Couple Things with Shawn and Andrew - 73 Mathew Hussey

Episode Date: July 7, 2021

This week on Couple Things, we got to chat with dating expert, Matthew Hussey. Matthew talks with us about his advice for anyone that is starting, ending, or currently in a relationship. We even ask him what his #1 pick ups line is… We think you’ll want to tune into this one. It gets juicy.  Here are a few topics that we cover: 0:00 Timestamps 2:37 Is Mathew single? 3:30 living up to the pressure 5:53 how andrew won over shawn 8:07 andrew’s first impression of shawn 9:42 are there certain qualities that everyone is attracted to? 13:23 what should someone look for when dating? 14:32 investment and timing 17:56 what are the true compatibility factors? 20:30 key principals to follow while dating 27:03 going back to people who aren’t good for you 30:08: improving your confidence 34:24 marriage and mathew’s goals 39:14 do pick-up lines work? 41:50 first impressions 44:12 the importance in how you react 47:40 what attracted mathew to his girlfriend 51:30 why mathew is constantly learning 53:26 the absence of judgement You can follow him on Instagram here ▶ https://www.instagram.com/thematthewhussey/?hl=en  Matthew’s page here ▶ https://www.howtogettheguy.com/ ANDD....WE ARE GOING ON TOUR!! Check out the link below to see if we are coming to a city near you in 2022! Click here to get your tickets now ▶ https://www.couplethingspod.com/ We are sponsored by these companies that we love. Check them out below: Generate Life ▶ This new screening test can detect more than 200 conditions and analyzes your child’s response and sensitivity to more than 40 medications. Now, what are you waiting for, guys? Hurry to https://www.cordblood.com to learn more about CBR's Family Protection Package with ReadyGen today! If you haven’t yet, please rate Couple Things and subscribe to hear more. Follow us on Instagram to keep the conversation going at https://www.instagram.com/couplething... To download Matthew's free confidence training video go to getcoreconfidence.com  Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/CoachMatthewHussey Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/gettheguyteam Instagram: @thematthewhussey And if you have suggestions/recommendations for the show, send us your ideas in a video format – we might just choose yours! Email us at [e-mail]. Subscribe for more! http://bit.ly/3rnOdNo Follow My Instagram ▶ http://www.instagram.com/ShawnJohnson Like the Facebook page! ▶ http://www.facebook.com/ShawnJohnson Follow My Twitter ▶ http://www.twitter.com/ShawnJohnson Snapchat! ▶ @ShawneyJ Follow AndrewsTwitter ▶ http://www.twitter.com/AndrewDEast Follow My Instagram ▶ http://www.instagram.com/AndrewDEast Like the Facebook page! ▶ http://www.facebook.com/AndrewDEast Snapchat! ▶ @AndrewDEast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What you say you're looking for and what you accept are very different things. Having a standard is only a real standard if it's backed up by a certain level of confidence and a certain level of courage. What's up everybody? Welcome back to a couple things. With Sean and Andrew. A podcast all about couples. And the things they go through. And today we have the one and only couple.

guru, Matthew Hussey. That's right. Matthew is the genius behind the number one YouTube channel for dating advice. He's also written a New York Times bestselling book called Get the Guy. This guy just lives, talks, and breeze dating. His YouTube channel has been viewed over 330 million times. His weekly videos reach 8 million followers. And he has a newsletter with 2 million readers daily. On top of that, he has his own radio show, Love Life with Matthew Hussie. That's right. And I think he's pretty much considered like the number one dating coach. Yeah. In like out there. Yeah. We're expert. Which everyone, whichever you want to go with. I do think my favorite thing about this interview though is that he

constantly kept saying or like continually said he's constantly learning. Yeah. And updating his advice, which I think was really cool. Yeah. And he was highly requested from you all. So thank you for introducing us to Matthew. It was fun to go through and hear his thoughts on dating. We had an interesting conversation with what his goal is though with all of his dating advice. Is it to push people towards marriage or what? And he has an interesting response. And we had an interesting conversation about his love life. Oh my gosh. I know. I hope we're able to share that. Me too. Anyway, we'll link more information about Matthew and what he's up to down below. He has courses. He has trainings and he has all of his content he puts out. It's all great. Check it out. The comment of the week, babe, is from the

Red, Yellow, or Green Flags episode. And you know what? It comes from Darcy, who says, I think the person judging someone on if they have a headboard or not could be a red flag. Yes. Darcy, I completely agree. But I don't want to just say that without having the person who submitted that red flag. For sure.

Be able to give defense. Anyway, that was a fun episode. So thank you for your comments. We're going to continue doing comment on the week because we, love all of your opinions. So keep them up. And before we jump into it, please subscribe to the episode. Give it a rating on whatever platform you're listening on. Without further ado, we bring you Matthew Hussey. Matthew, thank you so much for joining us. I just want to start off here, clear the air, because we've had a lot of people ask, are you dating somebody? Does this guy have a

girlfriend? Because we've had more girls ask about you and how they can get in contact than maybe I've ever been asked before. There's a lot of assumptions made about me in one. In one direction or the other. I heard someone, someone commented on my Instagram the other day saying, you're the, you're the single friend giving all their friends advice. And I was like, what makes you think I'm single? Like I, whatever story they want, they put on me. But no, I'm actually in a relationship. Wow. Dang. Congratulations. Congratulations. Thank you. You just broke a lot of hearts, but yeah, congrats. I'm curious, you being the number one dating advice coach. Mm-hmm.

In the world. In the world. Number one in the world. That's what it says. That's what it says. Is it tough to live up to that pressure? Because I can't imagine, you know, like, you always got to be the suave guy to a certain extent, you know?

It's bloody impossible, Andrew. Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, I don't know what number one really means. I mean, I have, you know, everyone's the number one something. We all make big claims for ourselves. I look at it like I'm just, you know, I've been around doing this for quite. a while now the kind of unnerving amount of time i've been coaching people for 15 years and i started this

company i think 14 around 14 years ago and i became known for helping women in their love lives but you know before that i was actually working with guys a lot of people don't know that i was working exclusively with men for a couple of two years then ended up working with women and didn't have time to do both so then i ended up working with women and now literally millions of people later it's kind of ended up a bit of both, mostly women, but actually we still have a large male following too and a large gay following. And it's just a, it's just really turned into something much more universal, which is, is really fun. And I'm still, I still make a ton of ridiculous mistakes. And, you know, I, it's just harder when I make mistakes, because I'm really,

I shame myself for them sometime. I like, I'll do something I know better. I know I shouldn't do that. I know that was a stupid thing to say. I know I handled that argument really badly. And, and then I have to sort of show myself some compassion because otherwise I beat myself up to no end. Oh, what? You're talking about in your dating relationship right now. Of course. Yeah. Oh, man. Oh, yeah. That's true because I can plead ignorance. Like, hey, I, you know, I'm just, I'm just figuring out on the fly, but you kind of are coming from an expert. I'm an athlete. Yeah. Dude, it's a great excuse. Don't give him that. Don't give him that. He doesn't need more.

That's funny. Yeah, no, I'm supposed to, I'm supposed to know better. But I still, you know, by correct course quite quickly, and I'm good at looking at myself. I'm very, you know, I like to think. Yeah, we know you're good looking, Matthew. You didn't need to say it yourself, okay? We get it, dude, all right. Geez.

No, I get it. Go on, you've got a charmer. I like it. Oh, yeah. He knows it, too. Oh, well, hold on. We'll get to tips. I do have a couple more questions.

I'm just excited. I'm excited. I know. I know. I know. I know. I've watched. videos. But I do have to say, in full disclosure, Matthew, I have zero game. So the fact that I am

sitting next to the woman of my dreams is strictly due to my sense of humor. As you can tell, it's very strong. I'm, I'm kidding. I'm done. I don't know why I'm talking so much. Is that true that he's got no game? Because it's hard, I feel like he had some game. It was really rough at the beginning. I'm not going to lie. I felt like when we first started dating. I lived in L.A. at the time and I had been on dates with guys who felt like they were reading from a book. They were following the instructions. They were trying to say the right things. They were doing the right things. Lewis. But it all, what? No, go ahead. I'm getting. No. It all felt like it was a game. It all felt like it was contrived and like they were trying to

make the impression. And then Andrew comes along and was so rough around the edges. I was like, is this guy for real you said there's no way this is a practice group too but it was it was just such a adorable mess that it was just yeah I just fell in love with it well with he did he came as very authentic very and such and he was just he was so unapologetically himself and he wasn't trying to play a game and he wasn't trying to put on a facade of any of any of any sort. He was just kind of like, this is me. And it was just adorable. And I was like, this guy. Was that, was that the thing that attracted you, the sort of the authenticity, the sincerity of it? Or was it something else? I think for me, it was the authenticity and sincerity

because I felt like at the time I was living in a world of perfection, where everybody just tried to be so perfect. And I feel like we still do that it takes such a long time for you to truly get to know someone because people try to impress you and be something else until it wears off and they can't, you know, fake it anymore. And Andrew just came in and you could tell it was just him. And I was just like, this is really refreshing. And I loved it. Thanks. What was it? I'm just curious. What was it for you, Andrew, in reverse? The first time I saw Sean smile, Sean was like doing dancing with the stars. She was like living this Hollywood lifestyle. and we first met and she like you could tell she was this sweet girl but I don't know she like just

wasn't as happy as you would expect or like bubbly I had a lot of walls up yeah but then she cracked a single smile and I was like I'm gonna I'm gonna get a second smile my goal is now to get a third smile and like I just kept going down this road and the more smiles I unlocked I feel like the the more I understood who she was like at her essence and it was interesting not to get in the weeds of our relationship, but dating Sean who had been in the public eye and had so many layers of whatever hurt and expectations and people only talking to her about, you know, when Sean has conversations, it's about gymnastics or dancing with the stars. Those are only two questions. And so, like, it was almost this adventure to try to figure out who she was, you know, at her

core. So is there one of you that's more gushy or like forward or romantic or, you? Or are you both sort of similar in that respect? I'm definitely more forward. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Definitely. He wrote me a poem on our first date, which is, again, I was like, this guy is like out of a movie or something. It was adorable.

So I want to transition to tips, and you actually brought up something interesting. You asked Sean, was she attractive to the authenticity? Do you find that there are certain qualities that everybody's attracted to? And certainly, we're each attracted. to different things. Maybe, maybe I'm more attracted to humor than another person who might be attracted to like ambition more. But like, are there certain underlying qualities that are good to resonate with? That's a, that's a great question. It's, it's actually a, wow. Is it 8pm over there? Is it midnight? That happens on the hour, every hour, everywhere in London. No, it's, it's 11

past the hour. I'm confused. No, it's just literally someone at my door. It was a doorbell. It's like Mr. Rogers' neighborhood over here. That's hilarious. It's either one very impatient person or two people in a row in a very short What are you doing? I don't know. It is a great question whether there are things that are universally attractive. I think certain things are more important to some people than others. So if you take, I think kindness is universally important, but kindness is more important to people who are in one stage of development than another. When you talk to someone who's 22, kindness, this is no judgment on 22 year olds, some of them may have really

amazing value systems, but it may not be the most important thing to someone at that age. It might be that the person is hot, that the person has this cool career or that the person, person is super creative because they're looking for something that's fun and exhilarating. And not that those things at a certain age cease to matter to us. It's just that some things come to matter more. Kindness comes to matter more to people when they realize what happens in a relationship where there's an absence of kindness. So I think teamwork is sort of universally attractive to a person who's ready for a

relationship. I think that emotional intelligence is universally important to a person who is emotionally intelligent and is looking for that. I think there are certain things, honesty. Perhaps we would all say honesty is important. You're hard pressed whether you're, you know, 20 years old or 50 years old to find someone who says honesty isn't important to me. I think that's one of those things that's always important. Yeah. Man, that's, it's interesting you saying someone who's ready for a relationship will be more attracted to teamwork and it's almost like it is it brings up the idea of you reap what you sow kind of of or you find what you're looking for and that is it's a responsibility it seems to really like okay

you know if i'm a 22 and i value attractiveness or i value money and career like then that's what you'll end up dating to a certain extent it's because i because you just do that's what you look for but planning out like okay actually think 20 years from now and what do you want your relationship to look like when when you're all wrinkly and old you know the attractiveness will be less I don't know I'm having philosophical thoughts so I'll stop talking about I go ahead no please Sean go for it I was just going to say I think the I think where you have to start with that though is there aren't many 20 year olds that look in 40 years into the future and they say who do I want to be with when I'm 60 years old and who do I want to date now?

No 20 year olds doing that. I mean, if they are, that's amazing. So what is it that a 20 year old needs to be looking for or doing or how should they be acting in order not to have a one-sided relationship and to truly find someone that they can be with long term? Look, at 20 years old or 22 years old or whatever, you could say at any time before you're really ready for a relationship, you're looking for it just, I suppose, you might be looking for just attraction

and you value attraction more than anything else. And so what you go for is who you think is the most attractive person you can get. And that seems like that's the win. This person is more attractive than anyone else I've ever dated, that must mean. And we have more chemistry. Chemistry is valued extremely highly.

and investment tends to be valued very on a very low level someone who's actually compatible tends to be valued on a very low level so you've got attraction and chemistry extremely important investment and compatibility not very important at all what do you mean when you say investment someone who's actually trying you know someone who's actually investing in us someone who is making sacrifices in the in the relationship someone who is willing to come to our part of town someone who is interested in getting to know our people someone who is uh willing to actually give time and energy to this relationship that's that's something that some people by the way never never reevaluate this and wow huge problem because that's why they get hurt over and over

again because they're still dating in their adult life like a 16 year old date. dates. Oh, God, this person is so attractive and they show all their friends the picture of this person on a dating app. Look, and their friends were all like, oh, my God, you know, that you did really well there. My God, you're killing it. Are you killing it if he treats you badly or if she treats you badly? Are you killing it if you're not actually compatible? If you have no, if you have completely different outlooks on life, but people do tend to, I really do think There's a kind of, I've come to believe more and more in life, timing is where it's at. Because there's a kind of the romantic idea that when you meet the right person,

everything just clicks into place. But to me, the precursor to that is when you are genuinely in a place of wanting a real relationship. And wanting a relationship is not the same. Being ready for a relationship is not the same as being ready to not be lonely anymore. more. That's a very different thing. A lot of people who say they're ready for a relationship are just ready to not be on their own. That doesn't mean a relationship. The relationship is a different level of commitment. It's a different level of investment. It's genuinely

wanting to know who someone is and making peace with that and accepting that and elevating the best in that person and soothing the worst in that person and having them do the same for a us and that that i think is what gets so many people into trouble is that they're not really they're not really doing that they get into relationships where there's tons of chemistry and there's fireworks and they never really evaluate if this is a strong person to build something with if i can can i truly construct when i look at you too i'm like that you know the fact that you wrote a poem on the first date is actually a really great story, Andrew, in the context of a relationship that panned out. Like a relationship. Even if it was a really bad poem? What if it was a terrible poem?

I don't think you're being judged. That's true. I think that that story for a guy who was at the time sleeping with five different people and not interested in a relationship and not, it's a very different story. That paints a very different picture. But in the context of someone who actually did want to build something, that becomes a really interesting gesture. It becomes something that's actually either sweet or funny or whatever, but it's in the context of something bigger. And I just think people don't pay enough attention to that context. Talking about how attraction and chemistry is usually what drives someone to find a partner, not long-term, but it's the driving force. You talked about compatibility. What are true compatibility factors that people should

be taking into consideration outside of chemistry and attraction? Well, to your point, though, I don't think those should be the things that gets into a relationship. They can get us onto a date. They can get us into bed with someone. They can get us, you know, a fun. They can have us building attraction and connection because they become kind of motivations to spend time together. But they shouldn't be the thing that gets into a relationship. That's something I believe that should happen more slowly. Compatibility is something that can only really be tested by spending real time together and seeing each other in real situations. How are you on days where work is stressful? How are you on days where you're not, you haven't got your best game face on, your

date night face on how are you when i've had a difficult day myself how do we solve a problem together when it comes up or do we solve a problem together can we solve a problem together it's it's all of those moments that you don't really not we think we know a person we don't we we you know we go on a few dates with them we get to know five or 10 percent of them you know maybe 30%, but we then extrapolate what the rest of them is. Our brain is just this, it's this incredible machine that very quickly paints a picture of who someone is based on the 5 or 10%. And then we fall in love with this person very quickly, but we're falling in love with

a 90% made up person. And that's why, you know, to me, someone who falls in, can someone who consistently falls head over heels too quickly is one of the surest signs they're not ready for a relationship because they're not really taking the time to measure compatibility. They meet someone to go, they're charming, we went to a great restaurant, we had so much chemistry, they were funny, they had, you know, wow, I'm like, I'm really falling for this person. And you're like, what are you talking about? You have a track, you may have an infatuation with this person, but that's not a relationship is just a complete.

completely different set of what makes a great date is not the same as what makes a great relationship so two questions one is there a timeline actually three what is the percentage of a person that you should like aim to know before you get married two is there a timeline where you feel like the discovery process is like able to unearth enough of knowing a person that you can proceed to the next step of engagement or whatever that looks like and then three, I know this is a lot, sorry, but is the strategy then in dating to throw yourself into any and all random situations so that I can learn how the other person responds to these different situations? So just remind me what was question two, the discovery phase? Yeah, what is there

a timeline that's like, hey, you know what? You should be able to know in three months that this is going to work out or not. Well, I don't think there's a role and I don't like rules, but I do like principles and if you said what's a good principle to follow it would be let me let me run at each stage a kind of mini experiment to you know someone recently said to me like I you know me and this guy were really in love but he he still lives right through COVID he's been living at home with his mom and I'm a bit worried that if we move in together because we can't both afford our own place If we move in together to share the rent, I don't know what he's like on his own yet or whether he, I don't know if he's spoiled by his mom and he's, you know, going to rely on me to do everything

around the house. I don't know if he's going to be a genuine teammate in that situation. Yeah. You know, I'm all about the mini experiment. It sounds like a big conversation to say, let's sign a year lease. That's a big thing. Yeah. What's to stop you saying, why don't we rent an Airbnb for a month?

Like, let's rent an Airbnb for a month and just see how we do living together on our own for a month. It doesn't even have to be, it doesn't have to be framed up as a trial run. It could just be, hey, look, I know it's a big, I know moving in together and signing a long lease is a big step. And it, you know, it's possibly a bit of a scary step. But I know that I do want us to give living together a go. I think we'd be a great together in that scenario. Why don't we rent a place for a month so that we can go and experience it together? I think that's a great way to run the experiment.

And oh, it worked for a month. Maybe we rent for another three or maybe we do six months. But that allows you to move to the next step without making every next step such a huge deal. And I do think that some of what stops people from moving to the next step is that they do, they exaggerate. And I've been in this position before myself where you exaggerate what the next step means because you think, oh, God, if I jump into that

and then I'm not ready, I'm going to hurt someone. But when someone is able to communicate, hey, look, it's all right. We're not signing a contract here for life. Let's just try this together. I like you, you like me. We're having an amazing time together. Why don't we see where this goes?

No one says you can't leave or I can't leave. Let's just see where this goes. And I think that would allow a lot more people to try having a relationship together without freaking out about what that means. As far as marriage goes, you know, I think you guys, I'm sure I have a really fantastic opinion on this on when is the right time. I don't know that there is a right time, but I think one has to say those truly important values. When I think about what's most important in someone I'm going to build with for life,

do they have those things? If you look at a lot of couples broke up over the pandemic. And some broke up because it was just such an intense situation and it was so unnatural. And we wouldn't, we wouldn't say that was a great recipe for a thriving relationship is to stick two people in a room together and not let them leave for a year, that wouldn't be a model making something work. So I do sympathise. I don't think every couple that broke up during the pandemic was always destined to fail. I think it put an enormous amount of pressure on some couples. But I also think there are a lot of couples that shouldn't have been together that discovered in that time, I'm, this person's not my person. I'm not, they were almost more in love with that

person's absence than they were in love with their presence. Because when that person was absent before the pandemic, when they were going to work every day, when they were with their friends, whatever, when it was long distance, it worked. And then as soon as it wasn't, as soon as I was met with that person's presence, the real person, not the imaginary person I had in my head that I was in a relationship with, they suddenly said to themselves, this isn't the person I want to be with. And I've been a lot of people during the pandemic, when you think what qualities would have been great in a person I'm with during that time? What qualities would have made someone a great partner to go through the pandemic with patients,

the ability to not the ability to not argue, but the ability to argue well. Someone who is kind, somebody's understanding of some of my crazy, we've all got our crazy, someone who understands and can accept, you know, and soothe my crazy, someone who sees the best in me, somebody's encouraging, you know, all of that would have made for a great partner to go through the pandemic with go through a difficult time with well you should apply that going forward now if anyone who's coming out of the pandemic going wow that's really made me realize I want a relationship because that was hard to do I'd love the next time hard times come around I want to do it with someone before going out and panic buying a relationship on that basis

people should think what were those qualities that I would have wanted during that time let me not rush into anything with a person before I realized they actually have those qualities. That's just like the new standard. Can I get through a pandemic with you? Yeah. Well, outside of a pandemic, honestly, doing the evaluation, anytime there is an interrelationship actually thinking about, hey, you know what? This didn't work out and that's okay, but let me think about why it didn't so that I can be better equipped going into the next one. I have a random question. Do you see in working with all the women that you worked with and all the men that people tend to have trends of the types of people that they get into relationships with?

And it's just a never-ending cycle of, I don't want to say failure, but do, I guess it goes back to like we've talked to a lot of people who say I made a list of what I'm looking for and it's just not working. Why do people tend to go back to that? Why do they go back to the same old people that never works with despite the fact that they have a good quality list of things they're looking for in front of them? Yes. What you say you're looking for and what you accept are very different things. Having a standard is only a real standard if it's backed up by a certain level of confidence

and a certain level of courage to say, I'm not going to allow myself to settle for less than this because I've realized and hopefully with some experience, we have realized that life isn't good when I accept less than this. Like my life is literally worse. I think it's a false economy accepting less than this because it literally makes my life worse. It makes me unhappy. It makes me scared. It makes me anxious.

It makes me depressed. It erodes my self-esteem. steam, that life is worse when I accept less, but so many people keep repeating the same thing because their confidence has never risen to the level of their professed standards. Dang. Today's episode is brought to you by, I know you do life coaching as well. And I think dating in life, you know, improvement kind of go hand in hand at a certain extent because the confidence is so key when you're going, like, dude, I shot my shot with this girl.

you know i felt and had i not had the confidence then we wouldn't be here or have started our dating journey so yeah and you know here's the crazy part even when you get the girl or get the guy you're not in the clear as far as your confidence at that point lack of confidence will haunt you at every juncture in life because even if you stepped out of yourself bravely and you got a great person and now you're in a relationship, you still, if you're not, if you truly don't feel confident in yourself and your life and what you bring to the table and what you've created, then you now just live in fear. You're just afraid that you're going to lose that person. You're just afraid that you're not good enough for that person. You're just afraid that that person

is going to leave you for somebody else because they're going to wake up to the fact that I never deserve them in the first place and they're going to see someone better looking than me or they're going to see someone funnier than me or more successful or more whatever and they're going to leave me for that person that lack of confidence plagues us every step of the way and it's one of the great one of the thing you know people sometimes take my my programs and they'll come to me and they'll they'll say I took your program you know I've got one called uh attraction to commitment and it's it's literally a program that's designed to show you how to get out of something casual and into something in serious. And there'll be people who say, I did the program. It worked. And finally, I get to say

with thanks, Matthew, that I can unsubscribe to your advice now, because I have the guy. And I'm like, that's not, that's not my message. This is now like, this is where your confidence really gets put to work. It's a start line. Yeah. Yeah, because it's you, those demons can creep in any, at any moment. And the irony of our love lives is that most of, there's certainly a competence as there is with anything, right? There's a competence aspect to any skill in life, whether it's gymnastics or American football or public speaking or a relationship. There is actually a competence factor that's actually weirdly often overlooked in our life. Whenever someone says, it's just about being yourself. I'm like, whoa, whoa, like yes, of course it's about being

yourself or being the best version of yourself. But there's a competence aspect to this. You learn certain things in your early relationships. You learn, oh, wow, I said something there that really hurt that person. Yeah. You feel so terrible for having in a moment of weakness, in a moment of fear, in a moment of anger, said something you couldn't take back that repeated on you in that relationship months or even years later. That person remembered it and it still haunted them. Having that experience breeds a kind of competence because you say to yourself, oh, I'm never doing that again. If you ever get into another relationship after that, there's a little piece of you that goes, I know how damaging words can be and how hard they are

to take back. And so even when I'm tempted to say that really nasty thing, I'm going to be more careful about what I say. That's not confidence. That's competence. So there's a competence aspect. but the irony about our love lives is that so much of what makes them great has nothing to do with your love life it has to do with how much of a big rich beautiful life you live that means if the person that you're dating never has a gun to your head that's loaded by your scarcity your insecurity that if you leave me i'll have nothing when you know that you have a big life to walk back into or that you're already in any moment, then someone leaving is painful,

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Stellist lenses for myopia control. Learn more at SLOR.com and ask your family eye care professional for SLR Stellist lenses at your child's next visit. Matthew, is the goal of all your dating courses and programs and advice marriage? Because we're big fans of a book called The Meaning of Marriage and he talks about the value of having a contract in the relationship because, you know, you're talking about the percentage of the of the person that you get to know and this author makes the argument that without that legal contract um you don't have the you know stick toitiveness factor I guess to actually get to know the last 10% and the contract keeps you in the game so that you can unearth all of a person so what are your thoughts on that had you been speaking to me

even five years ago I think I might have had a very different answer on this I am a I'm a slight I'm a little bit of a contrarian by nature I'm definitely a skeptic I don't I always want to question everything and there was definitely a time in my life where I looked at marriage through the lens of

well I I'm not a big fan of authority so the idea of anyone getting involved in my personal relationship and holding me to it You know, the idea of involving the state in some way in my relationship was something that I was allergic to. But and then I also said, well, why do I need a, why do I need a piece of paper to tell me how much I love someone or how much someone loves me? It's kind of like when I first got to, to LA, I had a, you know, I had an agent and I remember that agent saying to me, listen, this only, we don't need a contract because at any point, if one of us isn't winning anymore out of this, we'll leave as long as we're both winning we'll stay and i thought well pretty fair i i've changed my mind to some extent on that in relation to marriage not in the sense that i think everyone should get

married and it's certainly not the goal of my work i always say i'm as i'm as excited by the people that come up to me and tell me they they they broke up with someone because of me yeah as i am about the people that tell me they're in a relationship now because of me yeah the goal is always is always happiness and frankly on a more existential level to me the the reason i want to be on this earth the reason i want to make an impact is just to help people get through life a little easier a lot freer and and with a feeling of being less alone not because they found somebody but because they were able to to relate to other people to realize that their depression their anxiety their sadness, whatever they're struggling with that they think is insurmountable, whatever pain,

be it emotional or physical, that's chronic, that they can't seem to alleviate, that nothing they do seems to budge. To me, I always want to save those lives. I want to remind people that you're in good, if you're suffering in life, if you are having a hard go of it, you're in wonderful company. Yeah. So I want to make people feel less alone more than anything in this world. I, in terms of marriage, I look at that as I increasingly agree with the argument that you put forward that there is, I said, look, I got a friend of mine who's an older gentleman, he's an atheist, he's intensely logical, I wouldn't say he's overly romantic, he's married. And I said to him, you don't strike me as the person that's like, you're married. Why did you do it? And he said to

me, it does just feel a bit different after that. He said it, it's not, it's not that it gets easier necessarily or he said it's just there's something that feels different. You have a different level of security. Yeah. That breeds, you sort of relax a little more because of that. And, you know, arguments that you would have had pre-marriage that might have made you go, oh, do I really want this? He said, after marriage, you say to us, you, there's, you don't question it in the same way because you say, I'm in it. And I think that idea that that gentleman put forward that the difficulty of exiting

that situation makes you put in that extra effort to fix what needs to be fixed in a way that you might not otherwise. It's a bit like a company making refunds more difficult. You're more likely to put a back. If you tell me I've got to package it in its original box and write a letter and I tell you why I don't want it and then mail it back to the other side of the country and whatever. I'm just going to, you know what, I'll keep the hairdresser. That was incredible. But I have a very serious question to ask, which is, are there any pickup lines that work?

Well, yes. Yes, there are, and I think that the simpler, the better, because the less, the less simple they are, the more likely they are to feel contrived. You know, when someone, it's a bit like texting, you don't want to send texts that are too clever. Because when they're too clever, it's like, I've had people before send me like texts or messages that are so, so sort of thought out and overly. clever and overly witty and you just think how long did you spend thinking of you know you've given

away your insecurity in the message itself and I think you have pickup lines so I I always think the simpler the better it almost the quicker that you can just say hello in a way that doesn't telegraph you've been thinking of coming over to them for the last three hours the better because that's what you don't want because that communicates too much if i've been thinking for hours how am i going to come over to you i've already made you something you're not and people can sense that they can sense if you if if you've made it this difficult to come over to me you're already projecting it's already not about me it's about some version you have in your hair is because i'm i'm good looking and i'm used to people turning that into some big projection of who

I am and you've already made too much of it. You've already given, you've betrayed your own value in the difficulty that you've assigned to coming up to me. And that's why the quicker, the more offhand it is, the more, the quicker you see someone that you want to talk to and you could just get close to them and look across the bar and say, hey, how are you? The more quicker you can do that, the quicker you can put yourself on someone's radar, give a green light to whatever can come next and not over telegraph how much you care about this situation, which doesn't make sense in the context of someone who, for all you know, could be an absolute bloody nightmare. And people should also recognize that this is kind of a cool lesson for human dynamics

anyway that is really valuable for business, for relationships, for the person you just meet. if you imagine that, or let's say person A and person B, person A says something to person B. That's action one, let's call it. Person B has a reaction. That's action two. The most important part of this interaction hasn't happened yet. We think, when we think of first impressions, we take that too literally. We think a first impression is the first thing I say.

But encompassed in the first impression is not just, action one, which is, let's say, the first thing I say to someone, and it's not action two, which is the first response they have. It's action three, which is the response I have to your response. When I'm on stage, on tour, I get on stage, 1,500 people in the room, and I say something. That's me throwing the first shot. That's action one. Action two is the reaction to me. Now, let's say that the reaction to me is someone stands up in the middle of a crowded theater and disagrees with something I said. You know what, Matt?

I just thought about what you said, and it's totally wrong. That's action too. The most important part of this hasn't happened yet. The most important part of what's going on right now is in my hands, and it's how I react to this heckle, to this criticism. that is where all my power comes from. When I go on stage, I'm hoping someone in the audience disagrees with me. Because in that moment, I get to win over the entire audience

because the entire audience sees me get disagreed with. They then get to see me know my subject better than they ever imagined I did. Now I have true power in that room. But that was the third action, not the first. Now, to bring it back to what you said, Sean, the pickup line gets overvalued because we overvalue action one actually we should almost think nothing of action one action one can just be hey how's it going what you're drinking that looks cool whatever deep that's just action one act the reaction is what you get back and your reaction

to their reaction which is action three is actually the most important part in creating the impression you got me thinking about improv and how like you know we have several comic friends and you know they they have a premeditated line that they'll say to the audience he doesn't really know what they're going to respond to next but it's that that as you're saying the third step where it's completely raw that it's it's not premeditated at all it's just based off of whatever he just was teed up with that you kind of see the talent of their comedy or you know in this in this spot or this scenario like what is this person about and how can they That's so true, Andrew, and that is where we come.

That's where we, that's like where we earn our money. That's where we, in every walk of life, by the way, like, that's when you realize someone's truly great is someone said something and boom, they come back with the thing, when you go, oh, my God, they're quick. Or someone in a relationship, you have, what's the strength of a relationship? I may say something that upsets my girlfriend. I'm like, I'm an idiot. I should never have said that.

Now she has a reaction to me. And she's now on a certain way, like she reacts and gives me something back. Now, our ability to do action three. And in this case, me, because I'm the one who's screwed up, my ability to react to the argument in a productive way shows my ability to have a relationship. It's not my ability to never argue.

It's what, how do I? make sense of this argument. How do I turn it around with great leaders in a company? It's always going to be a moment where something's happened. It's upset your employees or it's, you know, something didn't go to plan. The action got a reaction you never thought it would. It's how you react to that and what you, the meeting you call with your employees to say, hey, guys, listen, this is what happened.

And it was a big mistake and I'm going to clear it up. You know, that's when all your employees go, oh, we. can I can hang with this person in this company because I've got an honest leader on my hands and the same is released content online, right? You guys, I'm sure, you've released something at some point that's, you know, sent people, got people upset, made them, you know, they've misinterpreted it. And I always have to remind myself, because I've said things that got a reaction I didn't expect. People took it the wrong way. And I went, oh my God, I didn't see that coming. so now people have a bad reaction but every time i then step up and i say you know guys i got

this reaction and it made me think you know here's what i really meant by this and i could see how it's taken that way but let me clarify this because this is so important then there'll be people in the comments that go this is why i follow you i love this video because you hit it on the head and you came right out and talked about it yeah that's where you earn your your your points It's the most revealing part about the core of who you are. That's interesting. That's good, Matthew. That's good.

I want to bring it full circle. You first started asking us questions about how we met and why, like, it worked out. What is it about your girlfriend that, if you want to talk about it? Oh, dang. That attracted you to her. I hope she's still sitting there. Is she sitting right there? He's right over there.

All of a sudden, guys, she's really. really perked up. Yeah. So what is it? What was it? What is it about her that attracted you to her and made your guys' relationship work? So it's a couple of things, but that encompass a lot. One is character.

I saw we didn't not have disagreements. We didn't not have arguments. We didn't not, you know, have things that we weren't sure about. It was, I saw. or how she handled things when they didn't go well. And I was like, oh, man, this is like, this is a real, I can really build with this person. Like, this is someone I can actually construct with.

Because it doesn't, it doesn't rely on everything going right. I don't have to, I don't have to score a perfect game for this to work. And neither does she. Like, we really have a beautiful way of resolving things. And so character was one. She's the most emotionally intelligent person I've ever met. That's a huge one. She's like, keep going.

She really is. Can we meet her? Hey, no. You know what? I won't because I'll be putting her on the spot. Okay, okay, fair, fair. But I, she is, she's incredibly emotional. emotionally intelligent. And what that means is I, I'm actually learning from her. You know, in any

normal scenario, someone would be, I think someone would come, I know from my past that people have come to me feeling like when they're with me, they're, they're like I'm somehow going to be the one who does everything right. Or I'm going to be the one that sees everything through the ideal lens. And actually, she gets more right than I do. And she's, she has. has an incredible emotional intelligence about her that means I can talk to her about anything and it's an amazing conversation. You know, you guys spoke of marriage.

There's a David Brooks quote that goes, marriage is a 50 year conversation. And so I really think a huge part of a relationship is who can I see myself continuously having the conversation with? Whatever the conversation is. And the conversation evolves over a relationship. And it takes all different. different twists and turns and but when you know oh whatever I bring to this person it's a really

productive conversation um I think that's that's magic yeah so that those have been those have been huge huge huge things for me I could list many more by the way but I those are those two have been really really big things that was so sweet I I really hope she makes you list these when we get off. Sean, she makes me list these at least twice. Yes. Sure. Yes.

I'm not telling her anything she doesn't know. Okay, good, good. I got to say we're big fans of what you do because we're big fans of marriage. And the whole point of our show is not, we don't give advice. We're not as smart as you or thoughtful. We just try to share stories. But we're huge fans of marriage. and we think, you know, our relationship has been such a key part of our life, obviously.

But when we hear people talk about, you know, life and self-improvement or improving your life, it's like marriage and our relationship to me has been the biggest and best tool of doing that. And so the fact that you help people on that journey, I think is incredibly impactful. So is there anything coming up that you're excited about? I know you have, go ahead. Firstly, thank you for that. That means the world to me. And I, not to, I, I don't want you guys to do yourselves a disservice in, in what you do because

the vulnerability that you bring forward and the curiosity that you bring forward, I hope, I really hope I never come across like I have all the answers because I truly don't. I, you know, I, I'm working this out as I go. I'm re-evaluating. I sometimes see old videos of mine and I'm like, I don't agree with that one anymore. And, you know, and it's hard for me. It's hard for me to have put out lots of opinions and to be getting older and hopefully a bit wiser all the time and to be looking at them in retrospect and going, some of them are really good and others was an idiot 24 year old or someone who didn't know what he was talking about at the time. And so I really do, I come to it with real curiosity.

I come to you guys with curiosity. I come to you guys to learn to, you know, you've done, I'm not married. You've done something I haven't. I want to know about that. you know that to me you're having a family that's something that's a stage of my life i haven't reached yet that you know i'm i'm i'm always wanting to learn from other people and i hope the key message from my work more than anything is not that i'm right all the time but that we can be better at things you know we don't have to you know and we should be better at things if

we're in a relationship we should want to be the best we can be for that person i i i don't have a lot of patience for when people say, oh, I have to do all of this for my partner. I have to, you're saying I have to improve all of these. I'm like, what I, that's how I am. I always want to be better. I always want to refine. I have mentors of my own. I'm always looking to learn from. So I just, I just think we should all be on that journey together. And by the way, I want to say one more thing just because you asked me what I got attracted to in my girlfriend. And this is, I want to say this because it's really important for everybody. I am so horribly far from perfect. And she genuinely has seen me and accepted me for who I am, which isn't the same as as excusing

everything. And it's not the same as putting up with everything. But there is a, there is an absence of judgment there that has allowed me to have a love. environment in which to actually be better because I've truly felt seen and acknowledged, you know, to quote Mr. Rogers for the second time in a podcast, there's, there's a moment where Mr. Rogers said no, no child can never feel truly loved until he or she is accepted for exactly who they are. And accepting, you know, some people may see that as entitlement or apathy that you're just accepting who someone is without expecting anymore and what if that person is awful and so on. But actually, I see it as a loving act to accept who someone is today and to

then encourage the best in them and to help heal the worst in them. I think that's the most loving act that we can do for somebody who we choose to do that with. In terms of where people can go, I have a place. I actually created a domain for you guys. Let me see if I can find it real quick. There's a domain, there's a website that people can go to called couple things and Matthew.com.

Wow. I know. You see that organization and foresight? Wow. Couple things and Matthew.com. If people go there, your listeners, there's a free video that they can stream there, which is a training.

and it's essentially a confidence training that shows people. I have a three layers model to confidence that if for anyone who has always struggled with their confidence and wondered why it's never really shifted, even if they've achieved a lot in their lives and they feel like, man, I thought I'd be, I thought I'd feel better by now. This training shows you why there may have been barriers to you reaching the confidence you've always wanted and a practical strategy for for changing that and it's free it's me on stage at a private event so you won't find it on youtube anywhere but it's it's a cool video and um you can find that a couple things and matthew.com well well we'll have to do a part too because we could talk

for hours i feel like um i have a lot that i have to think about now so thank you for that and thank you for uh for all the good content you put on the world and all the help that you give people is truly a pleasure. We'll link your YouTube channel and the couple things in Matthew as well will be down in the description. But it's a pleasure meeting you. Thank you for having me, guys. It was a pleasure for me too. Thank you.