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And you ll figure it out.
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As time passes, you ll start to remember things that you didn t want to see.
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The red flags, the way they snapped at the waitress, you know, something not right.
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So you ll start to get it later, but in that moment that they left you, that s when they look so unbelievably delicious.
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Welcome to The Art of Charm.
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I m your host, Jordan Harbinger.
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Today we re talking with my friend Susan Winter.
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She is a best-selling author and relationship expert.
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She s been on just about everything, Oprah, The Today Show, Good Morning America.
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She s super, super sharp, one of my favorite people to talk about the subject of relationships, dating, breakups, et cetera.
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And today, we re gonna be focusing on something that happens during the holidays quite a bit here, those breakups.
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It s breakup season.
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We re gonna talk about dismantling your ex s impact on you and the power to affect you, or taking some of that back, regaining mental clarity and emotional serenity, and reclaiming a little bit of self-esteem, confidence, and wholeness through what we call the breakup triage.
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This isn t just meditate and do yoga and feel better.
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This is the myths you go through, the rationalizations you go through, and how to get yourself through a rough breakup, especially in the beginning
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to put a little bit of tourniquet on that wound there.
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We re glad to have you with us here today at AOC, so enjoy this one with Susan Winter.
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Oh, and by the way, if you re new to the show, we d love to send you some top episodes and the rest of the AOC toolbox, where we discuss things like reading, body language, and nonverbal communication, the science of attraction, negotiation techniques, mentorship, influence, persuasion, networking, everything that we teach here at the Art of Charm.
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If you re here in the States, you can text charmed, C-H-A-R-M-E-D to 33444,
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Anywhere else, just go to theartofcharm.com and also at theartofcharm.com slash podcast.
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That s where you can find the full show notes for this and all previous episodes of the show.
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All right, here s Susan Winter.
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I m really excited to speak to you again about this because I think, especially around the holidays, I ve noticed, and maybe you can tell me why this is.
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I have my own theories.
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Breakups seem to happen more around the holidays, whereas I thought it would happen less because it s like, well,
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She can t be alone for Thanksgiving and Christmas.
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That s just mean.
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I ll wait till January.
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It actually turns out to be more the case and my theory is because They don t want to bring someone home to their parents for Thanksgiving Christmas who they re not serious about because they think it s kind of like
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You re really creating an extra bond there.
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And then in January, you re like, well, that was fun, but it s over.
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And it s just weird.
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And your family s asking about them.
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I get many more breakup emails, requests, phone calls and things like that.
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Literally, it s like shopping season, Christmas shopping season is breakup season as well.
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I agree.
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And I think that s a really astute point, Jordan, because it is.
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Quite notable that that is a time.
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My media director, Lauren, is an awesome girl.
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And she said, Susan, not only the holidays, on my birthday, within 24 hours of my actual birthday, that seems to be the breakup time.
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She goes, they know it s my birthday.
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I think it s a time of reassessment.
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It s a time in the holidays where we go back to our family.
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And if anything, rightfully so, what you said, it s clear who is in our inner circle and who isn t.
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And we make that judgment like, I ve got to do it now and I get to escape to my parents.
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It s like I can say, well, I, you know, I m so sorry.
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Let s go to our respective parents for the holidays.
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So it s kind of like you are thinking about who is family.
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And if you were wanting to break up, now s the perfect time because it s clear that you don t want them.
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at that elevated position in your life.
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And you get to escape.
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Right, yeah.
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I hadn t thought about the escape.
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It s like, oh, sorry I haven t answered your calls for five days.
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I ve been eating turkey or whatever, right, with my cousins.
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It s pretty convenient.
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Yeah, exactly.
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So it s the perfect reason to get away to kind of like not even deal with it.
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I ll tell you though, the birthday thing, I wish I didn t know this about some people, but when I was in college, I remember guys breaking up with girls like a week or a few days before their birthday because they re like, yeah, I mean, otherwise I have to buy a gift and then do it.
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And I remember thinking, you scumbag.
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But you know, when you re young and you have no money, I guess it s one of those things you put into consideration.
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Now it s the opposite.
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We go, I m gonna get her a really nice gift and then do it because then I won t feel as bad.
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Both are terrible, but one is slightly worse, I think.
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Many people who ve heard you on the show before know you re just like laser focused, razor sharp.
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You ve been on Oprah on the today show.
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I mean, you re kind of the relationship coach in many, many ways for a lot of people.
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And you ve been doing this for a long time.
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I won t ask you to tell me how long, because.
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Oh, no, no, no.
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Actually, not that long.
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I was an opera singer and then I was on television.
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I had my own show on broadcast.
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I was doing financial news on what s now CNBC.
0
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I started this around 2000.
0
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I wrote a book, an off thing, because my boyfriend was 20 years younger, but I did it an hour outside of New York in a remote area that was like Appalachia.
0
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Beautiful, but I mean, the opposite, like a vacation home.
0
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And all hell broke loose because I d flipped to 40, he flipped to 19, and it was just, you know, it was quite a big deal.
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So I wrote older women, younger men, just like pencil and paper off the cuff, you know, unknown writer.
0
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And it became an international bestseller.
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But when I got on camera,
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I d been on camera or on stage for years.
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So the message was very clear and I was done.
0
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Jordan, by 2003 after Oprah, I was like, okay, it s out there.
0
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I m done.
0
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Then I looked at the dating and I realized open sexuality, everybody s playing games, nobody s being honest, you know, and I thought, wow, okay, I ve got something more to say.
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So it s really been a relatively short amount of time.
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You know, when you find your voice, you just find your voice.
0
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Yes, you re very good at this.
0
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I mean, you are one of a very, very short list of people, yourself, Kim Seltzer, that I go to when I m like, how do I handle this particular relationship thing?
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Because, you know, you can t ask your guy friends 99% of the time, because they re just like, I don t know, bro, here s another beer, right?
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That s what we get from our friends.
0
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That s the reason I started this show in the first place, is because I was sick of hearing, I don t know, bro, here s a beer, every time I had difficulty in my life.
0
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So let s talk about this.
0
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You have a really interesting philosophy on dating, which is funny how much it mirrors startup philosophy in business, which is you need an exit strategy.
0
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We just interviewed Michael Gerber, author of The E-Myth, and you need to have your exit strategy in mind when you re dating, because everyone dating and seeking love has to get skilled at the exit, because endings are a reality.
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In most of our modern dating, think about it, hook up first, figure out why I m there secondarily.
0
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you are going to have more mismatches than you are successes.
0
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It is like a startup.
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There s going to be a lot of fumbling and learning curve and failures.
0
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I can t believe that anybody would start something when they don t know how to effectively exit.
0
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Think about it.
0
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When you learn to drive a car, they do teach you where the brake is.
0
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When you start to learn how to ski, they teach you how to fall on the bunny slope so you don t break your neck.
0
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So Jordan, I got my first pair of rollerblades like in the, I don t know, mid 90s.
0
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and I knew how to ice skate.
0
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So I thought, oh, it s like ice skating.
0
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And I start down a little hill, and then I m picking up speed.
0
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I did not know how to stop.
0
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Nobody taught me how to stop.
0
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And I had to dive into some bushes to stop myself from going into traffic, because I tried to do my skating stop.
0
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So love is an extreme sport.
0
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And can you imagine?
0
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People have never thought it through.
0
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They all want to fall in love.
0
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But the one thing that stops everybody from loving is the fear of being hurt.
0
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Yet, that very thing, they never address.
0
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That to me is crazy.
0
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If you don t have a plan going in and a plan to get out, you re just, you know, I cut my finger, okay, I can let it go.
0
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Or I can clean it out, put on peroxide, put some ointment, put a Band-Aid, there s protocol.
0
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So there is also an established protocol that you can use for breakups, and I don t know
0
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Maybe people haven t discussed it, maybe nobody thought about it, maybe they didn t detail it, but I ve got like seven little steps.
0
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And just so you know, I think you should know before you go in.
0
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Yeah, I think the reason people don t go after these particular steps is because it s kind of like when you re looking at the flight attendants, I almost said stewardess.
0
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I know we re not supposed to use that word anymore, but old habits die hard.
0
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When you re looking at the flight attendant and they re like, please give us a few minutes of your attention, and it s like, I don t know, a minute and a half of telling you what to do in case of a water landing, which you probably won t make it through anyway, but I think most of us just go, eh, I d rather play Candy Crush.
0
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It s not just because of the unlikely
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scenario coming to fruition, but I think there s a large part of me and certainly other people that doesn t really want to think about like, okay, if we re going down, man, this is it.
0
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And I always chastise myself, look, man, pay attention for like five minutes, at least know where the exit is, know where that little flotation device is because you re really gonna regret it if this thing is in the Hudson River or whatever and you ve gotta get out and you go, oh, wait, what was going on again?
0
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Or you can t see and you can t get out because you were playing Candy Crush.
0
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Talk about feeling stupid in your last few moments there.
0
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I know.
0
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You just do it once.
0
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We don t want to think about this.
0
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Once you learn it, once you just go over it, you don t have to think about it every single time.
0
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You know, you pay attention once.
0
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Okay, here s the exit.
0
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Feel for, do I have my pack under the seat?
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Does it come out of the side?
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I always do that.
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And you think you know how to put on the jacket?
1
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Wait till you re panicked, you will not know how to put on that jacket, right?
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crying, and your friends all think you re insane because you can t stop talking about it, and you re going to depression, and you re taking time off work, and you re eating ice cream out of the tub.
1
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I mean, I m just talking from my own personal experience here, so I don t know what everybody else does.
1
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No, you re right.
1
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It can be devastating, but like anything, if you know what to do, if you have information, it s less daunting.
1
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You know, when we have a solution, it doesn t seem like a problem.
1
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So being informed helps you.
1
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You re still going to feel pain, but you ll know some things to do.
1
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You ll catch yourself mentally, because the cure to emotional pain is mental, and that s the trick.
1
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So once you just go through the mental steps, you ll be fine.
1
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Okay, one point that I thought was brilliant in the breakup triage audio that you d sent me, which is, we only really are afraid of things for which we have no solutions.
1
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So it becomes much easier to jump into a relationship when we think, all right, in the inevitable moment in which this ends, I have at least some strategies, some tactics that I can implement, so I m far less afraid.
1
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Because the problem is, in some of the email that I get from men and women, they go, look,
1
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I got hurt so bad last time, I just don t want to do it again.
1
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How do I get back in the game?
1
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Because they know that they have to do that.
1
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And this is going to help with that, because we only fear that for which we have no solutions.
1
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So I definitely understand being hesitant to love somebody else when we re not adept at managing that ending.
1
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So let s dive in here, because there s a lot of people who give power to their ex in some way, or at least allow that breakup to continually affect them.
1
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They have a lack of mental clarity.
1
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their self-esteem takes a nosedive.
1
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Where do we start recovering from this?
1
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Well, the idea of breakup triage is I feel like a field medic running out to assist you, like somebody s had their leg blown off.
1
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I ve gotta stop the bleeding, and the bleeding is the emotional bleed out.
1
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So the first thing you have to do is stabilize the person.
1
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The number one step that I start with is they need to know why.
1
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The first pass, this is just the first phase.
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This isn t the first hours, days,
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a couple of weeks of a breakup, you need to have a reason.
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Even if your partner didn t give you a reason, if they ghosted you, you need to come up with one or two sentence answer.
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It s just temporary.
1
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You can review this three months from now when you ve got some emotional distance, but come up with a reason.
1
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It was the wrong timing, they drink too much, they can t commit, they can t be faithful, it was a mismatch.
1
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You need to have some kind of reason because humans are categorical machines.
1
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We use language and labels to give us context.
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And so oftentimes you might find that you have a partner that tells you, I don t know.
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And we get so angry with, I don t know, but it is true.
1
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I ve really researched this.
1
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There are people who honestly don t know why it s not working for them.
1
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So if your partner has told you, I don t know, it could be one,
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that they don t want to hurt you and tell you the truth.
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I m just not that into you.
1
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You re really bad in bed.
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You ve got bad breath.
1
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I don t like your disposition.
1
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Or it could be that they truly do not know.
1
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They don t know what the reason is that it s not working for them.
1
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It is a fact.
1
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So even if you hear, I don t know, come up with your own solution.
1
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Give it a phrase.
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And that s at least one level of clarification.
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It s temporary.
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You can review it later, but you ve got the first step.
1
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to start to put that bandage around this gaping wound to start to stabilize yourself.
1
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And I like what you said about putting things on the shelf for later when we re more stable because it doesn t seem like the right time to diagnose and dissect issues when we can t control our emotions and we re super upset and we re flying off the handle or we re crying ourselves to sleep.
1
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That s not a good time to think, what objective feedback can I take from this experience, right?
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You can t think clearly.
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No, this is a stabilizing process.
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This is just getting you functional.
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That s all it is.
1
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This is just the first phase
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of what to do.
1
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When the emergency happens, here s how you handle it.
1
SPEAKER_02
Because otherwise, things can sort of go out of control and spiral downwards, right?
1
SPEAKER_03
Yeah, and you re gonna want more conversation from your mate, and they may not wanna discuss it.
1
SPEAKER_03
You know, people are bad at breakups.
1
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When I see how people break up, I ve even been with a woman that I know, I feel she s gonna break up with a guy friend of mine, and I ll say to her, are you done?
1
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And she ll say, yes, I m done.
1
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And then I ll say to her, you need to tell him.
1
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And then she won t tell him.
1
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It s like, oh my gosh, you know, it s uncomfortable.
1
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They don t know how to do it.
1
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It s like talking about death.
1
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We don t want to deal with it.
1
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We know it happens.
1
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We ll figure it out later.
1
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So you may not be with a skilled dater that knows not only what they re doing in a relationship, but how to effectively end a relationship.
1
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You know, I always feel like I got you into this.
1
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It s my responsibility to help you process me leaving.
1
SPEAKER_03
I ve always done that.
1
SPEAKER_03
But people don t want to stick around for that.
1
SPEAKER_03
And they don t want to take the responsibility.
1
SPEAKER_02
No, especially for the person who initiates the breakup, right?
1
SPEAKER_02
They ve probably been thinking about it, processing it for a long time, and then they finally turn the corner where they re like, alright, I can drop this bomb now, and the other person is just blindsided, so the person who initiates it is like, oh, what a relief, oh my god, I can t wait to put that behind me, I m totally done, this is phenomenal, time to go eat some turkey or whatever the timing is, and the other person goes,
1
SPEAKER_02
they re just standing there with a bag full of groceries to cook dinner that night and two airline tickets or something, and they re like, wait, what?
1
SPEAKER_02
Hold on a second.
1
SPEAKER_02
And the other person s like, bye, jogging down the street as they head towards their apartment.
1
SPEAKER_02
Metaphorically, hopefully.
1
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It can really throw you for a loop.
1
SPEAKER_02
It s not usually even on both sides, I think.
1
SPEAKER_03
Absolutely, so we have to come from the premise, a worst case scenario, that you may not be with somebody who is skilled in communicating, who wants to communicate,
1
SPEAKER_03
who has the empathy level to be able to be clear with you, who wants to just exit.
1
SPEAKER_03
You re right.
1
SPEAKER_03
And so we come from that premise.
1
SPEAKER_03
If it s better than that, awesome, but it might not be.
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Now, back to the show.
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SPEAKER_02
So you mentioned that the pain is emotional and that the cure itself is mental.
1
SPEAKER_02
What do you mean by that?
1
SPEAKER_02
Are you talking about like logical cure for emotional pain?
1
SPEAKER_03
Yeah.
1
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I mean you can t have a feeling without having a mental thought that created that feeling.
1
SPEAKER_03
So whether it s something you saw and your mind locked into something, something you thought, it s the thought that creates the emotion.
1
SPEAKER_03
It doesn t happen the other way around.
1
SPEAKER_03
It can be instantaneous.
1
SPEAKER_03
You can see a puppy and just suddenly smile cause it makes you feel good.
1
SPEAKER_03
Or you can think a thought that makes you depressed.
1
SPEAKER_03
So the same way we get happy is the same way we get sad.
1
SPEAKER_03
And if you know that your emotions are coming off of how you re processing, how you re decoding and deciphering the situation, then you have more active choice over healing yourself by how you think about the relationship.
2
SPEAKER_00
If you go into the relationship like, oh my God, nobody wants me, I m gonna be alone forever, I m not desirable, what s wrong with me, you know you re digging a ditch much more deeply for yourself and impossible to get out of.
2
SPEAKER_00
So this is where rational thought can actually help you.
2
SPEAKER_01
Jason, you have a breakup story.
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SPEAKER_02
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
2
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This one was a little bit embarrassing.
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When I was younger and not skilled in the love arts, as one could say, I broke up with my girlfriend in college on Alf stationary and mailed it to her.
2
SPEAKER_02
because she was in college and she was downstate and I was up in Chicago.
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And for years, my friends kept giving me ALF gifts every time they could find something just to rub it in because it was so terrible.
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SPEAKER_00
It s like Carrie when she got broken up with a post-it note left on top of her computer.
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SPEAKER_00
You did it the way that felt right at the time and maybe a little distanced so you didn t have to deal with the emotional fallout.
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SPEAKER_00
You did what you were capable of doing at the time.
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SPEAKER_00
You know, if you did that at 40, we d say you ve got some emotional work to do.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, no, Jason, you re now 40.
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SPEAKER_02
How old are you now?
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SPEAKER_02
I m 45.
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And this was honestly before cell phones.
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So I couldn t just like call her up and do that.
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SPEAKER_02
You know, we did write letters all the time and I thought it was whimsy and lighthearted.
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SPEAKER_02
It s just like, go sow your oats at college and you know, we ll still be friends.
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SPEAKER_02
And yeah, that didn t go over so well.
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SPEAKER_00
Here s what you did that was right.
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SPEAKER_00
You told her that it s over.
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SPEAKER_00
The first breakup I had, the guy never told me.
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SPEAKER_00
He told me to wait.
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SPEAKER_00
I literally waited six months.
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SPEAKER_00
I took him at his word, because he was a coward.
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SPEAKER_00
At least you weren t a coward.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, now he uses Big Bang Theory stationary, because that Alph stuff, you can t get the Alph stuff anymore.
2
SPEAKER_01
You have to look on eBay.
2
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, that ALF stuff, that s collector s item right now.
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SPEAKER_02
I eBay that stuff.
2
SPEAKER_01
Right, yeah, exactly.
2
SPEAKER_01
Anything ALF gets resold to pay the rent.
2
SPEAKER_01
So, does it make sense for us to figure out why the breakup happened?
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, it kind of touches on our earlier point, which is maybe that s not super useful.
2
SPEAKER_01
Keeping the wound open is kind of what we end up doing when we think, why did this happen when we re in the emotional place, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it starts to bind the open wound.
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SPEAKER_00
Just one phrase, a temporary phrase.
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SPEAKER_00
Okay, we have a reason.
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Humans are logical, they need to know why things happened.
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SPEAKER_00
You may have to make up your own reason, but that is literally step one.
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SPEAKER_00
Because don t you find people are sobbing, going, but why?
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SPEAKER_00
See, so to stop you from going, but why, for two days, we come up with a reason.
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SPEAKER_01
Even if it s not true because it s just to get our brain to move forward.
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SPEAKER_00
Yes, this is why this is part one to the breakup thing.
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This is the very first steps when it happens.
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SPEAKER_00
how to stabilize yourself from this enormous crash that you ve just experienced.
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SPEAKER_00
It s the emergency protocol.
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So the first thing you do is find a temporary reason.
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SPEAKER_00
It may indeed be the real reason, but it might be more complicated than that.
2
SPEAKER_00
But you can deal with the details later with a little bit more stability.
2
SPEAKER_00
Now s not the time.
2
SPEAKER_00
So we close it off.
2
SPEAKER_00
The first layer of bandage comes on with, here s why it happened.
2
SPEAKER_00
You need to answer that for yourself.
2
SPEAKER_00
That helps you move forward.
2
SPEAKER_01
Once we give it a reason, like, oh, she was allergic to cats, wah, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Then what do we do?
2
SPEAKER_00
Okay, so the next step is to not go into the loop.
2
SPEAKER_00
And the loop is what I call kicking at the wound.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s like, don t keep talking about them.
2
SPEAKER_00
Don t keep digging around on Facebook.
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SPEAKER_00
What are they doing?
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SPEAKER_00
Checking out their Instagram.
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SPEAKER_00
Who else are they with?
2
SPEAKER_00
That s putting salt in the wound.
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SPEAKER_00
You re trying to heal.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s very tempting to know all the reasons why.
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You ve given yourself a reason why, but you re like, but I don t really, I know there s more to it than that.
2
SPEAKER_00
So you start digging.
2
SPEAKER_00
You start digging your way through the loop.
2
SPEAKER_00
And that s what we don t wanna do.
2
SPEAKER_00
We want to close that off because it keeps them actively in our minds and it keeps us obsessed with that.
2
SPEAKER_00
We keep replaying the good, the bad.
2
SPEAKER_00
And so we replay the past over and over again.
2
SPEAKER_00
Maybe you go through old photos, you look at the Facebook pages,
2
SPEAKER_00
what they said, and you can t help it, because it does bubble up, but it creates this tighter and tighter circle that kind of strangulates you from moving forward in your future.
2
SPEAKER_01
We see this a lot, just I know from my own life and my own friends, I don t even need to look in my inbox for this, where people will look at things like,
2
SPEAKER_01
their ex s profile and look at the people they re dating.
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SPEAKER_01
Are they going to parties?
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SPEAKER_01
Because I ve been home a lot.
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SPEAKER_01
Maybe I should go to parties.
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I gotta post photos of me having a good time.
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SPEAKER_01
And then you re in this weird one-way competition on social media.
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SPEAKER_01
Hopefully one-way competition.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I remember a girlfriend of mine years and years and years and years ago
2
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getting angry with me the next time I saw her, like, you just moved on right away.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I thought, what are you talking about?
2
SPEAKER_01
She goes, my brother sent me a picture from your Facebook.
2
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And I said, which one?
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SPEAKER_01
And then I was starting to talk to her and we were trying to be rational about it.
2
SPEAKER_01
And, you know, we had mutual friends and stuff.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I go, look, what are you talking about?
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t even know what you mean.
2
SPEAKER_01
And she showed me like this picture of me laying down with a bunch of friends of mine that was cropped weird.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it looked like I was laying next to a girl that I wasn t dating at all.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I thought,
2
SPEAKER_01
Now you go, oh, but how many days or weeks or months did you go that frickin  Jordan?
2
SPEAKER_01
How much time did you spend indulging that when it was just a random person that I hung out with for one day and never saw again?
2
SPEAKER_00
Right, so this is where going into the loop keeps it alive.
2
SPEAKER_00
It keeps it active.
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SPEAKER_00
We re trying to deactivate that partner s power over us.
2
SPEAKER_00
So, you know, being obsessed with it and digging up information and thinking about them and replaying the past and, you know, it s normal, it comes up, it just bubbles up, but this is where mental discipline will really help your emotional framework.
2
SPEAKER_00
Mental discipline, like, okay, there I m going again, okay, just anything, I ll look at the sky, I ll go take a run, I ll call a friend, anything, anything, listen to music, do anything to stop that obsessive
2
SPEAKER_00
The loop is circular.
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SPEAKER_00
It does not move forward.
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SPEAKER_00
It keeps you in the hole.
2
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You want to get out of that hole and get back into life.
2
SPEAKER_01
Do you have any systems for maybe not indulging the loop?
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SPEAKER_01
Just block them from Facebook, unfriend, block the number, stay away from people you know, hang out with them all the time.
2
SPEAKER_01
What s the system for that?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes, it is so much easier to separate from a partner when you don t have to be constantly re-exposed to seeing them and thinking about them, because that triggers it.
2
SPEAKER_00
It activates it.
2
SPEAKER_00
I think blocking somebody is a very juvenile part on Facebook.
2
SPEAKER_00
Just unfriend them or mute them or do something and try to discipline yourself not to dig, not to snoop.
2
SPEAKER_00
What happens if you have to work with this person?
2
SPEAKER_00
You re going to have to see them if you have the same friends.
2
SPEAKER_00
I would prefer at all points in that journey to separate myself and give myself a chance to breathe and recover, but you will run into them at a party or maybe you ll see them on the street
2
SPEAKER_00
It reactivates you, so the more time you can have away from them and in a positive environment, the better your healing process will be.
2
SPEAKER_00
It ll move more quickly.
2
SPEAKER_00
So that is my suggestion.
2
SPEAKER_01
Nice, yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense.
2
SPEAKER_01
And you mentioned something else in the triage, which is the perfect partner myth.
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SPEAKER_01
Tell us about that, because I think everybody goes through that.
2
SPEAKER_01
We do it with jobs and people.
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We do it with separation from pretty much anything.
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Any kind of loss, right, that got away from us, the thing we couldn t capture, it was perfect.
2
SPEAKER_00
This is a form of self-torment.
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SPEAKER_00
This is where our mind is working against us.
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SPEAKER_00
Once we identify these archetypes and just speaking about it, just mentioning it, the mind will never be able to go trotting off in that location without going, oh, wait, oh, I m snooping around the perfect partner myth.
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SPEAKER_00
I shouldn t be doing that.
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SPEAKER_00
That s, I m idealizing.
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SPEAKER_00
I m putting this person on a pedestal.
2
SPEAKER_00
So the perfect partner myth has a greater likelihood of occurring during the honeymoon period, during the first four to six months of being with a person.
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SPEAKER_00
So it is where we don t fully know them,
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SPEAKER_00
So our mind will automatically fill in all the wonderful scenario of what they are.
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SPEAKER_00
Oh my God, they re the most intelligent, most beautiful, sexiest, my future.
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SPEAKER_00
So you plan these future dreams in your mind.
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You take the external of the person that you find agreeable to whom you re attracted, and you re filling in all your desires, like your perfect mate.
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SPEAKER_00
You re seeing your future.
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SPEAKER_00
Now, that doesn t happen so much if you ve lived with somebody for 20 years, you know, and you ve seen every side of them.
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SPEAKER_00
So this is the most dangerous part when people are first dating and they re just getting into the groove and then boom, their partner s gone.
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SPEAKER_00
You tend to think you lost everything.
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SPEAKER_00
Because you don t fully know the person, you have a fictionalized version of them being perfect.
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SPEAKER_00
So we have to understand how we create this person on a pedestal.
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SPEAKER_00
We imagine, we selectively look at the things we want and we add the things we d like them to be.
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SPEAKER_00
In time, they ll disappoint us, not to worry.
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SPEAKER_00
we will learn they re not perfect, but right now we think they are, so there is no perfect partner.
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SPEAKER_00
It s a trick we play in our mind, and we all do it.
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SPEAKER_01
Right, it s like my last girlfriend was skinnier and taller and more fun and smarter, and then you re like, wait, no, those are all the reasons that we are not together anymore, or whatever, right?
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SPEAKER_01
We do that a lot, even with jobs.
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SPEAKER_01
Oh, my last job had better hours.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but you hated everyone there, and everyone hated you.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, well, you know.
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SPEAKER_01
You just rationalize it.
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SPEAKER_01
in any kind of protocol is to kind of narrow the gaze so that you systematically can recognize what these markers are.
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SPEAKER_01
Because when you already have a pre-exposure to, oh, I m doing the perfect partner myth, oh, I m going into the loop, it automatically makes you aware of that process that s harming you so it doesn t harm you.
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SPEAKER_01
Once you re aware, you can t be unaware.
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SPEAKER_01
So once you kind of hear these ideas, you ll feel much stronger.
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SPEAKER_01
going through that process because you now recognize where you are that s giving you that bad feeling.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you have a cure for the perfect partner myth?
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SPEAKER_00
Like, okay, let s de-rationalize some of these traits that I m giving this person that they didn t earn, that they don t have.
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, first of all, it tends to happen in the early stages of the partnership during the honeymoon phase where you don t know them and the sexual desire and stuff like that.
3
SPEAKER_01
And it also is based upon you re only looking at the good.
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SPEAKER_01
You haven t had a chance to see a lot of the bad.
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SPEAKER_01
They pulled away before they could disappoint you and harm you.
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SPEAKER_01
So you re still believing they are perfect.
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SPEAKER_01
Understand that people are not either all good nor all bad.
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SPEAKER_01
So this is where your mind, just thinking it through, will help you deconstruct them and take them off that pedestal that you put them on.
3
SPEAKER_01
There s a lot you don t know about them.
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SPEAKER_01
You re seeing what you wanna see.
3
SPEAKER_01
So don t torture yourself by focusing on that.
3
SPEAKER_01
And you ll figure it out.
3
SPEAKER_01
As time passes, you ll start to remember things that you didn t want to see.
3
SPEAKER_01
The red flags, the way they snapped at the waitress, you know, something not right.
3
SPEAKER_01
So you ll start to get it later, but in that moment that they left you, that s when they look so unbelievably delicious.
3
SPEAKER_00
So how do we start this?
3
SPEAKER_00
You kind of mentioned that we take some traits and we look for examples.
3
SPEAKER_00
I really like this technique.
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SPEAKER_01
It s just that we have to understand that we ve idealized the partner.
3
SPEAKER_01
So we need to dismantle it piece by piece.
3
SPEAKER_01
So if you catch yourself indulging in that, what you try to do is understand that maybe you thought they were the leading actor of the movie of your life.
3
SPEAKER_01
And you have to say to yourself, but I guess they were only a walk on.
3
SPEAKER_01
So that s just all they are.
3
SPEAKER_01
And just remember, nobody s perfect.
3
SPEAKER_01
What you re seeing walk away is what you wanted to see of them.
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SPEAKER_01
There s a lot more.
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SPEAKER_01
But they weren t the right one or they d still be there.
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SPEAKER_01
They d still try and work it out with you.
3
SPEAKER_01
They would have treated you better.
3
SPEAKER_01
They would have communicated with you more.
3
SPEAKER_01
So you have to logically use that.
3
SPEAKER_01
There is a little exercise that I have.
3
SPEAKER_01
You can take out a sheet of paper and you write down three admirable qualities that they possessed.
3
SPEAKER_01
And you just do this very quickly off the top of their head like they were industrious, they were on time, they were kind of animals.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then you ask yourself, did any of those qualities that I so admire
3
SPEAKER_01
apply to me directly?
3
SPEAKER_01
Like were they always on time with me?
3
SPEAKER_01
Were they always kind to me?
3
SPEAKER_01
Or was it a generic trait that they had in general but didn t choose to show me?
3
SPEAKER_01
So sometimes you realize that the very thing that you admired about them, they re so hardworking, yeah, but they never made you a priority.
3
SPEAKER_01
That s where the fantasy gets revealed.
3
SPEAKER_00
Thanks for listening and supporting the Art of Charm.
3
SPEAKER_00
For a list of all of our amazing sponsors and discount codes, visit theartofcharm.com slash advertisers.
3
SPEAKER_00
Now, back to the show.
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SPEAKER_00
Right, so we start to think of tangible examples for these quick three, four traits we rattle off above or earlier on the paper, and we think, all right, so they re really, really caring.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, actually, now I m starting to have trouble, and that s how you notice whether it s a rationalization or not, because you go, kind of animals.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, once I saw him pet a dog or something.
3
SPEAKER_00
Wait a minute.
3
SPEAKER_00
No, he doesn t exactly volunteer at animal shelters or anything.
3
SPEAKER_00
He doesn t even have pets.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
3
SPEAKER_01
That s where you see your fantasy come away.
3
SPEAKER_01
I remember dating a guy that was really ambitious, and I so loved his mindset for being ambitious.
3
SPEAKER_01
And that was good, but that was, when I looked at it, it was for himself.
3
SPEAKER_01
He wasn t ambitious in trying to learn how to get closer to me.
3
SPEAKER_01
He wasn t ambitious in creating a relationship.
3
SPEAKER_01
He was ambitious, which is admirable, but it in no way applied to something toward me.
3
SPEAKER_01
So therefore, all this thing that I had admired about him was isolated into things that were good for him and had nothing to do with me.
3
SPEAKER_01
So, nice that you re ambitious.
3
SPEAKER_01
not good for me, not admirable.
3
SPEAKER_00
We re basically shining a light on this.
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SPEAKER_00
It s like holding something up to the light, and you start to see the cracks.
3
SPEAKER_00
On the flip side, you have the bad partner myth.
3
SPEAKER_00
Let s talk about that and how it relates to what we re talking about, because it seems like, well, okay, great, no, I got it, the guy s a bastard.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, actually, that s not true either, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, that s, again, another black and white, and we tend to go between perfect partner and bad partner.
3
SPEAKER_01
We re like schizophrenic at this point.
3
SPEAKER_01
One moment you re crying over how much you miss them, the next minute you re screaming that you hate them so much.
3
SPEAKER_01
So the bad partner myth is a very quick ego fix.
3
SPEAKER_01
We tend to, you know, most people default to this position.
3
SPEAKER_01
They were rotten, she was crazy, he was abusive, he can t commit, he s a sociopath, she s out of her mind, she s hysterical, she s a drama queen.
3
SPEAKER_01
We get these labels and we feel for a moment like we re supported by this, oh yes,
3
SPEAKER_01
Now the only reason we create the bad partner myth is because we re really hoping that if we say that enough, we won t want them.
3
SPEAKER_01
But it s kind of like the person that complains all the time about something.
3
SPEAKER_01
It still keeps us in the loop.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s another way of keeping us in the loop.
3
SPEAKER_01
So it s this quick ego fix, but it tends to backfire on us because
3
SPEAKER_01
as we go and make our complaint to all of our friends, oh, he was so rotten, and then he did this, and can you believe he did that, and he didn t do this, you think you re getting support from your friends, like, oh, yes, aren t you glad to be rid of him?
3
SPEAKER_01
They may indeed be saying that, but the end result is you re gonna walk away and you know your friends are gonna say, God, I had no idea he was that terrible.
3
SPEAKER_01
What was she doing with him?
3
SPEAKER_01
Why would she be so crazy to date this guy?
3
SPEAKER_01
So in order to make them look bad,
3
SPEAKER_01
It s the boomerang thing.
3
SPEAKER_01
We start to look like we re crazy, like we have low self-esteem, like we don t know what we re doing to have loved somebody like this.
3
SPEAKER_00
Right.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like you must be an idiot.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re getting with all kinds of yodels.
3
SPEAKER_00
I don t want to want to be around you anymore.
3
SPEAKER_00
Right.
3
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
3
SPEAKER_01
So it feels like a temporary win.
3
SPEAKER_01
You know, all these ego things.
3
SPEAKER_01
Whenever I tell one of my guy friends, whatever your first instinct to do is wrong.
3
SPEAKER_01
because his first instinct is to make his ego big and to make him feel good around a woman that he thinks he s losing.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I m like, wrong move, wrong move.
3
SPEAKER_01
Your first impulse is always the wrong move because it s ego.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s like, oh, I don t want you, I don t need you.
3
SPEAKER_01
And the truth is he does, okay?
3
SPEAKER_01
It s a lot stronger position for him, that fake ego that comes up.
3
SPEAKER_01
It really does destroy us because it s base and it s reactive and it s just a form of defense.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s not in any way going to help us.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, this makes sense, right?
3
SPEAKER_00
It just makes us look bad, and it also probably has some deeper psychological impact when you start saying that all the people that you surround yourself with are terrible and things like that.
3
SPEAKER_00
I mean, you start labeling things.
3
SPEAKER_00
Anytime you distort anything in your own head for short-term gain, it seems like a bad idea.
3
SPEAKER_00
I can t quite put my finger on it, though.
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, yes, and absolutely.
3
SPEAKER_01
Why?
3
SPEAKER_01
Because then, automatically, we become the victim.
3
SPEAKER_01
The victim is a hard position to get out of.
3
SPEAKER_01
So if they re so bad, then I m the victim.
3
SPEAKER_01
So now I m doubly down.
3
SPEAKER_01
See, so here s the illusion.
3
SPEAKER_01
We think that making them the bad partner, one, we won t want them and everybody will be on our side and tell us, oh, you re so lucky to be done with them.
3
SPEAKER_01
But what actually happens is that we give them power.
3
SPEAKER_01
We give them power by making them the bad person because that automatically makes us the victim.
3
SPEAKER_01
So we re now disempowered.
3
SPEAKER_01
So we try to take away all their power by looking at it rationally.
3
SPEAKER_01
Like, it s just what we do.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s the thing we do.
3
SPEAKER_01
And working through our ego and making our thinking work for us.
3
SPEAKER_00
this is something that you recommend that we don t do simply because of the distortion, and I understand that.
3
SPEAKER_00
I think the other temptation, and you mentioned this also in your triage, is then saying, okay, maybe they re not perfect, and they re not awful.
3
SPEAKER_00
Maybe I m not gonna find anyone this good again, or maybe it took me so long to find them that I just can t be alone again for another five years, or another three years, or something like that.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s not the perfect partner myth, it s like the only partner myth.
3
SPEAKER_01
Perfect, step five is actually called the one and only partner myth.
3
SPEAKER_01
You re absolutely on it.
3
SPEAKER_01
So this is all a process of elimination, okay?
3
SPEAKER_01
They weren t the perfect partner, okay, check.
3
SPEAKER_01
We understand that.
3
SPEAKER_01
They weren t the bad partner, check.
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, the other category they could go into, they re the one and only.
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, only Jack, there ll never be another man like Jack.
3
SPEAKER_01
I ll never touch anyone, taste anyone, have somebody make love to me like Jack.
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, think of how that traps you.
3
SPEAKER_01
And that is a real trap.
3
SPEAKER_01
And you know, life always shows me this thinking.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s so funny.
3
SPEAKER_01
So I m always thinking about relationships because they show me so much about human nature.
3
SPEAKER_01
But when I can t work something out, I just look at my life in front of me.
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And I remember waiting for a bus in the 80s.
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And I talk about this
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in the audio booklet that, you know, that was a time that it was so unsafe to ride the subway.
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It was Russian roulette, and you couldn t get a cab.
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People would literally pull you out of a cab halfway to throw themselves in.
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It was a vicious city, and there d be a bus coming, so everybody s riding on the bus, and they d be crammed into this bus, like, really, like, in the stairwells, just fighting each other to get on, and there s a bus behind it a couple blocks away, so it s kind of like the only bus.
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There s no last bus.
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There s no one and only partner.
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And some of this thinking, the one, this whole the one thing, I mean, they make it like there is one.
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And if you miss that one, you ve lost all hope.
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I do not believe that.
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I believe most anybody could be the one, and the one is the one when you re ready to have the one, and the right one will show up.
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So this one and only partner myth is
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really another way that we keep ourselves in pain and in anxiety and it is simply not true.
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That partnership ended.
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They fell off the conveyor belt, they were a faulty product for us, it s not a problem, they re not the last one.
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Because the answer to that is that we don t look at what we ve achieved, we look at what we ve lost.
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So I look at it like if I ve gotten into a relationship, I ve attained that.
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It s not a dream, it s not a hope.
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I did it in the real world.
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Okay, that means I ve physicalized this thing I wanted to manifest.
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I had a relationship.
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Okay, it didn t turn out.
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I don t lose ground.
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I don t go backwards.
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I ve already done this.
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So it s in my skill set, it s in my vibe, it s in my energy.
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I know how to do this.
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I start from where I am and continue upward.
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I don t go back to zero.
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It doesn t work like that.
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None of life works like that.
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Like Jordan, you don t get up one morning and forget how to do a podcast.
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You don t, so it s the same is true with love.
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Yeah, this makes a lot of sense, and I think people have a hard time believing that once they find love, they can do it again, because they don t realize that there s a set of skills being built here, self-awareness being built here, they re just focused on the loss.
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Exactly, because we make love this crazy, we make it like this wild animal thing,
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It comes to you and then it runs away.
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And the more that we don t understand love and we don t understand the skill sets of love, there are some very basic steps.
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It s not confusing, but we make it like this elusive thing that maybe lands on you if you re lucky.
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So the more that we create love in a mystery, the more weakened we ll be with never having a sense of participation and direction with love.
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And it s just not that way.
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You know, love is a skill set.
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Dating is a skill set.
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Getting into a relationship is a skill set that s been refined.
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You re in a meaningful, dynamic partnership.
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It took you a while to develop that, and you ve got a partner that is equally matched, and you guys are working it out.
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But there were a lot of steps you took to where you are now to be where you are today.
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Those were all your learning curve.
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We don t lose that.
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We don t become dumb and blind and ill-equipped.
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You don t lose your skills.
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So there s no last partner.
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This is just where you stand today.
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This is where you stopped on your own mechanism that took you.
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Now you re going to regroup and refocus and collect yourself and be prepared for the next love.
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It s not like, oh my God, I can t love again.
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I can t start all over again because I don t know what I m doing.
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You do know what you re doing.
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This ride ended.
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That s it.
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Another ride is coming.
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I love the different point of view of the coming and going of love.
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I think that s important because with breakups, we kind of zoom in on the timeline, right?
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And it s, again, the focus thing.
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We don t zoom out and go, all right, over the course of my life, have I ever had a breakup?
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Yes, most likely.
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Did it hurt?
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Yes.
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Does it still hurt?
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Very, very little slash no, but we can t somehow then take that same model and apply it to the current relationship where we re like, I have had a breakup, but this one is different.
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I m not quite sure how, but I m never gonna get over it, although I probably will, because I always have.
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We re not really thinking about that, right?
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We re not comparing it.
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in any sort of reasonable way, we re comparing it in a way that makes it entirely unique and completely different than anything we ve ever done before, and somehow we re not gonna be able to recover.
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And I feel like zooming out on the timeline helps a little bit, but we also have to realize something that you had mentioned before that I thought originally sounded a little bit like, okay, this is a little woo-woo or something like that, but that love comes from within and is entirely independent of other people.
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And scientifically speaking, I mean, really,
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the emotions and chemicals are only happening in your brain, and that is somehow very empowering.
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That was my final step, because when people get a hold of that, that s the aha moment.
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You know, Jordan, in all these discourses that we have, the only one who s being trained is us.
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We re the ones refining our skillset to learn how to get into love, to learn how to love, to learn how to be a good partner, to learn how to get out of love,
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knowledge, you accrue it and you gain more and more.
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It doesn t get all erased.
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So this one and only partner assumes that all that we ve achieved, all that we know to this point is now erased and we go back to zero.
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And it is not like that.
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We are evolving.
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We are gaining in our skill set.
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It s one more thing.
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It s one more tier that we ve gone through.
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So we re the ones who are learning in this process, and we don t get erased.
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We don t go back to zero.
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Doesn t happen like that.
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Susan, this has been super helpful.
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Thank you so much.
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Is there anything else that you wanna say on this topic that I haven t asked you?
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Yes, that you really refined the last step is that the love that we re feeling, that we attribute to this person running away, we think they ve run away with all of our happiness, because we see them leaving, and all we know is we felt happy when they were here, and that s not the truth.
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In real truth, we were the ones who felt love.
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So once you know that the love came from me, you realize the power that that has.
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It s like you don t need their little deposit check.
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You own the bank.
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It is your bank.
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And that understanding is a more mature concept, but it is the one that completely frees you.
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You understand that the only one that ever felt love is me.
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And if my partner felt it, that s awesome.
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But since I m the one feeling love, I have the ability to replicate this again.
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And that s the thing that ultimately closes the wound.
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Perfect.
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Susan, thank you so much.
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We will definitely be having you back on the show.
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I mean, you should just go through my inbox at some point.
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But I m so happy that we got a chance to talk today.
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Thank you so much, Jordan.
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Always a pleasure.
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You re the best.
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Thank you.
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This is a really cool triage setup here.
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I really like the idea that there is power in knowing what to do in the inevitable event of a breakup, the inevitable end of romance.
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And knowing how our brains work and rationalize the perfect partner or the worst partner ever or the only partner ever, this can be super helpful, especially with the action steps that Susan laid out so we know what to do when this happens and we don t get blindsided.
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Or if we do get blindsided, we know how to handle it.
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And if you enjoyed this one, don t forget to thank Susan on Twitter.
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We ll have that linked in the show notes as well as some of her books and website and other work here.
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Remember, you can tap your phone screen here with our show art up there, and the show notes should pop up right on your phone.
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That happens with almost every podcast player now these days.
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I m also on Twitter, at The Art of Charm.
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It s a great way to say hi, say something else that s not so polite, or just check out some articles, insights, other ways to engage with me and producer Jason.
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Again, I m at The Art of Charm.
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on Twitter.
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Jason, what s your Twitter?
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At JPDef.
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J-P-D-E-F, right, awesome.
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And I m at The Art of Charm, so you can yell at one of us and both of us should, we ll forward it.
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We love to share the misery and the kudos.
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Boot camps are live program details, bootcamp.theartofcharm.com.
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The live program, really just by far and away my favorite part of running AOC.
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It s just really cool to see
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how people become part of the AOC family, the growth they experience over the next months and years, it s nothing short of amazing.
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We do sell out a few months in advance, so if you re thinking about it a little bit, just get in touch, we ll get you some info, plan ahead, no big deal.
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I also want to encourage you to join our AOC challenge at theartofcharm.com slash challenge, or here in the States, you can text charmed, C-H-A-R-M-E-D to 33444.
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The challenge is about improving your networking skills, your connection skills, and inspiring those around you to develop
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a personal and professional relationship with you, and we ll email you our Fundamentals Toolbox I mentioned earlier on the show that includes this episode, of course, and I also do regular videos with drills and exercises to help you move forward.
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It ll make you a better networker, a better connector, and a better thinker.
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That s theartofcharm.com slash challenge, or text charmed here in the US to 33444.
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For full show notes for this and all previous episodes, head on over to theartofcharm.com slash podcast.
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This episode of The Art of Charm was produced by Jason DeFilippo.
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Jason Sanderson is our audio engineer and editor.
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Show notes on the website are by Robert Fogerty.
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And I m your host, Jordan Harbinger.
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Go ahead, tell your friends, because the greatest compliment you can give us is a referral to someone else, either in person or shared on the web.
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So stay charming.
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and leave everything and everyone better than you found them.
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Thanks for listening to the Art of Charm.
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Get more confidence, relationship skills, life hacks, and more at theartofcharmpodcast.com.