.
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  Speaker 1: I have to be in true introverted fashion. I have
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  to be at home, like I like being with my
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  family because I do like the energy of people who
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  really care. What drives me mad is when you've got
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  people who have no idea what they're talking about. Yeah,
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  at a screen during a match, and I genuinely love
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  hearing all of the commentary so like, I'm one of
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  those people. I'm a fight fan, like boxing, and so
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  when there's a big boxing match, I'm like, all right,
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  everyone can come over, but just I want to hear
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  the commentary. So like, I hate that bar environment of
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  everyone yelling at the screen.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, so yeah, I get that. Yeah. No, I've actually
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  I lead a spiritual book club on Sunday and half
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  of it is bang in the first half of the game.
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  So I'm only going to get to what's the second half.
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  Speaker 1: It's hard for me to imagine anything more different than
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  the energy of English fans back home than a spiritual
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  book club.
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  Speaker 2: Literally, this is like a really it's like an intimate
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  it's a group of friends that are a spiritual book
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  club for happens every Sunday. And it's eleven to one,
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  So eleven to twelve I'm going to be doing. Sorry,
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  eleven to one, and so the game starts at twelve.
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  Heres man, Yeah, I'll get the second half, but no,
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  thank you for being here man. And like I said,
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  I've watched your videos for years, senior interviews, senior books,
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  senor not seeing you on stage in person. I look
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  forward to being able to do that. But I wanted
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  to start with the question I'm not sure if I'm
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  not sure if I've seen you been asked this before,
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  but I wanted to ask you, like, what's your favorite
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  love story ever? Or is there one that you have,
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  whether it's a real life wine, a client, a personal experience,
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  a book, is you know what's your favorite story of love?
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  Speaker 1: That is a really tricky question. There's a movie I
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  saw recently. It's a Japanese movie called Weathering with You.
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  Speaker 2: I've not seen that.
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  Speaker 1: It's an animated movie. This guy he created what was
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  at one time the biggest grossing anime of all time.
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  But this movie Weathering with You is about a young
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  guy and a girl who you know in this kind
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  of this young love, there's this kind of mythical story
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  where she it's constantly raining in Tokyo and she has
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  the power to make the rain go away. They call
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  her a Sunshine Girl, but and everyone she's soprised because
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  she's the Sunshine Girl, and so she's constantly called upon
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  by people who are running events or fireworks displays or
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  whatever to come along and make it stop raining. Only
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  and I spoiler alert for anyone who's not seen Weathering
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  with you by the way, I've come back in three minutes.
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  But there's every time she does it, she starts, a
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  piece of herself starts to disappear, and it gets to
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  the point where she completely floats up into the sky
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  and no longer has a presence here on earth because
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  she's given so much as the Sunshine Girl. And there's
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  a moment where he goes to save her from up
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  in the clouds because he realizes she can't. You know,
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  even if she comes back down to earth and never
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  does another thing as a Sunshine Girl and all it
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  does is rain all day, still chooses her.
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  Speaker 2: Wow.
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  Speaker 1: And for me, at least, I'm not saying the director
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  meant this, but it's so beautiful because it felt to
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  me like a story of a person who is accepting
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  that even if being with you means that it's that
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  it's raining, yeah, I still choose you. I don't just
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  choose you when the sun is shining. And that there's
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  something stunningly beautiful to me about that, because that's a
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  it's a much more grown up kind of love than
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  the one that we tend to look for in our twenties, yeah,
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  or as teenagers, and some of us for the rest
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  of our lives, where you know, we love someone as
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  long as the sun is shining, but when when the
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  chips are down and when things are tough, they start
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  reassessing everything.
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  Speaker 2: That's a beautiful answer. I love that. That was wonderful.
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  I mean, like I love movies too, So when you
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  said a movie and I've not seen that movie, so
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  that sounds amazing. I love that. What a great love story.
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  And yeah, now I don't know should I still watch
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  the movie?
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  Speaker 1: I really And there's another movie he did prior to
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  that called Your Name, okay, and there's something very beautiful
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  about his movies. Yeah, I would check them out.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, I'll take a look. Yeah, no, I love that.
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  And it's so interesting with what you refer to there
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  this idea of the view we have of love and
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  relationships in our teens, in our twenties, or like you said,
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  for some people their whole life. How do you think
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  your view of love has changed while helping people create
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  find keep love. I mean, you know you've been on
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  this amazing journey. You've been doing this for what decade now?
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  Fifteen years? Right, okay, so you've been in this for
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  fifteen years. How is your view of love changed over
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  the last fifteen years of actually working with people and
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  speaking on stages, being interviewed in all these places.
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  Speaker 1: I suppose getting older myself and I realize I'm still,
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  relatively speaking, a young man, but getting older myself, it's
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  become much more apparent to me the importance of reevaluating
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  is actually important in a partner, and we tend to
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  our younger selves. We do have this list of things
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  that we think we want that seem important. Might be charisma,
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  It might be the fact that you know someone is
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  super sexy because they can speak three languages, or that
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  you know they've achieved a certain status in their life
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  or an award or whatever. They can play the guitar,
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  and we we rate these things as these things, and
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  we know when we think of losing someone, we look
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  at all of those things and go, I couldn't lose them.
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  You know, they're funny and they're charismatic, and they're super
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  fun to be around, and they're sexy, and they can
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  play the guitar, and they can you know, speak three languages.
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  And it still is a kind of Instagram profile version
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  of a person. And someone recently said to me, like
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  I'm in a relationship with the guy, and you know,
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  he plays the guitar and I find that really sexy
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  and he's really good looking, and I'm like, he doesn't
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  need in order to be in a relationship with you.
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  He doesn't need to be great at music. He needs
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  to be great at a relationship. And if you want
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  to hear someone play guitar really well, go to a
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  John Mayer concert. Yeah, Like, you don't need that every
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  day in your relationship. What's important in a relationship is
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  someone who is really competent in a relationship and has
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  those skills, and those skills are hard. One. It's one
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  of the reasons that relationships with big age gaps don't work.
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  It's not because there is necessarily a chasm in the
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  way these two people feel. It's that there is a
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  huge chasm when it comes to their relationship competence and
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  their experience, and that really does matter. And if you're
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  with someone who has a far lower level of relationship experience,
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  then they either have to learn through you, which is
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  going to be a painful process. They're going to make
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  a lot of mistakes, They're going to hurt you a
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  lot in the process. That you're going to feel like
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  you're going to have to be careful of avoiding the
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  role of teacher constantly in the relationship and try and
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  be equals in a situation that's inherently kind of unequal.
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  And you're going to have to hope that they do
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  learn those skills. You're making quite a big bet on
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  the idea that one day they will have that skill set.
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  Some people take most of their lives to get it,
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  and some people never learn it because they're not the
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  kind of people that want to grow and be self
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  aware and do the work. And so I have come
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  to really believe that my view of love has changed
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  to the extent that I think firstly, the idea year
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  of you know, is it about meeting the right person
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  or is it about being the right time? And I've
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  started to wait my opinion far more towards time. Wow
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  that when you have decided it's the right time for
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  you to really meet someone, you go into love with
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  a completely different intentionality. Love isn't happening to you. It's
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  not this wave that's washing over you, which is super easy.
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  When a wave's washing over you just stand there and
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  just asking the goodness of how wonderful. It feels to
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  feel that sort of drug, But that's not the same
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  things as intentionally. There's a difference between winning the lottery
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  and starting a business. You know, when you start a business,
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  there's a method, there's a practical there's a pragmatism to it,
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  the things you need to do in order to build
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  this thing. And I think that that to me, it's
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  I don't I think I've developed a less romantic view.
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  I actually, if anything, have more and more and more
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  come to see a person who's in a place where
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  they're willing to actually do the work of a relationship
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  as romantic. And I think people consistently get burned when
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  they're not factoring into the equation of how right someone is,
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  whether this person is demonstrating that they are also at
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  a time in their life where they're looking for the
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  same thing and be that they have genuine great relationship skills.
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  Like you know, we're all going to argue at some point,
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  but how do we argue right? That's just one area,
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  but it's a huge thing. So that to me would
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  probably be the biggest shift. I believe in timing more
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  these days, and I believe that we we undervalue to
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  an incredible extent genuine relationship skills and we owe a
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  value just kind of mindless attraction.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I love that answer, man, That's so fascinating
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  to compare person versus time. And yeah, I often say
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  to my friends, like, the most romantic thing in the
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  world is someone who's trying to build relationship competence. Like that,
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  that is the most romantic expression that someone can have.
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  I love the way you talk about relationship skills and
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  we're talking about relationship competence. I find that actually, and
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  I can say this for my relationships too. Before I
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  met my wife and with now, relationship competence always felt
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  like both people didn't have it. I don't think I
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  was in many relations where I had it and the
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  person didn't actually think for many years it was just
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  we both had like me and the other person, we
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  both had zero relationship competence. How do you think people
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  build relationship competence? Because it almost feels like, and you're right,
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  and you know, I know, we both agree on this,
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  that you just expect to know how to be in
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  a relationship and you kind of just you're almost expected
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  to know that. Oh yeah, you start dating and then
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  you know what to do next, and none of us
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  know what to do next or now. Tell us about
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  how you go about building relationship competence and what are
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  the skills that you kind of break it down into
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  for people to think about that.
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  Speaker 1: Well, firstly, I had very much the same experience as you.
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  I always thought I was such a great guy in relationships.
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  I really did like I always thought I was. So
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  you know, the line Imas used to say about myself is,
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  you know, I, Yeah, maybe I wasn't ready, or maybe
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  I wasn't in a place where I wanted the same thing,
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  but I was a great partner while I was in it.
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  It wasn't true.
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  Speaker 2: No, I was. I was.
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  Speaker 1: What's the word. I was a gentleman. I was respectful
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  in many ways. I've always been kind. That's always been
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  a through line of my life. But you could be
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  kind and dumb. Yeah, and you can hurt a lot
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  of people when you're kind and dumb, you know. And
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  so I look back on myself and it sometimes it
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  takes someone who's better than you at a certain part
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  of a relationationship, maybe not the whole thing, but they
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  come along and you notice that they you know, going
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  back to that example, argue differently than you do. You
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  went into fight mode and they they went into compassion
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  mode and said, look, babe, I know, I know you
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  feel like this, but he's like the way you're reacting
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  right now, here's how it's making me feel. And you go, oh,
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  that was different. What was that. It's like you learn
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  a new move. What was that move? I haven't seen
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  that one before. I'm usually I've been in relationships where
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  I say this, and then you give me the silent treatment,
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  and then I have just I feel justified in then
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  being mean because you're going silent, and now we amp
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  it up. And now, all of a sudden, you come
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  across someone who takes you off road, and and that's
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  a scary moment. And when someone takes you off road,
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  you have two choices. You can either you you can
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  either be afraid of that and there's something uncomfortable about
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  it because you're not used to it. Even kindness can
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  be uncomfortable if you're not used to it, absolutely right,
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  But when someone takes you off road, that that really
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  is an opportunity to watch what someone else is doing.
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  I think the same is true in business. Right it's
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  you you see someone else who just did a different thing,
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  like in your industry, someone did someone took a turn
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  that everyone else didn't. And you can either be the
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  person who says, what are they? What are they? What's that?
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  Why are they doing that? That's the stupid or they
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  think that's going to work like or you can go, well,
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  that's interesting, no one else is doing that. Why are
• 15:39
  they doing that? That's let me let me check that out,
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  Like you could be curious about it, especially if you think, oh,
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  there's something to that what they're doing. Yes, So I
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  think that the exploring areas where someone isn't doing the
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  same thing as you and it takes you into a
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  different experience that's not bad. It's like it almost feels like, oh,
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  this is uncomfortable. But maybe it's showing me something I'm
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  not very good at, you know. Maybe they just maybe
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  they went out with their friends and I picked a
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  fight because I'm jealous about something that I think is
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  I've got this portrayal of what's going on. Whatever. I
• 16:15
  went out with my friends and they said, hey, have
• 16:17
  the best night, baby, and I'm like, oh, that's weird.
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  Everyone I've been with so far as when I go
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  out with my friends, they get super jealous and that
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  always makes me feel like I've got something to resist.
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  But now I just went out and they said have
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  the best night. By the way, you look gorgeous, and
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  I'm like, uh, okay, what's that? That's a new move?
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  Which is what's that one? You know? And you learn
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  something and that you pay attention because you go that
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  was really interesting. That made me. My God, that made me.
• 16:46
  That made me when I was out think about them
• 16:48
  half the time, you know, and think what a sexy,
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  confident person they are. I want to make her feel
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  that when she next goes out, and that apparently that's
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  how you do that. Oh that's interesting and you learn
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  from it. So I think that there's a learning that
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  we get from relationships. But in order to do that,
• 17:06
  you actually have to be in a space of being
• 17:10
  willing to put eyes on yourself and in a constant
• 17:14
  student mindset, which most of us are not. You know,
• 17:17
  we do go into relationships a lot of us thinking
• 17:20
  we know it all, we learned it all from our
• 17:22
  last relationship. But there's there is it's a cliche, but
• 17:26
  they're just there's always another level. There are so many
• 17:30
  levels to life, and it fascinates me because I'm always
• 17:34
  thinking that. I'm just thinking, my god, there are so
• 17:36
  many people that are so good at so many different things.
• 17:40
  Like I'm not saying everyone's better than us. They might
• 17:42
  be good at this one piece of the puzzle, but
• 17:45
  you watch how they do it, and you go, that's
• 17:46
  really interesting. There's something to learn from that. But if
• 17:49
  we're constantly trying to defend our own position and trying
• 17:53
  to feel like what we do is the right way,
• 17:56
  will never We'll never learn that. And I do. I'm
• 17:59
  a believer in I'm a believer in therapy or anything
• 18:04
  that gets you to be to look at yourself in
• 18:08
  a in a constructive way, and and someone in front
• 18:13
  of you who's not going to give you the answers
• 18:15
  that you want. You know, I remember a long time
• 18:18
  ago me saying to a friend like, I'm in I
• 18:24
  was in this relationship and I was like, you know,
• 18:26
  this person wants to speak a lot and I've you know,
• 18:30
  I've got this, and I've got this and I've got this,
• 18:33
  and I was expecting him to be like, well, she
• 18:36
  sounds like a lot of work, Like she sounds really difficult. Man,
• 18:40
  that's yeah, Like tell me about it and instead, he went,
• 18:43
  I'm kind of with her on this one. Yeah, like, actually,
• 18:47
  it's super important that you he was, like, he actually
• 18:51
  said to me, it's funny he goes you, he goes
• 18:54
  I go to the gym one tenth of the time
• 18:57
  you do. But I have a body like a bag
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  of milk, he said. So you get what you pay for,
• 19:04
  you know, And in your relationship, you get what you
• 19:06
  pay for.
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: You know.
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  Speaker 1: If you want it to be great, invest in it.
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  And that's that friend or that mentor or that therapist.
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  Speaker 2: Don't ever see them again.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: Fire there. They're weight in gold because we surround ourselves
• 19:23
  with you know people, you know, men surround themselves with
• 19:27
  the boys club. Oh man, she sounds differ. You know,
• 19:30
  that's so high maintenance, blah blah blah. And women surround
• 19:34
  themselves with their friends who sit around and say, I
• 19:36
  can't believe he did. I can't believe he said that
• 19:39
  to you. I can't. And half of them sometimes are
• 19:41
  sitting there going you kind of seem like the unreasonable
• 19:44
  one here, But they don't tell her, and then she
• 19:47
  gets further ingrained in this way of thinking. In fact,
• 19:51
  they even may amp her up and send her back
• 19:54
  into a relationship charged now and even more defiant and
• 19:59
  now you know, you get even more conflicts, so that those,
• 20:03
  to me are some of the key ways to learn
• 20:05
  and and just to be open, always, always, always, always
• 20:08
  be open.
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that. I love that. I think it's
• 20:11
  so true. And I love what you said about how
• 20:12
  like it's not like you're going to meet the mentor
• 20:15
  and your partner or the coach or the guru, but
• 20:17
  like they may be just better at one thing with
• 20:20
  maybe great at just one area of a relationship. And
• 20:22
  that's what you're kind of mining and picking from my
• 20:25
  When I look back at what you're saying in my relationship,
• 20:27
  I'm trying to reflect it. In my teens, I realized
• 20:29
  I had a serious issue with I just loved being loved,
• 20:35
  and so I was kind. I identify with so much
• 20:38
  of what you said. I was always kind. I was
• 20:39
  always a gentleman that was always like generous. But I
• 20:44
  realized that in my teens I would go above and
• 20:45
  beyond to want someone to fall in love with me.
• 20:49
  And that's all I wanted. All I actually wanted was
• 20:52
  for someone to fall in love with me, and it
• 20:54
  didn't actually matter who it was. Sometimes like it wasn't
• 20:56
  even that I really liked them or knew them, I understand.
• 21:00
  I just wanted that feeling of this person loves me.
• 21:03
  And what would often happen is they would fall in
• 21:05
  love with me because I'd be the perfect guy by
• 21:07
  giving them gives and remembering this and whatever it was.
• 21:10
  And then I would feel like they're not giving me
• 21:12
  anything back. Now I feel like the one. I'm the
• 21:15
  one who's doing all the loving and there's no love back,
• 21:17
  which I've only created myself because of my crazy cycle.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: Totally relate to all of that. And I was that
• 21:22
  guy too, And those guys will often look at guys
• 21:29
  who are kind of the textbook the textbook jerk yeah,
• 21:33
  and be like, well he's awful, yes, Like you know
• 21:37
  he slept with her and he completely ghosted her and
• 21:39
  he never called her again, or he'd disrespect whatever he's
• 21:43
  It's easy to point to that guy, yeah, and being like,
• 21:46
  what a piece of crap that guy is, But we're
• 21:51
  more dangerous.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: I would then break up with them because I didn't
• 21:56
  feel loved, and then I'd feel like I was the
• 21:59
  victim and that I'd the one not treated well. And
• 22:01
  then my wife broke me because I tried to. I
• 22:03
  did the same thing with her. I was always like,
• 22:05
  but she wasn't impressed by any of the ways I
• 22:07
  tried to love her apart from being me. And that
• 22:10
  was when it all kind of like unraveled, and I
• 22:12
  was like, oh, I finally found someone who actually didn't
• 22:16
  want all the stuff I was trying to do to
• 22:18
  get her to love me. And so my wife was
• 22:20
  the kind of person who broke through that barrier because
• 22:22
  she just didn't care about the stuff or the memory
• 22:27
  or the gifting or the extravagant like she hated all
• 22:31
  that stuff. And so all of a sudden, my technique
• 22:33
  wasn't It wasn't even a technique. It was genuine in
• 22:36
  my delusion, but it wasn't working anymore, right, And that's
• 22:41
  when I had to really look at it, because I
• 22:42
  really loved my wife and I was like, oh, I
• 22:44
  actually have to really look at this. And so she
• 22:46
  was the one who broke that and taught me that
• 22:49
  idea that's beautiful.
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, So it took someone who valued something completely different
• 22:56
  terms of the thing that the weapon you were used
• 22:58
  to choosing the move, the move that I took away
• 23:02
  all of your special moves, all the power you have
• 23:04
  to fight this fight now with none of these special moves,
• 23:07
  and then you're all of a sudden, like you say,
• 23:09
  it's like being stripped.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: There.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: Now I get a chance to truly be loved for
• 23:15
  who I am, not the performance that I'm doing in
• 23:20
  the beginning, which, as you say, it's not that, it's
• 23:22
  not it's.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: Not in Yeah, it wasn't like I was manipult. It
• 23:25
  wasn't manipulative.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: It's genuinely about getting something for ourselves completely as opposed
• 23:32
  to genuinely about discovering somebody else or building something or whatever.
• 23:37
  And and I did the same thing, and it's it's
• 23:41
  one of the great you know, I deal with my God.
• 23:44
  In my company, we're dealing with I mean, millions of
• 23:48
  women a month worldwide, but tens of thousands in terms
• 23:52
  of real coaching. And the one of the biggest problems
• 23:58
  is people falling people really quickly, falling in love too fast,
• 24:04
  where it's because they went on a couple of great
• 24:07
  dates with the guy and they can look at the
• 24:09
  date and go, he was amazing, and you should have
• 24:13
  seen what he did and how he was on the date,
• 24:16
  and all of that and the thing I have to
• 24:17
  always break down is that may not have been about you.
• 24:23
  It is about something he wanted you to feel by
• 24:27
  the end of the date, and not that you know,
• 24:33
  I'm a I kind of loathe this culture we have
• 24:35
  right now where everyone's a narcissist, like we call We're
• 24:39
  so quick to like label he's a narcissist, she's a narcissist,
• 24:42
  like I'm like, not everyone like we all have a
• 24:45
  narcissistic streak, absolutely, and we all exhibit narcissistic behaviors at time.
• 24:50
  That doesn't mean we're a diagnosable, but a narcissistic streak
• 24:55
  we all have early in dating and to differing degrees,
• 25:00
  is the desire to impress rather than connect. And so
• 25:06
  we go on a date with someone and you know,
• 25:08
  at the height of it, if someone's really on the
• 25:10
  extreme end, they will give the greatest date of someone's life.
• 25:15
  That person goes away and they're like, this guy is
• 25:17
  amazing or this person and they may have put on
• 25:22
  an amazing date, but you know nothing yet. And what's
• 25:26
  cool about your wife's saying, you know going through that
• 25:29
  process with you, is you know, I can imagine for
• 25:33
  her it's almost like, well, I want to see how
• 25:36
  you are in week four, or I want to see
• 25:38
  how you are in month three, And until you've been there,
• 25:42
  you really don't know how great of a partner somebody
• 25:46
  is going to be. And that's what I mean by
• 25:49
  you know, when you ask me about what I've really
• 25:51
  learned about love, and I talked about valuing the wrong things.
• 25:54
  That's one of the big ways that it shows up.
• 25:57
  If you are getting crazy now on a date, you're
• 26:01
  already that's already a reflection of the fact that you
• 26:06
  valued the wrong things because you're valuing this person's looks
• 26:10
  or their status or what you perceive them to be.
• 26:14
  But you can't you're not valuing them in a relationship
• 26:18
  or in relation to you, which is defined by how
• 26:21
  much they give, how they connect with you, how they
• 26:24
  relate to you, how they see you. All of that
• 26:27
  stuff is completely You're a zero. Yeah, So how can
• 26:32
  you be nervous if you're valuing the right things? You
• 26:35
  can only be nervous if you're valuing the wrong things.
• 26:39
  If that, to me, is the key to eliminating early
• 26:43
  nerves in early dating, is that there is I almost
• 26:46
  feel a little fatalistic about it. Which is funny coming
• 26:49
  from someone who gives advice in this area for a living,
• 26:52
  because you know, I do believe that we can influence
• 26:56
  situations with what we do, but we do have to
• 26:59
  have a bit of a dose of fatalism that the
• 27:02
  thing that didn't pan out wasn't the thing. The person
• 27:07
  who's still great in week eight is showing you the
• 27:10
  right things. But if they suddenly ghost you in week nine,
• 27:15
  then it doesn't mean they would have been great in
• 27:17
  week sixteen. Yeah, they're like, oh, but they were the one,
• 27:20
  and I just I don't know what I need closure.
• 27:22
  You have closure. That action was closure. What they showed
• 27:26
  you is they had eight good weeks in them.
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, that's interesting. It's it's and it's
• 27:33
  the same as you'd say in sport, like if you
• 27:37
  I'm just I was just thinking about sport while you
• 27:39
  were saying that. It's the idea of like a player
• 27:41
  may have one good season in him or her HM
• 27:44
  and then that player may have had ten good seasons
• 27:46
  in him or her And sometimes we have these players
• 27:48
  where we're like, oh, she's going to be the next
• 27:50
  or he's going to be the next, and then all
• 27:52
  of a sudden, they don't give you that season, and
• 27:55
  in sports we get closure by just going all right,
• 27:57
  they had potential, but they didn't make it. But you're
• 27:59
  right in love, and it's a lot hard to have
• 28:01
  that mentality of like, they gave me eight good weeks
• 28:04
  but they didn't make it.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: Well and you and you sit there and you obsess
• 28:08
  over someone who just left you going, you obsess over
• 28:12
  what they could have been.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what it could have.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: You know, this was so promising. They were everything that
• 28:20
  I was looking for. This could have been. And anytime
• 28:24
  someone breaks up with us, you know, the heartbreak is
• 28:28
  the loss of the life we thought we were going
• 28:30
  to have with someone. This is this is what it
• 28:34
  could have been, This is what it should have been. Yeah,
• 28:37
  And my answer to that is it would have been.
• 28:41
  If it should have been and could have been, then
• 28:44
  it would have been. You're literally you're grieving over something
• 28:50
  that was not by definition, it wasn't meant to happen
• 28:57
  because it didn't happen.
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, yeah, didn't happen.
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: So this idea that it was supposed to or it
• 29:04
  should have is is myth. It's a fantasy, it's science fiction.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: But I feel like in relationships, we have this fantasy
• 29:12
  mind that's already written the script and the book and
• 29:18
  the trilogy before the second date is over. And so
• 29:22
  it's almost like relationship seems to be like the one
• 29:24
  area of our life what we write decades into the future,
• 29:29
  and we can't help ourselves because we almost think that
• 29:31
  that and it's almost like you're living what you're saying
• 29:33
  is you're living off the fantasy, not even of the
• 29:36
  reality that's right in front of you. And so even
• 29:38
  when you're on a date with them, you're not even
• 29:40
  there because you're in your fantasy land and of what
• 29:44
  you think it is.
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: And that's where, in so many ways, everything that you are,
• 29:51
  you know, your expertise in mindfulness and everything you've learned
• 29:55
  there is so important in dating, because dating you have
• 30:01
  to beyond the date you're on. Mindful dating is beyond
• 30:06
  the date you're on. Don't be on date too, but
• 30:09
  really you're not. You're on date thirty two. Your mind
• 30:14
  has to be on date two with your body, yes.
• 30:17
  And when people don't do that, that's where they start.
• 30:22
  They start contructing a fantasy of where this relationship is going,
• 30:27
  a fancy of who this person is they know five
• 30:29
  percent of someone and they've built the other ninety five
• 30:31
  percent out of out of extrapolation. Yeah, Oh, he was
• 30:36
  really sweet in that moment. You know, Abe's good with kids, aves,
• 30:41
  you know, he's an amazing family man, you know, And
• 30:44
  and we've all had the experience of meeting someone who
• 30:47
  is incredibly charming, fun to be around, you know, you
• 30:52
  went away from Like, as men, we sometimes go out
• 30:55
  and we meet another man and it's like we've been
• 30:57
  a date on a date with that man, and you
• 30:59
  come home and you go, he was so great, you know,
• 31:01
  I loved him to bits he was and he really
• 31:04
  charmed you. And then six months later that person has
• 31:08
  really lost their shine because they're flaky. You realize they
• 31:13
  don't actually show up when when you need them to.
• 31:16
  You realize that it's they they kind of you know,
• 31:19
  it's that In The Talented Mister Ripley, there's that great
• 31:22
  line great movie is a great line where Matt Damon
• 31:25
  is like, you know, he's become the new chosen best
• 31:28
  friend of Dood Law's character. His name, Jude Law's character's
• 31:32
  name is Dickie, and Matt, Matt Damon is feeling suddenly
• 31:36
  shut out, like out of nowhere. He feels shut out
• 31:38
  when five minutes ago he was like, this guy is
• 31:41
  my best friend and he loves me and he's so
• 31:43
  and he says to Matt Damon's girlfriend at the time,
• 31:46
  he's expressing how he feels that you know, or you know,
• 31:50
  he's not even expressing. She sees the look on his
• 31:52
  face that he's sad that he no longer has this
• 31:56
  like friendship that feels real to him, and she said,
• 32:00
  the thing about Dickie is when he puts his attention
• 32:03
  on you, it's like the sun is shining on you,
• 32:06
  and then the attention moves on and it's very cold,
• 32:10
  and that's the experience of a lot of those people.
• 32:13
  But when you're taking the five percent of the sun
• 32:15
  shining on you and you use it to build the
• 32:18
  ninety five percent that you cannot possibly know. You can't
• 32:21
  know who this person is. When your brother gets sick
• 32:24
  and you need to travel to the hospital to be
• 32:27
  with that person and you need support in that moment,
• 32:29
  you can't know how that person is. When you're having
• 32:31
  an anxious moment and you need someone to show love
• 32:34
  and compassion towards you and this anxiety that you can't
• 32:39
  seem to control, and what you really need is a
• 32:41
  loving teammate to be there with you and not to
• 32:42
  judge you. You can't know what this person is like
• 32:45
  in year three of a relationship, when the you know
• 32:50
  you need to make a shift in your sex life
• 32:52
  because it feels like that part has become staid, but
• 32:54
  you need to work together to figure out. You don't
• 32:56
  know what that person is like in those stages, So
• 32:59
  thinking that you have all the answers because you've been
• 33:02
  on even ten or fifteen dates with this person and
• 33:05
  had a wonderful time is a fallacy, a fantasy. There's
• 33:10
  a great The relationship itself is about every stage of
• 33:15
  it and the effort that's put in. And there's a
• 33:19
  story from Bukowski where he slept with the prostitute. Every
• 33:23
  romantic story begins with begins this way. He's slept with
• 33:28
  the prostitute and he woke up to her having stolen
• 33:32
  his poetry, and he was so upset, so mad, and
• 33:38
  he wrote about it, and he wrote a piece that
• 33:42
  was all about how you could take anything, take my money,
• 33:46
  take the other stuff in the apartment, take it all,
• 33:49
  but please not anything but my poetry. And the whole
• 33:55
  piece finishes with the line, and then God said, crossing
• 33:59
  his legs, where I've created a great many poets, but
• 34:02
  not so very much poetry. And the idea is that
• 34:08
  you know, the person who has potential in a relationship
• 34:12
  is the poet. The poet. Everyone's a poet, not many
• 34:18
  people writing poetry. Writing is the more difficult part. A
• 34:22
  lot of people who are great on a date, very romantic,
• 34:25
  very charming, they're a poet on a date. The poetry
• 34:28
  is the relationship, and you shouldn't. You know, Bukowski was
• 34:33
  upset because his poetry was taken the thing he'd worked on,
• 34:38
  And that's how it should be in a relationship. Is
• 34:42
  don't get upset because you lost a poet. Poets a
• 34:47
  dime a dozen. Poetry is rare. People who are willing
• 34:52
  to write the poetry of a relationship, People who are
• 34:54
  willing to stick it with you for a year, two years,
• 34:56
  five years, ten years. That's really rare. And need to
• 35:00
  start valuing the poetry far more than we value the poet.
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that. What be for an analogy. Let's
• 35:06
  talk a bit about that poetry, because I feel like
• 35:08
  what's amazing is we convince ourself more of the fiction.
• 35:11
  When you are lusting after that person's looks, fame, prestige,
• 35:18
  whatever they have that you're attracted to, it's almost like then,
• 35:21
  even if they do a million bad things, like you
• 35:23
  said about the guy playing the guitar or whatever it is,
• 35:25
  it's like you're like, oh, but he's so or she's
• 35:27
  so whatever, But tell us a bit about what to
• 35:31
  look out for, so when people are out there, and
• 35:33
  I know what I love about what you do is that.
• 35:35
  And I love this conversation by the way so far
• 35:37
  because it's it's philosophical and it's real. But you're great
• 35:43
  at getting practical too, And I see that in all
• 35:45
  the work you put out. What's some of the practical
• 35:48
  things that people can look out for. I know so
• 35:49
  many friends were in early relationships or just started to
• 35:54
  date someone or finally met someone. What can they look
• 35:57
  for in those moments? Or is it looking or anything?
• 36:00
  Maybe that's even the wrong place to start.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: I think it's so we have a duty early on
• 36:06
  to bring our best to the table in as much
• 36:08
  as we can. We're all going to make mistakes, We're
• 36:10
  all going to have anxious moments or jealous moments or
• 36:15
  moments where we let our insecurity get the better of us,
• 36:19
  moments where we let our anger get the better of us.
• 36:22
  Everyone's going to have these moments, but we want to
• 36:25
  try and put our best foot forward. But I always
• 36:31
  think that we learn a lot in the moments where
• 36:34
  you have your first fight or you reveal something about
• 36:40
  yourself and you see how they react to it. You know,
• 36:46
  do they react with compassion or is there immediate judgment?
• 36:52
  And I don't mean a moment where you kind of
• 36:56
  try and perform. Yeah, I mean a moment where you
• 36:58
  genuinely are brave enough to let someone in and be seen. Yes,
• 37:04
  does this person do they see you? Do they acknowledge you?
• 37:09
  And do they show compassion and curiosity about why you
• 37:14
  are that way and what's happened in your life to
• 37:16
  get you there? Do they really are they looking to
• 37:19
  figure you out and who you are? Is a wonderful,
• 37:21
  wonderful sign because a lot of people just in a
• 37:23
  relationship and they're sleepwalking.
• 37:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they're just.
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: They're enjoying it, They're enjoying the fruits of the relationship.
• 37:30
  But you don't get the impression someone's really trying to
• 37:32
  get to.
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: Know you, you.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: Don't feel seen by that person, the person who's actually
• 37:37
  asking questions of you, the person who's looking to understand
• 37:42
  the good and the bad in you, and who elevates
• 37:45
  the good and soothes the bad. That's something very beautiful
• 37:52
  to look out for. The person who can come back
• 37:55
  and say sorry, as of course, and I apply the
• 37:58
  same standard to both sides, but the person who can
• 38:01
  who can come back and say sorry, you know again,
• 38:05
  we all when I'm when with one of my staff
• 38:08
  in my company, when I say, you know, when I
• 38:11
  give them a difficult piece of feedback, I don't expect
• 38:15
  them to smile in that moment. I don't expect them
• 38:17
  to like take you know, and I would hope that
• 38:20
  they don't react in a really negative or toxic way.
• 38:24
  But I don't expect them to have an easy time
• 38:27
  with that. But if that person can go away over
• 38:29
  the next few hours or days and then come back
• 38:32
  and say, you know, I really thought about what you
• 38:33
  said and I'm going to work on that, that's something
• 38:36
  to look for because you can really like that person.
• 38:39
  If you're both that kind of person, you can work
• 38:42
  with that person. That's someone you can genuinely have a
• 38:47
  relationship with because it's not a relationship that's based on
• 38:49
  perfection or never having an argument, but it is based
• 38:52
  on two people who are humble enough to genuinely own
• 38:57
  their mistakes or to own the areas where they want
• 39:00
  to get better. I'm always looking at the ways people
• 39:07
  argue and whether they whether they're trying to do damage
• 39:11
  in an argument or whether they're trying to rebuild in
• 39:15
  an argument. And if you're with someone that every time
• 39:18
  you come out of an argument, you feel like they
• 39:21
  lacerated you, and you come out of an argument bleeding
• 39:25
  every time, you know, and you're like, why did they
• 39:29
  have to say that incredibly nasty thing. And it's one
• 39:34
  thing if they come back an hour later and say,
• 39:37
  or even a day later and say, I truly regret
• 39:39
  having said that to you, and I will do better.
• 39:42
  But if they won't even acknowledge that that was a
• 39:45
  really toxic way to have an argument and that was
• 39:48
  a really nasty thing to say, then that's a problem
• 39:52
  because this is a relationship that's not going to soothe you,
• 39:55
  it's going to create more and more wounds. So that,
• 39:58
  I would say, is an important thing. And two people
• 40:01
  genuinely genuinely at the core of it, operating as a team.
• 40:07
  What do you what do you need? And can I
• 40:10
  tell you, you know, you're working really hard right now.
• 40:14
  Can I understand what your goal is in doing this
• 40:18
  and seek to understand that and where that's coming from
• 40:22
  for you and why that's important. But can I also
• 40:25
  voice to you that I'm not feeling very loved right
• 40:29
  now and that I'm you know, maybe it is just
• 40:33
  my insecurity or maybe that you know but I or
• 40:36
  maybe I don't have some enough as much many things
• 40:39
  going on in my life right now as you do
• 40:40
  in yours. But I know one of the effects is
• 40:42
  it's creating some anxiety for me, and it's making me
• 40:45
  feel like you don't love me as much as I
• 40:47
  love you. You know, you want an environment where you
• 40:51
  can have that real conversation and it it then to me,
• 40:56
  a relationship is no longer about right and wrong, It's
• 41:00
  about the conversation. Can the conversation be had? That, to
• 41:05
  me is one of the greatest signs of a relationship
• 41:09
  you should hang on to is can the relationship be had?
• 41:14
  And can it be had in a beautiful and productive
• 41:17
  and loving way, Because that's all you know David Brooks said,
• 41:22
  marriage is a fifty year conversation, right, is that conversation?
• 41:27
  Does it feel good?
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: It doesn't always feel comfortable, But does it feel like
• 41:32
  this is a conversation that is making me better?
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: Or is it a conversation that's always making me worse?
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah? I love that, and I think it's it's such
• 41:40
  a vicious cycle though sometimes because I find that you
• 41:44
  get into an argument, like you said, which I think
• 41:46
  the first argument is such a great it's such a
• 41:50
  great market put down as let's reflect on this. I
• 41:53
  think that's such a great way of putting it, that
• 41:54
  you said. And if you look at that, often what
• 41:57
  happens is the person reacts badly it's natural, or you
• 42:00
  react badly too, and then you're waiting for that person
• 42:03
  to make up, and that person's waiting for you to
• 42:05
  make up, and then maybe you go ahead and put
• 42:08
  the first hand in, but then now they deal with
• 42:10
  the second bad and now you're waiting again, and I
• 42:12
  feel like we get lost in this like waiting game.
• 42:15
  And I kind of got to a point where I
• 42:17
  was just like, I want to make sure that I
• 42:21
  am leading this conversation. So a conversation that me and
• 42:24
  my wife always have is I'll always check in with
• 42:26
  her and be like, is this relationship going in the
• 42:28
  direction you want it to go? In? Like? Is this
• 42:30
  going in the direction? Is this relationship what you want
• 42:32
  it to be? And if it's not, what do you
• 42:35
  want it to be? And what are you willing to
• 42:37
  do to get there? Because and I'll always be like, well,
• 42:39
  this is not how I want the relationship to be,
• 42:41
  and this is what I wanted to be. And I
• 42:43
  felt like that conversation for me is really healthy, and
• 42:46
  I'm always happy one thing that I've got to right now,
• 42:48
  and I think my wife has this in different parts
• 42:50
  of our relationship. I'm always happy to take the responsibility
• 42:54
  for the quality of the relationship because I'm in it
• 42:56
  in the same way as I'm with my company, in
• 42:58
  the same way as I'm for this podcast, say it
• 43:00
  was for anything. It's like, it's easy to it's easy
• 43:04
  to sit there and go, well, what are you bringing
• 43:05
  to the table. And I realized at one point where
• 43:08
  I was like, if I care about stuff, I've got
• 43:10
  to be okay with grabbing onto the reins. And the
• 43:14
  funny thing is I started to realize that that Actually,
• 43:17
  there are plenty of times when my wife does that.
• 43:19
  She just does it in different areas that I don't notice,
• 43:22
  and so it can feel like I'm carrying the burden,
• 43:25
  but actually that's not true. I'm taking responsibility where I thrive,
• 43:29
  and actually she's taking responsibility responsibility where she thrives, and
• 43:33
  I don't even notice that. And that's when I started
• 43:36
  to feel healthier rather than like I was like, well,
• 43:38
  where you show up? Like what are you doing? And
• 43:41
  I remember when I was a monk, the teachers would
• 43:45
  always tell us that, you know, you may sit in
• 43:49
  a class with a non charismatic teacher. So they were like,
• 43:52
  some of the monks are not going to be the
• 43:54
  most charismatic, the most attentive, the most like dynamic teachers
• 43:59
  of them the text and the spiritual scriptures. And they
• 44:03
  were like, but if you're a student that's ten out
• 44:05
  of ten, even if the speakers are one out of
• 44:08
  ten in presentation, you're going to get lots. But if
• 44:11
  you're a one out of ten and the speakers ten
• 44:13
  out of ten, then they're lifting you up. But by
• 44:16
  the way, if you're at a one out of ten
• 44:17
  and they're at a one out of ten, that's all
• 44:18
  you're going to get. And it's kind of like what
• 44:20
  your friends said about the bag of milk, you know,
• 44:23
  the idea of like taking your own responsibility for if
• 44:26
  you want to be in a relationship. I'd love to
• 44:29
  hear thoughts on that. Yeah, but that love speaks again.
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: You're so right, Joan. It's truly beautiful that you have
• 44:35
  that in your relationship. And it's also brave because talking
• 44:39
  those conversations are not easy, and people can say things
• 44:43
  in those relationships, in those conversations that can scare us.
• 44:47
  They could say, well, I'm not happy because I want
• 44:49
  it to go in this direct.
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've heard that too.
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, like you know, or I didn't realize you were
• 44:53
  unhappy in that way, or I didn't realize you felt
• 44:55
  like that. It takes a lot of bravery to have
• 44:58
  conversations like that. Commend you for that, and I think
• 45:02
  that's one of the things a lot of people aren't
• 45:04
  willing to do, is step bravely into an area where
• 45:07
  they could be criticized. But I think it is one
• 45:12
  of the most important aspects of a relationship is being
• 45:18
  able to do exactly that. So no, I think it's
• 45:21
  I think it's a stunning thing.
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: Well it's uncomfortable, like you're saying it's not, and I'm
• 45:26
  not sharing. It's like we've perfected and we've got it right.
• 45:27
  I'm just saying that that's what we've had to do
• 45:30
  in order to like, you know, we're only at year five,
• 45:33
  year eight in our relationship, year five in marriage. But
• 45:36
  it's like that's what we just I've had to find
• 45:38
  these what you're saying, like the fifty year conversation and
• 45:42
  the idea you're saying of having these like I'm just
• 45:44
  I've noticed that without these things you could go years
• 45:48
  without changing anything.
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: But speaking of what you said with the idea of
• 45:52
  the monks, that to me goes back to the you
• 45:57
  know what I was saying about timing being important. I
• 46:00
  do believe when you go into a relationship with genuine purpose,
• 46:06
  and even when you go into dating with genuine purpose,
• 46:08
  you know you go on a dating app because a
• 46:10
  lot of people out there listening to this won't be
• 46:12
  in relationship. They'll be right now in the crapshoot of
• 46:15
  dating apps trying to figure out how to navigate. When
• 46:19
  we're intentional, we bring a different energy to the things
• 46:24
  we do, we bring a different energy to a person,
• 46:28
  and in a relationship, in early dating, I think that
• 46:30
  when you're really intentional and when you really are like
• 46:34
  I'm looking for a real connection here, you don't actually
• 46:37
  judge people as quickly. You don't dispose of people as quickly.
• 46:42
  Where you just go wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong,
• 46:45
  you start actually looking for what could be right. You
• 46:48
  start and I'm not saying ignoring abusive and toxic behavior.
• 46:51
  I'm just saying those superficial things we just you know, decide, no,
• 46:56
  they don't meet this checklist, they don't meet this one.
• 46:59
  Where have we lose that? Because what we're looking for
• 47:01
  is deeper and we start genuinely seeking to Like we're
• 47:05
  on a date and we start going, let me really
• 47:07
  find out who this person is, like, let me really
• 47:10
  see them, and let me not be judgmental of them
• 47:13
  so quickly and look to understand them. And the reward
• 47:17
  for that is that this person now actually feels seen
• 47:20
  by you.
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's great, ace And they.
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: Now give you a different energy than they may have
• 47:24
  given on the last ten dates you Suddenly they blossom
• 47:28
  on the date differently because of the energy in front
• 47:32
  of them. There's a Mitch Album wrote a line about
• 47:36
  you know, if the culture isn't serving you, then you
• 47:39
  have to be brave enough to create your own culture.
• 47:42
  And in dating for so many people, you know, I
• 47:46
  get all the complaints about dating these days. You know,
• 47:49
  it's superficial. It's on everyone's flaky. No one goes on
• 47:52
  real dates, no one's trying, no one's really committing, no
• 47:55
  one's a real relationship. It's like, okay, so what you're
• 47:57
  describing to me is what you perceive to be a
• 48:00
  culture that's not working for you. But if that culture
• 48:04
  isn't serving you, then create your own culture that surrounds you.
• 48:12
  And your culture it can be powerful. Not for the
• 48:15
  world necessarily, because for that there needs to be a
• 48:18
  combined cultural shift, but in your micro life, in your
• 48:24
  micro problems and opportunities, the culture you create will have
• 48:29
  an impact on the people around you. And the same way,
• 48:34
  you know, I said, if you go into a room
• 48:37
  at a party and you say, I hope this party
• 48:39
  is good, well, now you're a victim to what, however
• 48:42
  this party is. You know, if everyone seems kind of
• 48:45
  closed off and mean, and you know, this cliquey and
• 48:48
  it's like oh God. Then you go home and you say,
• 48:52
  oh my god, that party was so you know, it
• 48:54
  was one of those horrible parties. But if you go
• 48:56
  in and you say, I'm going to at the very
• 48:59
  least be sponsible for a part of this party, Yes,
• 49:03
  I'm going to go in and I'm going to give
• 49:05
  the love and the energy and the and the and
• 49:08
  the compassion and the authenticity that I would love for
• 49:11
  people in this room to join me in giving. Some will,
• 49:14
  some won't. And by the way, that's also good because
• 49:16
  it will help you find your crowd. Right, So you
• 49:18
  you find your crowd by being the thing you want
• 49:20
  to be, not by hoping that your crowd elicits it
• 49:23
  from you completely. You found your crowd online by going
• 49:27
  out and being an energy that you wanted to be first,
• 49:30
  and then that crowd noticed you. It's like a lighthouse.
• 49:33
  All the ships start knowing where to come home because
• 49:36
  they see the you know, they see the lighthouse. That that,
• 49:40
  for me is that's one of the most beautiful things
• 49:43
  about giving energy Early on. I see dating, you know,
• 49:46
  not just relationships, but I see people in dating these days,
• 49:49
  it's the game is who can try less, who can
• 49:52
  be cooler? Who can be more indifferent. And and that's
• 49:55
  honestly not the way to do it. That's certainly the
• 49:57
  way to attract someone of a low a frequency that
• 50:02
  you can certainly attract someone who wants the game, who
• 50:04
  wants the who's got the demons that make them chase
• 50:08
  someone who's not into them, you know, And there are
• 50:11
  plenty of people with those demons. But you don't want
• 50:13
  to be in a relationship with a person like that,
• 50:15
  because for sure, a person like that, the moment you
• 50:18
  stop playing hard to get and you turn around to
• 50:20
  meet them, they're not going to be interested in you
• 50:22
  anymore because their demons will tell them this person likes us.
• 50:25
  Now they're not. This person's no longer call to us.
• 50:29
  They were only called to us as long as they
• 50:31
  didn't like us. So you can't ever Yeah, but it's
• 50:35
  you know, it's that that croutero marks thing. I wouldn't
• 50:38
  want to be a member of any club that would
• 50:39
  have me as a member. That describes dating insecurity amongst
• 50:44
  people like that is I want to that person doesn't
• 50:46
  want me, they must be a catch, yeah, exactly. And
• 50:51
  so what we have to do is give. When we
• 50:55
  give a little more energy in dating and say, you
• 50:58
  know what, this person who I've no for five minutes,
• 51:02
  maybe I'm not feeling much energy here, but I'm just
• 51:05
  going to give some energy. I'm going to give an
• 51:08
  amount of energy I'm willing to lose. Right, That's a
• 51:11
  key way of looking at it. What you don't do
• 51:13
  is you keep trying with someone who's not giving you
• 51:15
  equal energy. That then becomes masochistic. But giving an amount
• 51:20
  of energy you're willing to lose. I always think about
• 51:22
  that in every interaction.
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: That's so true.
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, give an amount you don't mind losing. It's like
• 51:26
  going into the casino and playing like roulette. It's like,
• 51:29
  all right, I'm in Vegas. I'll give like a hundred
• 51:32
  bucks and then I'm not spending anything else here in
• 51:35
  these casinos. That's it, you know, for me, it's normally
• 51:37
  like ten bucks. I'm not a gambler, But you just
• 51:41
  decide what am I happy to lose? And it's the
• 51:43
  same with energy. It's you know, i'm dating right now,
• 51:47
  I want to find someone amazing, someone beautiful. I'm going
• 51:51
  to give to everyone I interact with an amount of
• 51:53
  energy I don't mind losing. And some people I'm gonna
• 51:58
  bring out the people who who now are willing to
• 52:02
  give it back, because all of a sudden, they might
• 52:04
  be jolted out of their little coma that they've been
• 52:07
  in because they're disillusioned with dating and they feel like
• 52:09
  no one's trying, and so they went into their shell.
• 52:12
  But now they see you with a different level of
• 52:13
  warmth and playfulness and just positivity, and they go, huh,
• 52:19
  who is this? This makes me feel good? And when
• 52:21
  they come out a little bit and all of a
• 52:22
  sudden you see who they are, you wake them up
• 52:24
  a little bit, and then there's a bunch of people
• 52:26
  you won't And that's okay, because you are willing to
• 52:29
  lose that much energy. Yeah, But what people do instead,
• 52:32
  they do a far more dangerous thing of being afraid
• 52:36
  of the rejection from people that they approach or talk
• 52:40
  to in the first five minutes. God forbid, I get
• 52:42
  rejected in the first five minutes. But then they'll meet
• 52:46
  someone where they have a bit of connection and chemistry,
• 52:49
  but who isn't trying, who isn't giving them equal energy,
• 52:52
  and they'll keep pouring energy into that person month after
• 52:56
  month after month when they're not getting the same in return.
• 53:00
  And they think that's safer than going out there and
• 53:03
  getting rejected by a new person. But actually this is
• 53:07
  the dangerous one, being rejected in five minutes by someone
• 53:10
  who doesn't even know you, who on an app? How
• 53:13
  much can someone really reject you anyway? And we all
• 53:16
  know our experience, we've all chosen people in life who
• 53:19
  on an app we might have swiped right past.
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, so we know from our own.
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: Personal experience that if we get rejected on an app,
• 53:25
  it doesn't even mean that person wouldn't like us in.
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: Real life totally.
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: But we're so afraid of that rejection. That's mortal fear,
• 53:33
  is that rejection. And yet continuing to waste months or
• 53:38
  years on someone who's who's giving us unequal energy is
• 53:42
  something people happily do. They spend that time like it's nothing,
• 53:47
  And that's the readly.
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: Because it feels safe, because it feels like there's something
• 53:50
  at least.
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: There's some connection, there's some comfort. There's a couple of things.
• 53:54
  It's firstly, it's comfortable. It's what I know, doesn't mean
• 53:57
  I'm Happiness and comfort are very different things. It's not happy,
• 54:00
  I'm not happy, I'm not getting my needs met. But
• 54:02
  it's comfortable. Yeah, right, so I'll stay in it for
• 54:05
  that reason. It's the fear of I'll never find anyone again,
• 54:10
  which is a fallacy because you've found this person, you
• 54:13
  did it already, you know. And by the way, this
• 54:16
  person's not so unique that they're the only person in
• 54:18
  the world that's going to find you attractive. Yeah yeah, right,
• 54:20
  Like they're attracted to you because you're attractive.
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah. But that's the crazy thing, right, we have this
• 54:24
  massive paradox between there's now unlimited choice, more than ever.
• 54:29
  You feel like you have way more choice than you
• 54:31
  had before. But then we have limitless fear to go
• 54:35
  with that that we may not find anyone ever again.
• 54:38
  Like it's that weird thing, right, Like it's the idea
• 54:40
  of like, I don't so I've never had to online
• 54:43
  date or update. I became a monk when I was
• 54:45
  twenty one, and then my wife's been the only person
• 54:48
  I've been with since I left, So I the last it's.
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: A really impressive age to become a monk, by the right,
• 54:54
  I feel like that's uniquely impressive is becoming a monk
• 54:56
  at twelve.
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: Well, I started at fourteen, so I had seven years
• 55:00
  of being a single.
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: Of runway becoming among at eighty.
• 55:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, No, I think I did it because of
• 55:10
  having having to figure out some of this stuff. But
• 55:13
  the last time I went on a date was apart
• 55:16
  from my wife, was about what like I've got like
• 55:18
  twelve thirteen years ago, So I never had to date
• 55:21
  from an app. The closest thing we had was High five.
• 55:22
  Do You're on the High Five? No? High Five was
• 55:25
  like an early Facebook where it'd show you two hundred
• 55:27
  to three hundred friends in your network. And it was Facebook,
• 55:30
  but it was most people, most guys in their teens
• 55:33
  used it for dating. But the idea of you feel
• 55:38
  there's so much choice now, like you just always, like
• 55:41
  you said, you're just swiping away, you're looking at profiles everything,
• 55:44
  But at the same time, you feel like you'll never
• 55:46
  find someone again. Where's what's happening there? What are you
• 55:50
  seeing there when you're speaking to people?
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: And I think there's a combination of things. It's people aren't experiencing.
• 55:57
  For a lot of people, they're not experiencing what they
• 55:59
  see as an endless ocean of choice. What they're experiencing
• 56:02
  is an endless ocean of disappointment of constantly talking to
• 56:08
  people with it not going anywhere, being ghosted talking to
• 56:12
  someone and that person never actually takes them up on
• 56:14
  going on a date. So it's like we're living a
• 56:16
  computer game version of dating, but I'm not actually meeting
• 56:19
  up in real life, or you know, meeting someone seems
• 56:23
  to be going well for a few dates and all
• 56:24
  of a sudden they disappear and you know they're or
• 56:27
  they're not interested anymore. It fizzles out, and so it's
• 56:31
  a lot of disappointment. But the ironic thing about that
• 56:34
  is that on the flip side, people experience that choice
• 56:38
  in a negative way. So what they feel is the
• 56:41
  person I could be going, I'm going on a date
• 56:43
  with endless choice, and that brings out all of my
• 56:48
  insecurity because I feel like I'm never how can I
• 56:53
  possibly compete with what bo Burnham says is everything all
• 56:58
  the time. I can't peep with that. I can't compete
• 57:02
  with you having access to everyone in a ten mile
• 57:07
  radius or more if you choose to have more. That's
• 57:11
  something I How do I possibly live up to that?
• 57:14
  And that, to me is at the root of so
• 57:17
  many people's lack of confidence, even their lack of authenticity
• 57:21
  when they go on a date because they're trying to
• 57:22
  be they stop trying to connect and they start trying
• 57:25
  to be something they think the other person wants them
• 57:28
  to be. And now it's a departure from themselves. Now,
• 57:34
  to me, the lesson here is the same as you know,
• 57:38
  one of the things I really enjoy about working with
• 57:39
  people in their love lives is that there is it's
• 57:43
  so transferable and universal to other domains. So if you
• 57:47
  look at this problem of we're afraid, you know, we
• 57:50
  can't live up to the choice that somebody else has,
• 57:53
  that's actually true in business too. It's true in content creation, right,
• 57:58
  Like I've had it in the last couple of years.
• 58:00
  I've had moments where I look at just how many
• 58:05
  creators there now are, and just how much video content
• 58:10
  is pumped online every day that i feel like I've
• 58:16
  overeaten and want to be sick, and I'm like, it
• 58:21
  can get to a point where even though because in
• 58:23
  one sense, being good at something creates confidence, right, if
• 58:27
  you feel like you're a good partner, and you're attractive,
• 58:29
  and you have good qualities and so on, then you
• 58:31
  feel like a version of competence. And the same is
• 58:35
  true in content creation. I've been doing what I do
• 58:37
  for fifteen years. I feel very competent when it comes
• 58:40
  to speaking into a microphone, going on TV, going on stage,
• 58:44
  making videos, and yet there's still moments where I've had
• 58:48
  just this little feeling of like do I need does
• 58:53
  the world need another voice? Everyone is speaking all the time,
• 58:59
  and I mean, this is a side note, rand, but like,
• 59:02
  you know, it's so funny. I was watching there was
• 59:04
  like some thumbnails for Motor for a major podcast, and
• 59:09
  this is no slant on it, because I understand what
• 59:12
  happens with this, but it was so funny because I
• 59:14
  was like, there was one thumbnail that was like, you know,
• 59:17
  be kind to yourself, and then the next one was
• 59:21
  achieved through suffering. There's like another one that's like push
• 59:26
  past your limits and ignore the realistic, and there's another
• 59:31
  one that's like motivation is bs And it was all
• 59:33
  the same podcast. Yeah, but it's like every next thumbnail
• 59:37
  is like a piece of wisdom that contradicts in some
• 59:40
  way the last piece. But that I think is just
• 59:43
  I think we're all force feeding ourselves content at the moment.
• 59:46
  This is just untenable. But when you're a creator in
• 59:50
  an environment like that you can get to a point
• 59:52
  where you're like, does the world need me?
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Like if I just stopped talking, does it matter?
• 59:56
  Everyone else is saying it anyway, in a thousand different ways.
• 1:00:00
  And what I tell myself is, there is someone that
• 1:00:08
  uniquely vibes with my personality and the way I deliver
• 1:00:15
  the message I need. It's not about me worrying how
• 1:00:20
  do I grab that person's audience, or how can I
• 1:00:24
  appeal to everybody? It's just about me saying. You know what,
• 1:00:28
  William's Inser, there's a wonderful book for life and writing.
• 1:00:32
  Someone once said to me, every book on writing is
• 1:00:34
  a book on life. But there's a williams Inser wrote
• 1:00:37
  one of the seminal books on writing, which I forget.
• 1:00:41
  I think it's on how to great writing or something.
• 1:00:44
  If you look up williams Innser, people will find it.
• 1:00:46
  But he says, you know, when you go to He said,
• 1:00:51
  you may be an aspiring travel writer who when you
• 1:00:55
  think about going to Tokyo to write about Tokyo, you think,
• 1:00:59
  but thousands of travel writers have been to Tokyo and written
• 1:01:03
  about Tokyo. What do I possibly have to add? And
• 1:01:09
  he says, but the world hasn't heard what your lens
• 1:01:13
  on Tokyo is. The world hasn't heard your take on Tokyo.
• 1:01:20
  And that might contain some idea or way of looking
• 1:01:25
  at things that other people haven't actually done, or that
• 1:01:29
  you may say the same thing, but you may say
• 1:01:31
  it fresh. Yeah, And so I tell myself that when
• 1:01:34
  I'm creating content that it's not about appealing to everyone.
• 1:01:38
  It really is about saying, I my take on this
• 1:01:42
  is interesting for its own sake to the people that
• 1:01:45
  vibe with me. The same is true in dating, that
• 1:01:50
  you there is a specific audience for you, and it
• 1:01:54
  doesn't have to be ninety nine point ninety nine nine
• 1:01:57
  percent of people. If you're looking for serious relationship, it
• 1:02:01
  just has to be one. Yeah, those are amazing odds.
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: That's a great analogy. I love that it resonates. You're
• 1:02:09
  so right on both levels and you're spot on. It's
• 1:02:12
  weird that in dating, too, we want to be attractive
• 1:02:15
  to everyone. We want everyone to feel just as a
• 1:02:18
  content creator, you want everyone to feel a certain way
• 1:02:20
  about you. And so I think that's such a great
• 1:02:22
  way of looking at it. And yeah, I love the
• 1:02:24
  idea the writer you mentioned around the voice on Tokyo.
• 1:02:28
  I always feel that I'm like, we need more faces
• 1:02:30
  and more voices, and because there are just so many
• 1:02:34
  people that you can connect to that I can't connect to,
• 1:02:36
  and vice versa with everyone else. And I see that
• 1:02:38
  all the time that whatever and whatever field you're in too, right,
• 1:02:43
  Like I always say, like there's enough space for the
• 1:02:46
  best athletes, the best actors, Like there's so many actors,
• 1:02:49
  there's so many actresses, but there's always a new person
• 1:02:52
  that kind of makes it in and wins the upcoming
• 1:02:54
  Actor Awards really true actress award, because you kind of
• 1:02:58
  want to discover and you also want the idea of
• 1:02:59
  discuss and I think people almost make it like I
• 1:03:02
  think we've always made it about like, oh, who's your
• 1:03:05
  top three, who's your top five? And the people that
• 1:03:08
  actually are watching and listening, they don't see it in
• 1:03:10
  a hierarchy. They just are like, oh, I listened to
• 1:03:13
  this group of people, right, That's usually how people think
• 1:03:16
  about it. I feel like even if someone asked me,
• 1:03:18
  like who are your favorite authors, don't I don't have
• 1:03:20
  a categoric like number one author. There's a group of
• 1:03:23
  authors that I love reading from. Yep, And I feel like,
• 1:03:26
  that's how people and in relationships. Obviously, like you're saying,
• 1:03:29
  it's it's a much smaller poore, but you having that
• 1:03:33
  intention is going to be much more clear. But tell
• 1:03:36
  me about your take on changing people. I wonder how
• 1:03:39
  much you get people saying I'm with someone who met
• 1:03:41
  someone they have potential, I think I can change them.
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: There's a quote from I Think It's Jacob M. Broad
• 1:03:47
  where it says, consider how hard it is to change yourself,
• 1:03:50
  and you'll understand how foolish it is to think you
• 1:03:52
  can change somebody else, and that people should really let
• 1:03:58
  that sink in. Because in the beginning of January sixty
• 1:04:06
  seventy eighty percent of the world decides they want to
• 1:04:09
  get fit and healthy. Yeah, what percentage of those people
• 1:04:14
  get fit and healthy? Those are people who want to change.
• 1:04:20
  They didn't make that resolution for nothing. They made it
• 1:04:22
  because they want that. It's not someone saying to them
• 1:04:26
  you should really lose weight and them going I'm fine.
• 1:04:28
  That's someone's saying to themselves, I should really lose weight
• 1:04:32
  and they still can't do it. Now, Consider being in
• 1:04:38
  a relationship with someone who's not even admitting that they
• 1:04:44
  need to change and thinking that they're going to change.
• 1:04:51
  It's hot, it would be on your heart of behalf.
• 1:04:55
  And I'm not saying it would be wrong to trust
• 1:04:57
  someone when they say this, but it's still sp kulative.
• 1:05:01
  If you or I in a relationship and you say, Matt,
• 1:05:04
  I'm going to change, that's still speculative. For me, you
• 1:05:10
  might it might be too hard, but it might be
• 1:05:14
  worth me staying. If we have a lot of love
• 1:05:17
  between us and you're saying I'm going to change, because
• 1:05:20
  I say, you know what, that's If you're really committed
• 1:05:23
  to this, then then game on, let's do this. But
• 1:05:28
  in order for that to happen, you have to first
• 1:05:30
  acknowledge that there's something to be changed, and then show
• 1:05:34
  desire to change it, and frankly, to have any real credibility,
• 1:05:38
  show a plan for changing it. Yeah, when two people
• 1:05:43
  are in a relationship, or two people break up and
• 1:05:46
  a woman comes to me and says, you know, two
• 1:05:49
  weeks later he came back and he said he'll never
• 1:05:52
  you know, he wants me back and whatever, and he's
• 1:05:55
  not gonna hurt me again. I always say, an important
• 1:05:57
  question to ask is why would it be different this time?
• 1:06:02
  Not for a minute emotion not from a like charged place,
• 1:06:04
  a real curiosity. I get that you're telling me.
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 2: Has that person even thought about that part right.
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: Like two weeks later, which is a suspect of time anyway, right,
• 1:06:14
  because this is like you're very much in the panic
• 1:06:18
  stage of I'll say anything to get you back right now,
• 1:06:20
  that's not considered. But fine, this is where we are.
• 1:06:24
  We're two weeks out from our breakup. You're telling me
• 1:06:26
  you want me back and you'll never hurt me again.
• 1:06:29
  I get you want me back, But what is it
• 1:06:33
  that's different this time. That's what I need to understand
• 1:06:38
  to feel safe to go down this road with you again.
• 1:06:43
  And and so I think people can and do change.
• 1:06:47
  Otherwise you and me would be out of a job.
• 1:06:51
  But change. If you are not the author of your
• 1:06:56
  own change, then the idea that your partner is somehow
• 1:07:02
  going to will you to change.
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: It's like telling your partner I want you to do therapy. Yeah,
• 1:07:10
  I'm going, Okay, I'll go.
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: And that's the reason most people do go, right, I find,
• 1:07:17
  at least from people that I speak to your work
• 1:07:19
  with like you hear that so often. And the number
• 1:07:21
  one reason people do go to therapy is because their
• 1:07:23
  partner kind of forced them into it and they kind
• 1:07:25
  of agreed to it, and that's.
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: And that's a problem because you're hoping that they will
• 1:07:31
  see the value in it once they get there, and
• 1:07:34
  they might, but someone needs to have some skin in
• 1:07:38
  the game. Yeah, And so I just think that here's
• 1:07:44
  what I will say, because there are so many people
• 1:07:47
  in relationships or in situationships, if you want to call them, that,
• 1:07:54
  that are convincing themselves. They're conning themselves that somebody else
• 1:07:59
  is one day going to be different. And at that
• 1:08:01
  point you have to say to yourself on what basis
• 1:08:06
  have you decided this? What is it that this idea
• 1:08:11
  that they are that some grand change is imminent? What
• 1:08:16
  is that based on? Is it based on them having
• 1:08:19
  said to you, Hey, I know that in these last
• 1:08:23
  few months or years or whatever, this has been a
• 1:08:27
  big problem in this relationship, and I know that's because
• 1:08:30
  of me, and this is something I am committed to changing.
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: Have they said that? Because if they haven't, I have
• 1:08:40
  to ask, where is the logic here underpinning your argument
• 1:08:46
  that they're one day going to change? Oh, this isn't
• 1:08:50
  about them that they're going to change or that they've
• 1:08:52
  even expressed a desire or a willingness or a commitment
• 1:08:56
  to change. This is about your demons calling the shots. Yeah,
• 1:09:02
  this is about your fear of losing someone because maybe
• 1:09:07
  they don't want to change. But what's really happening is
• 1:09:11
  you don't want to lose someone. You don't want to
• 1:09:14
  be on your own again, you don't want to take
• 1:09:17
  the risk that there's something else out there where you
• 1:09:20
  can get your needs met on a higher level. And
• 1:09:24
  then it becomes about exploring yourself and saying, well, this
• 1:09:29
  person's been this way for years and I've complained about
• 1:09:32
  it for years, So is this still about them? Can
• 1:09:36
  I really keep saying this is about them?
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 2: That's so powerful man, that that really like hit a chord,
• 1:09:43
  And I hope that everyone's listening and watching. You know
• 1:09:45
  that drops and sinks in for them as well, because
• 1:09:48
  what you just said there, I think that's the dilemma
• 1:09:50
  that most people are in do I stay or do
• 1:09:52
  I go? And you've just answered, like you know, that's
• 1:09:56
  how you know, Like that's it's clear.
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: You know. I sometimes look at video of myself from
• 1:10:01
  years ago and I cringe because I'm like, you know,
• 1:10:06
  it's not what I'm saying might be factually right, yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 1:10:10
  but the way I'm saying it, I was once.
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 2: Looking at old hairstars. It's the same thing. It's like
• 1:10:16
  looking at old fashioned sense.
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: Thought that looked good.
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I thought that.
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 1: I was in Beverly Hills when I first got to
• 1:10:23
  LA I was about twenty five, and I was making
• 1:10:26
  a video in front of the Beverly Hills sign. I
• 1:10:29
  was like, I'm going to get the Beverly Hills sign
• 1:10:30
  in the background. And it was a video about getting
• 1:10:34
  over heartbreak. And I think it was like the three
• 1:10:38
  tips for getting over heartbreak right, which, by the way,
• 1:10:40
  as soon as you say three tips for getting over heartbreak,
• 1:10:44
  you already don't understand, because anyone who's deep in heartbreak
• 1:10:50
  is not coming to you, going what are your tips?
• 1:10:54
  They're going save me from this existential doom.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: I am in where life doesn't feel worth living right now? Yeah,
• 1:11:05
  you know. And I was making this video and at
• 1:11:09
  the end of the video a guy came over, as
• 1:11:11
  like a three four minute video, because of course you
• 1:11:13
  can sum up how to get over deep, deep loss
• 1:11:16
  in three minutes. He came over and he said to me,
• 1:11:21
  you've never been heartbroken?
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 2: Have you?
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: Someone who's just watching just to listen to the whole
• 1:11:26
  I didn't know he was listening, but he was like
• 1:11:28
  in earshot the whole time, and he was like, you've
• 1:11:30
  never been heartbroken? Have you? Now? Twenty five year old
• 1:11:33
  know it? Or me? I was like in my head
• 1:11:36
  because out loud, I went, no, I have, and yeah,
• 1:11:40
  I have, yeah, and I like sort of shuffled on
• 1:11:44
  in my head. I went, who do you think you are?
• 1:11:47
  Of course I've like, what does this guy know? Like, oh,
• 1:11:50
  you know so much more than me or what? He
• 1:11:52
  was right? I had never been truly I'd had time,
• 1:11:58
  I'd had things that like hurt me. Yes, I'd never
• 1:12:01
  been like crushed, and having had that experience in my
• 1:12:08
  life now, the video I make is very different. How
• 1:12:14
  I talk about that is extremely different. And the reason
• 1:12:19
  I say that is because I am aware that these
• 1:12:24
  things we're talking about here. It's very easy from a
• 1:12:28
  distance to say to people, this person hasn't changed in
• 1:12:33
  a long time. What makes you think they're going to
• 1:12:35
  change now? And why you're still there? And the why
• 1:12:39
  you're still there is because this stuff is so hard.
• 1:12:44
  Change is so hard. Leaving a situation it's doing. Changing
• 1:12:52
  anything is hard. Like This is one of the things
• 1:12:56
  that I sort of one of my gripe opposed sometimes
• 1:13:01
  with some of the self development rhetoric is that it
• 1:13:04
  makes things sound so much easier than they are, and
• 1:13:08
  sort of it trivializes what are really difficult things. You know,
• 1:13:13
  most people, if they could just turn off their depression
• 1:13:16
  or their anxiety, if there was just a switch where
• 1:13:18
  they could go, they would do it. And it's a
• 1:13:23
  terrible thing to feel. So the fact that they are
• 1:13:28
  feeling it must mean it's very difficult for them to
• 1:13:32
  not feel that. And the same is true of a relationship.
• 1:13:35
  If someone has stayed in an unhappy situation for a
• 1:13:39
  long time, that must mean it is incredibly difficult for
• 1:13:46
  them internally to make peace with the idea of leaving.
• 1:13:51
  And what's happening, of course, is in this moment where
• 1:13:55
  it's evident to all of their friends and family that
• 1:13:57
  they should leave and that they should never look back.
• 1:14:02
  Their abandonment issue that's been around their whole life is
• 1:14:05
  screaming at them. Yeah, screaming using any tacticket can to
• 1:14:12
  get them to stay. And when they were in the relationship,
• 1:14:16
  the way the tacticket used maybe was to go into
• 1:14:20
  people pleaser mode, and even though this person is not
• 1:14:23
  treating me right, I'm going to do anything I can
• 1:14:25
  to make them happy, make every compromise, make every sacrifice,
• 1:14:28
  bend over backwards, subjugate my own needs, to try and
• 1:14:32
  serve you all in order so that I can keep you.
• 1:14:38
  And then at a point where you get so unhappy
• 1:14:41
  and you say, oh my god, this person's terrible. I've
• 1:14:44
  had to lose myself in this relationship to make them happy,
• 1:14:47
  I'm going to leave. Just to the point of leaving,
• 1:14:51
  just as your friends are like, thank the Lord, they
• 1:14:56
  did it. They left you go home that night, and
• 1:15:01
  that abandonment demon realizes a different tactic has to be played.
• 1:15:06
  So it says, maybe they weren't so bad, Maybe like
• 1:15:13
  we're asking for too much. Maybe like you know, they
• 1:15:18
  did have really great qualities, didn't they. I mean they
• 1:15:20
  were they were loyal, and they're a lovely person a
• 1:15:24
  lot of the time, and they're this, and they're that,
• 1:15:27
  and that. That voice starts using a different tactic with you,
• 1:15:30
  because the only thing that voice wants is don't be abandoned,
• 1:15:35
  and they'll do anything in its power to reach that goal.
• 1:15:39
  It will ruin your life to achieve that goal because
• 1:15:42
  it only has one goal, and the goal is don't
• 1:15:45
  is not make you happy. The goal is make sure
• 1:15:47
  you're not abandoned. And so this stuff is so difficult,
• 1:15:54
  and it's why people should that in those moments. If
• 1:15:58
  anyone is listening to this, and if you're listening to
• 1:16:01
  this and you're in an unhappy situation, I get it.
• 1:16:04
  I get how hard it is and taking the time
• 1:16:08
  to really say one of the things that can help
• 1:16:11
  is to say, this demon would come out with another
• 1:16:18
  person too, so it's not really about this person. To
• 1:16:22
  that extent, at least, I can depersonalize this and go,
• 1:16:26
  it's not really about losing this person. It's just about
• 1:16:29
  losing a person. And I'll have I can carry this
• 1:16:34
  demon with me to the next one and the next
• 1:16:36
  one and the next one. So but I think people
• 1:16:41
  should be compassionate to themselves. But if they're struggling to
• 1:16:46
  end something difficult, but extend that compassion to your future self,
• 1:16:54
  because extend, truly extending your compassion to your future self
• 1:16:59
  is doing something that gives him or her a shot
• 1:17:02
  at a happy and a peaceful life. And if you
• 1:17:05
  know that all the evidence has told you it does
• 1:17:08
  not reside here, then compassion towards your future self is leaving,
• 1:17:13
  even if for your present self it's deeply painful.
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 2: That's so powerful, man, that's amazing. I'm so glad that
• 1:17:20
  you brought it to that and your reference to just
• 1:17:24
  have people could switch it off that. I remember when
• 1:17:26
  I read that statistic the first time that we have
• 1:17:28
  sixty to eighty thousand thoughts per day, but eighty percent
• 1:17:31
  of them are repeated, and that was the one that
• 1:17:34
  really hit me, and I was like, Yeah, that's what's happening,
• 1:17:37
  Like if someone's saying that to themselves, what you just
• 1:17:39
  said about abandonment, the idea of if someone keeps repeating
• 1:17:42
  to you themselves without even knowing subconsciously, don't be abandoned,
• 1:17:46
  don't be abandoned, don't be abandoned, don't be abandoned. And
• 1:17:48
  that's just repeating over and over again when you hear
• 1:17:51
  the advice of like, oh, yeah, you should be able
• 1:17:53
  to leave or walk away. Of course it's hard because
• 1:17:55
  that's one thought amongst sixty thousand thoughts or whatever it is. Yeah,
• 1:17:59
  and so it's a complete rewiring that needs to take place,
• 1:18:05
  and it's not just about cutting the wire right like
• 1:18:07
  we're so we're just like, oh yeah, I'm just gonna
• 1:18:08
  cut that thought out, and it doesn't work like that.
• 1:18:10
  It's completely shifting it around. And so I love what
• 1:18:13
  you just said that, you know, I'm so glad that
• 1:18:15
  you took this conversation there, because without that, actually it's
• 1:18:20
  not even possible to rewire, because you're just trying to
• 1:18:22
  cut a wire that can't be cut. It's not possible
• 1:18:25
  to cut it.
• 1:18:25
  Speaker 1: And even if you cut it in the form of
• 1:18:27
  ending this relationship, the issue is still there and you'll
• 1:18:30
  latch onto the first person you find on the way.
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 2: Out exactly exactly, Matthew. We've talked about so many things today.
• 1:18:36
  I want to ask you, is there anything that I
• 1:18:38
  haven't asked you to share before we dive into the
• 1:18:40
  final five? Is there something that's in your heart, in
• 1:18:42
  your mind that's intuitively there for you that you feel
• 1:18:45
  like you need to share with everyone today before we
• 1:18:47
  dive into the final five?
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: I suppose, if I may, there's I've been working on
• 1:18:55
  something recently that I know. These subjects and as you said,
• 1:19:00
  seem very abstract even when you talk about When we
• 1:19:04
  talk about confidence, it's a very hard thing to latch
• 1:19:07
  onto and figure out. Well, Okay, I want to be
• 1:19:10
  more confident. I want to be confident enough to leave
• 1:19:12
  or I'm single, but I want to be confident enough
• 1:19:14
  to approach that person. It's a very hard thing to
• 1:19:18
  grab onto. What does it mean to be more confident?
• 1:19:21
  How do I actually do it? I put together something
• 1:19:24
  that I said if in thirty days I wanted to
• 1:19:30
  if I had a gun to my head and it
• 1:19:31
  was you have to improve someone's confidence in thirty days,
• 1:19:35
  what would you do? I said, Well, maybe I'd create
• 1:19:39
  five challenges that were specifically engineered around the psychology of confidence.
• 1:19:46
  And my theory with this is if you can give
• 1:19:49
  yourself a genuine, not like you know, completely transform everything
• 1:19:55
  about your confidence in thirty days. Because we all know
• 1:19:57
  this just bs no one's The world is full of
• 1:20:01
  these kind of hyperbolic promises. But if people can I
• 1:20:06
  believe that when you can create like a crack in
• 1:20:09
  the doorway, and that shows you what's possible, that momentum
• 1:20:14
  leads to something bigger and bigger and bigger. I don't
• 1:20:17
  think someone starts by saying I know I can be
• 1:20:19
  a millionaire. I think someone starts by saying I made
• 1:20:22
  two grand this month. I bet I could make two
• 1:20:24
  and a half next month, and then making two and
• 1:20:26
  a half and go I think I see a way
• 1:20:28
  to four. You know that to me is how belief
• 1:20:31
  is built. It's incremental. And so I said, if I
• 1:20:34
  can get people a thirty day significant incremental shift in
• 1:20:38
  their confidence, then whatever goals they have this year, that
• 1:20:43
  will give the momentum to charge into those goals. Differently,
• 1:20:47
  so I put together a place where I've got there's
• 1:20:50
  an initial kickoff call that I'm doing with everybody where
• 1:20:53
  I'm going to take them through those five I love
• 1:20:55
  that challenges. We're going to do them, to go through
• 1:20:58
  them together as a blueprint for thirty days, and then
• 1:21:00
  the timer of the thirty days is going to start
• 1:21:03
  and everyone's goal as a community is to do those
• 1:21:06
  five challenges over those thirty days. And that's literally engineered
• 1:21:09
  them based on the psychology of what I've learned about
• 1:21:12
  confidence over fifteen years. If I may, I would say.
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 2: I'd love that. Where can people sign up?
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, if you go to MH challenge dot com. That's
• 1:21:23
  my initials MH and challenge dot com. There's a place
• 1:21:27
  where people can sign up and they can join that challenge.
• 1:21:30
  But we already ran it once and it was The
• 1:21:33
  results have been really beautiful because everyone's writing in, Yeah,
• 1:21:36
  it just ticked off this together and I just did this.
• 1:21:39
  I just did this. So it's been a very unifying
• 1:21:41
  thing for people, and we're about to do we're running
• 1:21:45
  it again now so people can come and join an
• 1:21:47
  MH challenge.
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 2: I love it. Everyone who's listening and watching, make sure
• 1:21:49
  you don't sign up at MH challenge dot com. I
• 1:21:52
  don't want you to miss out on that. That sounds
• 1:21:53
  that sounds awesome, and it's so much more fun doing
• 1:21:55
  it with other people. And yeah, taking it through these
• 1:21:57
  five challenges.
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 1: And we know I've changed. Just buy buy those practical.
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 2: Things thousand percent, like I've never changed without being I've
• 1:22:08
  always said to it is three things. Coaching, consistency, and community,
• 1:22:12
  Like those are the three things if you want to
• 1:22:14
  change any air of your life. If you don't have coaching,
• 1:22:16
  you don't have consistency, and you don't have community, you're
• 1:22:18
  not going to change it. And so that's exactly what
• 1:22:21
  this is. So MHS challenge dot Com is the place
• 1:22:23
  to sign up everyone, and Matthew, I've got the final
• 1:22:26
  five for you. So these have to be answered in
• 1:22:28
  one word or one sentence maximum a sentence. I don't
• 1:22:31
  know what the official definition is, but I make it
• 1:22:33
  seven to ten words.
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 1: So one word of one sentence, one word of one
• 1:22:37
  sentence for each of these.
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 2: Okay, so Matthew asked you, these are your final five.
• 1:22:40
  The first question is what is the worst relationship advice
• 1:22:44
  you've ever heard or received?
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: Find someone who loves you more than you love them.
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, okay, great, good, good answer, all right. Question
• 1:22:56
  number two, what's the best relationship advice you've ever heard, received,
• 1:23:00
  or given.
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: Make a list of the things that are truly important
• 1:23:09
  for you to find in a partner, and then be
• 1:23:12
  that list.
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 2: Love that great advice, all right. Question number three, one
• 1:23:17
  word to one sentence again, define love for.
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: You generous interpretation of other people's behavior.
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 2: That's a great definition. I was not expecting that. That's awesome.
• 1:23:31
  That is a great definition. All right. Question number four,
• 1:23:35
  what is how would you describe your current purpose in life.
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 1: To make people feel less alone in their suffering.
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 2: That's beautiful. I love that man. That's really special. All right,
• 1:23:49
  question number five. If you could create one law in
• 1:23:52
  the world that everyone had to follow, what would it be.
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 1: I don't think I can be the golden rule. All
• 1:24:01
  the confusion you know, you know, do to other people
• 1:24:08
  or treat other people how you would want to be treated.
• 1:24:10
  I don't think I can.
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 2: I love it. I love it. Matthew us here. Please
• 1:24:17
  please please go follow Matthew on all social media platforms YouTube, Instagram, Facebook,
• 1:24:23
  Go and check out the MH Challenge dot com. Don't
• 1:24:26
  forget that you're getting five challenges in confidence with Matthew
• 1:24:30
  for that as well, so it makes you Go and
• 1:24:31
  check out MH Challenge dot com. And please tag me
• 1:24:35
  on me and Matthew on Instagram, on Twitter, on any
• 1:24:37
  platform that you use with your biggest takeaways from this episode.
• 1:24:41
  We want to see them. You know that I love
• 1:24:43
  sharing those insights. And leave a review as well with
• 1:24:45
  your big takeaway from Matthew's episode. Matthew, thank you so
• 1:24:49
  much for doing this. I hope this is the first
• 1:24:52
  of many that we get to do this for.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: And can I say it's been just been an unbelievable
• 1:24:57
  pleasure to do this and you are You're incredible at
• 1:25:02
  what you do, and the way you bring yourself even
• 1:25:05
  to an interview like this is people don't realize the
• 1:25:09
  level of pro in the way you interview, the way
• 1:25:13
  you listen, the way you like I sat here learning
• 1:25:17
  about listening from watching you listen, and that that's exactly
• 1:25:21
  what we talked about in a relationship. Right You see
• 1:25:23
  something in somebody else that's that they're doing really well,
• 1:25:26
  and you go, wow, I want to I want to
• 1:25:27
  be as good a listener as Jay is right now.
• 1:25:31
  And to watch you. You know, we have mutual friends,
• 1:25:34
  but to watch what you have done over the last
• 1:25:37
  few years is a is a truly extraordinary thing to behold.
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 2: I know.
• 1:25:47
  Speaker 1: What kind of resourcefulness and initiative and proactiveness it must
• 1:25:54
  have taken for you to build this thing that you've built,
• 1:25:57
  which is just extraordinary. And you know, I don't I'm
• 1:26:03
  sure you hear it many many times a day, but
• 1:26:05
  it is, you know, from one creator to another. I
• 1:26:09
  look at it and it is something very special what
• 1:26:12
  you've done. So congratulations, thank you man.
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 2: I appreciate it's very kind. Really that means a lot
• 1:26:17
  to me, and I've felt how genuine that was, and well,
• 1:26:20
  the way the reason why I was listening so well
• 1:26:22
  is because you were speaking so hard. This is easy
• 1:26:25
  to listen to. I was just sitting there going, this
• 1:26:27
  is great, Like I'm like this, people are gonna love this,
• 1:26:30
  and this still makes sense. And so it was easy
• 1:26:32
  to listen to you. And I think that's part of
• 1:26:35
  a relationship. You want to You want to sit down
• 1:26:37
  with someone that that makes it easy. You enjoy the conversation,
• 1:26:40
  You enjoy the conversation that you're weird so no, and
• 1:26:43
  the feelings meet you man, like I remember, you know,
• 1:26:45
  I've been watching you for years and years and years
• 1:26:47
  and to see what you've created and the evolution of
• 1:26:50
  your work and just also just what I what I
• 1:26:52
  really appreciate is the dedication to what you do and
• 1:26:55
  who you help and how you help them. I think
• 1:26:58
  it's so you know, I think we live in a
• 1:27:00
  world where it's so easy to like, you know, now
• 1:27:03
  I'm a crypto influencer and now I'm a you know,
• 1:27:06
  NFT influence or whatever it is, and it's like to
• 1:27:09
  dedicate your life to to something that is big enough
• 1:27:13
  to be dedicated to. But to just see you so
• 1:27:15
  focused and even in today's conversation, I can see that.
• 1:27:18
  You know, It's like you can tell when someone's really
• 1:27:20
  well read in an area and has really thought about it,
• 1:27:23
  from like pop culture to history to you know that.
• 1:27:26
  I love that. I love meeting someone who's immersed in
• 1:27:28
  there in their space, and you you demonstrate that beautifully.
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 1: Thank you.
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 2: Thank you for that. Yeah, thank you for dedicating your
• 1:27:35
  life to and especially you know, helping people suffer less
• 1:27:38
  in their relationships, which can be such a great source
• 1:27:41
  of suffering. So thank you, man.
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 1: Appreciate you man.
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 2: If you want even more videos just like this one,
• 1:27:46
  make sure you subscribe and click on the boxes over here.
• 1:27:50
  I'm also excited to let you know that you can
• 1:27:52
  now get my book, Think Like a Monk from Thinklike
• 1:27:56
  a monkbook dot Com. Check below in the description to
• 1:27:59
  make sure you ordered today.