Call Her Daddy - Jay Shetty: The Rules for Falling in Love and Not Fucking It Up

Episode Date: January 18, 2023

Jay Shetty joins Call Her Daddy to discuss the rules for falling in love and not fucking it up. Alex and Jay break down common mistakes people fall into when navigating the early stages of dating and how the pace of the relationship is a crucial part of not missing any potential red flags. Jay explains the link between the way our parents raised us, how that influences potential partners we seek out, and how to become aware we are even doing any of this. He debunks the idea that a fairytale proposal and wedding is synonymous with true love and teaches us ways to be grateful and content with the life we have. Alex and Jay discuss the terrifying moment when you lose the ‘spark’ in your relationship and Jay gives practical advice on how to settle into a relationship that is rooted in trust, respect and growth. Every relationship comes with stress and conflict but Jay breaks down how to navigate these situations with your partner in a way that ultimately ends up deepening the relationship. This episode is packed with advice on how to cultivate a healthy relationship in your life whether you are currently single or coupled up! Jay's second book, 8 Rules of Love, releases January 31 and is available for pre order at 8RulesofLove.com. To catch Jay on his first ever world tour 'Love Rules', go to JayShettyTour.com for tickets and VIP packages.

what is up daddy gang it is your founding father alex cooper with call her daddy jay shetty welcome to call her daddy i'm so grateful to be here i am so happy to have you here i feel like we've become quick podcast friends yes everyone i went on jay's show the first it was i don't really go on podcasts and you made me feel so comfortable so i'm so happy to have you here now at my studio you're a comfortable vibe you're amazing people loved you as always as expected but i think people love seeing that side of you and i'm just so grateful that you gave me that opportunity so thank you so much well thank you because now we're going to learn from the master today we're going to talk about love the real reason you're here is you have a new book out, The Eight Rules of Love.

Yes. I read this and was like, daddy gang. Every single person listening today, you are going to learn something because I learned so much from your book. What inspired you to write a book breaking down all things love related? So I think I just had so many friends, clients and people in my life for the last few years that had a passionate career, but they felt unfulfilled because they didn't have love in their life. Or they were hustling and they were making things happen. But then their partnership was falling apart,

their relationship was falling apart, and that was affecting their self esteem. And I started to find that whether you were at the beginning of your career or at the peak of your career, if you weren't figuring out your relationship, it was causing massive issues with self-worth, self-esteem and self-respect. And so I realized that no matter what you achieve in your life, if we don't pay close attention to this, we're going to feel extremely disconnected from the quality of our lives. And so I don't want people to live their lives feeling unhappy, dissatisfied. And then let's talk about this. School didn't teach us how to fall in love. It didn't teach us how to find people. It didn't teach us how to keep love. Our parents may have struggled. Most people didn't see

a great example. If you did, you're extremely fortunate. So we didn't have a good example at home. And then when you look at your friends and family members, you see a lot of dysfunction. And so I wanted to study all of that. I wanted to look in within the dysfunctions I've had in my own life and then go, okay, how do we actually give people a guidebook, a map and not tell them how to do it and what to do perfectly, but give them everything they need to think about along the way. We're going to get into all of this, but let's start from the beginning the first rule you write in your book is let yourself be alone we see it all the time people can convince themselves to say like in a really bad relationship rather than ending it and just being good with being alone

how can people get over the hump of actually breaking up with someone they know is scared of being alone and single. Both our hands are up. Everyone in the room's hands are up. We've all done that. And here's what happens when you get into a relationship because you're scared of being alone. The first thing that happens is you settle for less than you deserve.

The second thing that happens is you become more dependent on them. And the third thing that happens because of the first two is you are so scared of breaking up with them. You struggle to break up with that person, which is the core of your question. And the reason for that,

and we have to dive into why that happens. Like when I get to the question of like, how do you break up with someone when you know they're not right for you? We have to go backwards and look at how we ended up there. We ended up there because society makes you feel less than when you're lonely. If you went to school and you had a

birthday party and no one showed up, you were the loner. If you sat alone at the lunch table at school, you were the weirdo. If you're in your 20s or 30s or maybe even 40s and you turn up at a wedding without a plus one, it's like, oh, poor you. And so society is made being alone the victim. And so somehow that's gone inside our minds and we've gone, oh, wait a minute, if I leave this person, that reflects on my self-worth. And what I want people to understand is the difference between compatibility and self-worth. You may be incompatible with someone, but that doesn't mean that that's a reflection of your self-worth. And so we need to disconnect the idea that just because this person's not right for me doesn't mean I'm bad. The way you just described that, it's so fascinating to to actually if you dissect the concept of like

you're right being alone has always been something that you feel shame for and then I think as we get into our adulthood we start to realize like shit I feel so uncomfortable when I'm alone but I think that's what I'm supposed to feel the most comfortable with but how do I achieve that again back to like no one taught us that being alone is actually very cool and it's like the sexiest thing about someone is if you can be good on your own you're gonna attract better energy because you are an independent fully formed human being that's not then attaching yourself to someone else just because you're trying to fill a void or a need throughout the book you use your own love story with your wife Roddy as a reference point for the reader where were you at in your life when you met your wife and how did you grapple with being alone

prior to finding your person when I met my wife I hadn't been on a date in probably around three to four years and then all of a sudden I'm dating this girl that I'm really into. And I go back to all my old habits. So I'm trying to impress her with everything. By the way, I have no money. I'm $25,000 in debt. I don't have a job.

And I'm trying to craft this thing to her that I'm really cool and I have it and I know what I'm doing. And so what I'm doing is I'm tutoring kids on the side, like students making like 20 pounds an hour from teaching economics to a student at university or college, saving up to pay for our dates and then trying to pull off the most expensive, epic, show-off 18-year-old dates that I thought were impressive. Classic. And so I took her to La Candela Catelli,

which is like this Michelin star, like David Beckham there it's in London I can't I couldn't afford it to save my life I like save up everything I possibly can to book a table there you can never get a reservation I took her to see Wicked in theater like saving up for that so I'm saving up like literally my 20 pound an hour student payments to pay for a date and i'm realizing what am i doing and the best thing was my wife came to all these things and now i know obviously i know her we've been together for 10 years but at the time i didn't know i thought that's what women want when you start dating and if you're not so self-assured with yourself and who you are and what you can offer in a relationship and confident i think that's a huge right? You can then start to try to appease

the person sitting across from you like, what do they want? What do they want? It's like, hey, what do you want? What would you naturally want to give this person? And what kind of experience would you want? I would say that I felt confident about who I was internally, but I was really unconfident about what I had externally. Because I didn't have a job, I didn't have a job I didn't have money I didn't have a car I didn't have a home I didn't have anything and because I thought that's what relationships were value based on I was devaluing myself and I think we all do that right like we just we find another way to find one of our own inadequacies and devalue ourselves and that's the thing we're trying to devalue who we are and value what we think the other person will value and that paradox like that challenge

ends up making you move so far away from who you are that actually that person could have fell in love with that and i think i feel the opposite now and it's really interesting where and i'm sure i'm sure you've gone through some form of this, but I found that as I became more externally successful, I wanted my wife to validate my external success. So every time I'd win an award, I'd be like, look what I did. Like, look how cool this is.

Or like when we did something big, I'd be like, love me for this. Like, please appreciate me for this. And luckily I have a wife who humbles me in every possible way and just doesn't care and and I started to realize that actually my wife loves me for who I am and I should just see that as the greatest truth and accept that rather than constantly trying to get her to love her for stuff that I have yeah that that reminds me of something I I really appreciated you talked about in your book. And I actually pulled a quote because I thought it was so powerful.

Something I say all the time, and I think we're aligned on this, is like the best way to get into a relationship, I always think, is to focus on yourself. Really focus on, obviously, without being fully selfish. Like, what do you want? Who are you? What do you need in a relationship? That's when you're going to attract someone that then is going to be a great partner for you. You wrote in your book, in solitude, we practice giving ourselves what we need before we expect it from someone else. People determine how to treat us in large part by observing how we treat ourselves. A relationship with someone else won't cure your relationship with yourself.

Can you give us an example of like, how do people negatively talk to themselves? And how does that impact then how they're going to be treated? Yeah, so I think that a great example would be we think like, I'm, I'm not smart. And so, or I'm not intelligent, or I don't have anything valuable to say. And I have a bunch of friends who the world would consider absolutely stunning and gorgeous and beautiful and everything else, but they're super smart and intelligent, but they never show that side of themselves because they're scared they're not allowed to be that. And what ends up happening with that is you never show and display that side of yourself. So in a conversation, when a topic comes up, you stay quiet. When you have something

to say, you remain silent. So you're constantly like suppressing your own voice. And now what you don't realize is that you've created a persona for that person to fall in love with. And if that person falls in love with that persona, now you've got to act and perform for the rest of your life, right? Exhausting. Exhausting. Or chances are they don't like that person because they would have liked you. But now you've started to think there's even more inadequacies in you. So I think what ends up happening is I think we've just been made to believe that there are certain things that people are attracted to and there are certain things that people are not. And I think when you play that game, you run the risk of not being attracted to yourself anymore. And I think that that's the most dangerous thing. You're right. A lot of life is about viewing ourselves

through the eyes of other people. And if you don't really know yourself, you're probably, your self-worth is going to be predicated on how other people view you. And if you're probably your self-worth is going to be predicated on how other people view you and if you're seeing someone treating you a certain way though what we don't realize and what you so beautifully write in your book is like because you're probably giving that energy that you treat yourself that way and you're not even noticing it you don't speak up or you talk you literally talk down on yourself to a group of people and so you are devaluing yourself in their eyes. And the only way that people are going to then all of a sudden start to treat you as an equal or what your worth is, especially in romantic relationships, is if you carry yourself in the way that you want to

be treated and you actually can see yourself, but you can't get there unless you actually do the work. I've done a few episodes talking about how our relationship with our parents and our siblings has so much influence on our behaviors and our life course I love that these two lines are literally in bold in your book you write this is so fucking smart I loved this part if there is a gap in how our parents raised us we look to others to fill it and if there is a gift in how our parents raised us we look to others to give us the same which I immediately I mean there's so many gaps and there's so many obviously gifts that my parents gave me but like just a personal note I was fortunate my parents

are still very in love how they've been together for 30 40 years that's so beautiful I love that totally and everyone would always look at it when I was young like you are so lucky and I feel that way but then I started dating and I was like I had the craziest standards because I was like no one is gonna be the way that my dad treats my mom like I it's a perfect relationship and so everyone has the way that they look at it like oh I was fucked up from this way or this way if your parents are divorced you're fucked up if your parents are together you're fucked up right like yeah it's all the same so how can figuring out the gifts our parents gave us and the gaps that they left impact how we operate in dating? Yeah, that's such a great

question. And thank you for sharing your personal because that that's exactly how I wanted it to hit that. I didn't want people to be like, Oh, yeah, well, Alex, your parents are great. So you're lucky like you should be. And it's like, well, no, no, no, you don't understand. Like, it's really hard for me to find someone to make me feel that way. The first thing is, I want everyone to know what their gaps are and the way you and I have exercises all over the book to help you do this deeply, but in essence, the way to build a gap or figure out your gap is obvious. It's like, what do you feel you wish you got from your parents that you didn't get? Maybe it was praise. Maybe it was encouragement. Maybe it was belief. Maybe it was presence and energy. You just wish they were there at your football game,

or you just wish that they showed up to your dance rehearsal or whatever it may have been what are those gaps that have been left out i want you to go fill those gaps yourself i want you to go do each and every one of those for yourself if your parents didn't compliment you compliment yourself if you didn't if your parents didn't show up for what you love show up for what you love if your parents didn't turn up at your games or whatever it was, make sure you're turning up. Have you given up on your passion because your parents didn't show up for you? And so I want people to fill that gap themselves because what that does is that now when you go meet another human, you allow them to just be themselves

and give you love in the way that they like to show it rather than them trying to figure out how to be your dad or your mom. And I think that that's often what happens is that we become a project and we're looking for someone to fix us. And what we do is we become broken, hoping that we're gonna find a fixer and exhaust the fixer trying to fix us

because we're broken from something that they never did. If you don't fill in those gaps for yourself, back to what you were saying earlier, you're then going to enter a relationship and want that person to fill the gap for you. And you'll never even know if that's the right person for you. Because if your gaps were filled, you probably would have a very different compatibility rather than you're finding someone that's like filling your need for compliments, filling your need for this. Well, imagine if that was filled. Would you even be with that person? What would your relationship be like if they didn't have to constantly fill you up in certain areas? Exactly. And then the gifts part is looking at the same things as what

you just said. Like what were the way your parents loved you or showed you love that you thought were beautiful, that you thought were amazing? And then ask yourself, is that something that I want? Or is that something my parents had and it was beautiful for them? But maybe I don't want that. Like maybe that's not exactly how I want it to be. And when you figure out the gifts that you received, now what you're going to do is when you meet someone, you're going to realize if they give those gifts, that's amazing, but don't become blind to the other gifts that they want to give you. And I think so often we're like, well, they're not giving me these three things that I really wanted.

And you're missing out on all this amazing stuff that they're giving over here because you don't think that's love. You think love looks like ABC. And if they're giving you X, Y, Z, you're like, no, no, no, but that's not love. This is love. And I think so often we limit how people love us

because we put limits on what love looks like to us. And so I'll give a practical example of this with me and my wife. So me and my wife have completely different love languages. We have completely different parenting situations. For my wife, love was shown by presence and time and energy. Her parents took the day off on her birthday. They would take her out on long walks. They'd spend lots of quality family time together. My parents didn't have lots of time. They were working really hard to make sure that we had enough money and had enough food and working hard to take care of me and my sister. So my parents gave me gifts. They would save up to buy me the one thing I wanted. So when we met, I just wanted someone who'd buy me epic gifts. And my wife's like cooking an amazing meal and making all this time and energy and I'm going well why didn't I get the gift I wanted and and that's how the gifts and the gaps play through because your love language is just based on the gift and the gaps you had but what I'm saying is don't don't limit love to your love language your partner may

be able to express love in a far more beautiful, greater way, and you're just missing out on it. Speaking of, you know, material items, you talk a lot about the tradition around diamond rings and the culture around engagements just in general. You also mentioned Disney princess movies and how we were taught from a young age,

like your prince will come and your life will be complete. What is the fallout from this fairy tale fantasy that all of us grew up watching? Yeah, I have to tell you this story. I think you may have read part of it, but I think I want everyone to hear it because it's amazing. So when I was deciding to propose to my wife, I went to my brother-in-law and I was like, dude, I think I'm going to propose. And he was the only person in my life at that time who'd already got engaged and married. So I was like, he's the right person to go to. And I was like, okay, I want to propose. How much should I spend on a ring?

I have no idea, right? I've never thought about getting an engagement ring for anyone before. Never been into a store. No idea how much it costs. And he was like, yeah, you just spend two to three months salary. He just threw that number out there. And I was like, okay, cool. And then I went and asked another friend who was about to propose. And he was like, yeah, yeah, two to three months salary. So I started here two to three months

from a lot of my male friends. I didn't make a lot of the time. And I was like, okay, two to three months salary. Okay, cool. And so I was like, fine. I went and spent two to three months salary. I proposed. We got married. She said, yes, all the rest of it. And then years later, when I was researching this, because I was thinking about this and I was like, how did everyone know that number?

Like, where did that number come from? Literally in 1977, De Beers has a commercial. You can YouTube this. And in that commercial, it's thisers has a commercial. You can YouTube this. And in that commercial, it's this black and white commercial. There's like silhouettes of a man and a woman. And at the end of it, in this silhouette, there's a diamond ring that's sparkling and shining that's going onto the finger.

And it literally says, what better way to spend two to three months salary in 1977? A full marketing ploy. A full marketing ploy. What advice can you give around being happy with what you have as opposed to focusing on what you don't have? Happiness actually sits at the intersection of gratitude and growth. And so I would encourage anyone who's listening to genuinely be grateful for what you have, but then think about who you want to become and who you want to grow into, not the house or the car or the external thing.

Because we both know this and everyone knows this, and I will never be the person who say money doesn't buy happiness or money's not important. I just don't like that rhetoric. I think it's unhealthy because it makes people feel like, well, A, it makes people feel bad if they do want that, but it also feels like it always comes from people who are already financially stable who say stuff like that.

I'd actually say that you need growth in your life constantly, but the goal is to bring out growth. I appreciate that because I think even just in the world of social media, everything we just talked about of like you viewing things that make you feel less than, or you're not adequate enough. And, and then it's like,

and then on top of it, just where you're at in your life. I think a lot of times, I think the younger generation is having a hard time finding their own path of growth because there's a lot of people trying to be like, I want to be like that person, or I want to be like that person, or I want to be like that person because people are more accessible and sharing more of their life.

And although it can be someone that you look up to and you're like, I appreciate how they do that. I think there's been a little too much of people trying to quite literally emulate exactly what people are doing on the internet. And I think growth wise, it's you're in danger of not allowing yourself to pave your own path and figure out what's good for you. We all learn from people that came before us, but I do think there's, there's some type of like copycat mentality that it's like, wait, wait, but what do you want? Do you even, you're watching that person on Tik TOK, but like, do you even like that? And they're like, no, it just looks cool. Well then maybe carve your own path. I thought what you wrote in your book was interesting.

And I kind of want you to talk about this because you talk about there's five people that we fall for, right? The rebel, the chase, the project, the fuck boy and the opulent one. Yeah. When I read that, I was like, this was my ex-boyfriend. This was my first boyfriend

like i was obsessed with it can you explain what the opulent one is yes yeah absolutely so i had to put this one in there because i think this is the most uh misguiding one this is the one that you don't quite understand so the opulent one is the idea that they have one thing that you really like about them so you may look at obviously the obvious one is they're so attractive the other one is like oh they're so smart like i love the way they think or oh they're so educated they went to a great school right so you find one thing rich yeah rich right like oh he or she drives a nice car like he or she is famous whatever it may be you find one thing and you start giving someone other qualities because they have that

quality so i'll give an example you say oh he's rich which must mean he's organized got it he'll be an organized partner oh they're good looking they're trustworthy right i can trust them we think anything we find attractive about someone we start to give them softer qualities we're like oh they must be kind they went to a good school they must be nice they must come from a good family and we just start giving people all this ammunition good that's so Because we start painting a picture. And so the opulence completely is an illusion because now you're not letting someone earn the right to be those things. You're not letting them become those things or demonstrate those things. You're just assuming.

And I think that that's really unnerving because it's so intoxicating. Like when you're... We all know what that feels like. Yeah, I've had an opulent one, Jay. Yeah, exactly. When you're attracted to someone, it is so intoxicating that you will push yourself out of these reasoning techniques. And the reason I put these all there was just like,

please reflect if this is all you're doing. And I'm not saying you shouldn't go after someone you're attracted to. I'm just saying check that the other things you think they have, they actually have. Don't just give it to them because you assume that they must have these abilities so I did this little uh video on Instagram recently which I think made the point and I I lit a match and I was like this is what chemistry feels like and it's amazing and then I lit a candle with it I was like this is what connection and compatibility looks like it's going to burn a lot longer this this match is

going to run out and so the idea being that like i'm not saying you shouldn't feel chemistry i want everyone to feel chemistry but chemistry is just this one specific spark and now your job is to turn that spark into a burning flaming candle but if you don't make that transition that spark in and of itself is not going to create love it It's the idea of how the chemical, what's happening chemically. And I think we have to look at that. So when you find someone attractive, there's two things happening. You're experiencing attraction, but you're also experiencing stress. So there's attraction of like, oh, they're hot. The stress is, do they think I'm hot? The attraction is, oh, they're really smart. I really like how they think. The stress is, do they like how I think?

And so there's this, when you first meet someone, you're experiencing attraction and stress, and that's what feels like chemistry. Now, the science shows that what happens as you become more comfortable with each other is the stress decreases, because you now actually, they make you feel de-stressed because you feel comfortable with them,

but we see that comfort as anti-chemistry we see that comfort that that person now provides is a spark is gone but it isn't that it's literally a feeling of our bodies i think everyone always says like the spark is gone and you even talk about the flame versus the candle it's like the spark isn't gone your stress is now down you're now not so freaking nervous to walk into a room and wondering like is he gonna think i look good and it's like well now they're you've been with them for a while Stress is now down. You're now not so freaking nervous to walk into a room and wondering like, is he going to think I look good? And it's like, well, now you've been with them for a while. You know they find you attractive.

You're comfortable. And so eventually when you get into the right relationship, there is nothing better than that comfortability because they are the person that you trust. And that trust is built where the stress comes down and the trust raises, I think. And so some people get a little stressed out about that different dynamic, but then you have to look internally of like, why are you so addicted to the chaos? And I was for a very long time. Like if I look back at my relationships, I'm like, I was so addicted to drama and like all the guys

that I was dating, it had to be something, but because I wasn't ready to settle down. And then when I was, I started to look for those qualities of trust and not feeling so on edge and not feeling insecure. And then all of a sudden I was like, oh, that's definitely more of the vibe and the person I want to be around. But it takes time. It takes time. It takes time. When looking back at past relationships, what types of things should we look to examine to make future relationships easier? When you're starting, it's better to look at pace. I think one of the things in a relationship, I would look back on your relationships and look at how fast did they get serious, intimate or close. And I would analyze the pace of the relationship. And you find that

relationships that have a steadier, slower build help you make better decisions. And so I'm not saying that if you have a slower rise, you're more likely to stay together. I'm just saying that if it doesn't move in too fast, if you don't fall in love too fast, you have the ability to make healthier, better decisions sooner before you're too attached and you're too deep in. So I would look at pace of relationship and go, let me look back at my last few relationships and ask myself, did I fall in love too fast? Maybe did I fall in love too slow? Was I too skeptical or was I too optimistic? I would look at, was I letting the person show me who they were or was I painting the picture of who I thought they were? And I think that in and of itself is everything. Like we're constantly

not actually letting people earn their stripes. And this applies to trust. Like I talk about trust a lot and you just brought it up and that's what's on my mind. And I created these four levels of trust. We often think of trust as binary. Like we think of like, I trust you or I don't trust you. And that's how we think about people. You walk into a room and like, yeah, you're trustworthy. You're not trustworthy. I would go home with you. I wouldn't go home with you. You can drop me home. You can't drop me home. So we think of trust as black and white, but trust isn't it's it's actually levels. And so the first level of trust is zero trust. When you meet someone, I don't care how good looking they are. I don't care how smart they are. I don't care where they went to college or how much money they had. Don't trust them. They've got to earn that trust from you. And I know that

sounds really dark, but it's not. It's give them the opportunity to show you where they're trustworthy. So they may say, I'm going to pick you up at 7 p.m. They pick you up at 7 p.m. They may say, I'm going to text you on Sunday. They texted you on Sunday. These are like signs of transactional trust. That's the next level. There's a transactional trust.

They say something and they live up to it. Then the third level of trust is reciprocal trust. Now you're getting deeper where it's like you do nice things for each other, but you're not checking in. You're not having to check every minute detail, but you know, it's going to be reciprocated. And the highest level is unconditional trust, which is like God level trust, which to be honest, beyond your parents, probably most people are never going to have it. But we want that so bad that someone does one nice thing for us. We're like, they're the best. They're amazing. Like I'm

done. Like, you know, I love them. They, they won. Like they're, they're not like my'm done like you know i love them they they won like they're they're not like my ex at all and it's like guys they got one thing right like that's okay that's great and i'm not saying you're going to test the person i'm just saying just don't trust them based on a couple of things and so i think pacing is what i would look at from a last relationship i would look at how much you let them show you who they were versus you made them who you wanted them to be it's so fucking good jay because i think you're so right everyone can fall on the spectrum of like either you're someone that trusts so fast and it's like wait did you even know them now all of a sudden you're getting engaged and it's like do you even know their childhood trauma or what they like

you don't know anything about them and you've just trusted them to like hold your heart and go forward and it's like hold on and then when one weird things happens and you're going to your friends crying they're like well did you ask him yeah and she's like no and I think the other side can be people that have a really hard time trusting and even as much as someone's showing you there's clearly something from your past that's withholding you from being able to move forward because it's like I seen relationships. I've done it in the past where they're like, I have literally done nothing. Why do you not trust me? And it's because I didn't heal my past relationship where someone broke that trust. And so it's like, everyone's going to have a different level. But I think the pace is such an interesting concept because I know from

my personal current relationship, we were in the pandemic. It moved way too fast in the very beginning. And I made a very, very hard conscious decision that I worked on in therapy to slow it down. So I could, we, I was like, we need to go back and pretend we're not in the pandemic. We're spending so much time, which is great, but we're moving too fast we can't move in together yet we've only been dating for like six fucking months like hold on and so i think you can always alter the pace you're never too far gone there's always times to reel it in but you have to be with a partner that's willing to also adjust pace wise and not be like what the fuck are you talking

about we like we live together we don't need to talk about that now well no i realize we've never had a conversation about xyz so pacing can also be on your terms and you can dictate it but you have to have a partner that's willing also to work with you i love the point you just made that it can change at any time this isn't like oh i messed up in the beginning it moved too fast i'd say the same with me and my wife actually i'd say in the beginning we moved way too far we spent every day together because i didn't have a job we spent every day together for like six months and then all of a sudden i got a job and now i couldn't see her every day and it shifted and so the pace changed again yeah and so i i fully agree with you that the pace can change at any time and the reason why i talk about pace is just you make better decisions when you have more time and you have more clarity and you don't feel pressure.

All the research shows that when you are clear of mind, you can deal with seven things at once. But when you're stressed, that number goes down to three. And acute stress, it gets lower and lower and lower. And so when you start making really big decisions based on really small pieces of information, you're going to make some unhealthy choices. Another recent study I read that blew my mind was that this really hit me, especially with, I'm someone who really likes to make new friends. And I like building new connections with people I feel a similar value. And this science really blew my mind. It said it takes 40 hours of spending time with someone to consider them a casual friend.

40 hours. I was like, wow, I haven't spent 40 hours with a lot of people. Of course, I do think things like interviewing someone, being interviewed by someone, podcasting. There are certain things like deep, intimate conversations, vulnerable conversations accelerate this journey. 100 hours counts as a good friend. And 100 hours counts as a good friend and 200 hours counts as a great friend.

So the question when you're dating, you have to ask yourself is, do I want to spend 200 hours with this person? And have I spent 200 hours with this person? It's a great metric to like just check because it gives you something tangible when your feelings are like running ahead at like 2,000 hours.

Like Daddy Gang, don't you dare be telling some guy you love him and you haven't even spent like 80 hours together. Like let's like the fourth date. I get it. It can feel like it's very exciting, but you don't really know that person yet. So maybe like hold, hold your cards a little closer to the chest. The next rule that you talk about that i i think is very very important is define love before you think it feel it or say it yeah so jay how do you define love i define love romantically as when you like someone's personality when you respect their values and when you're committed to helping them achieve their goals. And the reason why I define love that way is liking personality is obvious. And that goes back to, do I want to spend 200 hours with this person? Do I want to spend 2000 hours with this

person and 20,000 hours with this person? Respecting someone's values, I use that word very carefully. Most people feel that relationships are where you have the same values and that you're on this magical search to find someone who believes in the same stuff you believe in. That is so hard and so impossible, and I don't even want to put fairy dust on it. I don't think that's going gonna happen because people are so different. We're wired so differently.

Yes, we can have shared values, but we have trump values and priority values. And so I'll give an example with me and my wife. My wife values family above everything. Her immediate family that she grew up with, that is like her number one priority. My number one value is my purpose. It's my work. It's what I do for others one value is my purpose. It's my work.

It's what I do for others. It's my service. It's my passion. That's what I love above everything else. And when we met, we both talked about this and we realized that if she had a family event, she would choose that over anything. And if I had a purpose-based opportunity,

I would choose that over everything. And I don't want to change that and she doesn't want to change that either. But respect it so when she says to me and the reason i respect alex it kind of comes back to your relationship my wife's amazing because of how her parents raised her and my wife's incredible because the relationship she has with her parents why would i want to take that away from her why would i say no you got to come and support me at my thing no you got to give up your family to come be with me at this thing because my thing's so important because I'm doing xyz like there's a certain respect that I have because I know that her love for her family is what makes

her so lovable and she knows that my drive and my ambition and my persistence is what makes me attractive to her and so why would she want me to give that up i feel like of course there's going to be some values that you hold very similarly to the person because naturally if you are in simpatico with like how you want to live your life there's going to be things that are overlapping but i agree that there's going to be an emphasis for each individual on a different value and where it lies on the scale of importance to you. And I think it's really interesting because if you are with the right person, I think it's really good to have different values, obviously, that don't completely contradict each other, that you're

like you can't stand each other. But having different values, I think, allows you to grow as a human being and in a dynamic of a relationship pushes each of you to learn to compromise and compassion and to learn to respect the other person because you respect your value so you're going to respect what they like and so I really think it's it's a really great way you just dissected that. Because I think sometimes people worry, if we don't have exact same values, how are we going to make it? Well, do you like what they value? Do you agree with that? Exactly. Then you're good. Yeah. It doesn't have to be your number one. It's their number three. It's your number one. Like, it's okay. What you're trying to do is get someone to value what you value and that's not possible they can respect

what you value but they're not going to shift their value to value what you value yeah i i love what you're talking about because i want to get into the part of the book where you talk about the three date rule yeah and i think this is very applicable to transition in this way because we're talking about finding that person and the values and feeling like you can really connect with that person on multiple levels that allows you to be like that's my person that's my partner for daddy gang listening that's like i'm in the dating phase like jay i'm single i'm trying i'm trying to get there but back up a little bit you have this three date rule and your theory is you have this three date rule and your theory is that by three dates in, you should have had enough time to determine if you and the other person will be a good match. So these are not the first three dates.

They're three dates that I recommend you sprinkle across 10 dates, 20 dates, 100 dates. I don't mind where you put them in. I'm not expecting you to make the first three dates an interview. And I don't want you to do that. And I actually think that dating that dates that start like an interview and like a firing, right? Like I really feel like that. Like that's how it feels because all you did was put your best foot forward. And then all of a sudden you feel fired or rejected because you're like, oh no, no, I was interviewing for this role. Like, right. I came dressed and prepared. And, you know, so I don't expect you to make these your first three dates. I expect you to use them in your dating journey. You're saying there are three dates within the scope of you getting to know someone that you would like them to

sprinkle in these questions. So your first date questions you think should be asked that are geared around finding out someone's tastes or preferences. What's something you love to do? Do you have a favorite place? Is there a book or movie you've read or seen more than once? What is occupying your thoughts most at the moment? What's something you wish you knew more about? What's the best meal you've ever had? What I'm saying in this is you're getting to know someone's personality. The question you're asking is like, do I find someone interesting? Do I find someone intriguing? Do I like them? Do I enjoy who I am around them? But on a very personality chemistry level, sometimes you don't even have to ask these questions. Sometimes you're actually going to just observe those. You're not like

having these in your nose. Yeah. Can I ask you a few questions they're like jay told me that jay and alex told me to ask you these questions but this is something you can be looking for and do i like the tone with which they carry themselves right like and the tone is so important even compared to the words like yeah to really listen out and go oh is this is this person arrogant is this person like coming across like my ideas are not interesting? Like do they ask the question back? And by the way, you know, I think that a lot of some of these questions like men may struggle to answer because they feel quite, you know, they feel quite personal. And they can feel quite like intimidating sometimes because you can feel like oh god like why am i

and so these questions are going to be fun they're meant they're going to be they're not an interrogation they're not an intervention and they're not an interview it's being inquisitive right and i like to make that difference between you're never asking a question from an interrogation standpoint or intervention standpoint because everyone no one no one likes that you're asking it from a point of like genuine interest and And by the way, have your answers ready, because if you have your answers ready, you can say, well, let me go first. Let me tell you mine. And now it's a conversation and now it's open and vulnerable. And it's not this forced thing of like, well, I want to know what you have to say. And I'm judging you. It's like, no, no, I've, I've thought about this for myself too.

It's all coming from a place of, which I think if someone's open, you just want to get to know them better. And I think that's very fair. So second date questions. At some point while you're dating this person, you're going to feel like you're ready to get underneath a little bit more. If you won the lottery, what would you spend the money on? I think that's so telling about someone. Which is totally fine if they're like, oh, i'm retiring and i'm just like never doing anything again totally fine but like is that someone you'd want to be with exactly they just told you they just told you they're not going to be driven they're not they're not going to be ambitious they're not going to push for it and there's nothing wrong with that right that's the point like i think sometimes we have a hierarchy

of like oh this kind of person is better totally and it's not people should just be happy well no and i think even the way you said it i think because you and i have kind of agreed like for me i wouldn't be happy if i didn't have a purpose i think a lot of my purpose comes from my creativity i think you're similar so that question to me is like i would keep working if i won the lottery like i i don't i but there's also then i know a friend of mine that was like bitch i'm getting five dogs moving to a ranch and living my goddamn life and having 10 kids and i'd be like like and do you and i totally respect that but again then maybe the person sitting across from me would be better for me or my friend based off of that answer you would

find out correct you gotta ask these questions correct and then the third date this is where you get really a lot deeper right at some point you're going to feel like they've opened up to me in some capacity um and what types of questions are you thinking should be asked on this third date where you're really trying to get under yeah these are the ones where you're trying to do something called like self-disclosed vulnerability where you're really trying to get to a point where you're building a sense of trust and you're building a sense of openness where you're comfortable having uncomfortable conversations. And I think that that is an art and skill that you have to test in a relationship.

If you think you're getting serious, if someone asks me, how do I know that a relationship is getting serious? It's when you can have uncomfortable conversations in a comfortable way that to me is a sign that your relationship is actually serious not that you moved in uh not that you get nice gifts not that you can spend lots of time together or you go on vacations together can we have a conversation that usually creates conflict and not get mad at each other and not make it about each other's weaknesses. There's so many things that people like this tangible thing will allow me to be closer

moving in with someone. You can move in with someone and realize you barely know that person. But can you have a conversation and you don't even live together? Can you really go deep with someone like where they're trusting you with information that they clearly keep close to their chest that they're like, you know what? I trust you. Again, trust, stress is going down, trust is going up. And I love what you just said about the trust element. Like, the way we check whether we trust someone is like, we say we trust each other, right? Like, we literally asked that question, that makes no sense. It's like, it's like, we trust each other, right? Like, you trust me,

right? I trust you. It's like, no, like trust is me being able to tell you stuff that may be uncomfortable for me. One of my favorite questions that, and you can read more from the book, but one of my favorite questions that's not in the book is a question that I often ask my wife and I ask it even till this day. And so every couple of months I'll say to, and it's not like it's in my calendar. It's not like it's in a spreadsheet. I don't record the answers. This is a gen, you know, it's not a technique. It's a i don't record the answers this is a gen you know it's not a technique it's a genuine thing i'll say to her is this relationship going in the direction you want it to go in and if it's not what are we willing to do about it and if it is what are we

doing right that we should keep doing it's it's just such a healthy question and it's asked not because i think things are going wrong right like i'm not asking that because I'm scared or I'm worried I'm asking it because it's the same as doing this podcast right it's the same as doing anything uh there's a famous quote that says you can't improve what you don't measure right you can't grow something that you don't measure like you whether it's a business whether it's a podcast whether it's whether it's life and i just think life is something that is lived so unintentionally and unconsciously that 10 years go by someone comes knocks on the doors and goes i don't think it's working out anymore and you're surprised because that person kept it inside them every three months how they were feeling i was gonna

say i think that's such a testament to how much you trust your partner to be able to go to your wife and know that you're ready for any answer but you also kind of know there may be something little she wants to adjust but you know you're not going to be fully blindsided because you're constantly checking in because of consistency exactly and i also think it's like there's a lot of people, and I would really encourage daddy gang. I know it's so uncomfortable sometimes, but like having those hard conversations

allows longevity in a relationship and it to grow. Because if you're not having that conversation, like you said, you're having so many in your head. I hate him for this. I hate her for this. I hate them for this. And then you're like, what are we doing here? So that's really cool that you do that with your wife and if anything I'm going to

steal that from you because it's just a really mature way of basically saying I'm giving you the opportunity to say anything to me and I'm willing to hear it because I care so much about our relationship that my ego is on the floor right now and like i i care more about our partnership than whatever you're gonna say individually that i could potentially also work on and i then you also know she's willing to hear it from you if you're like because i've been thinking about this i mean i know this is hard like i want to empathize with everyone like i'm not saying this is easy i'm not saying that you should do this tomorrow. What I am saying is I'm just trying to save people from wasting 10 years of their life with someone that doesn't love them and that they don't feel loved by. Like that's where this is coming from. This isn't coming from a place of

I'm really smart and I know what to do in a relationship. It's coming from a place of just I know how hurt people have been by relationships and I know how much pain it causes when you feel blindsided and when you feel like you've just been surprised and someone just like delivered you a big notice that you had no idea was coming your way I just don't want you to have to go through that like you know I just want to save you from the big I not that I can save you but I want this advice to save you from the bigger pain to save someone for the bigger pain I agree with you I think there's sometimes people especially maybe in those early dating stages where they get a little excited, they get a little ahead of themselves. What's your advice for managing expectations in a new relationship? you make expectations? How do you set expectations? I believe the word expectation is completely

insignificant and useless. And I'll tell you why. An expectation is a hope, a wish, or a want that something might happen, just hopefully, randomly, potentially. I don't want to live my life in expectations. I want to live my life in intentions and actions and attention. Like I want to live my life in saying I'm going to be vulnerable in this relationship and I'm going to see if the person's vulnerable back. I'm not going to expect the person to be vulnerable or open because that doesn't give me anything. And so I kind of remove expectations from pretty much every area of my life. And I go, how do I change that into intentions action and attention so if I want a open exciting fun-filled relationship I'm gonna bring that

energy to the relationship and then see where that person matches if they're on a lower frequency or lower vibration it will show you won't have to ask them because you can tell immediately, right? Like if you bring your best, it's kind of like with an interview with a guest, you know, when a guest brings their best energy and now you were probably prepared anyway, because you're a great interview, but you can bring your best energy too. Now you're creating something amazing. But if you're waiting to see what energy the guest brings and then basing your energy off it, it kind of starts creating, it could create something that you don't want to create. And I think that happens in a relationship on a much bigger scale. What is your advice for people that are in a relationship where both of the partners

handle stress differently? That's such a great question. So, I mean, one of the things I've realized about stress recently is that oftentimes when we break a habit, for example, you want to be strict about what you eat, but chances are you break that habit when you're stressed. You want to be a nice, kind person, but chances are you compromise with that because you're stressed. I'm snappier with my wife when I'm stressed. I say things I don't want to say to my wife when I'm stressed. I won't say them to them if I'm not stressed. So you start seeing how stress literally makes you who you don't want to be. And so sometimes we're trying to manage our diet or we're trying to manage how we talk. It's like managing our stress is actually the core of what allows us to be a nicer human a healthier

human a better person when you handle stress differently i think the core in a relationship is knowing how the other person handles stress and i think for so long in relationships we don't know or we don't like so another thing and it goes back to respecting we have to respect unless it's abusive manipulative physically verbally like there's none of there's no part of me that says you have to be patient with anything of that sort but beneath that if anything in your life if you don't understand and accept the way your partner deals with stress is different to yours, that creates issues. So in the book, I break down three fight styles. And the reason why I came up with the fight styles is because me and my wife would always argue and fight and have discussions. And we would never swear or raise our voices, but we would get into really intense discussions,

debates around stuff that didn't even matter sometimes and stuff that did matter. And I would walk away always thinking like she didn't care as much as me. I would always feel like she didn't love me as much as I loved her because she had a different way of dealing with stress. So her way of dealing with stress was she wanted to lock herself in a room. She wanted to be quiet. She didn't want to talk to me me she just wanted space and time and she would figure it out and my way of dealing with stress is we're going to talk about right now we're going to talk about everything i've got all the points laid out the bullet points already and that shows i care and her way of showing she cares is give me some time if i get to reflect and digest and

introspect i I care. But I didn't think that. I think you don't care and I care because we always think what we do shows we care. Absolutely. And so my fight style, which I broke it down, is called venting. And her fight style is called hiding.

And the third fight style in the book is called exploding. And so a venter is me. I want to talk about it. I want to talk about it right now. A hider is, I don't want to talk about it, I need space and an exploder is, my emotions matter the most and I just need to talk about how I feel emotionally and so none of these are good or bad,

none of these are better or worse, none of these are things to judge each other for but when you know that's how your partner deals with stress, you can now create a healthier boundary. So me and my wife will say, all right, you need two days. I want to talk about it right now. We're going to talk about it in 12 hours.

Let's find the space where you get enough space, but I don't have to wait for two days because I want to talk about it now. And now I'm dealing with stress healthier rather than saying, oh, I don't like the way you deal with stress. You shouldn't be stressed. You don't deserve to be stressed.

I love that. I think everyone in a relationship can immediately immediately if you're thinking right now about your relationship you can kind of pinpoint how you deal with stress in the beginning of my relationship with my boyfriend it was the same dynamic i would be like i need a minute i'm gonna go and my boyfriend would be like we need to talk about this and he had the same exact response where he was like i feel like i care more about you in this relationship you don't care as much and I'm like just because I don't want to talk immediately I'm thinking about it up there but like I don't want to talk about it right now and so I think eventually we got to a point where we respected that boundary

of I know your need and I know my need and let's find compromise. Totally. And it changed the dynamic because what it also allowed us to do is feel safe in the relationship of like, okay, we now have established, we know we both care. Yeah. We are just handling it differently. Totally. And when you know that, like even when I was up in the bedroom, just like ruminating on something, I still knew, like I know he's there and he wants to talk and we're

both, we're going to figure this out. But you have to first acknowledge the difference in how you handle shit before you can actually then actually handle it. Yeah. And it's, and that's why I say respect because it's like judging someone for putting their milk before their cereal. Right. And it's like, you put your cereal before your milk and you would never be like, Oh, I mean, I mean, some people get really passionate about this kind of stuff but generally i would think that you wouldn't but that is exactly how we deal with stress it's that like it's that example cereal first obviously yeah but again no judgment but cereal before the milk but that's what i mean like we get so attached to like how we have learned to process emotions

and we think if you don't process emotions like i do you don't care you don't love me we're not in this together and that's and that's what we just create assumptions out of nothing yeah i start pushing the other person away and i'm like no just realize that that person deals with it that way you deal with that way and we'll figure it out i have one more final question okay what is the most common mistake people make in love i think the biggest mistake people make in love is that they think the epitome peak experience of love is only through romantic love and i think people devalue the love a mother has for their kids, friends have for each other, people have for their brothers and sisters, the love kids have for their parents. Like there are so many opportunities in life to give and receive

love. And the biggest mistake we make is we think that this romantic relationship is the only place I get to give and receive love, which means I know single moms who love their kids with all their heart and their kids love them back, but they don't feel like that's enough because society has said, well, if you don't have someone in your life,

then you are not worthy of love. And so we kind of have a hierarchy of love where it's like romantic loves at the top. And when I look at the greatest acts of love in the world, often they're not romantic, often their family, often their friendship, often their people for society, like sacrifice. So I just, I just want people to remember that as much as romantic love is important, don't And I think that's a mistake we make in relationships because I think a healthy relationship is where two people say we want to make this work, not a relationship where you're searching for this perfect person, fully formed, ready-made, waiting to come out of a box. And I think that's kind of how we've been trained, like the perfect Barbie doll and the Ken doll that sits inside a box that's shiny sparkly brand new they they are the they're wearing the

perfect outfit that we want them to wear we can buy clothes to put on them and make them who we are and it's like that person doesn't exist but what does exist is this unique interesting flawed fascinating individual that wants to make it work with you and you want to make it work with them. And that's what makes you more special because you chose each other. You weren't meant for each other. If you were just meant for each other,

that means there was no choice. That means it was just meant to be. But if you chose each other, that's what makes you special and that's what makes them special and that's what makes what you have special because every day you're working against all odds to be together it it's such a good point it the like we said the word growth and the effort that you're putting in is also why you're in love with that

person the issues you've gone through the things that you've had to overcome that's why i'm in love with my partner that's why you're with your wife it's like looking at what we've gone through and how we've gotten to this point I don't want something that's easy I want something that's worth the work and the effort Jay Shetty everyone go read your book it is truly like there are exercises this is not a book that you're just casually reading like I read this and it is really incredible Jay just like you are exercises. This is not a book that you're just casually reading. Like I read this and it is really incredible. Jay, just like you are able to do exercises that are very thought provoking and really give you an insight into yourself and what you want for your future. So Jay Shetty, it was an absolute pleasure. Alex, thank you so much. You're so phenomenal at what

you do. This is so fun. You're the sweetest. Like I'm so'm so honestly this is like I'm so grateful to you on such a deep level for doing this and to open me up to your beautiful community Daddy Gangsta I love you thank you so much