Why Women Lose Desire Faster in Marriage | Esther Perel

27:49It's a very small thing, but they don't do it. They don't do it. And you say, why not? Why not? Why don't you stay an hour extra at home in the morning and not just because when you have a headache and just say, this matters to me. All in all, you know, committed sex is premeditated sex. It's not just going to happen because whatever is going to just happen already has. So you're going to make it happen because you say we matter. We're important. Let's do this. It doesn't mean if you're going to make love or have sex. It just means we're going to take this hour and there's nothing else that matters in this moment, but just you and I to be together, to check in.

28:27And then we'll see what unfolds. That's the erotic space in which sex may happen, probably will, doesn't have to, but it is the place from which it is much more likely to emerge. But people don't do that. They do the responsibility. That's the love, right? The citizen, the commitment, the caretaker, the burdens, the safe. And then they say, I'm bored. I would be too. Exactly. There's no mystery. There's no risk-taking, right? Exactly, yeah. There's no risk-taking. That's the word. If you want desire, it's risk. And the risk is an emotional risk. It's not about sexy risks. It's really a risk on the emotional front, is that I bring something else to you differently from the way I typically present myself.

29:12Sure. You know, how can I do this? something, what can I do today that will be different from the ways that I've done it until now? How can I do something that I think would actually improve our relationship? Me, right? Not something that I want or that you want, but that I think would be actually good for us, that third entity, the us, right? And you check every time, you know, how often do you just go on the tried and trodden as in, you know, it works. Sex that just works. For most people, it's really not interesting enough. Right. Because what does it mean it works generally? Right. What about the people listening who are saying, man, that sounds like a lot of work, that every day you have to change, do something different and unique and be...

29:59Not every day. Not every day. Not every day. But what you can do every day is just a quick check with yourself. You know, is there something that I should notice? Is there something that I can be thankful for? Is there a little note that I could write? is there you know just a way that i can show up a time it's small it's really small um here's the thing there is work and then there is the creative work you know i'm talking about a level that is creative and that elevates you and that actually gives you you feel you feel taller you just feel like you're engaged you feel awake rather than this this is the other seated position it's comfortable it's great but nothing happens here sure this this is alert here's the essential word is curiosity when you're curious you lean forward and you watch you're open to the mysteries of life this is please don't bother me with anything because i don't want any stimulation i've had my share.

31:07And this is the position that most people have at home. So when people say it's too much work, I basically say, look, if I was to say this in your business, would you say this is too much work? Or you would say, that's very good advice. This is high rate consulting fees. It's like, excuse me, but you don't think for a minute that your business would thrive if you let it languish like that. Never. You have a reward system. You have incentives. Bonuses. Bonuses. But there is no incentivized system in the private domain. So people just think, why bother? And that's the difference is that the ones who have good relationships are the ones who created their own internal incentivized system.

31:58What are some of those incentive systems that you've seen over time that really work or are effective for long-term relationships? I would say the first thing is almost one of the first things that our parents teach you. Please and thank you. Do you know how many people stop thanking their partners? Thank you. Thank you for doing this for me. Thank you for picking up the shirts. Thank you for, you know. Making you feel appreciated. Yes. Appreciation. Appreciation is huge. Gratitude. acknowledgement of the presence of the other in your life not did you do this did you call did you pick up do this you know half the time expectations expectations of course you know expectations is often a resentment in the make uh but the expectation comes the fear of it's not good thank person first of all and because it also makes it feel like this is not a given Nobody owes you squat.

32:57You're not owed anything. You're not that important. You're actually quite replaceable. Right. And with the divorce rate that we have. What's the rate at right now? You have 50 on first and 65 on second. 65 on second. Wow. It's not good. Right. It's really, you know, it costs a lot of money. It's not good for the health. I mean, it's just like, you know, it's not good for the jobs. It's just, it's like, okay. Now you could say maybe people should marry, but it doesn't matter if it's marriage legally or... The idea is that we can do better. We can do better in general. I really think that the quality of our lives depends on the quality of our relationships.

33:38I mean, nobody's got the right, you know, you worked 60, 70, 80, 90 hours a week. And, you know, no, they're going to say he was there for people when they needed to. He was there at every game. He was there at the party. he's the guy who when you were in his presence he had charisma not because he could stand in front of a huge crowd but he had charisma because when I was in his presence he made me feel special it's a different charisma so appreciation gratitude, thank you little things to go out of your way rather than just to do the minimum, a lot of people start to do the bare minimum just so that they can't be scolded, go an extra thing on occasion just do something for the other person just because it matters to them even if you couldn't care less rather than it's not important to me I don't need this or I don't care about this give each other a lot of individual space not everything needs to be shared people have different passions, different interests, different friends and they need those separate spaces to exist admiration I think is huge because admiration is also that you kind of really see the otherness of the other person.

34:56Don't try to make your partner into one person for everything. There is no such a person. Find multiple sources of connection, of intimacy, of friendship so that you can have a group of people support you and don't have one person who has to be there for you for everything, especially when you're in the dumpster. We used to have a village of people that do that Now we just expect one person to be the village, right? Yes, yes, yes. One person for the whole village. That is a unique... And then we're upset when they don't fulfill the mandate. And that's the more important... Like, I can't talk to you.

35:30You're not supportive of me. You're not excited for me. Excuse me. Find other people. Right. I can't be everything for you yet. No. Exactly. No. Can we talk about what marriage was about early, when it started? Do you know the history of marriage and how it's evolved and where it's at now and kind of like how we look at it in society? So I won't go back millions of years because it is a long history and we were actually much more polygamous and much more polyamorous and all of that. But the model from which we come is basically this. Marriage used to be an economic enterprise. It was a mercantile arrangement.

36:09Men depended on women's fidelity for patrimony and lineage so that I can know who are my children and who gets the cows when I die. When was this? What time frame? This is pretty much still, it still is in most parts of the world, by the way, and I would say it's probably, we're going to go about 50, 60 years back. Okay. That's it. Okay, wow. That's it. People didn't choose who they married. You know, people didn't choose who they married. Arranged marriage is the norm still in many parts of the world. Certainly you didn't marry because you fell in love. You married somebody who was a good person with whom to have a family with.

36:49And if love grew, that was wonderful, but it was not the beginning element of a relationship. Desire certainly was not what sex was about in marriage. So this is the traditional model. That doesn't mean that there was no good sex and intimate sex. That doesn't mean there was no passion. And that doesn't mean there was no love. But that was not what the institution of marriage was meant for. Marriage that becomes a romantic arrangement, I will begin that at the end of the 19th century. It's about 150 years old. But it needs contraception. It needs feminism. And it's a lot of things to become what we want today, which is a relationship that is rooted in intimacy.

37:32Intimacy, which until not too long ago was basically, we live together, we share the vicissitudes of everyday life, we raise the kids, we work the land. intimacy now is into me see. I share with you my inner life. That required individualism. Before individualism, we didn't have the concept self. That's beginning of the 20th century, late 19th, beginning 20th. So it's a lot of things go together. You know, the rise of individualism, the move away from religion as the center, the person becomes the center. Hence my individual happiness becomes central. Now I move away from the community. I choose you.

38:12And as I choose you, now you become responsible to alleviate my existential aloneness. You know, that's why you become my village. Right. Because I've left the village. And you're going to make me feel that I matter because I'm not judged by my actions. I'm judged by my personality. It's very different. I'm not, you understand, it's a whole new thing. It's like who I am, not what I do, as in do I show up in church? Am I an upstanding citizen? Am I doing right by my parents? It's personality. It's a whole new thing. So trust, affection, intimacy, desire become the four pillars within modern relationships.

38:58That is a whole new model. Affairs used to be actually adultery for most of history was the space where people went to look for true love because marriage was arranged and economic. Now that we brought love into marriage, adultery destroys it. So what did we do? We brought love into marriage. We brought sex to love. We connected happiness to emotional and sexual satisfaction. And we also want a passionate marriage, which for most of history has been a contradiction in terms. Passion has always existed, but somewhere else. Right. In the affair or in whatever. Yes, wherever. Wow. Wherever. How are we supposed to navigate all this?

39:49Actually, I think it's exciting. I really do, because nobody in effect wants to go backwards. No, absolutely not. Nobody wants to go back where you are stuck. This is it. You have one chance for life. And the only thing you have going is that you die younger. Right, exactly. Okay? You actually have the opportunity to do it again, to try a different story, to be a different person, to be a better partner, and to be a better parent for that matter. And I think that that is something that we've never had is the opportunity to rewrite that story. We always had one job for life and one relationship for life.

40:30I think one of the, you know, of course, we therefore didn't have to decide five times what do I want to do. Right. But we have been given a unique opportunity. I can have more than one career or more than one job, more than one identity in this world. And I can have a whole new family and I can have a whole new love that I can start at 60, 40, 50, 60. and have another 20 years with somebody and actually do it better this time. I think that is actually one of the greatest gifts we've been given. How long have you been married? 30-something. 30-something years, okay. And how has your work, two kids, and how has your work and the constant conversation you're in about this work supported or not supported your relationship with your husband?

41:25You know, there was a comment that I once made a few years back, and it's become a line in one of my TED Talks, where I said most of the people today are going to have two or three relationships. You mean marriages or just relationships? Committed relationships. Marriages. I could say marriages, but let's say in Europe, so many of us don't marry. So I would say committed relationships. Most of us are going to have two or three committed relationships in our lifetime. due to divorce, due to death, various things. Some of us are going to do it with the same person. I have had probably three marriages to the same man.

42:04Wow. Not because we divorced or anything, but because over 30 years, we have had to redefine ourselves. Sure. To restructure everything that you do in companies, you know, to change our brand. What works for five years is not going to work for the next five years. That's right. What works when we are just two is not the same as what works when we are four. What works when we're in our 20s isn't the same as when we are in our 50s. What works when we have this type of career is not the same as now. And I think that the very principles that you apply to companies today, flexibility, fluidity, the ability to reinvent itself, to redefine itself, to manage tradition and innovation is really what has to enter into all modern love.

42:51That's what coupledom is about. Those who can do it, do it with each other, and the other ones do it by finding a new person. So what's the ideal relationship moving forward in our... It's this. You sit every once in a while and you say, how are we doing? What are the strengths between us? I actually think people should have different commitment ceremonies in the course of a marriage. Really? Yes, I think that every few years or every year they should have a little summit or they should have a little whatever they want to call it. They could have a ceremony. Where are we at? Checking in. How are we doing?

43:28What has been good in our life? What could we do better? What could we do differently? Are we doing right by our children? Are we meeting some of our important needs at this point? What has changed for us? We've just been sick. We've just lost a parent. We've just lost a child. What's changing in our life? And to actually address this head on, what the problem is in couples is that most of the big topics are addressed when there is a crisis rather than when actually things are good. When you're calm. When you're calm. Of course, you have less incentive to change when things are good, but you have less creativity to change when things are bad.

44:08Same for companies, same for couples. Wow. So I think retreats for couples are unique, actually, because couples are often isolated units. They talk to nobody. Sometimes women will talk to women, men will talk to no one. And when a group of couples come together in a group, it is powerful. It is so normalizing to know what's happening at the neighbors that you never know and that you can always imagine is different from yours. it's so powerful to hear your partner like you can never hear them because somebody else just said the same thing but just with a different word or just with a little bit more distance so that you're not instantly reactive and defensive i think that that conversation between couples the same way that you bring entrepreneurs together to a mastermind to talk about their company to hear something in a different way that it finally lands with you yes and you can take action towards it Yes.

45:04I think that if we could actually bring the entrepreneurs and their partners, it would be an incredible thing. I do a lot of it with YPO, with EO, with all this. I see it each time. And not to separate the partners from the others. No, actually have the people in the room, you know, have a fishbowl where the entrepreneurs talk about what their life says and then have a fishbowl on the other side where the next inner circle is where the partners talk about what it's like to live. with the entrepreneur and have each of them listen to the other. It's been one of the richest conversations I've had in that space.

45:42Wow. Okay. And what's your thoughts on divorce? You know, as you said, over 50 % are divorced the first time, then over 65 % the second time. Do you believe that, or do you think it's, you know, that people should experience divorce or they should go through that? Or do you think that they're being lazy? Or do you think that they're just not committed to it enough or that they haven't tried all the different things to become better themselves and to see the good in their partner?

46:10I would start differently. Is that a bad question? No, no, no, no, not at all. But I would say differently. I would think that the first thing that has to happen with divorce is to take away the concept of failure. As long as we still think that it is marriage for life, till death do us a part, when de facto, for the majority of couples today, it's till love dies, not till they do us apart. That's when we divorce. We break up, when love dies. Yes. And then we think it's a failure. I think that a relationship that has lasted for 15, 20, 25 years sometimes, that's not a failure. It's a huge success.

46:54It's a long time. It's a good success. And they may have done certain things poorly and other things very well. I think a lot of people who divorce don't have the chance to actually appreciate how many good things they had in their relationship and to do what I like to call, you know, a la Gwyneth Paltrow, the conscious uncoupling. Meaning... Oh, you have Catherine Woodward Thomas. Do you know her? Yeah. Goodbye. Yeah. This is what I really am thankful for that we had together. This is what I take with me from what we had together. This is what I wish for you as we move forward. This is how I hope our children will remember us.

47:36That is a very different departure. And when you do that departure, you also have a very different continuity in your next relationships later than carrying bitterness and victimization and resentment and all of that. So I think that many people, something ends, you know, but they moved in together. They helped each other through school. They helped each other in the beginning of their careers. They helped each other when their parents were sick. They helped each other when their parent died. They helped each other with raising children. This is a lot of what marriage is about. They've had good marriages for all sake and purposes.

48:12And maybe other things have come in and they were not necessarily always that nice to each other. And maybe they hurt each other and maybe they abandoned each other. Maybe they betrayed each other. Lots of other things come in too. But this stuff all disappears because of the negative that then sits on it, making it look like their marriage didn't work out. It failed. Why? It failed because it ended. The only time it's successful is when they meet in the funeral home. Interesting. So you think we should redefine or look at it differently? Yes. I think that marriage has to be disentangled from the concept of...

48:46Death to us part. Yes. I think that divorce as the proof that a marriage failed is the wrong conclusion. Right. It's not right. And it takes away from people decades of enormous endeavors and constructive stuff. It's not because a company closed that a company failed. Right. Right. They close all the time. Yeah. Okay. Interesting. So are you saying that, you know, since we're evolving and growing and having different needs and desires and things like that, that we should expect, you know, to start a family and then get divorced. And how is that going to affect our children's lives going forward?

49:27Should we be expecting more of that and be okay with just, well, now I've got a new partner and a new stepmom or stepdad, and this is how we have multiple families now. How is that going to be moving forward? Listen, when there was no divorce, basically the ones who took the brunt of it were the women. The supposed stability of the family basically rested because the woman stayed put, made sure that the children were taken care of. The man went out and they wouldn't want it. Many times. Many times. If they had the possibility, they certainly would. So I think that we definitely have a model today that is more focused on the adults.

50:08When you divorce, it's for the well-being of the adult. It's not for, unless there's real egregious, you know, issues in the family, it's not for the benefit of the children. It's for the benefit of the adult. A divorce is not the end of the family, it's the reorganization of the family. It's the end of the couple, but it's not the end of the family. And if the couple can disentangle with more integrity and more respect and more real thoughts about the children, not manipulation for the good of the children, then the family can actually reorganize better and this is where it's going to go so we can bemoan it but the fact is we better think about a better way of doing it so that the children the children of today i look the millennials of today 50 of them are either the children of the divorced or the disillusioned yeah okay and half of them half of you men grew up with single mothers so you've come out with a very different kind of emotional intelligence because you actually were speaking to those mothers at the table the whole time and they engaged you in conversations in ways that often did not take place if the father would have been at the table so you come, I think it's a very very beautiful new generation of men actually that emerges out of this, that we don't think of it they were at the table with mom and when mom said how was your day she was not content with just it was good or it was all right.

51:38She said, what? She had another question and another question. And you've developed a kind of an emotional literacy that most boomers don't have a clue about, men. Sure. That the millennial man really has available. Interesting. I don't think you've ever thought of that. Yeah, that's great. That's great. You see it. I mean, watch yourself at the table, at breakfast. that, you know, there was a whole, that conversation did not happen when dad was at the table. Not that there was no conversation. It was a different conversation. So I think families are reorganizing. Yes. Yeah. Yes. It's not failures.

52:21It's not bad. It's not wrong. We have blended families. We have single parent families. We have gay families. We have accordion families. We have long distance families. We have the fastest growing model of couples in America today is the lat, living apart together. That is the fastest growing and it's a boomer model. It's the people after 55. Wow. Okay. Who are in relationships, but don't live with their partner. Interesting. Why? Because they often have their own families, because they have their own living arrangement, because one of them is still working. One of them is already preparing and downsizing.

52:58lots of different reasons for why they prefer to have the benefits of the connection and of the relationship and their own space and their own space interesting or because they want to stay closer to their children or grandchildren why the other person has their grandchildren elsewhere it's millions millions because the question of the lot is what will happen when they get older do you have the same commitment to a person who is aging and getting sick when you have not lived with them and you have maintained so much of your own life because i meet you in my 50s i have a whole life and i'm not willing to let go of that life yeah i'm willing to make to be with you and create a relationship and connect things but i don't want to let go of my i have a whole world of my own you know yeah so that's the lat model and we don't know what the lat model will do for public health yeah we know that men you know live better in older age when there is somebody next to them.

53:54They don't take good care of themselves. Yeah, of course. Should we expect moving forward in relationships with our time that monogamy is something that we're going to be able to do? Or there's always something better option and that it's more available now than ever, especially with social media, online dating. There's distractions constantly. Yeah, you don't have to leave your house anymore. You can pretty much cheat on your partner while lying next to them in bed. Exactly. But we are by definition already doing serial non-monogamy. You know, most of us don't come to marriage monogamous. We've come to marriage after years of nomadism, sexual nomadism.

54:37So monogamy is a concept that has already been redefined throughout. You asked me before about how has marriage changed. But monogamy had nothing to do with love for most of history. Monogamy became about love with romanticism. It's the sacred ideal of the romantic ideal, the sacred cow, because monogamy means I'm everything. I'm it. I'm the one. I'm chosen. I'm unique. I'm iris. And if you are interested in someone else, it means I'm not enough. Versus monogamy, which was basically for patrimony and for children. So how should we navigate this moving forward? This concept of monogamy. Look, if I had talked to you 70 years ago about premarital sex and virginity was a precondition, you would have looked at me like this is a taboo, this is impossible.

55:28Today, premarital sex in the West, it's like nobody blinks an eye. It would have been inconceivable. If I had talked to you about going from families of eight-tailed children to families of one child, you would have looked at me inconceivable. If I had told you that we were going to be conceiving so many children through assisted reproduction, inconceivable. So today, when you say open relationships or non-monogamous relationships or periodically non-monogamous or monogamous, shall I dance, savage, or, you know, or polyamorous, people would say can't work, impossible. You know, the fact is monogamy is the new frontier.

56:07But you can have it as negotiated through divorce or through what most people have always done, which is proclaimed monogamy and clandestine adultery. or you can do it through a model of transparency in which people have consensual non-monogamy. This is it. This is the options. Right. What do you think is going to be working the most for people? It's going to be a little bit of everything. There are some people who really need stable, committed, monogamous relationships. They don't want open doors. And there are other people for which open doors probably should be the model from the start. That's kind of who they are.

56:46that's their curiosity that's the way they live their life and it's not because they're less committed or less loving it's because their sexuality is organized in a certain way and it lives together with a certain arrangement and all of that is going to be redefined as we go along it's de facto what's going to happen it will be the next frontier but if you see it on the level of marriage, people say, you know, if you say, okay, let's look under, you know, you have to look at it from the place of before marriage. You know, a Swedish philosopher said, today, monogamy only exists in reality. It doesn't exist in your memories, and it doesn't exist in your fantasies.

57:34So, this is not because I advocated. It's just, first of all there's nothing to advocate it's very simple that by definition we have multiple sex partners before marriage we are not monogamous anymore in the traditional sense of the word the world has been in flux and we don't really know where it's going we don't what we know is that people still seek to connect people want to love people want somebody who loves them and how that will play itself out is the mysteries of life. But the fundamental human need for love, for connection, for passion, for transcendence will never change. The expressions, the forms, the institutions in which we will seek those fundamental human aspirations will continuously transform.

58:28That's really how I see the evolution taking place. Sure. Sure. What do you think of what I'm saying? Oh, man. It's just so, you know, it's confusing because you hear so many different options that work, that don't work. You see people that love each other that go through breakup and divorce. You see, and then you see the pain and the struggle and the emotional toll that it takes on some people. Then you see people who are in, you know, committed monogamous relationships who feel guilty because they want to be able to explore, but they can't because they've made this choice and they've committed to it.

59:02Monogamy is a practice. We are not by nature, biologically, evolutionary monogamous. It's a practice. It's a choice. And it's a choice. Not our makeup. No. Yeah. And it's a choice. And monogamy is a continuum. You have mind. You have fantasy. You have memory. You have a lot of things. At what point do we become non-monogamous? Where does non-monogamy start? and all of these concepts are fluid concepts today. There is just no way to define it like that. So we make our choices and we make compromises and we sometimes don't just do what we want and we often need to think about the consequences of our actions and we need to think about the larger picture and something that may be perfectly desirable for tonight may not be worth it.

59:59for the next weeks and the next years. Yeah, exactly. And I think that in the era of self-fulfillment and the right to happiness, we don't have more desires today than the previous generations. We just feel more entitled to fulfill our desires. And we feel that we have a right to be happy, my personal happiness. The switch, the greatest switch, is from a social organization in which I think about the well-being of others. Collectivist thinking thinks about the well-being of others and I sacrifice my own individual needs for the well-being of others. To the other side of the continuum is I have a right to pursue my individual needs and the others will have to adapt to it.

1:00:46And I think that we are a little bit on the extreme end of the other side at this point. We really take ourselves a little very seriously and sometimes at the detriment of other people to whom we do have an obligation and a commitment to, not just our partners, the world. So where should we be? Somewhere in the middle, you think? In an examined state. I don't know that it's always in the middle, but in an examined state, in a state that doesn't just say what I like, what I feel. The fact that I have options doesn't mean I have to exercise all these options. the problem of consumer life is that we don't know anymore to make choices same with the cereals in the supermarket why would it be better with love so i could get better i could get better i'm like you know i'm a victim of fomo you know i'm a how do i know this is the best no you don't yeah when do i find the best no you don't you don't find your partner you choose your partner it's very different you know if you think you're going to find somebody who is the person who's going to make you stop looking it doesn't work this way because no it doesn't because at some point your inner rumblings will start up again and then you will say oh probably start looking you know it's like you just say this is it this is where i decide to put my my roots in this moment you know and i'm gonna and i'm gonna try to deepen them i think we are all living with paradoxes of choice yes you know from from which phone i get but we cannot commodify a partner and just kind of beta test the partner and beta test the relationship and check out to see, is it good enough or can I find better help?

1:02:24Yes, you can. The fact is you could find other. I'm not sure it would be better, but you definitely can find other. And there are lots of people you can love and there's only a few you can make a life with. And they're not always the same. There are a lot of people you can have love stories with. Right. And have beauty, but they're not the person you would make a life with. How do you know when it's the person you can make a life with? I think values enter into there a lot more. I mean, you can have magnificent love stories with people you would never live with. Right. They're just too different from you.

1:02:58They have not the same values as you. One wants child. One does not. One wants to travel. The other does not. One wants career. The other does. very major different classes different different Weltanschauung as they used to say in German you know visions of the world but you can love them you can have a beautiful love story with that person and be transported in your experience with them but you know that that's not the person with whom you're going to build a home, a future, a trajectory, maybe a family if you want that. That's not the person we do. And for that, you need more of shared vision, shared mission, shared values, stuff that is not just in the domain of feelings, but also in the domain of beliefs.

1:03:54It's different. views about money views about independence and separateness versus connection views about emotional expressiveness views about power wouldn't you say that those differences that we have also attract us to other people that we have some of those differences maybe we don't share the same values or beliefs but it's also different, unique interesting and so it also brings us together or do you think it's not enough I think that what attracts you originally is often what becomes the source of conflict later. The very thing that is so attractive because it's different is also the very thing that becomes difficult because it's different.

1:04:38So, of course, it's a mix and match. But what makes thriving relationships is not only feelings. it's a mix of feelings actions beliefs touches physicality it's a more all-encompassing thing a beautiful love story can be just about feelings and you can love more people than those that you can make a life with that doesn't mean you make a life with people you don't love but it means that there is a whole other set of ingredients that enter into the making of a life, which is the creation of a world, it's a little different. And in that world, you often can be on the side of, you know, there's a lot of sentences today that I never heard 20 years ago in couples therapy.

1:05:37This is a raw deal. I'm not getting my needs met. Where is my return on investment? Wow. Excuse me. Excuse me. Somebody owes you? it's like wow it's I am in a relationship for what it's going to give me that is an important piece I don't misunderstand me but I'm also in a relationship for what I'm going to give to this person for what I'm going to give if I want children to these children not just for what they're going to bring to me it's like the level of narcissism has to be shrunken a tiny bit on occasion Right, exactly. It's just like, you know, I mean, I'm part of that same, you know, landscape.

1:06:22But on occasion, I think it's like you calibrate it. On occasion, some of us need to really learn to think more about ourselves. And some of us really need to think more about others. Some of us live with the fear that we're going to be abandoned. And some of us live more with the fear that we're going to lose ourselves. some of us are better takers and need to learn to give and some of us are consummate givers and we need to learn to take and often we find a partner who is exactly the missing link and that can be beautiful complementarity if we actually get to use the other person to become more whole to learn from them and we need both you need to be able to think about yourself and to know what you want and all of that.

1:07:17But you also need to be able to remember that others exist near you, your family, your friends, your loved ones. Sure. And that's what will make the difference the day you die and who will show up at your funeral, basically. I love this conversation. I have four questions for you left. I feel like I could ask a lot more and I want everyone to make sure they pick up the book, Mating in Captivity. We'll have it linked up here at the end. The first one is, what are you most grateful for recently in your life?

1:07:53Recently in my life, I had kind of a medical scare. So I'm actually very grateful that it turned out to be nothing. A small boo-boo, not a big one. It was a big boo-boo. I thought it was a big boo-boo, but it ended up being a small one. So that's actually probably the first word that comes to me. I have, you know, I spent most of my career in the professional academic world. And in the last two or three years, I've really crossed over to the mainstream. And that has entered me into TED and Aspen and the entrepreneur space and Summit and Ciudad. I mean, it's worldwide. And I think that it's been a wonderful, taking what I've done in the four walls of my office to a larger platform and being actually a psychologist, not just in the therapeutic space, but in the larger cultural space in the world.

1:08:52That's been great thing. Going digital, the idea that I can actually help people and give people an elevated conversation about relationships and that embraces the complexity and that meets them where they're at through my online courses and through this whole new platform. that's been a trip it's been a fantastic creative uh journey for me it's been just one year right so i'm very grateful for that because it's been fun creative new very different for a therapist actually um to move into kind of thought leader if you want and being part of a more global conversation. Sure. Great. And I'm actually in many ways I'm much happier today because because I've become more if I miss something I no longer think oh shit I would never get it.

1:09:52It's like I used to want you know I'm like okay it's all right I don't have to have gone to three things full Full, to go back to the beginning of our conversation, I feel that the day is full even if I haven't binged. Okay. I used to need to binge for the day to be full. I no longer feel like that. I like that. Good things to be grateful for. A second question is, if someone's looking to get into, find a partner, a long-term partner, a committed relationship or a marriage, what's one piece of advice you would say to go enter into that relationship to find that relationship? If you could give one piece of advice.

1:10:37Yes. Ask yourself, what do I want to give to someone? Don't just ask yourself, who do I want to meet and what characteristics do I want in that person? And make a list of all the things that the other person needs to have. Think in the reverse. What do you want to bring to somebody? What do you want to bring in? What's the love that you want to put out into the world? The love, the caring, the benevolence for another person. I think that that's probably much better than the checklist that most people go dating with. Here's what I want. Yes. Here's what you need to be for me, for me to then be interested in you.

1:11:16Be compelling to someone else rather than wait for them to dazzle you so that you can swipe in one direction or another.

1:11:27And that would be the first thing I would say.

1:11:32That's it. That would be the most important one. And don't think just like this is the best. You're not buying a product. no it's not the best just decide in advance but neither are you it's just the one that you say this is it because often you know you pick somebody because you're ready but there were plenty of others you met before that could have been fantastic partners for you just you were not there in your life you were not ready for that that commitment that decision so you were ready to have beautiful experiences relationships lovers you know and you love these people but You were in your 20s.

1:12:09What did you know about life, about wanting to build something? Now you're 33 and you say, okay, now I want to do it. So it's the timing. It's your maturity that makes you make the choice, not only the person that you are being dazzled by. So that would be when you go dating. I like that. Question number three.

1:12:32It's your last day here on Earth and your book is gone. It's been deleted from history. everything you've ever created has been gone for some reason it just got deleted and you're on bed and everyone you love is there and they give you a piece of paper and they say will you write down the three things that you know to be true about your experience in this world the three truths about what you learned and this is the last thing that will this is the only thing we'll ever know or have left about you what do you think you'd write down about the three truths So I am a connector. And an enormous amount of people in my life know each other through me worldwide.

1:13:13It's always been something I love to do. Maybe because I had no family and I was one child of two soul survivors. I think that recreating a tribe was something that came very natural to me. and I would write, I have touched a lot of people and I will continue to live on in their memories because so many of them are now interconnected. Interesting. I have created a lot of beautiful events that were fun, celebratory, abundant, where a lot of people came together and I have had a great relationship with the men that I've lived with at least for now, for the 30 years, 35 years of my life. And I've raised two boys who if I was a woman interested in men, I would have wanted to date them.

1:14:12There you go. I love it. I love it. Before I ask the final question, Esther, I just want to say that I acknowledge you for being here and the continuous commitment to the work you do to supporting so many people in the world about navigating relationships and understanding how to have full, rich, meaningful experiences and relationships. I think the work you're doing is so powerful, especially today, more now than ever. And I just want to acknowledge you for the gift that you bring to so many people. So thank you. Thank you. Final questions. What I ask everyone at the end is what's your definition of greatness?

1:14:48Oh, um, I went to a company recently and they asked me that question. I think irreverence is a big part of it. There's going to be a few words. Integrity, but that's often irreverence. Not to take the accepted as the given. I don't think that that's because that's what we do or that's how we think that that definition means that it's right or it's true. So I am a person who questions, I topple sacred cows, I open up possibilities. I'm rather nonjudgmental. And I like to shed a whole new light on something that people think they've already heard a lot about and to rethink or kind of challenge the conversation.

1:15:46Those words go into creativity. But greatness is that. Greatness is when you poked at something. And when you started out, it existed like that. And when you end it, it became something completely different. And I think mating actually, you know, mating or the courses in general. I am counterintuitive. I have, you know, I think people come in, I'll just give it to you like that. People have a story. Every person who comes to therapy or every company who comes to me to consult, they have a story. They describe themselves a certain way. Greatness is when they can come in with one story and live with a completely different one.

1:16:32I love that. It's a perfect ending. Esther Perel, thank you so much for being here. Where can we find you online? Where can we connect with you? What's the best place to go? All right. So it's www.estereperel.com. You opt in with me. I connect with you. I communicate with you. We're in conversation. I never harass, but I inspire. I'm on Facebook. I'm on Twitter. I'm on Instagram. And I'm about actually to release the third online course called Rekindling Desire. That is really, once you've read me, what can you do? How do you bring this home? How do you bring this to your relationships? Committed ones or not?

1:17:10and to yourself. And that's really where these online courses now are. It's like, it's me on, it's not the podcast yet, which we will talk about, but it is me speaking to you about how you take all of these ideas and make them personal and transform them into actions that will change your life. Hello, Esther Perel. Thanks so much for coming on. I appreciate it. It's a pleasure. I have a brand new book called Make Money Easy. and if you're looking to create more financial freedom in your life, you want abundance in your life and you want to stop making money hard in your life, but you wanna make it easier, you wanna make it flow, you wanna feel abundant, then make sure to go to makemoneyeasybook.com right now and get yourself a copy.

1:17:58I really think this is gonna help you transform your relationship with money this moment moving forward. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review.

1:18:36I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you if no one has told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.