Relationships aren’t easy, we all know this.
This is because we’ve never been taught what healthy relationships look like.
On top of that, social media feeds us a laundry machine of misinformation about relationships.
I don’t know about you but whenever I open up my explore page, its filled with toxic garbage.
“You have to punish him by waiting 1 week before texting him back”
“You have to control her, she’s not allowed to go outside without your permission”
“If he doesn’t do XYZ or buy you XYZ, then dump his ass immediately. You DESERVE princess treatment gurrlllll”.
It seems like we now live in a world where we have 1 foot in, 1 foot out.
Many are juggling different people on the side, just because they’re afraid of being hurt by their “primary” guy/girl.
Not only that, we’re also constantly on the look out for reasons to break up, constantly blaming the other person for our relationship failures and not ourselves.
If that’s you, if you’re the kind of person to blame your partner for your relationship failures then this video is NOT for you.
However, if you’re someone who’s open and willing to reflect on what you could’ve done better and genuinely want a healthy, long-lasting relationship, then this video is for you.
Today, here’s what we’ll be discussing:
- Why most relationship failures are NOT based on anything you did during it, but what you did BEFORE you got into it
- The importance of head+heart coherence when choosing your partner
- If its not a hell yes, then its a hell no
- The relationship happiness curve (you NEED to understand this to have any hope of a lasting relationship)
- Why the purpose relationships is NOT to make you happy (its for some other reason entirely)
- Why having infinite options = infinite misery
- How to avoid lust from destroying your relationships
- Why successful relationships require WORK and EFFORT (just like anything else in life)
- The “Its always day 1” mindset
Settling for the wrong person
Most relationship failures are not because of anything that you or your partner did “wrong” during the relationship.
Instead, most relationship failures are due to choosing the wrong person in the first place.
The truth is that infatuation with someones looks, or some superficial element like how much money they have, how famous they are can cause us to overlook the signs of incompatability.
The way our mind works is this:
If we’re attracted to someone, it causes us to only look at them favourably. We see everything about them, even the negatives and the red flags in a favourable way.
This causes us to lie to ourselves about who this person really is, and we fail to identify the key indicators that would suggest that this person would be a terrible partner.
This is because of something called the reticular activating system (RAS) in your brain.
When your RAS is working, and twisting everything about a person in the positive because you’re infatuated or attracted to them, you’ll tell yourself some bullshit like this:
“Oh, he’s gotten 5 other women pregnant, cheated on his last 3 girlfriends and has 2 criminal convictions?”.
“Don’t worry I can change him”.
“She does OF, hangs around at clubs 5 days a week, does drugs and comes from a broken family?” ”Don’t worry, she said shes going to change for me” 🙄
As you can see, our brain can very easily trick us into being with the wrong person if we’re not aware of what’s going on!
Before I met my first girlfriend, I knew deep down I wanted someone who went to the gym, lifted weights and was into deep topics.
However, at that time in my life, I’d never been with anyone before so I was extremely needy and desperate, and since she was one of the first girls to show interest in me, I jumped all over her…
Looking past the fact that we really have zero common interests.
My RAS clouded my judgement.
I told myself bullshit stories like “well I’ll start taking her to the gym with me and she’ll begin to get into it aswell” and “I’ll just teach her about self-development stuff and the topics I’m into and she’ll start to be interested in it aswell”.
And you know what? It never happened!
Despite my eagerness to change her, she wasn’t willing to change.
She never developed an interest in the things I was into.
This is because human beings need to discover things for themselves and enjoy the process of doing it themselves, for there to really be an opening in their life to accept this thing.
If you just try to force something onto someone, I can guarantee you it will never work.
What about people who say they’re going to do this, or do that?
People who tell you that they’re going to change, and be better and they’re interested in being their best selfs?
Yeah, probably bullshit too.
Let me give you guys a word of advice: People are full of SHIT. Talk is cheap.
Everyone can talk a big game about how they’re going to change, how they’re all about “self improvement”, blah blah blah.
It’s all a bunch of BS.
Out of the many many people who I’ve met in life who talk about how they’re going to change their lives, 99% of them are liars.
What you REALLY need to look at is someones past track record.
Do they have a consistent track record of being the kind of person you want them to be?
If you want someone who is into going to the gym, don’t date someone who hates the gym and think you’re going to change their mind.
Instead, date someone who has already being going to the gym, for many years now.
If you want someone who is going to be loyal and commited to monogamy, don’t date someone who just told you “I don’t want a committed relationship”, thinking that you’re going to change them.
It will NEVER happen.
The reality is that its ALMOST impossible to change people into something their not.
Not to mention the fact that if they don’t already have a track record of having changed themselves for the better, then that person likely will NEVER change.
So instead of finding someone who ISN’T what you want and thinking you can change them, why not just find the person who is ALREADY what you want?
By waiting for the RIGHT person, we avoid 90% of the conflicts and misery that comes with being with the WRONG person.
We can achieve relationship success by AVOIDING being with the wrong person.
And you REALLY need to be strict with this.
Its incredibly tempting to just jump into something with the next hot girl or guy you meet, but its important to slow the hell down, and be willing to say NO if they don’t meet your criteria.
Which leads me to the first crucial secret to successful relationships which is defining your criteria for your ideal partner.
Defining your criteria
As I said before, a major key to successful relationships is to avoid begin with the wrong person, and picking the RIGHT person.
To do this, we need to clearly define our criteria for what we want in our ideal partner.
What does this mean?
It means you must write down somewhere a clear depiction of the person you want to be with & the type of relationship you want.
What do they look like?
What are their personality traits?
What interests and hobbies do they have?
What sort of career would they have?
How do they think?
What does your ideal relationship look like?
What will you both spend time together doing?
Do we need to go into crazy foresic detail on this, like “I want them to have perfect golden blonde hair, with one eye thats blue, and one thats green, exactly 5ft 4, they must exactly want to have sex with me at 5am and 10pm at night”?
Nope.
While you want to be clear about who you want, you don’t want to be too rigid about everything.
If you’re too rigid, this won’t work either.
This criteria list should serve as a general guide, not be overly detailed and rigid like a step by step architectural blueprint.
So instead of doing it kinda like what I just said, instead you can write something like:
“I want someone who I’m highly attracted to, preferably shorter than me, but I’m open to taller girls too. Lean physique, prefers being natural in her appearance, puts effort into looking good”.
Its probably also a good idea to split your your list of criteria into “non-negotiables” and “optionals” too.
Don’t put everything into the non-negotiatbles, only the things which are truly crucial like the type of relatiobship you want i.e. monogramous or poly, important core values to you like if you’re a Christian and you only want to be with another Christian etc.
Once you’re done defining your criteria, the next thing is to go out there in the world and start meeting people.
As you meet new people, you’ll use this list of criteria you wrote as a filter to screen out those who don’t meet your criteria.
There are a couple of mindsets you must adopt to successfully meet the right person:
- Infinite patience (be ok with being single)
- Saying yes to the wrong person = saying no to the right person
- Head + Heart coherence
- If its not a hell yes, its a hell no
1. Infinite patience (be ok with being single)
To meet the ideal person, you MUST have infinite patience.
What does this mean?
Infinite patience means you need to be willing to wait for the rest of your life for the right person.
If you’re unwilling to wait forever, I can guarantee you will get antsy, impatient, meet the wrong person and rationalize to yourself why you should be with them, despite them not meeting your criteria.
Now I’m not saying that you’re going to need to wait until you’re 90 to meet that person.
But just having that mindset of infinite patience and being willing to be single for extended periods of time, gives you more time to wait for the right person.
Realistically it might just take a couple years at the maximum, but by having the mindset of “I’m willing to wait forever”, it instills into you the mindset of never settling for the wrong person, which is crucial.
2. Saying yes to the wrong person = saying no to the right person
According to the laws of physics, a vaccum always wants to be filled.
Whenever you are single, there’s a desire for someone who fill that vaccum.
However, what you need to understand is that by settling for and saying yes the wrong person, you’re simultaenously saying no to the right person.
This is something in life called opportuntiy cost, which is the idea that whenever you make a decision to do something, you’re simultaneously saying no to everything else.
The problem with saying yes to the wrong person is that right person could’ve come along in the years you were with the wrong person, and you missed out on them becuase you were dating the wrong person.
There’s a saying which goes “the enemy of the great is the good”.
Its crucial for us to avoid saying yes to the wrong person, because if we do, then we’re basically telling life “I say no to the right person”, and as a result that right person will never come our way.
And truth is, Its easy to say no to someone who is awful for us, like some drug dealing, rapper guy without a job, with face tats all over and a harem of 10 other women.
But its hard to say no to the guy or girl who is ok, but not great.
I’m talking about that person who you’re only kinda attracted to.
Where your heart’s not really in it, but your head tells you “Well he/she is got XYZ good qualities” and you need to logically rationalize in your mind why they’re a “good partner”.
This is the person you must adamantly say NO to, because by saying no to them, you are telling life, I want someone who truly meets my criteria.
This is why the ideal partner requires something which I call “head+heart coherence”.
3. Head + Heart coherence
Its not enough for someone to just meet your criteria list, if your hearts not really in it too.
Your ideal partner is someone where they make sense both in your HEAD AND your HEART.
Not just one or the other.
If you meet someone who only meets the criteria in your head but not your heart, you’ll probably rationalize being with them by listing the logical reasons why you think they’re a good partner.
You’ll tell yourself some bullshit like this:
“Well, he has a masters degree, and he comes from a wealthy family, and he’ll be able to take care of me financially… soooo he should be good for me. I mean my mom likes him”.
The problem though is your heart doesn’t truly FEEEEEL anything for them.
And so if someone meets your criteria, but your heart doens’t feel anything for them, just say no.
Because the right person, who satisfies both your head and heart is likely just right around the corner.
On the flip side If someone only feels good in your heart, but doesn’t meet the logical criteria in your head, then you’ll feel very strong feelings for them, but deep down you know they’re not good for you.
All the red flags will be flaring up, but you’ll bullshit yourself by saying something like:
“Maybe he/she will change”. (HINT: They probably won’t LOL)
Your ideal partner is one who fulfills both the criteria that you write down (your head), but ALSO sparks attraction, desire, and love in your heart. Don’t forget this.
4. If its not a hell yes, its a hell no
A simple trick to determine whether or not someone tickles your heart is to use the rule “if its not a hell yes, then its a hell no”.
The ideal person is someone who makes you go “hell yes!”.
They’re someone who you’re excited by, intrigued by, and most importantly who YOU want to be with and spend time with.
If deep down in your heart, you feel “meh” toward someone, this is the wrong person.
If you need to tell yourself some logical story about how they’ll be a good partner because of XYZ, but there is no emotional pull behind your words, then you’re lying to yourself.
If someone is kinda ok, but not really the best, you must say NO.
If you’re “meh”, or not 100% sure about someone, then its a HELL NO.
You’ll know that someone tickles your heart when you meet them, they meet your criteria, and your heart sings a big fat HELL YES!
The relationship happiness curve
“I think the biggest problems with relationships is that it always starts out amazing.” - Me
Relationships are this interesting thing where very often, the peak of our excitement, romance and happiness is at the very beginning.
However, after a couple months of being together, the relationship fizzles out.
The other person begins to trigger us.
We become annoyed at their constant nagging.
They don’t put their dirty laundry in the right place and this pisses us off.
We start to have arguments which seem unfixable and the inevitable outcome is a break up.
What you guys need to understand is that all relationships follow this particular trajectory on your screen which maps out relationship happiness over time.
Initially, it starts off amazing. This is the phase where everthing is new, everything feels perfect, it feels like you’re going to be forever with this person.
I call this the “honey moon phase”.
However, after a couple months, as I described before, problems start to creep in.
Arguments, petty fights and small things begin to wear down on the love that felt so real at the start.
These problems get bigger and bigger.
Arguments become more and more intense.
Eventually the relationship hits a rock bottom.
This is the point where most people quit and give up.
I call this the “bubble popping phase”.
Most people then go onto repeat the same mistakes as before, get into another relationship 2 weeks later, go through the honey moon phase, to the bubble popping phase and you guessed it, break up again.
The reason why the relationship goes through a period of the bubble popping phase is because you haven’t really experienced the full extent of what its like to be with this person yet.
During the honey moon phase, your RAS was neglecting to see all the things which would’ve caused conflict between the 2 of you, but now that things have settled down a bit, you begin to only see problems and reasons to quit.
However, unlike most people who tell you that you should leave when the going gets tough, I propose an alternative:
Maybe you should fucking RESOLVE the conflict.
If you did the right steps I talked about in picking the right person, then any conflict that comes up is probably small stuff that can easily be resolved.
This requires you to change your mindset from “the purpose of the relationship is to make me happy” to “the purpose of the relationship is to make me grow”.
Does that mean you won’t experience any happiness?
Of course not, you’ll have a ton of happiness, but just understnad that the point of your partner and relationship is not to placate your relationships or make you love yourself.
That’s YOUR job.
So whenever your partner triggers you, or says something you deem to be hurtful, yes, perhaps they shouldn’t have said it. That’s on them.
But if you feel deeply hurt by it, then its your responsibility to heal that part of you which is hurting.
If you’re truly whole and healed, then any hurtful thing your partner says should not really hurt you.
Instead, you should be able to look at it with loving eyes, see that maybe they’re hurting or afraid, and thats why they said it.
The way you want to think about your partner is like a personal trainer.
The trainer will push you hard, and make you go through alot of pain, but ultimately its for your growth and development.
In a course in miracles (link in the description), it talks about something called the “holy” or “conscious” relationship.
This is a relationship where the purpose is not to serve you and make you happy, but serves as a basis for greater inner healing and self love.
A holy relationship is one that serves as your mirror, reflecting back to you all the insecurities and things you hate about yourself, in the hope that you will thank your partner for showing you these things and for you to heal them.
This is exactly the point of the resolution phase which is filled with lots of conflict and drama, but instead of responding in a toxic way, you take personal responsibility, you heal whatever inner triggers come up, you forgive your partner and you both come into deeper love.
Slowly but surely the conflicts and drama lessen over time, the triggers and wounding reduces over time and you both entire into a phase of true lasting love.
So next time you get into a relationship, be highly aware of his relationship happiness curve.
Understand that yes, you’ll euphoria at the very start during the honey moon phase, and it’ll gradually begin to dip in the first couple months.
Conflict begins to then kick in but with continual effort in working through conflict, healing your own issues, not blaming your partner for the way you feel, the relationship will begin to get better and better and your love for one another will be based on TRUE love, as you learn to TRULY LOVE YOURSELF through the hard lessons you learnt through the conflicts you both went through.
Its also important to expect that the perfect honey money phase will not last forever.
Instead, expect and know that things will go downhill for a bit, but if you deal with the conflict in a conscious, loving way as I described, you’ll be able to reverse the course and put your relationship back into love.
This trajectory by the way is no different from how you feel when it comes to doing anything else in your life.
Think about any new exciting business venture or project you began to work on, or some new hobbie you picked up.
At the start, you’re super excited and pumped.
But gradually that excitement wanes as you start to experience challenges and frustrations.
But do we just give up at the first sight of challenge in our new business venture?
Of course not, so why should we give up on our relationship when challenges arise there.
And like your business venture, where by pushing through, eventually you reach the light at the end of the tunnel where you begin to make money, things become easier and the business becomes easy…
…Your relationship will also reach the light at the end of the tunnel where love becomes deep, things become easy and you reap the dividends of the hard work you did during the many arguments and fights you had together.
Relationships require constant work
I want to just briefly bust the myth that successful relationships should “just happen” without any work or effort.
I don’t know that there’s anything else in life where we tell ourselves that if its meant to be then “it’ll just happen”.
What a crock of BS.
The truth is that relationships, just like maintaining a business requires constant work.
Not just at the start, but everyday, forever and always, until the end of time.
If you own a restaurant, but instead of cleaning the place everyday like you’re supposed to you clean every once in a while only when customers complain about it, whats going to happen?
Its going to be dirty and disgusting and customers won’t come back.
Its the same way with your relationships.
A relationship is not just some mythical thing where everything just “happens perfectly” if you love each other.
If you’re not continually seducing and re-seducing your woman or man, guess what? They’re going to lose attraction.
If you’re not continually putting in the time, work and energy to maintain a great relationship, guess what? It’s going to fall apart.
What does this mean for you?
It means that not only do you need to make your relationship a priority, but you also need to adopt this mindset:
Everyday is your first date —
IDGAF if you’ve been together for 5 years, treat everyday together as if its your very first date.
Remember how much you actually gave a fuck on your first date? Yeah, you must bring back that mindset and mentality and apply it everyday.
Do your absolute best to be your best for your partner.
Eat clean foods, go to the gym, learn to be sexy, do all the amazing things for them to blow their minds, as if this is the very first time you ever met this person.
All too often most relationships go downhill because one or both of them get lazy and fat, and stop putting effort into their appearance and sex life.
Yeah… You definitely wanna avoid this.
So stop taking your relationship for granted and know that every single day you need to be fighting the urge to be lazy.
Every single day you need to fight the urge to take him/her for granted.
This is a daily fight. Just because your relationship was amazing for the first 2 months, doesn’t mean it’ll last without your time and effort.
In the same way that a jacked physique requires you to continue to go to the gym 4-5 times a week to maintain it, your relationship requires you to dedicate yourself toward it, and keep putting in the work every day.
The daily fight against lust & temptation
As I just said, relationships require work and effort, every single day.
Not only is this to fight off laziness and complacency, but its also to fight off lust and temptations.
We live in a world of infinite options.
Dating apps, and social media makes us think that theres another, better person, just round the corner.
We walk around and we see beautiful, scandily clad women everywhere.
We go on the internet and adult videos are just a click away.
“Damn shes sexy.”
“Oh he’s cute.”
“I’d love to fck her.”*
All of this is oh so tempting.
We then tell ourselves some bullshit story about how its ok to give that guy your number, because “oh, he just wants to be friends” (🤦🏻♀️ we know thats bullshit)
Then gradually things escalate from a number, to you going on a date without your partner knowing, hand holding, kissing and then sha-bang, the deed is done.
So then it begs the question, did you really cheat when he put it inside you, or did you cheat by refusing to tell him “no” when he was hitting on you?
You cheated by refusing to say no at the very start.
In the book “The Little Prince” by Antoine de Saint-Exupéryt, it talks about a prince who discovers a single rose in his planet. This is the only rose he had ever seen.
They build this deep, emotional bond together. He tends to the needs of the rose, listens to her complaints and grows fond of her, but he’s is also confused and frustrated by her pride and demands.
After leaving his planet to explore, he arrives on earth and discovers an entire garden filled with roses.
At first, this upsets him because he realizes that his rose was not as special as he’d thought.
However, eventually he realizes a very important lesson: The uniqueness of his rose didn’t come from being the only one of her kind, but from the time, love and care he invested in taking care of her.
The depth of their emotional bond came from the investment and shared history together.
The value of their relationship came from the time and energy he invested into that one, single rose.
The more time he invested in her, the more valuable the relationship became.
Fuifillment in life doesn’t come from the endless searching and swiping.
You can swipe forever, but until you choose to commit and nurture what you’ve chosen to commit to (despite the hard times), you won’t ever find true fulfillment.
This never ending chase for “someone better” is like drinking water that makes you thirsty. You think the water nourishes and fulfills you, but it actually only makes you more thirsty
When you’re on this constant chase for better, at what point does it end?
At what point can you truly be content and happy with your partner?
Because the reality is that people only get older, and we only ever become less attractive with time, even if you date someone who takes amazing care of themselves.
So there will always be someone younger and hotter.
Let me say it loud and clear for you: It ends when you decide to end it.
It ends when you decide to change your mindset from constantly seeking someone new or “better” to comitting to who you’re with because with time and investment, that relationship WILL become the best possible relationship you could have.
The grass isn’t greener on the other side. The grass is greener where you water it.
Like I said before, its important not to just settle for someone who you’re not into.
You must be willing to wait for your ideal partner, but at the end of they’re human.
They make mistakes.
They’re not perfect.
They’re not infalliable.
A successful relationship isn’t about trying to find the perfect person, its about finding someone who meets your criteria 80-90% and then you compromise and accept the remaining 10-20% where you may have differences.
In addition, you must also choose to resist the allure of the thousands of temptations that come your way.
Hot guy or girl wants your number or Instagram? Say no.
Feel the temptation to download tinder? Say no.
Feel the temptation to cheat on your vacation? Say no.
The reality is that lust, like the desire to be lazy, the desire to be undisciplined, will try to strike you every single day.
So fighting lust requires you to say no, day in, day out and most importantly, nip things in the bud before something more substantial comes from it.
Like I said before, if you cheat on your partner, it didn’t happen when you kissed or had sex with that girl, you cheated when you refused to say no when you were first talking to her.