Matthew Hussey: “I Wish I Knew THIS When I Was Single” - How To HEAL The #1 Pattern BLOCKING LOVE

37:58She said, and she didn't realize what she was saying as she said it, but she said, you know, I mean, it's like my dad, for example, if I try to have a hard conversation with him, he just leaves the room. Right. And I, and she kept going but she didn't realize what she had said which is your entire life because that wasn't a pattern your dad started yesterday right your dad's most likely been like that since the day you were born so what you learned is that if you tried to have a hard conversation with your father he would leave the room he would abandon you so now you have what therapists call a core abandonment wound right that's a this is something that's now with you and you wonder why with this person that you're on date three with who shouldn't even be that important to you why it feels hard to articulate that you know you are disappointed that they showed up half hour late to the day or that they didn't text you for a week and then all of a sudden like reached out out of nowhere to say do you want to do something in one hour and then you went without expressing that like hey we had two great dates and then you would like i didn't hear from you for a week and now you're like are you ready in an hour the reason she didn't express that is and the reason it made her so terrified to express it unirrationally terrified is because in her world it's been perfectly rational it's not this is where compassion comes in because we're very good at calling ourselves crazy like i feel crazy why am i so scared of having this conversation or we get called crazy by other people that's a favorite thing to call people ah she was crazy oh they're crazy like you can't believe what they tried to do or what they said to me they're not crazy that something happened they experienced something in their world at a time when it was their reality it was her reality growing up that and i'm you know i'm extrapolating here but like i said if she's saying that about her dad almost certainly her dad didn't start doing that last week right he's been doing it her whole life it was real for her that there was a time in her life where if she tried to express a need with her father or tell him something that she wasn't happy with or something that she'd like him to do more of or less of or a way that he'd hurt her, he would not be able to have the conversation and he would leave.

40:40That, when you're a child, that poses a real threat to you. So what she's feeling now is rational for her in her world based on where she came from. we look at it from the outside and go i can't believe that she would be so afraid to say this thing and she's going to end up in a two-year relationship with someone who never meets any of her needs who doesn't even know what her needs are who she resents deep down because it's like he never thinks of me yeah but she's terrified to have that conversation because for her if she has a hard conversation it means abandonment and abandonment means on an emotional level, not a logical level, she might not survive.

41:22Yes. And so when someone says, I struggle, I find it a turnoff when someone is nice, they are articulating a deep, deep pattern that has been there for a long time in their life that they didn't choose and that they may not even be aware of. And most likely it sounds like their father probably was either rude to their mother or rude to them as a child or maybe had some, you know, behavioral patterns that caused them to feel rude at different times. Yeah. Or they, you know, were neglected and they felt like they, in order to get attention, they had to do a lot or they had to be, you know, the golden child, or they had to, you know, meet everyone's needs.

42:10They had to go out of their way all the time to make someone happy. And so, you know, and then they'd get like, you know, whether it's from the father or the mother they get like a hit of love and all of a sudden it's like like i feel calm i feel safe oh this feels so good and then of course it's right back to you know the next day they're cold again and you have to fight for that next hit and so if you've experienced that and now you're out there looking for love you you may very well have developed the association that love is something you have to earn. Love is something that comes in fits and starts.

42:49Love is something that you're grateful when you get a hit of it. And then you have to endure these periods of someone being cold in order to get the next hit. And of course, that's, you know, what's known as the trauma bond, but it's, that's really what someone is saying. When someone says, I get turned off by people who are nice and I get turned on by people who, you know give me and we have all sorts of euphemistic terms for it like the bad boy or the person who like you know is is super bold or the person who is has an edge or whatever but a lot of the time what we're talking about is i'm trauma bonded to people who are hot and cold inconsistent make me have to earn their love their attention take it away from me and then give me it back again and that by the way makes that woman who said that a perfect target for abusive people it makes them a perfect target for people who forget like whether they're abusive because they're narcissists or because they're you know sociopathic it's it makes you a perfect target for someone who's in a even just a selfish phase of their life because someone who's in a selfish phase of their life takes what they can get.

44:07It's intermittent, it's up and down, it's hot and cold. They're glad to be around someone who doesn't ask a lot of them. So even if you don't get someone who's truly toxic and abusive, you're still going to attract people who are selfish. And those people are going to waste your time and your energy because they're not where you're at, but you never test the relationship because this is on some level what you're looking for. This is what's familiar to you. Yeah, this is so, I mean, I can relate to this because in previous, you know, previous seasons of life, I really struggled of having the hard conversations.

44:41Like I dreaded it. So, you know, looking back, I can say, man, you're, that's crazy. Just have the conversation and whatever, just deal with it. But in the moment, you know, when I didn't have the tools or the nervous system to feel safe myself. And I needed the approval of someone else to feel safe, or I needed someone else to be okay with the hard conversation that I was having. And when they weren't okay with it, or they would explode, or they would cry, or they would scream, or they would not speak to me for two days or something because they were upset of what I wanted to talk about, or they avoided it, it would make me feel like, oh, I'm really insecure.

45:25And I always had the fear of like, I guess, I guess it was being alone or it was like the person not loving me in return or me not being good enough or something like that. There was probably a combination of insecurities or fears that caused me to be afraid of having difficult conversations and just saying what I really wanted to say. And then I remember having throat clenching and heart palpitations over years of being in these different relationships where I never felt like I was able to speak up. And I can't blame the other person. We can never blame the other person for our decision to not communicate, not set standards, not say the things we need to say.

46:09We can't blame the other person, but it always felt like, oh, this person isn't willing to accept me for who I am. If I say the full truth or if I talk about the things that I'm uncomfortable with, if I'm, if I don't like this situation, they will not accept me. And they didn't, they didn't accept me for my authentic conversations or my truth. But I was afraid of losing them for them not accepting me for who I was. And therefore it was never going to work out. And it wasn't until I started to really understand that and become aware of it and start to heal that process. A lot of things changed with Martha because I was like, wow, this is an incredible human being in front of me that I'm starting to date and connect with and meet.

46:52Wow, she's pretty special. But I got to the point where I was like, but I can't be willing to lose myself in order to try to have someone want to stay with me. I cannot go down this path again, which I'd done five or six times in 20 years in different relationships where I lost myself to try to please someone else so that they'd want to like and love me. And therefore, hating myself in return, resenting myself, resenting the person, resenting the relationship, feeling guilty of why I wasted all this time and energy being in this relationship, fighting for it, while all the while I was losing myself and losing my self-respect in that process.

47:31And it wasn't until Martha, I was like, oh man, I'm going to have the uncomfortable conversations pretty early on, right? In the first few months, I'm going to talk about, these are my standards. These are my values. This is what I want. This is what I'm not willing to deal with in a relationship and be willing to say, maybe this isn't the right fit. If you don't have the same or similar standards, and if you're not willing to fully accept all of me, my past, my shames, my insecurities, et cetera, then maybe we're not the right fit. But that means I might not be with a great person in front of me.

48:05And that's a scary thing. Well, it was scary. It was scary, but it also set me free when I made the decision like, okay, I'd rather be free and be fully myself, authentic to myself than trying to please and change who I am to be with someone to have them like and love me. And that set me free to say all the conversations I wanted to. And it was like the more honest and hard conversations I had, there's like the more she fell in love with me Well, this is the interesting thing this is the tragedy of giving into those patterns because I think I think this is a really important thing for everyone to hear is that the past does not have to Equal the future when it comes to these patterns Right.

48:49We our nervous system may have gotten wired in this way at a time when we didn't choose for it to be wired that way it just happened to us because that's what we needed to do to survive but it doesn't mean that it's not a it's not a life sentence once you become more aware of those patterns you do have the power to have an enormous impact on changing them or even just how you relate to those patterns you know I I relate to what you're saying because I I know that one of the things that I have come to enjoy in my life is just moments of being able to sit and read a book yeah just just to sit and read and to do it and you know it doesn't matter if if my wife Audrey is there but just to feel like it's the same as if I was only on my own In other words, I just feel like I'm in my own company and able to fully relax doing that without feeling the need to entertain somebody else.

49:55And that even what I just said is my stuff. They used to scare you in the past. It's a feeling of being responsible for somebody else's emotions and their happiness or their joy. Yeah. And so it would make me, I realized I had to come to terms with the fact that I was afraid to speak up about what I needed about really silly little things, you know, not, I was afraid to say, I really could use just a night to myself, or I could really use just a few hours to just read like just something simple. Like I love on a Sunday, I love just reading or spending a few hours, just catching up on like the news.

50:38And cause it's not something I do on the weekdays. I like once a week, I like to sit down and just look at like everything that's going on and just feel like I'm doing it at a leisurely pace. And, and. And not responsible for someone else's like. Are they having, are they having a good Sunday? Now, what did it used to be like in the past? I wouldn't, I just wouldn't say anything. And then I would become less of myself in the relationship. and you know there would be resentment from my side but i'd also be a worse version of myself because they would feel me kind of frustrated frustrated on some level and was there something you'd like did you try to communicate this in previous relationships no it was all my fault oh really it's all my fault you never tried to even say it and someone was mad at you no i i for wanting like two hours by yourself no because it pre even if that was true it predated anyone I dated it's like this deep feeling from childhood of feeling like I'm responsible for because you're the oldest right probably and you know I I think in my family dynamic I felt responsible a lot for people's emotions and and so it it carried over into my relationships and with Audrey I would notice that something that she'd be more than happy to give me I was afraid to say and and even when I did say it I would then feel anxious having said it really yeah because I would feel like I've upset you I I've now like no I feel like you know are you mad at me is there like is everything okay are you happy is it is this and it almost like in my head there was a subconscious feeling that there was going to be this weird comeuppance for it like you know you took your two hours of alone time now i'm gonna something or like yeah or like i'm gonna go and do something really fun that you would have wanted to do i'm not gonna invite you yeah like it was just my brain my brain was doing all of these weird things and i had to pay attention to that and go hey it's look what you said is what you said is absolutely true that if you play if you keep doing that it's a very similar pattern to yours it might have different origins but there's a similarity in being unwilling to speak up about your needs and what you want and what you said is true that if you if you didn't learn to speak up about those things then you could be really unhappy in a relationship And we tend to focus on that side of it, that I never want to be that unhappy again, like I was in the past when I was in a relationship and none of my needs were met.

53:19But we also often don't give enough focus to the inverse of that, which is that imagine how great your relationship could become when you're with someone who truly knows you. like when someone gets to see all of those little idiosyncrasies about you and who you are like audrey my wife makes fun of me all the time really yeah she's constantly making fun of me because she's she's like you're so particular and you need like when you wake up in the morning she makes fun of me because she's like when you wake up in the morning you really like those like couple of hours before i wake up where you get to just like do all your little rituals and the things you want to do.

54:06And like, she doesn't, she makes fun of me for it, but it, she loves me for it because it's like, that's you. I, I, I know you, I know who you are. And the more she knows who I am, the more she can actually be a teammate in supporting that. And so now she's such an incredible partner that she'll, she'll say to me, Hey, do you want, like, she'll, she might say to me proactively, do you want some time this weekend to yourself? Or do you want to, and so because I'm honest about the things that that i would like which requires bravery and courage because again it's like old wounds and old things like i feel like it's gonna go something's gonna go wrong if i do this i've i've given her the gift of showing who i really am i've given myself the gift of truly feeling seen and accepted yes for who i am and i've also given myself the gift and her the gift of her knowing how to support me better which is a beautiful thing because she wants to support me she wants to be the best partner she can be for me and vice versa and we can only do that if we know each other and so that that we we've both worked on that together and it's bit it's and And that's another form of vulnerability, by the way, is sharing those things.

55:28And it's, this is like beyond any relationship I've ever had in my life because of those moments, not just, you know, me and Audrey have the most extraordinary connection and, and, you know, chemistry and all of those things like these amazing things. but we also just, I've never, I've never felt so seen and accepted and loved. And that's because, and she would say the same. And it's because both of us have been more brave than we were in previous relationships. How do we, but how do we learn the skill of expressing our needs and having a hard conversation without the fear of some blow up or backlash happening?

56:14How do we, if we've never done that before, had hard conversations, how do we learn to have them without the fear of something bad happening? A couple of things. I think that there's, I think first just noticing, I'm a huge fan of Nicola Pera's work because, you know, so much of her focus is on understanding that there is a, there is a nervous system response and therefore bodily sensations that we feel that. that you have to detach from the story that goes with them. right so if you start thinking about having a conversation with someone your body starts to react as if there's danger if that's your version of danger from your past yes and when your body starts to react we try to kind of logic ourselves out of it by it's very common self-development is it's very common in self-development to come up with reframes, right?

57:24Like, oh, but, you know, if you have this hard conversation, it could actually improve the relationship or it could, and reframes are really important. I love reframing is something I use all the time in my life. But one of the things Nicole said to me recently that I really loved was that until you can regulate your nervous system and the sensations that are going on, you might not have access to a better story. Because that's what a reframe is, right? It's a more powerful story. You know, for example, someone came to me some time ago about a hard conversation they needed to have with their boss.

58:08And a reframe that I gave them was that you're treating this hard conversation like it's the be-all-end-all hard conversation that you have to have. and actually this is like the first of the next 10 ,000 hard conversations you're going to have in your life this is what this is like one of so many hard conversations you're going to have in your lifetime so instead of seeing this like this big epic moment where you have to have a hard conversation actually see it as practice for the next hard conversation you have to have because you're going to have to have many in your life and your ability to have hard conversations is going to determine the quality of your life.

58:48So instead of seeing this as really high stakes, see this hard conversation is practiced for the next hard conversation you're going to have to have with him or with somebody, with anybody. Anyone, yeah. That's a reframe. But when our body goes into a true like nervous system response, when we go into fight or flight or when we go into freeze, for example, it can be extremely difficult to even have access to a better story. So hard. Someone can tell you, it's like a heartbreak. Someone can come along and say to you, you know, some story like, there's plenty more fish in the sea is a story. It's like, it's a reframe.

59:27Oh, there's more people out there. That's a reframe. And you're trying to give someone a more empowering story. But in their state of heartbreak, which has physiologically overcome their body, they don't have access to the truth of the story you're telling them. even if it's true. So the regulating your nervous system first, whether it's through, and you and I have done so much of this together, right? When we went to Poland with Wim Hof, what did we do every single morning? We regulated our nervous system. We didn't like, like 45 minutes of breathing, but you don't need to do 45 minutes of breathing.

1:00:02You could do five minutes of breathing. You can find a way to slow yourself down, whether it's through meditation, whether it's through losing yourself in a different task we could even be calling a friend and having a nice conversation before revisiting this hard conversation you need to have you it's taking your body out of that state by regulating and then when you've regulated like i feel it i do brazilian jiu-jitsu at the end of an whatever problem is making me anxious at the beginning of a session of rolling at the end of an hour of rolling on the mats feel it i i have access to a better story and you can communicate it better yeah because my i've burnt for i've burnt off a lot of anxious energy i've been forced you know any kind of like sport like that forces presence so you're not thinking about the problem it's like being it's like when whim says like being in the ice being in the ice and being in a frozen lake or whatever for him was the thing that you know took his it was the first time he wasn't thinking about the greatest tragedy of his life was when he was in the ice it's true because his all his focus was just on the feeling the shock the pain of being in the ice and for me i get that from brazilian jiu-jitsu where i'm it's forced presence for me And then at the end of it, when I'm laying on the mat, I'm like, that thing doesn't feel as scary to me or I feel like I have access to a deeper truth or something better.

1:01:32So the start is regulating your nervous system first. And then to start to look at what are some better stories that I could tell myself here. For example, I have this story in my head that if I am honest with someone about what my needs are, they're going to leave me. But what if, firstly, let me remind myself that in the beginning when I haven't done this, it's been a special kind of hell. Like I've, the relationship where I didn't get my needs met was. Miserable. It was hell. It made me so, and I, I've been in those relationships and I know that people around me at the time who loved me were like, oh my God, he's, he's in a dark place.

1:02:28I'd much rather be single than in a relationship with intermittent love where my needs are not met. And knowing that is a power because if you've never experienced that pain before, then you're liable to go back to it. But if you have had it and if you connect to that pain, then all of a sudden you go, well, nothing is worse than that. So I can't go back there. and then there might be a also a very positive story that if I think of my dream relationship if I think of the kind of and I don't mean dream relationship in that you find the perfect partner I mean if I think of the kind of connection the kind of team that I want to be a part of what that that's a place where I really feel seen and if I want that then I have to allow myself to be seen.

1:03:26And that means me sharing. You might also tell yourself that, hey, this, me sharing this stuff also gives them permission to do the same. And my end of the bargain, by the way, I think this is really important. We talk a lot, you know, there's a lot of like instagrammable content out there now of like getting your needs met but you're also in a relationship with a person who has needs on the other side yeah yeah we don't it's popular to talk about when our needs aren't being met but what about when their needs aren't being met what about the things that would make them really happy there's not nearly as much content around that stuff how to be how to serve your partner at the highest level yeah now now the reason there's not is i believe is because the those posts are usually created by people who have experienced the pain of over giving yes and and never being vulnerable enough or brave enough or confident enough to receive and to ask for what they want to receive but the other end of the bargain is when someone when in finding you're looking for someone who sees you and your needs and wants to show up as a teammate in meeting those needs.

1:04:48But the thing that often gives someone the sense of safety that they can do that is when you're also taking care of their needs. People don't feel safe to meet our needs when they're worried that they've got to watch their own and vice versa. It's like when I said, when Audrey anticipates my need, it actually frees up my energy because now I don't need to be worried about my needs I'm like oh she's got me she's got me it frees up energy to go what does she need like what's the thing she just asked me the most beautiful question in the world she said what do you need how can I be better for you this week how can I support you this week that frees me up it frees up mental bandwidth to go hang on have I done anything that awesome for her this week like this is someone who really has my back who else in my life is asking me that question that's unbelievable she's the greatest teammate in the world I'm so lucky I'm so grateful and from that place you're like I better be showing up for this person in the same way like what what does she need how can I be there for you like what's what are you missing right what am I not doing enough of that would mean a lot to you so it's it's a two-way street 100 and if you're giving and giving and you don't feel like your needs are being met then you probably need to communicate hey I want I need some time for my needs as well or here's what I need is it you know make a request is this something you can provide and notice if you are giving and giving and feeling resentful because that has nothing to do with them they they it may come from the fact that they're giving less than you are but you have an expectation then too why you're well but the fact that you're resenting it and you haven't said anything that's on you that's your pattern that's your work to do because there's something i bet you that pattern doesn't just show up with this person i bet it shows up with other people in your life too i bet it's shown up with people in the past so we have to suspect ourselves when we have the same resentments all the time it's suggestive of the fact that there is a there is a pattern that requires healing within us that healing that could hold the key to the relationship you've always wanted because by the way you'll never like i said by changing these patterns and healing these wounds you will find yourself in a place where better and better relationships are available to you because people will start to see you.

1:07:35You'll start to attract a different quality of person. You'll start to attract someone who sees that you respect yourself. You'll start to sculpt the kind of relationship that you want, but, but we deny ourselves these relationships and we wonder why it is I keep running into people who take me for granted. This is something I used to do in relationships. I used to think that everyone in the world thought the same way as me, essentially, that if I'm attracting this person, they must think similar to me. They must want to give like me. They may want to be thinking about me the way I think about them.

1:08:15They may want to be generous the way I'm trying to be generous and therefore thinking they're going to be similar with their generosity like me. But when it wouldn't happen, I would get frustrated and be like, huh, why aren't they giving the way that I'm giving? So I had an expectation, right? And this expectation left me feeling frustrated, resentful, confused, whatever it might be. And because I lacked the ability to communicate my standards through hard conversations, the relationships never worked. I'm sure there's many other flaws that I had why those relationships didn't work. but that was one thing that left me feeling frustrated, not only in intimacy, but also in friendships or business relationships where I was like, I'm gonna show up a certain way and I have an expectation that other people show up a certain way.

1:09:00Or if I'm gonna be generous in one way, I have an expectation that if I do something for someone else that they would be just thoughtful in similar ways and be as generous. And when some people did that, but not everyone. And so it left me feeling frustrated more times than not because I had an expectation. As opposed to just communicating, okay, here's what I'm all about and here's what I value. Here's my values, here's my standards, or not having any expectations at all and being the generous person and not being resentful if there's not a standard met in return and being okay with that. And so I've had to learn the hard way of making sure that I either don't have expectations in certain friendships, business relationships, intimacy, or communicate with hard conversations and see if someone can meet that standard and that's the interesting thing that's where romantic relationships hold this strange sort of space of their own because there's things you can do with other relationships that that take all of that pressure out of it with business relationships or certain friendships maybe you're not your very closest friends but with people who are kind of on the outskirts of your core circle you can have few expectations because you say i'm when i'm with this person i have a great time they don't really show up for me in meaningful ways in my life but they're fun company when we get to have it and that's okay because i got other people i've got a handful of core people in my life that really do show up when it matters i don't need that from this person so i don't have to have any expectations and and if i give to this person i'm just going to know the deal that i'm going to give to this person but i'm going to expect nothing back because there's i know that probably i won't get it back for this person our our intimate relationships hold a special place of power in our lives because they're the tend to be the person we have the most proximity to on a daily basis it's the person that we expect the most from and it's the person that you know we can't we can't meet certain needs elsewhere right it's not like it's not like sexually you go well if this person doesn't meet all of my needs i'll go elsewhere and you know i'll mix it up and spread it around like it's not like that so we have certain rules in place for The most monogamous relationships that say that there are certain things that it's inappropriate for me to get elsewhere.

1:11:40And even if that's not the case, because that's not the case with many of our needs, it's still the case that this is the person I'm going to invest the most time and energy into. And the most love into and the most of myself into. And so if that's the case, by definition, it's the relationship that has to come with the most reciprocity. It can't be a one sided thing because of how much I am required to give to this relationship, how much I'm prepared to give to this relationship. So that's why you've got to communicate the hard, the hard things, express them. You have to. And look, you're right.

1:12:19People are different. We're not all the same in relationships. And you might really like this and she really likes that. And they're different. But it's why I think compromise is important. Where might we be able to give each other a bit more of what we want? But it's also the thing that I think people fail to do a lot is view their romantic relationships holistically. So I might not get this thing as much as I want. But, you know, it's like if you really like if you really like phone calls, right? And your partner, when they go on a trip, you don't really hear from them because it's just not like for them sitting on the phone.

1:13:05it just doesn't lend itself to their communication style so they'll text you but like being away and then sitting on the phone for an hour just isn't it's just not their natural thing so you could try and force it but most times it just feels a bit forced yes well if that person in every other way is an incredible partner and when they're with you they are so present and they text you they you know it's not like they leave you they they don't ghost you on texts there's a back and forth through texts they'll send you pictures of where they are and what they're up to you know they might leave you a loving voice no and the big and you're in a relationship that's not long distance in other words the majority of the time you're together it just so happens that sometimes they have to take trips without you for work or whatever then it's like this is all i'm loved yeah of course i feel loved in this relationship i don't need them to try to be good at this thing that they're not good at or they don't feel natural at because i get my needs met on the whole i do get my needs met would it would it be nice if they enjoyed sitting on the phone as long as i did maybe but it's okay yeah if there's now start adding in variables and you can quickly see how justifying that can become a problem let's say that this person also isn't good at texting let's say that this person's work takes them away for half the time now you might have a real problem because you're not together 50 of the time you're someone who values closeness phone calls were a way that you felt close but fine you would have settled for messages and pictures and just feeling a little bit involved in their day but you don't even feel that and although away half the time you're going to be miserable yeah so it's viewing these things holistically no one is ever going to be a hundred percent of everything you'd right needed a person to be and they're always going to be differences so when we when we ignore the fact that our needs are getting met less of the time than uh you know they're not being met more of the time than they are and you're ignoring that then then you're unhappy yeah in your book love life uh how to raise your standards find your person and live happily no matter what you talk about there's a quote from your book that said, I made a big miscalculation.

1:15:45I underestimated people's ability to make poor choices in their love life, even when they had an abundance of choice. How, when we have an abundance of choice of opportunities, maybe great men in front of, you know, us or great women in front of us, and we're going on lots of dates and like, wow, there's so many inspiring people where most people are struggling to find one person that they're interested in, but now you have an opportunity with lots of people. How do we choose properly when you have an abundance of choices with a potential partners? How do you know the person you're going to choose for the next 20, 30, 50 years potentially is the one for you?

1:16:28Look, I think a very simple place to start is who do I feel most at home with? like who when i spend time with them yes makes me feel most like myself and i think when we listen to that we are listening to do i want to say my heart you know we're listening to our heart we're not listening to our ego because I think ego drives us a lot in our lives. You know, we chase after people who seem impressive on the surface, people who look a certain way, people who have a certain life, people that we think are going to look good to our friends and family and they're going to be celebrated by the people around us.

1:17:18Everyone's going to go, they're amazing. You know, and by the way, the person that all of your friends and family initially say is the most amazing is not necessarily the best person for you that you know that so true how many people have gotten married by saying oh but my family loves this person yeah and and by the way your family aren't all the greatest judge of character yeah and they're not spending 24 7 with this person they're not what they're getting is an advertisement yeah two hours on a weekend or something you know how many how many of us have ever spent a few hours with someone a day with someone and thought they were the greatest person ever and then weeks or months later we look back and we realize oh this was a very charismatic person who really knew how to be endearing yes and was very charming and i just when i met them i just felt so good around them I mean, I felt like, oh my God, they're like, they're so, you know, you just felt this amazing thing.

1:18:22But later on you realize like this person's like actually kind of like they, there was no friendship there at all. This was just a person who's really good at making people like them. And some people were like that with your family and friends. It's like, it's now, by the way, that's not me saying if all of your family and friends think someone is bad news, you should not listen to that. because if the people you trust the most are like i don't this doesn't something doesn't feel right you should hear that and if and again if the people that trust you trust the most it's almost like on that level it's more important that the people you trust the most feel like oh this person is a really good fit for you like i can see that this person is like that you two go really well together like they get you as opposed to this person's really amazing like if that's a bit different you should be thinking of like does this person bring the best out of you and if your family sees that the person you're with maybe he doesn't make as much money or have the job that i think i would want him to have or whatever he's not there yet in life but if you are a happier human being in general if you shine more consistently if you bring out the best aspects of yourself because of this relationship then that's something that people should approve of that that's exactly right do they bring out the best in you are you sad are you exactly are you constantly having the conversation of problems with this relationship right and everyone's experienced a friend or a family member who is terribly anxious and unhappy in a relationship that they are desperately clinging on to thinking it's the most important thing in the world and the rest of us from the outside are going this shouldn't be the most important thing in the world you're unhappy right you know so i i think someone we feel at home with someone who makes us feel like the most like ourselves look for the areas where ego seems to be driving you know i and ego is often driving when you have a poor answer to why you like someone.

1:20:36Oh, yeah. When you're asked the question, why do you love this person and you don't have a good response? No. That's a red flag. It's for sure. For sure. I know, you know, Dr. Ramani, our mutual friend, who's the leading expert on narcissism, says one of the surest signs that something is up is when she asks why someone loves someone and they do not have a good answer. The answer approximates to there's just something about them. yeah that's not a good answer so and and saying there's great sex isn't a great answer either no having we just have great explosive sex and there's some prerequisites for a great relationship right chemistry is important it's not that you can say i'll just you know be with someone who's nice to you even if you have no chemistry that also isn't going to work yep so you have to have chemistry but chemistry is a prerequisite it's not like the thing you have to go like i'm trying to get the greatest chemistry anyone could ever have it's just that you need chemistry yes there's a moment in the book where i say don't comparison shop for chemistry right right instead it see it as a beautiful thing if you found someone who's an incredible teammate who's all of these things you really want values that you that are important to you and there's chemistry that's an amazing thing so am i coming from ego or am i coming from a place of what actually makes me happy is a huge huge huge decision and sometimes we don't learn that until we have spent time with people that are less familiar to us but make us feel really good yeah you know your ego might flare up in some way or another and or you might be like oh but do i still want do i want to like do this maybe i could have someone with this or that or whatever like it there's a lot of that in the world and it creates massive confusion instead of just going this feels unfamiliar but there's something about this that It feels really good.

1:22:53I love your definition of like when you should, when you know that you're choosing the right person is someone who makes you feel most at home. I love that idea. And Martha, my fiance, she's always like, man, I wish I would have met you like 10 years ago. We would have had so much fun like over these last 10, 15 years being together. And I keep saying to her, you know, I wouldn't have been ready for you. Because if I would have met you 10 years ago, I would have looked at you and I would have not have had the same level of, I don't know if you would call it attraction or just like curiosity to be in a relationship because my nervous system wasn't built for you.

1:23:33It wasn't built to feel safe and accepted for who I was. It wasn't. I still needed to learn how to regulate my nervous system, heal, reflect, and really go through a growth period emotionally um and physically really to feel familiar with safety and and and feel peace right feel familiar with peace because i didn't have the familiar i didn't understand that that was safe no and when you're in that i i think for a lot of people especially those who are playing the field and experiencing different people and whatever there is a kind of being single is this dopaminogenic cycle and it and it's hard to get off that cycle because you're kind of wired you're wired for it now you're wired for instant gratification you're wired for variety and excitement and what next and the dramas of the first few weeks of knowing someone and the romance of like just figuring each other out and all of that is like and texts and phone buzzing and you know this and that and this person's now called and it's like a frantic sort of dopamine engine that that you get stuck in and at a certain point you have to come to value something else more because otherwise and this happens of course routinely as people get locked into that cycle.

1:25:06And it was clear to me at a certain point, oh, this happiness doesn't lie here for me. Anxiety lies here for me. Uncertainty. Uncertainty is having an effect on the way I see the world or myself, or this is not, this is not going to serve me long-term. But that doesn't, just because you realize that it doesn't mean that you immediately have an appreciation of what the other thing is or that you even know what it looks like or what package it comes in or you don't know any of those things and so you you know there's a whole chapter i wrote i wrote in this book that i'm really insanely proud of because i think it's so on the money of what's happening for so many people it's called never satisfied and that i think is the feeling i explain the steps of why it is we struggle to be satisfied and the next chapter is how to rewire your brain so that you can actually rewire yourself for happiness because i know for a long time i was that never satisfied in relationships or just yeah my love life i think in life too right right but But in my love life, I was just chasing, chasing, chasing, chasing, chasing.

1:26:26Dopamine, dopamine. I'm not happy. I need to get out of this relationship. I'm single. Dopamine, dopamine. I'm not happy here. You know, like there must be some perfect person who's going to make me feel differently about this whole thing. And I'm going to feel different when I meet that person. And that person didn't come because it wasn't really about that. Something was going on with me. I was in that cycle. And the other thing that is available to you is so, I don't want to, this isn't a lecture on whether someone should be single or in a relationship. So I don't want to become that person.

1:27:06Sure, sure. But what is so amazing about a healthy relationship is not available to you until you come to value something different it's like someone who's been used to doing drugs every day and then the day that you that you get them to quit drugs you sit them outside their house in front of a beautiful field and you say appreciate the sunset yeah there's no dopamine rush anymore a sunset is a mate like a sunset is an awe inspiring unbelievable thing it is something that is mind-blowing why do we all go on holiday and everyone at the same time goes out onto the beach and watches the sunset because there's something stunning and magical about a sunset but for the person who's been doing drugs every day that's not the day you can appreciate a sunset you you are coming out of all of those feelings that you've been addicted to and all of that like instant gratification dopamine so it's about like again it's nervous system stuff right it's retraining my nervous system and this is some of the stuff we talk about in how to rewire your brain but it's you have to orient yourself towards a different goal and in the beginning you can't expect the new thing to feel like the old thing because it's not it's not gonna feel like the old thing but the more you lean into the new thing it you develop an appreciation for how much better it actually feels and that's like a kind of stunning and eye-opening realization um and i'm i feel really passionate about this because i see a lot of really unhappy people i was one of them by the way who are stuck in those cycles and and i think there's a lot of i think there's a lot of people who get stuck in optimization cycles in their love life where it's like especially type a people not everyone does but a lot of people do where it's like, I'm trying to find the perfect thing and I'm trying to, and if someone's missing this thing, I'm going to optimize and go for another person who's like got all the good things about this person, but, and also that thing.

1:29:39And it's like, people don't work like that. You exchange one basket of ingredients for another basket of ingredients and you'll get new good stuff and new bad stuff and challenging stuff. And it, you, I'm a huge believer. I think the, um, settling is a word that has, has a really unfairly negative connotation and it shouldn't. Is there something amazing about that word? You can change the meaning of, of that depending on the word that goes after it. So if you say, if you tell someone you have to settle for something that feels immediately negative right i like settling down yeah because i feel like i'm being short-changed but if you say settling on something that changes it because you lewis settled on a particular business and brand yes you you're such a capable person you could have done a hundred different things in this lifetime and you would have been a success at them right so how the hell do you decide which one you should do?

1:30:49You found one that scratched the itch in a bunch of different ways. It allowed you to be creative. It allowed you to broadcast, which is something you're really good at. It allowed you to connect, which is something you're really good at. It allowed you to, you know, harness all of these relationships, which is something you're really great at is relationships. It allowed you to put to work your strategy mind. It allowed you to be competitive, which is something that's in your bones. And, and so it, this business, it ticked a lot of boxes for you, but it's not the only business that would have ticked boxes for you.

1:31:22There are other things you could have done that would have ticked boxes, but you settled on greatness. And you said, I'm going to go all in on this and I'm going to keep going on this. And the thing that has made what you do so great and what you have done is extraordinary. What you've built, the audience you've built, the platforms you've built, the body of work you've built, it's extraordinary. But it's not extraordinary because you found an extraordinary thing. You didn't find the word greatness. And like, you know, you just went, I've got the, if you'd have said to me like 15 years ago, we didn't know each other then, but when you started, if you'd have said to me, Matt, I've got the greatest idea.

1:32:04I am going to take the word greatness and I am going to just own that world and a word and build a brand out of it and do all of the, I would have been like, that's not an idea. So you've taken a common word in the English language. You talk about it. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, but that's not what's made this extraordinary. What's made this extraordinary is that you have settled on it and you keep you take this thing to another level every year and people who are looking at you going there's you've got a lot of i've i've walked with you in the street in vegas on holiday in places on when we've traveled you have people coming up to you everywhere you go and you're a hero to so many people and so many people want to create what you've created or want to be where you are but you didn't you didn't start with this really special thing you spent year after year after year making a really special thing and every year i see you take the same core thing and stick with it again yeah not go you know what now what i really want to do is now i really want to do real estate yeah i'm over this i'm going to move on yeah the greater yeah it's not that's not it for you you're like i'm gonna make this thing even better i think that's how people should approach relationships and that's my point is that you settle when the thing that makes a relationship the greatest relationship of your life is that you take someone who ticks the boxes for you and that's the starting point but then based on the values you each bring and i think there are some very powerful values for a relationship, like being growth oriented, like teamwork, like loyalty, like prioritizing the vision of the relationship.

1:33:58I think when you take those things and you put those two people like that together, what they start with is not nearly as interesting as what they will create together. And you can only create that if you settle on a person, but you will never settle on a person as long as you are looking for the perfect person as a starting point because the perfect relationship doesn't exist at the beginning but the perfect relationship for you can exist over time if you settle on someone and you resolve to make that relationship as good as it can possibly be and that's why i get i get so excited about my relationship because i'm like it's amazing right now it's going to be even better in six months right because we're building something together.

1:34:47Martha says that to me all the time. She's like, how do I love you even more today than I did last week? And I think it's because we're both focused on growing ourselves individually and growing the relationship together. And I'm sure there's going to be adversities and challenges we face, but us facing it together makes us even more connected and appreciate each other even more. And there's something even fun about that. When you know you're an amazing team, there's even something fun about knowing that there's going to be challenges and the two and how you're going to solve those as a team because you're in a killer team absolutely like that's that's even that there's something exciting about it absolutely so i you know i think we we almost have to pay attention to some of these ideas we have about love and relationships is what you know the way we use words like settling are you settling for someone or are you settling on someone that will change if you settle for someone you'll become passive and resentful in that relationship if you see it like you settled on someone of any choice you could have made you chose this person and because you chose it you're going to lean into it and you're going to make it as great as it can possibly be that relationship that will change the way you approach relationships the same is true of the word commitment there's amazing this is such a a fantastic example of the point I'm making.

1:36:07If you look up, I think it's an Apple dictionary. I don't know how it's reflected in the Oxford dictionary, but if you go on your Mac and you type in the word commitment, there are two different definitions that come up. Really? What does it say? One is a, uh, I think it reads and people can go and look for themselves and get the exact wording. But one of them says roughly a obligation that restricts freedom of action. Wow. Right? Now, if you give me someone that has that as their definition of commitment, and I'll show you someone who has a hard time ever being in a relationship. But there's another definition of commitment under that one.

1:36:53And it says commitment, dedication to a cause. Now, when you think of dedication to a cause, it creates a completely different energy in your body. I'm dedicated to this cause I'll fight for this cause I'll do anything for this cause like there is a there's something heroic about that I'm dedicated to the cause of our relationship of our future of our vision of where we're going there's something stunningly beautiful about that dedication to a cause an obligation that restricts freedom one is about shrinking your world and the other one enlarges it there are so many people out there struggling with the idea of committing whether it's to a business an idea a path a country a person a new sport and your definitions around these words the way you choose to see them is going to determine your ability to stay with something to invest in something and i think that's so fascinating i really do yeah this is big man um there's so many more questions i want to ask you but i want to i want people to get the book because i know you're going to answer a lot of these questions in here as well.

1:38:26Love life, how to raise your standards, find your person and live happily no matter what. So make sure you guys get a few copies. If you have a friend who's been struggling in relationships, get them a copy as well. If you know someone that just went through a breakup, get them a copy. If you know someone who's in a healthy relationship, get them a copy so they can still use these tools to improve their relationship as well. Love life. Where can they go and get this copy? Is there a way we can get some extra goodies or bonuses or should we just go on Amazon? Where should we go? You can definitely get it from Amazon or Barnes and Noble or wherever you get your books.

1:39:01But, um, we actually have a website, lovelifebook.com. And the advantage of getting a copy through that website is, uh, we have something really, really special going on right now on the 4th of May, I'm doing a worldwide live event and, uh, it's going to be a very, very special event it's the sort of event that if we just ran this as a normal event it would cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars um this is my first book in 10 years amazing um it's a huge celebration for me and for my team it's a big moment it's a big milestone i've poured my heart and soul into this i think people who read it are going to see there's a lot more vulnerability from me in this book a lot more completely different person yeah and and i tell those stories in the book in a way that I've never told them on YouTube or anywhere else.

1:39:51So this is a big celebration for us. And as a result, we wanted to do something very special for everyone who gets a copy of this book and supports us and supports themselves or someone they love in the process. So every single person who gets a copy of the book, when you go through lovelifebook.com, you'll see you can order a copy of the book and then you can literally take your confirmation number on your receipt, wherever you got it, even if it's from a regular bookstore and not Amazon, you can take your confirmation number, put it in on the website. And that confirmation number becomes your free ticket to the worldwide event that I'm doing online on May the 4th.

1:40:30There you go. So yeah, that's going to be a great accompaniment to the book is to actually spend this day with us. Lovelifebook.com. So they'll get that event for free by getting a copy of the book. Exactly. There's so many great concepts in here. Again, how to rewire your brain. I love the chapter in here about if you know you want to leave, but you don't know how to leave. It teaches people how to get out of a relationship the right way. Yeah, there's a lot of talk in there. That's a big chapter on anyone who's in a toxic, abusive, or narcissistic relationship. And you can apply that, by the way, across the board, not just to your love life, but if there's family relationships that you're struggling with and you don't know what to do about them that's a very hard-hitting chapter there's chapters on confidence in there which is why this has mass appeal i i want to say this just to just to because i think it's important for people to hear i have come to believe that there are three relationships we are all in in life one is our relationship with other people the second is our relationship with ourselves and the third is our relationship with life itself and these are three relationships that you can't get out of right you're for as long as you're here on this planet you are in these three relationships and these relationships the quality of them will determine your happiness in this world so we better focus on those relationships and that's in many ways this book is designed not just to be a book for people who are looking to find love but a book for people who are looking to improve those relationships.

1:42:07And I talk about my own journey. Even I talk about some times where I fell out of love with life because I was, you know, handed some difficult cards along the way and struggled. And, you know, maybe we could talk about it on another episode, but, you know, was in a very dark place and a very depressed place. And I talk in the book about how I improved the tools that I use to improve my relationship with life in the hardest times of my life. And that, you know, that that's why the double meaning in the title of this book is so important to me. This isn't just about your love life. It's about your love for life.

1:42:46And it's why that last line, you know, how to raise your standards, find your person and live happily no matter what was really, really important to me. So I don't think this is just a book about finding love. I believe that this is a book that will get passed around for people who are struggling with all sorts of things in their lives. That's cool, man. And again, if you don't have a good relationship with life, you're probably not going to have a good relationship with yourself. And if you don't have a good relationship with yourself, how are you going to find someone that you can actually love and appreciate without being jaded on them trying to hurt you in some way?

1:43:22So you need to have a healthy relationship in all three areas, or those first two at least if you want to have a healthy relationship with someone else and trusting them in your life and opening your heart to them. So I want to get the book, lovelifebook.com to get that special event with Matthew Hussey. We're going to do another episode here in a moment. So I want people to check out part two, a separate episode. You know, make sure to subscribe so you can watch this and listen to this as well for part two coming up here soon. But I'm going to ask you some of those questions you just talked about there.

1:43:56But to wrap up this interview, I wanted to ask you about, I've asked you these, a bunch of questions at the end before you've been on this show many times, but I want to ask you a question about if you could give your 18 year old self three pieces of advice about love. Let's get out of my pen. You know, if you could give your 18 year old self three pieces of advice about love, knowing everything you know now from being in multiple different relationships, going through breakups, being in challenging situations and in love, being single and dating a bunch of people over the years, you know, now being married, if you could give your 18 year old self three pieces of advice about love that you wish you would have known then that you know now, what would those three things be?

1:44:46Okay, I think I got it. Three on the spot is hard, by the way. If you imagine, I got it. 18 year old Matthew sitting in front of you saying, I just want to find love. And I just want to, I just want to feel loved. And I want to find a great, I want to have a family and be married one day. And you get to sit in front of him with all the wisdom that you have now and all the heartache and all the pain and all the love that you've experienced. What are you going to say to your younger self? um i think the first thing i would say is that it's it's not this is gonna sound cheesy but i i i mean i really mean it i would start by saying it's not your fault that you are the way you are that these things that you think uh are a sign that you're broken whether it's your shyness or your anxiety or feeling like you're uh you know terrified of rejection or that you're not good enough i you you know these things are either they've either been part of you from the beginning or they are a response to things that have happened in your life you know i'm not saying everything is nurture some of the some of it is just our dna right yes our brain but either way you know these things that you keep judging yourself for and telling yourself that you're broken for they they deserve compassion because they're not you didn't choose them you know and i and the reason i think that's important from a love life context is because the what i lacked for so much of my life was self-compassion i thought i wasn't good enough I thought that, you know, deep down I was shameful.

1:46:44I was ugly. I was unlovable. I was bad, like not a good person. You know, I was just like just not, you know, like if people really knew who I was, they would think I was disgusting and pathetic and weak and unlovable and um and I'm not saying all of this is was always conscious but it was on some level this must have been how I was feeling because I was really deeply afraid to be seen yes and so I would have I would have said it's okay that you're like you're you're okay you're like the way you are you didn't it's not because you're broken or that you made choices to be there it's that you're responding to something and that would that would give me self-compassion wow and the second thing i would say to myself is is share those things now i don't know how well it would have gone for me at 18 to share those things with girls my age.

1:47:59But in general, I would have said as a lesson for life, share those things because that everyone else is also, in all the ways you fear you're broken, everyone else is too. And if you can share that with other people, that is going to be your ultimate power. I spent my 20s, Lewis, you know, I was coaching people and I was lucky enough like you to be quite known relatively speaking you know as a 25 year old I you know made a bit of a name for myself and a lot of people knew who I was and and I and I never really allowed myself to truly just be myself because I was trying to be something else I was trying to like be impressive and these days I'm much more focused on connecting with people.

1:48:52It's like you and I would never have had this interview 10 years ago. Right. You were trying to impress too much. Yeah. I'm sure the first interview we did together was strong because it's fun sometimes when someone is being impressive, right? We get to watch someone, you know, do their thing. But this now, this wouldn't happen 10 years ago because I wasn't sharing myself in that way. So I would say share yourself because that's the route to real connection, real friendships real love and uh and then the third thing i would say to myself is

1:49:30have compassion for these flaws in other people because you know i i spent way too much of my life writing people off or judging people for things that they were struggling with you know and things i didn't like about the way they did this or that or the way that insecurity showed up all the way and and oh like honestly man i i look back on it now and i'm like they were me they were me like i i they only didn't know that that was me because i wasn't being vulnerable with them for you know i didn't even offer them the ability to have compassion with my deeper flaws or my insecurities or my vulnerabilities because i never shared them you didn't reveal them no because i i didn't i judged those things in myself and when you judge them in yourself you judge them in other people and the more in my life i've developed space for myself and who I am, the more compassionate I've become with myself, the more compassionate I've become with other people, the greater my capacity to love other people for who they really are is.

1:50:48And I, I, I think that's such a, that's such a big point to me. You know, in one of the comments that I read a lot in self-development circles is like it's really hard to meet someone when you've upped your game in life and you now are someone who you know is growth oriented and you're doing this and you're doing that and whatever and it's like your pull shrinks because you're just so awesome and everyone else sucks you're so cautious and everyone else is unconscious that's basically sort of the subtext is that why is it so hard now that everyone sucks and i'm great and i i have to say i have found a slightly different experience to be true i i have found it easier to love other people the more that i have learned to love myself and the more compassion i've developed for my own complexities and the things that make me a difficult and complicated and somewhat damaged and whatever person yeah i it's made me able to love other people more because now that i'm making more space for myself i also make space for for the way that other people are and the things that, that those things on the surface that are easy to judge, that the things that the deeper wounds that those things represent that they're struggling with.

1:52:08It makes me emotional as I say it, because I think that that's, I have found it easier to love. And I think that, um, having, having that compassion for yourself breeds compassion for other people. Um, so I would say have, have stopped judging other people so much and have compassion for, for who they are because they're you. This is beautiful, man. Make sure you guys get a copy of the book, lovelifebook.com. Check it out. Matthew Ozzy. Thanks, brother. Appreciate you, man. Thanks, man. I hope today's episode inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a rundown of today's show with all the important links.

1:52:50And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me as well as ad-free listening experience, Make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel on Apple Podcast. If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend over on social media or text a friend. Leave us a review over on Apple Podcast and let me know what you learned over on our social media channels at Lewis Howes. I really love hearing the feedback from you and it helps us continue to make the show better. And if you want more inspiration from our world-class guests and content to learn how to improve the quality of your life, then make sure to sign up for the Greatness newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com slash newsletter.

1:53:28And if no one has told you today, I wanna remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.