Latest / How Hard Can It Be? with Diana Maria Riva / Toxic Love, the Sex and the City Paradox, and Dating Right after 50 with Sabrina Bendory

Transcript

Toxic Love, the Sex and the City Paradox, and Dating Right after 50 with Sabrina Bendory · How Hard Can It Be? with Diana Maria Riva

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Speaker 1: When it comes to dating and relationships, what code do
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Speaker 1: you live by? Do you even have a code? Or
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Speaker 1: do you tend to settle for the crumbs as a
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Speaker 1: whole meal? My guest today is an expert in this field,
0:10
Speaker 1: and we're diving into her book and this topic and
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Speaker 1: discussing everything from confusing chaos for chemistry, how sex in
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Speaker 1: the city was a whole ass lie, and why do
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Speaker 1: we stay when we know better? Really, how hard can
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Speaker 1: it be? How hard can it be? Welcome to another
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Speaker 1: episode of How Hard Can It Be? I'm your host,
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Speaker 1: Diana Maria Riva, a podcast here for Gen X women
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Speaker 1: navigating midlife's most fantastic bullshit. I am very excited about
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Speaker 1: today's episode. We are going to be talking about something
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Speaker 1: that resonates with women of every decade, you know, 20
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Speaker 1: and over. Dating. Dating, the gloriousness, the bullshit, the self.
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Speaker 1: And my guest today is a relationship coach, expert. She
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Speaker 1: works with women on this topic and the bestselling author
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Speaker 1: of Detached, How to Let It Go, Heal and Become Irresistible,
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Speaker 1: and The Feminine Code, which I have read, noted, ready
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Speaker 1: to discuss. Please help me welcome my guest, Sabrina Bendori. Hi.
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Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited
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Speaker 1: to be here. I am very excited. I feel we're girlfriends.
1:25
Speaker 1: I feel we're girlfriends, and I'll tell you why. Because
1:28
Speaker 1: when you read this book, you write and speak to
1:33
Speaker 1: your reader like a friend, like a girlfriend. And I
1:36
Speaker 1: don't say that lightly. And you're not there like, hey, girl.
1:41
Speaker 1: It's just the way you approach subjects from this subject
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Speaker 1: from a place of no shame, no blame, which I really,
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Speaker 1: really love. And you may think, okay... I'm married. I've
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Speaker 1: been married for 38 years, like my bestie Tina, who
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Speaker 1: does my sidekick episodes here. She's been married for 30,
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Speaker 1: I don't even know, 30 years, 35, 30 years. And
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Speaker 1: she may think, oh, I don't need to read the book.
2:05
Speaker 1: You do need to read this book. You do need
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Speaker 1: to read this book because there are things that you
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Speaker 1: will recognize in your longtime relationships. that you need to
2:13
Speaker 1: have answers for. So I wanted to ask you, I
2:18
Speaker 1: know it prompted this book, but I wanted to just
2:21
Speaker 1: start off by reading something that made me think, yes,
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Speaker 1: and then the launch of this. And you write here,
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Speaker 1: I paid a huge price in my attempt to be
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Speaker 1: loved and and chosen. I sold myself down the river
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Speaker 1: for the sake of him. I gave everything and left
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Speaker 1: with nothing. After him, I had to rebuild everything. New friends,
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Speaker 1: new purpose, new sense of self, new sense of self-respect,
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Speaker 1: and a whole new career. It was an epically massive
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Speaker 1: mountain to climb. And I wanted to open with this
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Speaker 1: story because I know it will resonate deeply and it
2:54
Speaker 1: will serve as a reference point through this book. Many
2:57
Speaker 1: of us have had a Nick. which is who the
3:02
Speaker 1: other party is, what's being called. And that relationship prompted
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Speaker 1: you to writing this? That relationship prompted so much just
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Speaker 1: in my life. It gave me the career that I
3:14
Speaker 1: have because the aftermath of that relationship hollowed me out.
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Speaker 1: And this was a long time ago. This was before
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Speaker 1: you had all the talking heads on social media about
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Speaker 1: their experiences. I felt so alone.
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Speaker 2: And even though I had my friends around me and
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Speaker 2: they were like, I've been through breakup, you'll get through this.
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Speaker 2: It felt like, no, this pain is mine and mine alone.
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Speaker 2: I ended up working with him for a long time.
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Speaker 2: That's why I say like new career because that was
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Speaker 2: a whole other 13 year saga that came after. And
3:44
Speaker 2: actually this book was born out of one section from
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Speaker 2: my previous book, Detached. So after I had submitted the
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Speaker 2: draft and we're doing edits, it occurred to me that
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Speaker 2: I didn't write a section on detaching from a narcissist.
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Speaker 1: Which is a very specific experience. We can do another
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Speaker 1: episode just on that topic alone. Anytime, truly. And last
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Speaker 1: one I was like, oh my gosh, I can't believe
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Speaker 1: I didn't add this in. And when I sat down
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Speaker 1: to write that section, the rest of the book I
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Speaker 1: wrote from a very detached place.
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Speaker 2: But as I was writing about this experience, which had
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Speaker 2: happened so long ago, I felt venom in my veins.
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Speaker 2: It still lives in you, even.
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Speaker 1: After all this time.
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Speaker 2: And then that section of the book, I think, is
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Speaker 2: the best one. And once the book came out, that
4:26
Speaker 2: was the one that went massively viral to the point
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Speaker 2: where the comment threads on Facebook turned into like a
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Speaker 2: support group of people who had been through this and
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Speaker 2: are sharing their experiences. So then my publishers were like,
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Speaker 2: you know, people have such a strong reaction to this.
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Speaker 2: Maybe you should write another book that really focuses on
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Speaker 2: toxic dynamics and why that happens. So that's where this,
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Speaker 2: and obviously I had to open with like the full
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Speaker 2: story of Nick.
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Speaker 1: Totally. It wasn't even the full story. I could write
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Speaker 1: a whole book just on him. You could feel it,
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Speaker 1: but that's the best part. You start with like, here,
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Speaker 1: here's the relationship and this is what happened. And we're
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Speaker 1: reading it and we're like, girl, but we've all been
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Speaker 1: there and we've all walked through it. But this is
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Speaker 1: what I love about the book. You divide it up
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Speaker 1: in pretty much three segments, three journeys. First, let's just
5:08
Speaker 1: look back and see where this came from. What is
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Speaker 1: it that would attract me to these relationships, either one
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Speaker 1: really bad one or over and over again? With no
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Speaker 1: shame or blame. That's what I think you do the
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Speaker 1: best in this. No shame or blame. And the middle is,
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Speaker 1: and then what were the warning signs that we ignored?
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Speaker 1: And then the end is, okay, now how is it
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Speaker 1: that you live your most authentic self, which will be
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Speaker 1: the woman that would never even be attracted to this
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Speaker 1: person in the first place? Exactly. Yes. That's the full
5:37
Speaker 1: journey of it. That's the journey. It's who you become next. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: But let's break down. Let's start in the beginning. One
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Speaker 1: of the things that first prompted me, you recognize yourself
5:46
Speaker 1: or you recognize portions of yourself in one or more relationships.
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Speaker 1: But I love that you talked about I said a
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Speaker 1: story of my self-care. I truly believed I just needed
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Speaker 1: to love him enough so that he could love himself
6:00
Speaker 1: and then in turn be able to love me. That
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Speaker 1: formula is something that I have applied to the worst
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Speaker 1: relationships I've ever been in. I labeled it as when
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Speaker 1: I figured it out, because by the way, what you
6:15
Speaker 1: figured out in this happened so much earlier in your
6:18
Speaker 1: life than it did for me. But I figured out
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Speaker 1: that if I love a guy that has lower self-esteem
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Speaker 1: than me, then he thinks I'm refreshing. And so refreshing
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Speaker 1: that he finds joy in his self-loathing, now joy in
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Speaker 1: what I'm bringing him. And then suddenly I'm making him
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Speaker 1: love himself. And now because of that, he's loving me.
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Speaker 1: And we all know that's not sustainable. Oh, no. And
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Speaker 1: that's good until they can't do it anymore. Because it's
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Speaker 1: not a true self-love. Right. So they project it. He
6:51
Speaker 1: just feels emasculated and he feels like a loser. Maybe
6:54
Speaker 1: at first it feels good because if this guy is
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Speaker 1: somebody with narcissistic tendencies, I'm not going to say full
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Speaker 1: on narcissist, it will feed their ego. And narcissistic people
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Speaker 1: live in pursuit of their own ego fuel.
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Speaker 2: So at first, oh, this incredible woman, she's so accomplished
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Speaker 2: and she sees me and she's pouring into me. But
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Speaker 2: after a while, he knows deep down, oh, I can
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Speaker 2: never really measure up. I'm not really, you know, she's
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Speaker 2: seen the weak sides of me. And then he's going
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Speaker 2: to find some other source of fuel, some other woman
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Speaker 2: that doesn't know about his sad history. And then he'll
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Speaker 2: pursue that and he'll forget about you. And you're like,
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Speaker 2: was I nothing?
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Speaker 1: Did I mean nothing? Did I imagine this whole relationship
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Speaker 1: that I thought that we had? Yep. But you bring
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Speaker 1: something up, though, about the fact that she's going to,
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Speaker 1: she's in on it. She knows that, or they start
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Speaker 1: to realize that they will never measure up. And what
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Speaker 1: that tends to translate to, which you write about here
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Speaker 1: in this relationship with Nick, is how he started to
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Speaker 1: point blame, how he started to say, you walked into it,
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Speaker 1: it was your choice. And they project, I always say,
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Speaker 1: why face the pain when you can blame? And so
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Speaker 1: when they start realizing, she's going to realize that I'm
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Speaker 1: not All that she builds me up to be that
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Speaker 1: I am a loser, that I am inadequate or that
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Speaker 1: I am self-loathing, whatever. And so they they project it
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Speaker 1: all on you. Yes. Yes.
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Speaker 2: And then that's where the demeaning comes in and the belittling.
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Speaker 2: But that usually follows a period of.
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Speaker 1: Everyone's favorite word, love bombing.
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Speaker 2: It always starts off with the. You're so incredible. You're
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Speaker 2: so amazing. And you get so hooked on that, especially
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Speaker 2: when I talk about in the book childhood and that
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Speaker 2: forms the foundation for this. If you never felt truly
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Speaker 2: loved and you made it through a childhood feeling where
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Speaker 2: your needs were very much neglected and you thought someday
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Speaker 2: love is going to save me, just like in the movies.
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Speaker 2: And this guy comes along and he's saying all the
8:48
Speaker 2: right things and he sees you. He really seems like
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Speaker 2: he sees you and he gets you and you're like
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Speaker 2: this this is my salvation. This is my reward for
8:56
Speaker 2: all this suffering. And you hold onto it. But eventually
8:58
Speaker 2: things flip. Eventually he starts making comments. The thing with
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Speaker 2: Nick is he would say the nicest things to me
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Speaker 2: that I've, that anyone has ever said to me. And
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Speaker 2: also the worst things that anyone has ever said to me.
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Speaker 2: And when he would say those worst things, I wouldn't
9:13
Speaker 2: think there's something wrong with him. I would think, oh,
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Speaker 2: there's something wrong with me. I did something wrong and
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Speaker 2: I need to work harder to win him back over.
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Speaker 1: And that's how, that's how it starts. And then you
9:21
Speaker 1: get hooked on that cycle. You talk about breadcrumbs. Yeah.
9:25
Speaker 1: Oh my God. I used to have a mentor that
9:27
Speaker 1: would say, you don't do scraps. And by the way,
9:32
Speaker 1: you bring this up. You don't have to have been
9:34
Speaker 1: from a broken home to have experienced an adult life
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Speaker 1: with these kinds of relationships. I didn't come from a
9:39
Speaker 1: broken home. It can happen to anyone. My dad is
9:41
Speaker 1: amazing and he's amazing to my mother and he's a
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Speaker 1: household of women, three daughters and a wife and he's great.
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Speaker 1: I had the example of a good man, a good, reliable, loving,
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Speaker 1: kind man. Yet I And my house was bountiful with love.
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Speaker 1: Yet when, like you broke it down so beautifully, they
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Speaker 1: give you so little that when they give you one
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Speaker 1: little nice compliment or when they return the text with
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Speaker 1: a certain emoji or when they... And by the way,
10:05
Speaker 1: this was happening at me in my 40s, not the
10:09
Speaker 1: shit that was happening in my 20s. And I'm just like, oh,
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Speaker 1: he sent me the love emoji with a real kiss. Oh,
10:14
Speaker 1: my God. And I'm like, oh, my God. I'm like 13.
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Speaker 1: It was... And it's amazing how we get into the
10:21
Speaker 1: cycle of just wanting the crumbs. Yeah. And that erodes.
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Speaker 1: That starts to break a woman down. Yeah. You start
10:29
Speaker 1: abandoning yourself just for the sake of being chosen. And
10:32
Speaker 1: it's the most addictive cycle in psychology is the intermittent reinforcement,
10:39
Speaker 1: meaning when you don't know when that reward is coming.
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Speaker 1: So with the breadcrumbs, with consistent care, you're not stressed.
10:46
Speaker 1: And they found this in studies with rats. When they
10:48
Speaker 1: reward the rats on a consistent schedule, okay, they're at
10:51
Speaker 1: a calm, even baseline. But when the rats don't know
10:54
Speaker 1: when the reward is coming, like it's coming. They measure
10:56
Speaker 1: that they are so stressed. So with the bread crumbing,
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Speaker 1: when you don't know when that nice gesture is coming,
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Speaker 1: you don't know when the kissy face emoji or whatever,
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Speaker 1: you don't know when he's going to ask to see you.
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Speaker 1: You're so stressed. But then when you hear from him,
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Speaker 1: it feels so good. It's just that relief.
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Speaker 2: I always equate it to like taking off high heels
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Speaker 2: at the end of a long day. And it's euphoric.
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Speaker 2: You're like, this is heaven. But it's not because you
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Speaker 2: gain something positive. It's because you remove something negative. The
11:21
Speaker 2: pain of wearing those painful shoes.
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Speaker 1: Look at that. It's the same with the the person
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Speaker 1: who's breadcrumbing you like this, when you get that hit
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Speaker 1: of validation, it feels so good, you become addicted. It's
11:32
Speaker 1: the same reason people park themselves at slot machines and
11:35
Speaker 1: they're just pulling and pulling because sometimes, sometimes you win
11:38
Speaker 1: and that's enough to just keep you there. It's the
11:41
Speaker 1: exact same mechanism. You bring it up and you mentioned
11:44
Speaker 1: the word dopamine. The dopamine release, it's a small IV
11:48
Speaker 1: drip of it and we get like, you know, just
11:51
Speaker 1: wanting it and... And not only did, so if we're
11:54
Speaker 1: looking at the origin, maybe there wasn't enough of that
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Speaker 1: in your home. Maybe there was a parent that was
12:03
Speaker 1: very critical and very criticizing. And so your self-image, your
12:08
Speaker 1: self-worth was just being chipped away at from a young age.
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Speaker 1: And now you look at your self-worth in a relationship
12:15
Speaker 1: that gives you a dopamine drip of worth. Yeah. And
12:19
Speaker 1: then you mentioned also society, the movies. You bring up movies.
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Speaker 1: I rip on those movies. I was in my early 20s, no, teens.
12:30
Speaker 1: And when I was a teenager, the 80s were my,
12:33
Speaker 1: I lived in an 80s movie in my head. I'm like,
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Speaker 1: I am Molly Ringwald. I'm the one that doesn't fit
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Speaker 1: and look like everyone else in the hot, handsome knight
12:42
Speaker 1: comes showing up at the church to pick me up
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Speaker 1: and take me away. And we did live off of those.
12:47
Speaker 1: Music videos, I'm like, I live in like a music
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Speaker 1: video in my head. So there's the rom-coms that make
12:52
Speaker 1: us feel like it's going to be that way. Yes.
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Speaker 2: Like if you just endure for long enough, eventually you'll
12:58
Speaker 2: be chosen. And I'm sorry to say this because this
13:00
Speaker 2: show meant a lot to me, but Sex and the
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Speaker 2: City is the biggest offender of them all.
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Speaker 1: Honestly, it is. She said what she said.
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Speaker 2: What did that show do? It took, first of all,
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Speaker 2: They tricked us. I was very young when the show
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Speaker 2: came out. I should not have been watching it.
13:13
Speaker 1: I was too young. But I watched it.
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Speaker 2: I watched it, like, through every phase of my life.
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Speaker 2: That show tried to tell us, oh, this is female empowerment.
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Speaker 1: And they don't need men. But the whole show centered men.
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Speaker 1: The whole show was about being chosen. Even Samantha. Even
13:28
Speaker 1: if we think that, no, she was actually probably the
13:30
Speaker 1: most broken of them all. Yeah. And the most in
13:32
Speaker 1: need of being chosen and loved. But with Carrie... We
13:36
Speaker 1: saw six seasons of her enduring Biggs nonsense just for
13:42
Speaker 1: the sake of being chosen by this man who told
13:45
Speaker 1: her in every which way, I don't want you.
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Speaker 2: And she just couldn't hear it. But then in the end,
13:51
Speaker 2: they had to give her that happy ending.
13:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, of course. You need the Hollywood ending. Six years,
13:54
Speaker 1: six seasons later. six seasons of this on again, off again.
13:57
Speaker 1: And fine, we get it. We know it's a show.
13:58
Speaker 2: We know in real life, the real Candace Bushnell did
14:01
Speaker 2: not end up with her Mr. Big, which, yeah, because
14:03
Speaker 2: of course they would not end up together. But it
14:06
Speaker 2: still plants a seed. It still plants a seed of
14:10
Speaker 2: just maybe, just maybe if I wait this out a
14:14
Speaker 2: little bit longer and we see that everywhere, if you
14:17
Speaker 2: think of every, almost every show and movie, because healthy
14:21
Speaker 2: love is boring.
14:22
Speaker 1: That does not make for good entertainment. No, of course not.
14:25
Speaker 2: And the point of movies and TV shows is this
14:26
Speaker 2: isn't a documentary about this is what regular life looks like.
14:29
Speaker 2: It's to entertain us.
14:30
Speaker 1: Yeah. But it still seeps in there. I do remember
14:33
Speaker 1: a man that I was dating... I knew going in,
14:47
Speaker 1: this is not the right guy for me. I knew
14:50
Speaker 1: going in, he's likely going to do something that's really dumb,
14:54
Speaker 1: really hurtful or whatever, because that's just who he is. Like,
14:58
Speaker 1: I had the wherewithal to say, it's not me. That's
15:00
Speaker 1: exactly who he is. And then, like, two months into it,
15:03
Speaker 1: he's like, I love you. And I'm like, how are
15:06
Speaker 1: you going to let me do? And then proceeded to
15:09
Speaker 1: remain in that relationship. And a year and a half in...
15:14
Speaker 1: Bad behavior, like non-negotiable stuff. And guess who renegotiated that contract? Myself. Right.
15:21
Speaker 1: And I did that for two and a half years
15:23
Speaker 1: until he broke up with me and I was like,
15:28
Speaker 1: who the Are you bringing me? But I, because I
15:31
Speaker 1: lost myself. Yeah. And I was the cool girl until
15:34
Speaker 1: I wasn't. And I then started falling into the crumbs
15:38
Speaker 1: and the dopamine drip and all those, you know, and
15:42
Speaker 1: I was love bombed in the beginning because I had
15:44
Speaker 1: come out of my divorce so starved and hungry and
15:48
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what and why the biggest thing.
15:54
Speaker 1: And I do want to focus on this with you
15:56
Speaker 1: and ask your take on this. You do mention it
15:59
Speaker 1: in here somewhere. The biggest source of heartbreak for me
16:04
Speaker 1: in that breakup was not him, was not... And I
16:09
Speaker 1: knew that when we broke up. It wasn't him. It
16:11
Speaker 1: wasn't the fact that he broke up with me. It
16:13
Speaker 1: wasn't the fact that there was a third party involved.
16:16
Speaker 1: It was none of that. It was how angry I
16:19
Speaker 1: was at myself. There it is. Yes. Talk to me why...
16:24
Speaker 1: First of all, we lose ourselves, and then the anger
16:27
Speaker 1: of trying to come back from that anger, it took
16:31
Speaker 1: me too long. Of course, because you just said it yourself.
16:36
Speaker 1: You saw the.
16:36
Speaker 2: Signs from the beginning. You knew, and you overrode your instincts.
16:41
Speaker 2: And you know what that tells you? I can't trust
16:43
Speaker 2: myself to make decisions that are in my own best interest.
16:46
Speaker 1: That's debilitating.
16:48
Speaker 2: It is debilitating, and then that is a very long
16:50
Speaker 2: road back. Because then you're like, how do I trust
16:52
Speaker 2: anything anymore?
16:53
Speaker 1: Yeah. I overrode everything. Yeah. And so the road back
16:57
Speaker 1: is to really understand the why. Fine.
17:01
Speaker 2: If you want, you could beat yourself up about it.
17:02
Speaker 2: I guarantee you that's not going to take you anywhere.
17:04
Speaker 2: It's not going to take you anywhere good. It's just
17:06
Speaker 2: going to send your self-esteem, self-worth, further down, down into
17:10
Speaker 2: the toilet. Instead, you have to look at what need
17:13
Speaker 2: was I trying to fulfill here? Because you didn't do
17:16
Speaker 2: this because you were stupid or broken. You pursued it
17:19
Speaker 2: because it was fulfilling an important need.
17:22
Speaker 1: I think I need you to repeat that again, because
17:25
Speaker 1: this is something, it actually makes me choke up. I
17:27
Speaker 1: learned it too late. I have women in my life
17:31
Speaker 1: who are right at this crossroad and need to hear that.
17:34
Speaker 1: You didn't pursue this.
17:36
Speaker 2: You didn't pursue this because you were stupid or broken.
17:39
Speaker 1: It's because it was meeting a fundamental need. The problem
17:42
Speaker 1: is you were meeting that need through something unhealthy rather
17:46
Speaker 1: than something that was healthy. So you need to identify
17:49
Speaker 1: what the need is. You need to look at, okay,
17:51
Speaker 1: what did I do wrong here? Where did I abandon
17:53
Speaker 1: my boundaries? Where did I abandon myself? And what is
17:56
Speaker 1: my plan? You have to make a plan so that
17:58
Speaker 1: I won't do this again. Yeah. So that I could
18:01
Speaker 1: trust myself to know that I won't do this again. Yeah.
18:04
Speaker 1: That's how we find our way out of this. That
18:06
Speaker 1: self-trust is the biggest, I think, liberation. Yeah. When you
18:13
Speaker 1: really have it. Because then you move on when you
18:17
Speaker 1: recognize all of this and you're in this humbled place
18:21
Speaker 1: or you've been brought down to your knees place to discussing...
18:25
Speaker 1: The warning signs. So what I always say, women have
18:29
Speaker 1: a phenomenal ability to ignore the red flags. Oh, yeah.
18:35
Speaker 1: And I say this to my daughter even because she's
18:39
Speaker 1: a young woman. And I say, like, the sooner you
18:42
Speaker 1: recognize the red flags and honor them for what they are,
18:47
Speaker 1: the easier your life will be, the better quality your
18:51
Speaker 1: relationships will be, all of it. Because, I mean, I
18:54
Speaker 1: could spend an insurance seminar. I could polish a turd.
18:58
Speaker 1: I could smooth the sharp edges. And why are women so–
19:04
Speaker 1: I don't know. Why do we struggle with this? Why
19:09
Speaker 1: do we take the red flags? It's in our face.
19:11
Speaker 1: And we're like, I don't see anything. Why do we
19:14
Speaker 1: do that? Because women and feminine energy is– we are
19:18
Speaker 1: the manifestors of potential. We could see potential and turn
19:22
Speaker 1: it into something great. Yes, we can. And most men
19:25
Speaker 1: do not do this.
19:27
Speaker 2: Most men do not see a woman who is struggling
19:31
Speaker 2: and broken and really having a hard time and say,
19:34
Speaker 2: you know what? She's not really the type of partner
19:38
Speaker 2: that I want right now, but I bet I could
19:40
Speaker 2: fix her. I'm just going to come in and save
19:41
Speaker 2: the day. Men typically see what is, and it's either
19:44
Speaker 2: a yes.
19:45
Speaker 1: Or a no. Women, just our compassion gets the better
19:49
Speaker 1: of us. Our nurturing instincts get the better of us.
19:53
Speaker 1: We see the good guy he could be underneath the mess.
19:56
Speaker 1: You think Nick was what I wanted? He was depressed.
19:59
Speaker 1: He was directionless. He was broke.
20:01
Speaker 2: I mean, and I was young. I had no money either,
20:03
Speaker 2: and I spent every cent on him.
20:06
Speaker 1: He... He couldn't take me anywhere. He would just play
20:10
Speaker 1: video games for days on end. Some days I had
20:13
Speaker 1: to force him to get in the shower. I mean,
20:16
Speaker 1: was that my dream man? No. I wouldn't judge you
20:20
Speaker 1: for it. You never know. But I was like, if
20:24
Speaker 1: only he would just shower every day and get a job.
20:28
Speaker 1: And then he showers on that Wednesday and you're like, crumb.
20:32
Speaker 1: This is great. Get a job. I'm like, get some money.
20:36
Speaker 1: Figure himself out. Maybe get on an antidepressant. Maybe go
20:40
Speaker 1: to a therapist. If only we could get all these
20:42
Speaker 1: things in line. then I have something here, right? And
20:46
Speaker 1: look what I did to myself in the meantime. I
20:49
Speaker 1: put myself through hell. And that's just like what you
20:53
Speaker 1: said in your story.
20:54
Speaker 2: I couldn't just be mad at him because like Nick
20:56
Speaker 2: said to me, you're choosing to be here.
20:58
Speaker 1: I was choosing to be there. He wasn't holding me hostage.
21:01
Speaker 1: It was my choice. And he made it clear to me.
21:02
Speaker 1: He's like, no, I'm not going to commit to you.
21:04
Speaker 1: He basically told me you're not good enough for me.
21:06
Speaker 1: I mean, it's funny now, but at the time he
21:09
Speaker 1: was basically like, no, I can never see myself having
21:11
Speaker 1: kids with somebody like you. Basically, like, you're broken, you're defective.
21:14
Speaker 1: And I was like, I'm just going to work even
21:16
Speaker 1: harder to show you that you're wrong. We default. First
21:21
Speaker 1: of all, I do think the Gen X women in particular...
21:25
Speaker 1: will default to that work hard and make it work,
21:29
Speaker 1: partly because it's in our DNA generationally, but it's also
21:33
Speaker 1: because we have boomer parents and we saw them go
21:36
Speaker 1: the distance a lot, you know, many of them in
21:38
Speaker 1: the marriages, and they just made it work. Even if
21:42
Speaker 1: your parents weren't friends, if we didn't see your parents
21:45
Speaker 1: being friends, it was like, no, but they are partners
21:47
Speaker 1: in the household, you know, whatever. And yet we definitely
21:53
Speaker 1: just know how to stay too long. Yes. Yes. And
21:56
Speaker 1: it also like the other part.
21:57
Speaker 2: Of it is what I talk about in the book,
21:59
Speaker 2: the desire to be chosen, especially a lot of this
22:03
Speaker 2: does go back to childhood.
22:04
Speaker 1: Yeah. A lot of us, especially those of us raised
22:07
Speaker 1: by the boomers, and this wasn't their fault. I'm not
22:09
Speaker 1: placing blame. Right. But their idea of parenting was just
22:13
Speaker 1: provide for the child physically. You have a roof over
22:16
Speaker 1: your head. You have food in your belly. Your physical
22:18
Speaker 1: needs are met. It wasn't even until fairly recently in
22:22
Speaker 1: the field of psychology where they started studying and realizing
22:26
Speaker 1: the emotional needs of a child.
22:29
Speaker 2: And how much kids need emotional attunement. And a lot
22:32
Speaker 2: of people didn't get that. And yes, you can end
22:34
Speaker 2: up in a toxic relationship even if you had a
22:36
Speaker 2: great childhood. I talk about this in the book as well.
22:38
Speaker 2: But really the question to ask yourself is, who did
22:41
Speaker 2: I need to be as a kid in order to
22:43
Speaker 2: be loved? And we all needed to play some role.
22:46
Speaker 2: Either it was, I'm loved when I'm getting straight A's.
22:50
Speaker 2: I'm loved when I'm the people pleaser. I'm loved when
22:53
Speaker 2: I'm the perfectionist, when I'm the quiet one, when I'm
22:56
Speaker 2: the good girl, when I'm not too loud, whatever it was.
23:00
Speaker 2: Then we're like, okay, when I act like this, then
23:02
Speaker 2: I get loved. We go into our adult relationships believing
23:07
Speaker 2: I can control how people feel about me and how
23:09
Speaker 2: much they love me based on my behavior. And that's
23:12
Speaker 2: the trap because when a guy is acting... monstrously towards
23:18
Speaker 2: us we think it's my fault we we lose the
23:21
Speaker 2: ability just like a kid does not have the ability
23:24
Speaker 2: to see mom had a hard day that's why she
23:27
Speaker 2: yelled at me instead a kid thinks I there's something
23:31
Speaker 2: wrong with me they don't think they're not mad at
23:33
Speaker 2: the parent they're mad at themselves yeah and we grow
23:37
Speaker 2: up and do the same thing we default to those
23:39
Speaker 2: same childhood coping skills and from back before we even
23:43
Speaker 2: knew better, way before our brain was developed and had
23:46
Speaker 2: the ability for higher cognitive function and reasoning. And so
23:50
Speaker 2: that's what women need to step out of and realize,
23:52
Speaker 2: like realize when they're doing that.
23:54
Speaker 1: And you talk about mirroring when he becomes exactly what
23:58
Speaker 1: you need. This is so methodical. When you talked about
24:03
Speaker 1: how When a man comes into your life or just
24:07
Speaker 1: any love interest comes into your life and they love
24:09
Speaker 1: bomb you and they start saying and doing all the
24:13
Speaker 1: things that seem to just sweep you off your feet.
24:16
Speaker 1: And they do it almost as a testing ground to
24:20
Speaker 1: see what does she respond to? What does she not
24:22
Speaker 1: respond to? So that I know what to dopamine drip
24:25
Speaker 1: her with. Yes. And. I would have never thought of
24:29
Speaker 1: it that way. Right. The fact that it can be,
24:31
Speaker 1: and not that they're all consciously trying to do that
24:35
Speaker 1: because that sounds methodical as fuck, but it can definitely,
24:39
Speaker 1: that's where the manipulation can come in and they get
24:42
Speaker 1: what they want and you just start to feed them
24:45
Speaker 1: the response. And it becomes so addicting, especially with me
24:49
Speaker 1: and Nick. He picked up very early on that I
24:53
Speaker 1: felt very lonely at that point in time. Early in
24:57
Speaker 1: the relationship? Yes.
24:58
Speaker 2: He was so good at this. He was really good
25:01
Speaker 2: at reading people. And a lot of people like that,
25:04
Speaker 2: highly manipulative, pathological, people with narcissistic tendencies are very good
25:09
Speaker 2: at reading you.
25:10
Speaker 1: And he could pick up on that and he fed
25:13
Speaker 1: into that.
25:14
Speaker 2: He fed into that meaning like he made me feel
25:17
Speaker 2: so seen. And so understood, which I was really lacking
25:22
Speaker 2: in my friendships at that point in time.
25:24
Speaker 1: And it was addicting. It was intoxicating.
25:27
Speaker 2: And so when somebody really sees you like that, you're
25:31
Speaker 2: so willing to rationalize away all the bad things.
25:35
Speaker 1: Yeah.
25:35
Speaker 2: Because he's tapping into something that you so desperately need.
25:39
Speaker 1: Yeah. And that's why the mirroring can become very dangerous.
25:42
Speaker 2: I mean, almost worse, I feel like that was the
25:45
Speaker 2: part that worked best on me, even more than the
25:48
Speaker 2: love bombing. Like the love bombing was great in the beginning,
25:52
Speaker 2: but it was really that feeling of, oh my God,
25:54
Speaker 2: he really sees me.
25:55
Speaker 1: Yeah. And he accepts me. Wow. How does a woman
25:59
Speaker 1: even begin... to pull themselves away from knowing nothing more
26:05
Speaker 1: than chaos as their baseline?
26:08
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, that's a million dollar question. I mean,
26:10
Speaker 2: you have to look at what was my blueprint for love?
26:14
Speaker 2: What was the relationship like between my parents, especially when
26:17
Speaker 2: I was very young? And what do my relationships look
26:20
Speaker 2: like now today?
26:20
Speaker 1: And why am I confusing chaos with chemistry? Because chaos....
26:28
Speaker 2: Is really that feeling of like those anxious butterflies, which are,
26:33
Speaker 2: does this person like me?
26:35
Speaker 1: Are they choosing me? And they're here and then they're
26:36
Speaker 1: not here. And you need to look at that dynamic
26:39
Speaker 1: and ask yourself, is this how I want to spend
26:41
Speaker 1: my life? Yeah. Because this is what I'm signing myself
26:44
Speaker 1: up for. And you need to see it for what
26:46
Speaker 1: it is, which is an unhealthy relationship. And you have
26:49
Speaker 1: to open yourself up to.
26:51
Speaker 2: Doing it a different way. And what that will look
26:54
Speaker 2: like is dating someone where you don't feel consumed by
26:58
Speaker 2: that spark right away and recognizing that that's not a
27:01
Speaker 2: bad thing, that healthy relationships typically develop pretty slowly.
27:05
Speaker 1: And that's okay.
27:06
Speaker 2: You can still have the spark and the butterflies, but
27:09
Speaker 2: they're coming more from a place of Just genuine curiosity
27:12
Speaker 2: and excitement rather than a place of panic and anxiety.
27:16
Speaker 1: And does he like me? Am I going to hear
27:18
Speaker 1: from him? Is he going to choose me? Is he
27:19
Speaker 1: going to pick me?
27:20
Speaker 2: So you need an understanding of where was the blueprint formed?
27:24
Speaker 2: How has this shown up in my relationships? What is
27:26
Speaker 2: my typical pattern? What am I attracting? What am I
27:29
Speaker 2: attracted to? What do I actually think a healthy relationship
27:32
Speaker 2: should provide for the people in it? And then changing
27:36
Speaker 2: the way you date.
27:37
Speaker 1: I can't tell you how many of my former clients
27:40
Speaker 1: ended up engaged and married to guys where they were like,
27:43
Speaker 1: if I hadn't done this work, I would have dismissed
27:45
Speaker 1: him right away. Oh. I would have felt like this
27:47
Speaker 1: is boring, no spark. And then they end up realizing, oh.
27:51
Speaker 2: My gosh, this is the greatest guy that I have
27:53
Speaker 2: ever known.
27:53
Speaker 1: And this is so worth it. I just had three
27:55
Speaker 1: clients get engaged over this past weekend. I kid you not.
27:58
Speaker 1: One of them, towards the end of our time working together-
28:00
Speaker 1: She was picking apart everything about this guy. I don't know.
28:03
Speaker 1: He's a little socially awkward sometimes. I don't know. Like
28:05
Speaker 1: sometimes he talks too much and like that's annoying. And
28:09
Speaker 1: then in time she realizes, okay, I just was trying
28:14
Speaker 1: to figure out what was wrong because what was really
28:17
Speaker 1: wrong was the absence of the hunt and the anxiety.
28:20
Speaker 1: So it made her think that she's like overlooking something.
28:22
Speaker 1: So she's like picking things apart when really she was
28:24
Speaker 1: just not used to something that was stable and good.
28:27
Speaker 1: And now, I mean, she's over the moon, so happy.
28:30
Speaker 1: They just got engaged. And I see this all the time.
28:33
Speaker 1: You shared so generously about your relationship that it just
28:36
Speaker 1: makes me feel like, okay, I'm not I'm not like
28:40
Speaker 1: depleted self-esteem. Like there's a lot of us out there
28:42
Speaker 1: that have walked through this, but you, you, you shared
28:44
Speaker 1: about how he would never call you his, his girlfriend. Yeah.
28:48
Speaker 1: Like for years. Yeah. And then he broke up with you,
28:51
Speaker 1: goes and dates another woman for two years and it's girlfriend, girlfriend, girlfriend, girlfriend, girlfriend.
28:54
Speaker 1: Two weeks. She was his girlfriend. Yeah. Right. And, and then,
28:58
Speaker 1: you know, and, and the fact that I, I've said to,
29:02
Speaker 1: to women in my life who are dating, I've had
29:05
Speaker 1: it said to me, you're a catch. The first time
29:09
Speaker 1: I had a woman, I was in my very late 40s,
29:12
Speaker 1: if not knocking on 50, when she says, Deanna, you're
29:14
Speaker 1: a catch. I never put myself in that category. Although
29:18
Speaker 1: I knew it. I'm like, what? I have things to offer.
29:22
Speaker 1: I never really felt like I wasn't a catch, but
29:25
Speaker 1: I didn't act like one. And I think there's a
29:27
Speaker 1: big difference between- That's the self-worth piece. Yes. But you
29:30
Speaker 1: talk about how when all that is in alignment for you,
29:35
Speaker 1: Love is, you realize that love is consistent, not volatile.
29:40
Speaker 1: It's calming, not activating, which is a big one. It's
29:45
Speaker 1: clear and not confusing. I love these four bullet points.
29:50
Speaker 1: And it's secure, not conditional. When you come across those,
29:56
Speaker 1: when you... are able to recognize and not deny that
30:00
Speaker 1: this is not chemistry, it's chaos, that this push-pull is
30:03
Speaker 1: not normal, that this perpetual hold is unreasonable. All those things,
30:08
Speaker 1: you start to see what real love looks like and
30:11
Speaker 1: feels like. And it is an adjustment of tone and
30:14
Speaker 1: tempo and energy in your life. Because you talk about
30:16
Speaker 1: that too, regulating your central nervous system. Yes. And how
30:20
Speaker 1: that's just affected by the mindset. Absolutely.
30:24
Speaker 2: And the nervous system, this is important. Learned through repetition.
30:28
Speaker 2: This is how we heal. We heal by every day
30:32
Speaker 2: putting in the reps. You're not going to heal like
30:34
Speaker 2: they do in the movies where the therapist says something
30:37
Speaker 2: and you're on the couch and you're like, oh my God,
30:39
Speaker 2: I never even thought about it that way before. And
30:41
Speaker 2: then everything is different. And now you're able to love
30:44
Speaker 2: that guy and let him love you back. No, instead,
30:46
Speaker 2: it's every day catching yourself when you're feeding into those
30:49
Speaker 2: negative beliefs about yourself.
30:51
Speaker 1: I'm not good enough. That's typically the wound that most
30:53
Speaker 1: people carry. I'm not thin enough.
30:54
Speaker 2: Or I'm too much or I'm never going to find anyone.
30:57
Speaker 2: I'm going to end up alone. It's pausing and it's
30:59
Speaker 2: stopping and it's saying, is.
31:01
Speaker 1: That actually true? Yeah. Isn't that really true? I'm never
31:03
Speaker 1: going to find anyone. Like 8 billion people in this
31:05
Speaker 1: world and not one person. I'm never going to find
31:07
Speaker 1: my person.
31:08
Speaker 2: And you realize how silly these things are and how
31:10
Speaker 2: outdated these beliefs are about yourself. So you have to
31:12
Speaker 2: start challenging and start pushing back against them. And if
31:16
Speaker 2: you are dating and you feel like this feels a
31:18
Speaker 2: little bit too calm, this feels a little bit too boring.
31:22
Speaker 1: Don't worry about that.
31:23
Speaker 2: If you are trying to figure out, am I settling?
31:25
Speaker 1: We're all terrified of settling. Are you still curious about
31:28
Speaker 1: this person? That's it. That's the only question. That's a
31:30
Speaker 1: great hook. That's it.
31:32
Speaker 2: Because a lot of people are scared. They're like, no,
31:34
Speaker 2: I'm forcing myself. I'm forcing a square peg into a
31:36
Speaker 2: round hole. If you are genuinely like, I do not
31:39
Speaker 2: want to hear one word out of this person's mouth,
31:41
Speaker 2: I don't care about anything. I don't care about his job.
31:44
Speaker 2: I don't care what he has to say. I don't
31:45
Speaker 2: care where he grew up. Okay, this is not your person.
31:48
Speaker 2: He's too boring. And I remember dates like that where
31:50
Speaker 2: you're saying, I'm like, oh, my God, can this guy
31:52
Speaker 2: drink his drink faster so I can.
31:54
Speaker 1: Get out of here? You knew that wasn't going to go. Exactly,
31:57
Speaker 1: because that is like, I am bored. I'm bored. I
31:59
Speaker 1: don't care about anything he's saying.
32:01
Speaker 2: If you are on a date and you're interested, maybe
32:05
Speaker 2: you don't feel like a hungry lion, like you want
32:07
Speaker 2: to just rip his clothes off right then and there.
32:11
Speaker 1: That's okay. You don't need to feel that way. That's okay.
32:13
Speaker 1: That's actually pretty healthy. If you still feel like I
32:16
Speaker 1: enjoy being around this person, I feel comfortable. I feel safe.
32:19
Speaker 1: I feel secure. I want to hear more about him.
32:21
Speaker 1: I want to spend more time. That's it. And it
32:24
Speaker 1: might be uncomfortable to have that absence of how does
32:27
Speaker 1: he feel about me? And I remember this when I
32:29
Speaker 1: started dating my husband. It was very weird to me
32:32
Speaker 1: to not have to have anything to analyze. It was
32:35
Speaker 1: very weird to me where I would spend time with him.
32:39
Speaker 1: Go hang out with my friends. And and and they
32:41
Speaker 1: would ask me about the relationship and I could just
32:42
Speaker 1: say it's great. And I literally did not have one
32:44
Speaker 1: question to ask them. And I wasn't like, what do
32:46
Speaker 1: you guys think he meant when it was it was like, no,
32:48
Speaker 1: he likes me. It's obvious. It's clear. We're like on
32:51
Speaker 1: the same page. Yeah. But it did feel very weird.
32:55
Speaker 2: There were points at time where I was like, I
32:57
Speaker 2: must be overlooking something. I really need to like pick
33:00
Speaker 2: this poor guy apart and figure out like what I'm missing.
33:03
Speaker 2: Because every relationship in my life up until that point
33:06
Speaker 2: had either been me chasing after some emotionally unavailable guy
33:09
Speaker 2: like a Nick or an available guy chasing after me
33:13
Speaker 2: and me being so repulsed.
33:15
Speaker 1: Like, you want me to meet your family? Like, oh
33:17
Speaker 1: my God, like I was the one that was like,
33:18
Speaker 1: You know, I even say in the book, I was like,
33:20
Speaker 1: I was the villain in a lot of their origin
33:21
Speaker 1: stories because I would like them, but I would get
33:24
Speaker 1: so freaked out by how much they liked me that
33:27
Speaker 1: I would sabotage the whole thing. By the way, don't
33:40
Speaker 1: you think dating apps have not helped in that way? Listen,
33:44
Speaker 1: I met my guy and he's my forever and on
33:48
Speaker 1: a dating app. And I will say, though, I did
33:51
Speaker 1: fall into a little bit of that in just looking
33:54
Speaker 1: at his profile. What kept me coming back to it
33:58
Speaker 1: was his sense of humor. I was like, I love
34:00
Speaker 1: this thing that he wrote here. And he had, you know,
34:02
Speaker 1: I was reading this and that it would make me laugh.
34:04
Speaker 1: But I was like, well, he doesn't have really that
34:07
Speaker 1: many tattoos. And I think that, oh no, like I
34:10
Speaker 1: was already like going down that path. And I thought, okay,
34:14
Speaker 1: but you know what? I'm curious about him because he
34:17
Speaker 1: makes me laugh. So I did reach out to him.
34:20
Speaker 1: And in our conversing for the first two weeks, Carrie,
34:23
Speaker 1: quit saying it was only a week. It was two weeks.
34:25
Speaker 1: We really just had to listen because we were just texting.
34:30
Speaker 1: And then even on our first date, I was like,
34:33
Speaker 1: I don't know. But then all of a sudden, Three
34:36
Speaker 1: hours later, the restaurant's closing. I'm like, oh, I'm still
34:40
Speaker 1: here and we're still talking. And I'm kind of sad
34:42
Speaker 1: that the restaurant is closing. So don't you think that
34:48
Speaker 1: dating apps can get in the way of us trying
34:53
Speaker 1: to analyze too much and not just let it be
34:55
Speaker 1: boring for a minute? A hundred percent. Dating, I mean... again,
34:59
Speaker 1: like there's good and bad in everything. Dating apps have
35:03
Speaker 1: been wonderful in that they expose you to so many
35:05
Speaker 1: more people that you otherwise wouldn't have met. But the
35:08
Speaker 1: problem is that people become disposable and there's just always
35:11
Speaker 1: an upgrade that's one swipe away, right? And so it's like, okay,
35:15
Speaker 1: I'm saying yes to this guy. We go, but what if.
35:17
Speaker 2: All I had to do was swipe like two more
35:19
Speaker 2: times and then I would have found someone even better.
35:21
Speaker 1: That's so bad.
35:22
Speaker 2: You're competing against yourself. You're not even just competing against
35:25
Speaker 2: all the people that are out there. You're always competing
35:27
Speaker 2: against this idea that a better person might be one
35:30
Speaker 2: swipe away. And I think that that is the biggest
35:32
Speaker 2: problem of all with the dating apps. They also really
35:35
Speaker 2: can do a number on your self-esteem just because of
35:37
Speaker 2: all the micro rejections. It's like we're relating to people
35:41
Speaker 2: as products, not as people. I've seen this so many
35:43
Speaker 2: times with men and women where you're talking and then
35:46
Speaker 2: all of a sudden they unmatch out of nowhere and
35:48
Speaker 2: you're like, something I said?
35:49
Speaker 1: Like, what did I do? Yeah.
35:50
Speaker 2: You know, you're like, at least meet me before you're
35:53
Speaker 2: going to reject me. So I think all those micro
35:55
Speaker 2: rejections can really take a toll on you.
35:57
Speaker 1: Yeah.
35:58
Speaker 2: And you're piling so much rejection into such a short
36:00
Speaker 2: amount of time. Whereas dating in real time, that's a
36:04
Speaker 2: bit more spread out and a bit more rare.
36:07
Speaker 1: Yeah.
36:07
Speaker 2: I mean, I started dating my husband just when the
36:09
Speaker 2: dating apps were taking off. And I'm very grateful that
36:12
Speaker 2: I got to miss that era. I was part of the, like,
36:17
Speaker 2: dating site. Like, so you had to log on on
36:19
Speaker 2: your computer. It wasn't on your phone.
36:21
Speaker 1: Yeah.
36:21
Speaker 2: You had to log on. And, like, the profiles were
36:24
Speaker 2: so extensive. And it was no, like, swipe, swipe, swipe.
36:27
Speaker 2: I'm very grateful I missed the era of the swipe
36:28
Speaker 2: because it is the gamification of dating. And, yeah, people
36:32
Speaker 2: are treated as commodities. So it can work. I do
36:36
Speaker 2: encourage people to be on the dating apps. It should
36:38
Speaker 2: not be your only tool. You also have to be
36:40
Speaker 2: meeting people in real life as well.
36:41
Speaker 1: I agree. So you have the origin of finding out
36:45
Speaker 1: where and why this either lack of self-worth or diminished
36:49
Speaker 1: self-esteem is keeping you from being your truest self. And
36:54
Speaker 1: the recognizing of the love bombing and the push-pull and
36:59
Speaker 1: the chaos and the chemistry And then, so what I
37:02
Speaker 1: love is you do not leave us without, so here's
37:05
Speaker 1: what you can do. Yes. Here's the pivot to what
37:08
Speaker 1: you can do to get away from that old self
37:12
Speaker 1: and be that true self. And I love that you
37:14
Speaker 1: word it that way. It's not like become someone new. No,
37:17
Speaker 1: you were always this woman. Exactly. Somewhere along the line
37:20
Speaker 1: in your lifespan, that woman was blocked, eroded. chipped at
37:24
Speaker 1: whatever and you start with simple things the code of
37:29
Speaker 1: silence and mystery and you go on to um i
37:32
Speaker 1: love to see being open and being porous but it's
37:36
Speaker 1: all summarized with the trust that you are worth discovering
37:41
Speaker 1: yeah so getting in a first so explain that a
37:43
Speaker 1: little twist about just not oversharing like you talk about
37:47
Speaker 1: like just meeting someone and being like diary of the.
37:48
Speaker 2: Mouth Exactly, because so many people are so starved for
37:51
Speaker 2: connection that that's the way that they try to establish that.
37:55
Speaker 1: And the thing is, the more you.
37:56
Speaker 2: Disclose to someone else, and this has been scientifically proven.
38:00
Speaker 2: the closer you feel to that person.
38:02
Speaker 1: So you have to make sure that you're matching whatever
38:04
Speaker 1: it is you're disclosing with what they're sharing. And you
38:07
Speaker 1: have to make sure that you're, like vulnerability is not
38:10
Speaker 1: the same as oversharing. Vulnerability is something that develops because
38:14
Speaker 1: you feel safe with this person and you've developed a
38:16
Speaker 1: level of trust where you're able to open up a
38:18
Speaker 1: little bit more and more. Oversharing is I am just
38:21
Speaker 1: so desperate to be seen and to be heard. And
38:25
Speaker 1: a lot of the time people who overshare, it's because
38:27
Speaker 1: in childhood they felt very much unseen, unheard. And they're
38:30
Speaker 1: just desperate for somebody to hear them and validate their
38:33
Speaker 1: experience and connect with them. Or they've been in a
38:36
Speaker 1: loveless marriage or a marriage that has been depleting over
38:40
Speaker 1: the years and years and years. And they're suddenly single,
38:43
Speaker 1: ready to mingle. And they dive in and they're a
38:47
Speaker 1: little too starved and hungry for that. Exactly.
38:50
Speaker 2: And another big problem that I see is, and I
38:53
Speaker 2: used to do this as well, again, no shaming, no blaming,
38:56
Speaker 2: but is trying so hard to show all sides of
38:59
Speaker 2: yourself to a person when you're on a date.
39:02
Speaker 1: Like, I need to be super interesting. And I used
39:04
Speaker 1: to fall into this trap. I used to think if
39:05
Speaker 1: there was a silence, I had to fill it or
39:07
Speaker 1: he was going to think I'm boring. No, why can't
39:09
Speaker 1: he fill it? Always thinking of something interesting to say.
39:12
Speaker 1: And I need to show him that I'm I'm kind
39:14
Speaker 1: and I'm a good friend and I'm a good listener
39:16
Speaker 1: and I'm all these things because if I don't tell him,
39:18
Speaker 1: then how is he going to know? Instead, when you
39:21
Speaker 1: do that, that is lack of self-worth because you don't
39:24
Speaker 1: trust that your authentic self will shine through. You feel
39:26
Speaker 1: like I need to tell this person about all my
39:28
Speaker 1: travels and all of my friendships. and all my accomplishments. Otherwise,
39:31
Speaker 1: they won't know. You don't trust that you're worth it.
39:34
Speaker 2: Discovering slowly trust that like your real self is enough
39:38
Speaker 2: and that there will be enough there for him to
39:41
Speaker 2: want to discover more and if he doesn't then okay
39:43
Speaker 2: this isn't your person not your person that's okay.
39:45
Speaker 1: That's not a big deal you know I I think
39:48
Speaker 1: and I love going into this chapter of the book
39:52
Speaker 1: or this section of the book because like I said
39:55
Speaker 1: whether you're in your 20s or you're in your fifties
39:58
Speaker 1: and divorced and you're, you're, you're starting to get in
40:01
Speaker 1: that field again. There's so many women in my generation
40:04
Speaker 1: in their forties and fifties that are, they were married for,
40:07
Speaker 1: you know, 15, 25 years, whatever, 30 years. They don't
40:11
Speaker 1: they're not ready to wrap it up and just live alone. No,
40:14
Speaker 1: there's so much life left to live. There is so
40:17
Speaker 1: much life. Listen, sexy Gen X-y. Oh, that's what that says. Yeah, girl.
40:22
Speaker 1: But my thing is, is that, you know, giving yourself
40:26
Speaker 1: time to heal, obviously, is imperative. And recognizing those things
40:30
Speaker 1: about where this broken self-worth came from. And then adding
40:34
Speaker 1: in these elements of this feminine code that give you
40:38
Speaker 1: a template for walking through this as your authentic self
40:43
Speaker 1: and recognizing things. Because the great thing that I did,
40:46
Speaker 1: I may have learned late in life a lot of
40:49
Speaker 1: these things that you learned a lot earlier. But the
40:51
Speaker 1: one thing I did do right was after that one
40:54
Speaker 1: dumb relationship, I didn't date for six years because I
40:58
Speaker 1: knew I needed to figure what else. I'm like, I
41:02
Speaker 1: don't want to do that again. I got divorced. I
41:04
Speaker 1: didn't date well. And so I didn't learn something or
41:07
Speaker 1: I didn't figure out something. So I took my six
41:10
Speaker 1: years to figure it out. And also it was being
41:12
Speaker 1: a present single parent and all of that. But it's
41:15
Speaker 1: the reason why now I was able to hear and
41:18
Speaker 1: recognize those bullet points about what love looks and feels
41:21
Speaker 1: like for a man that didn't have quite enough tattoos,
41:25
Speaker 1: but enough for me and is the man of my dreams.
41:28
Speaker 1: So you talk about this in describing this feminine code
41:33
Speaker 1: about being mysterious and taking your time. Also standards, evaluating
41:38
Speaker 1: where your standards are. What do you think we do?
41:42
Speaker 1: What happens to our standards? We were born with them.
41:45
Speaker 1: They were nurtured in us. We have them. We just
41:47
Speaker 1: don't uphold them. It's like when I would say to Nick,
41:50
Speaker 1: you can't say that to me. You can't treat me
41:52
Speaker 1: that way. But I was still there. Yeah. So, yeah,
41:55
Speaker 1: when you say to somebody, these are my standards, but
41:57
Speaker 1: you still put up with what you don't want. You
41:58
Speaker 1: don't have standards. You have wishes. Yeah. Okay.
42:02
Speaker 2: It's not the same thing. A standard means nothing unless
42:05
Speaker 2: you uphold it. So you need to spend time considering that.
42:08
Speaker 2: What is it that I actually want and need in
42:10
Speaker 2: a relationship? And what are the absolute no-goes? What are
42:14
Speaker 2: the absolute like deal breakers? What are the things that
42:17
Speaker 2: I absolutely will not tolerate? And then you need to, again,
42:21
Speaker 2: you have to build up that self-worth so that when
42:23
Speaker 2: you see those behaviors, you will walk away. And that's
42:26
Speaker 2: one of the other codes, actually, the code of absence
42:28
Speaker 2: and walking away. Your greatest power is the belief that,
42:35
Speaker 2: The knowledge, the knowing that if this isn't what I want,
42:38
Speaker 2: I'm okay with walking away. And I'm not going to
42:41
Speaker 2: cling to this dear life because why do we do that?
42:42
Speaker 2: We think we're not going to find anything else.
42:44
Speaker 1: That's a big one is thinking that, you know, I
42:46
Speaker 1: did say to someone recently who had a breakup, I said,
42:49
Speaker 1: you need to, this sounds far greater than it really is.
42:53
Speaker 1: You need to learn how to be alone. Yeah. That
42:55
Speaker 1: doesn't mean lonely. Right. And I do look back at
42:58
Speaker 1: those six years that I didn't date as the most
43:01
Speaker 1: wonderful years. Yeah. I had a great time. I was
43:04
Speaker 1: raising my children. I was working. I had good friendships.
43:07
Speaker 1: And I was just feeling I was not mad at me.
43:10
Speaker 1: We get into these standard setting. And then you go
43:14
Speaker 1: into I love this. Living as a magnetic woman. This
43:17
Speaker 1: is now the icing on top of it. And again,
43:22
Speaker 1: you do pitch this as you've always been. Yep. And
43:26
Speaker 1: it's been rediscovery. And what brought you to that point?
43:32
Speaker 1: What brought you to the decision of this is what happened,
43:35
Speaker 1: this is what I lived through, this is what I've
43:37
Speaker 1: discovered about myself, and this is me now? Yeah. Yeah.
43:41
Speaker 2: So what really did it for me is the period
43:43
Speaker 2: of life where I describe it as the summer of me.
43:46
Speaker 1: And I talk about in the opening of my book, Detached.
43:49
Speaker 2: Where I just had hit a point where I was
43:51
Speaker 2: so sick of myself and the way I had been operating.
43:55
Speaker 2: And I just I knew that there was so much
43:57
Speaker 2: more that I could be and that. the way that
44:01
Speaker 2: I was behaving and conducting myself in relationships was just
44:04
Speaker 2: not in alignment with who I wanted to be. I mean, obviously,
44:07
Speaker 2: this all started with Nick in my very early 20s.
44:09
Speaker 2: But then I found myself, 29, still making the same
44:12
Speaker 2: stupid mistakes. And it was mortifying because I was a
44:14
Speaker 2: relationship writer and coach at this point.
44:16
Speaker 1: And I was a good one. And I was successful.
44:18
Speaker 2: And I was helping people. And I was just making
44:20
Speaker 2: such bad choices in my own life. And I saw
44:23
Speaker 2: firsthand what happens when you actually work on your self-worth
44:26
Speaker 2: and when you actually challenge yourself. those limitations and those
44:29
Speaker 2: limiting beliefs. And when you actually just stop trying so
44:32
Speaker 2: hard to be chosen, and when you stop letting that
44:35
Speaker 2: fear of ending up alone run your life, because in
44:38
Speaker 2: the two years before that, it was a dating desert.
44:41
Speaker 1: It was a drought.
44:42
Speaker 2: And that's why I would cling for dear life onto
44:44
Speaker 2: like any guy that I liked, because I'm like, who
44:46
Speaker 2: knows when the next one's going to come along? I
44:48
Speaker 2: like people so infrequently. And then I decided I was
44:51
Speaker 2: just done with all of that, done with the chasing.
44:53
Speaker 2: I was going to surrender. I was going to detach.
44:55
Speaker 2: And by the end of that summer, I was magnetic. Meaning,
44:58
Speaker 2: opportunities were finding their way to me. My business was
45:02
Speaker 2: more successful than ever. Men were coming from left, right,
45:05
Speaker 2: and center.
45:05
Speaker 1: It was crazy. It was raining men.
45:07
Speaker 2: I started dating my husband at this point in time. Friendships,
45:10
Speaker 2: like all these girls wanted to be friends with me
45:12
Speaker 2: because when you have self-worth, you're the best type of friend.
45:14
Speaker 1: To have because you're not comparing. There's no jealousy. There's
45:18
Speaker 1: no competing.
45:18
Speaker 2: You can actually hear someone else without projecting your own
45:21
Speaker 2: nonsense onto them. And so you're just operating on a
45:24
Speaker 2: different level. And anyone can get there. This wasn't magic
45:27
Speaker 2: for me. I recreate this with my clients all the time.
45:29
Speaker 2: And I see in a short amount of time how
45:32
Speaker 2: much can change by doing that inner work.
45:34
Speaker 1: So I experienced it.
45:36
Speaker 2: I live it over and over again vicariously through my clients.
45:40
Speaker 2: And I hope that anyone who reads this book or comes.
45:42
Speaker 1: Across my content We'll get to experience it as well.
45:45
Speaker 1: What do you think has been your biggest area of
45:48
Speaker 1: concern with women in my generation, Gen X women, when
45:52
Speaker 1: they've come to you with this but not figured out?
45:56
Speaker 1: What their concerns are when they come to me? Yeah.
45:58
Speaker 1: What do you think has been the biggest or the
45:59
Speaker 1: most frequent? Oh, they think it's too late. They think
46:02
Speaker 1: they're too old. They think that all the men are gone.
46:04
Speaker 1: I'm like, ladies. Look at the divorce rate.
46:07
Speaker 2: Like the divorce rate being what it is, is a
46:10
Speaker 2: positive in that you have so many available men who've
46:13
Speaker 2: already been married and had children.
46:15
Speaker 1: There is a massive dating pool online. in that age bracket.
46:18
Speaker 1: I know. I see all the time they're like, no,
46:20
Speaker 1: but they want younger girls. They want younger girls. Not necessarily.
46:23
Speaker 2: Not guys who've already been married and had kids. The
46:24
Speaker 2: younger girls might still want kids. Like the women in
46:27
Speaker 2: their 30s maybe doesn't want a guy who's in his
46:30
Speaker 2: 50s who doesn't want kids, already has kids that are
46:32
Speaker 2: grown up and left the house. And no, I see
46:35
Speaker 2: that's a limitation that you're imposing on yourself that has
46:38
Speaker 2: no basis in reality. Are there some men in their
46:41
Speaker 2: 50s that want to date 20-somethings?
46:42
Speaker 1: Fine. Okay. That's not for you. Right. That's not your guy. Exactly. Yeah.
46:46
Speaker 2: There are plenty, plenty of men out there who are
46:48
Speaker 2: in your phase of life. And I just see this
46:52
Speaker 2: all the time.
46:53
Speaker 1: Yeah. All the time. Yeah. And if you're telling yourself
46:56
Speaker 1: a different story, it's because that's a story that you
46:58
Speaker 1: already believe. Yeah.
46:59
Speaker 2: That's a story that you're creating and generating. And whatever
47:01
Speaker 2: story you generate, fine. You could find that anywhere.
47:03
Speaker 1: Yeah. And you can find it anywhere.
47:05
Speaker 2: If you tell yourself, I'm too old, anytime somebody rejects
47:07
Speaker 2: you or it doesn't work out, it's because I was
47:09
Speaker 2: too old. Even though, I mean, people in their 20s
47:11
Speaker 2: get rejected all the time. People in their 30s get rejected.
47:13
Speaker 2: They also get ghosted. Every age bracket, and I work
47:16
Speaker 2: with all of them. Has their problems. It's not easy
47:19
Speaker 2: dating as a 20-something either.
47:21
Speaker 1: It's really not. It's just not easy. I love dating.
47:24
Speaker 1: If it was, I wouldn't have a career. I wouldn't
47:26
Speaker 1: have this job. Such thing as a relationship expert. Exactly.
47:29
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be writing these books. Nobody would buy them.
47:31
Speaker 1: They'd be like, I don't need this. It's just smooth
47:33
Speaker 1: sailing out there. That you would have found the holy grail. Exactly.
47:37
Speaker 1: And I do like hearing that because one of the
47:40
Speaker 1: reasons why I wanted to do this podcast is because
47:45
Speaker 1: there was clearly an entire population of women that society
47:48
Speaker 1: was telling, you're just too old for everything. And yet
47:51
Speaker 1: we are responsible for more. than any other demographic because
47:54
Speaker 1: we're not retired. We're still bossing. We still have children
47:58
Speaker 1: that are dependent on us that we're either financing or
48:00
Speaker 1: still live with us. And we have aging parents. We
48:03
Speaker 1: are so not done. So it's great to hear you
48:06
Speaker 1: come and reemphasize this because when it comes to love,
48:08
Speaker 1: it's really easy for a woman to be like, You know,
48:11
Speaker 1: my tits are down here and I've got Helen flapping
48:14
Speaker 1: in the wind. I don't know how sexy I am.
48:16
Speaker 1: And yet I know I'm a sexy bitch. Exactly. But
48:19
Speaker 1: I have to I had to really, you know, just
48:23
Speaker 1: come to grips with it. It's like I said, it's
48:25
Speaker 1: one thing to know you're worth it and then act
48:28
Speaker 1: like you're worth it. Yep. So I'm going to end
48:31
Speaker 1: this with reading a little paragraph that you said, because
48:33
Speaker 1: I'm everyone you have. There's so much more in this.
48:36
Speaker 1: There's so much meat in this. But I want them
48:40
Speaker 1: to hear what happened. I never think of Nick anymore.
48:42
Speaker 1: So it happens. It finally happens. Not unless I'm writing
48:46
Speaker 1: about him to warn women about men like him. Eventually,
48:51
Speaker 1: he just stopped mattering. He had no power over me.
48:56
Speaker 1: I had reclaimed it. But I think about her sometimes,
49:00
Speaker 1: the girl who couldn't leave his apartment because she was
49:03
Speaker 1: more afraid of her own loneliness than of his cruelty.
49:06
Speaker 1: the girl who spent an hour consoling him over another woman,
49:10
Speaker 1: the girl who stood outside his door with nowhere to
49:13
Speaker 1: go because she had made him her entire world. I
49:17
Speaker 1: don't feel sorry for her. I feel tender toward her.
49:21
Speaker 1: She was doing the best she could with a nervous
49:23
Speaker 1: system that had been wired for chaos since childhood. She
49:27
Speaker 1: didn't know there was another way. She thought she had
49:30
Speaker 1: to earn love. She thought if she had tried hard enough,
49:33
Speaker 1: gave enough, shrank enough, someone would finally choose her and
49:36
Speaker 1: the pain would stop. She was wrong about that. But
49:40
Speaker 1: she wasn't broken. She was never broken. And neither are you.
49:45
Speaker 1: Love it. Thank you. I just congratulate you. I applaud you.
49:48
Speaker 1: And I'm glad women like you share their voice. Thank
49:52
Speaker 1: you so much. Thank you for being here. Thank you
49:53
Speaker 1: for having me. This was wonderful. How Hard Can It Be?
49:57
Speaker 1: with Diana Maria Riva is a Hyphenate Media Group production
50:00
Speaker 1: in partnership with iHeart's My Cultura podcast network. For more
50:03
Speaker 1: of your favorite shows, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
50:07
Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts.