Love Life with Matthew Hussey - 266: Esther Perel - Part Two! The Best Advice for Finding Love Today

Episode Date: October 9, 2024

Esther Perel returns for part two of our chat on all things modern dating and sexual communication in relationships.  In this episode, Matt and Esther discuss: The realities of the biological clock (and how to date accordingly) How to find a romantic partner for your age The concept of "soulmates" and what matters in relationships Having the right expectations  The challenge of modern masculinity, jealousy, and sexual judgment Conversations that improve your sex life  How to stoke desire in a relationship --- Esther is a New York Times Bestselling author who books "Mating In Captivity" and "The State Of Affairs" have had a profound impact on our understanding of modern relationships. Get a copy of Esther's brand new course "The Desire Bundle" ▼ Connect with Esther ▼ Blog → https://www.estherperel.com YouTube → ‪@estherperel‬ Instagram →  @estherperelofficial Facebook → @esther.perel ▼ Get My Latest Dating Tips and Connect With Me… ▼ Blog → https://www.matthewhussey.com/blog/ Facebook → @coachmatthewhussey Instagram → @thematthewhussey Twitter → @matthewhussey

We have Esther Perel back for part two. So many of you loved the interview I did with her a few weeks ago. Well, today we continue with Esther talking all about sex, how to communicate around it in relationships and much, much more. And if you haven't already and you want to join me in a live event, I have one coming up on October the 22nd that is free and is online. So anyone can come wherever you are in the world. Thousands of people have already signed up for this event. Don't miss it. It's all about commitment. If you're struggling to meet people who are ready, who are emotionally available, who actually want a relationship, or you're already seeing someone

and that person isn't committing, this event is for you. I'm gonna show you my greatest insights on getting to commitment. Like I said, it's completely free. So just come. Go to lovelifetraining.com to sign up now and I will email you all of the details.

And now I would love to present, re-present David, Esther Perel. if you found yourself in the world of dating today and you having to deal with what other people are having to deal with which is trying trying to figure out, do I just try to meet someone in the course of my life by getting out of the house more? Do I go on the apps? Do I give myself the best possible chance and do both? How would you approach the apps in a way that it didn't just become this hopeless exercise that burned you out? How quickly would you want to get on a date with someone that you met through the app? How long would you tolerate messaging back and forth before you were like, okay, like either we meet up for a coffee or something or we don't. Would you get on the phone first like i'm just curious you you strike me as someone who is somewhat no nonsense

you speak your mind i don't think you have a high tolerance for having your time wasted and i imagine that those things would translate into the dating process in an interesting way for you. But you're also not cold. You're a very warm person. You're a very affectionate person. So, you know, that makes for what I call a unique pairing in dating. You know, when you find two things you don't often find together in the same person. What would be your, this is maybe a challenging question to put you on the spot with,

but if you were on the apps and you were thinking, I don't want to waste time on the apps. I don't want the apps to become my life. I don't want to constantly be checking them. But I also recognize that they are another way to meet someone. Is there a way you would approach it that you see other people not approaching it that way? It's an interesting question. Of course, I've thought about it. I've thought about it. You know, I think what would happen if something happened to my partner and I've enjoyed couple's life, I would like to have another relationship. But I also could very well imagine other relationships that have intimacy and love and closeness

that are friendships. I don't only think about the romantic part. I come from the generation before app. There was never such a thing. And the concept of not wasting my time was also, you know, you went, you met someone. It was a surprise. The whole notion was an adventure, you know, sleuthing.

Like, wow, where is this going i saw i met this person and we and then i ran into them again so then we decided you know two times in a week must mean something let's go you know maybe we and then we just started walking and then we said should we have a drink and then that drink became a six-hour thing i mean i didn't go to meet my partner. I met somebody and something evolved and I had no idea where it would go. And then they became boyfriends. You know, this is a very different narrative than I'm on a mission. I have a goal. I need to optimize my chances. I have to maximize the results. And is this person somebody who could be it?

So could you translate that for me? Because I think that's really, really, I couldn't agree with that more from the point of view of what actually creates rewarding encounters and allows things to develop in interesting and surprising ways. So many of the people that I coach are people who are in a state of anxiety, fear, panic, they want families. They maybe, I mean, I'm working with people who are on the other side of that, who are getting out of divorces in their fifties and sixties,, I'm working with people who are on the other side of that, who are getting out of divorces in their 50s and 60s. But I'm also working with a lot of people who are in their 30s and they are looking at the clock going, I got to move.

I can't afford not to be highly intentional about how I go about this process. And so it's almost like so many of them feel like I don't have the luxury of just seeing where things go and how does it you know like what how does it unfold because I have five years before I'm in the danger zone of this dream of mine isn't going to happen anymore and it does unfortunately rely on at least if I want a child biologically that's mine and in the context of a traditional family unit that it does rely in part on another person so is there a way that you would because I think everything you're saying is true but how would you marry it with what is an underlying anxiety that people have I think I would start earlier I, I start earlier in the process because when I think of this story,

I think, I don't think yet 35, 40. Okay. As a woman, now I'm talking, I'm thinking earlier. So I think that there's a few things that are a little bit rigged at this

moment. A, and this may be a little controversial what I'm going to say. Um, And this may be a little controversial, what I'm going to say. I think that we have been told that there is equality and that that equality means sameness. We are different and we need conditions that will work towards that difference. So that means that when people say you have all the time in the world you don't men and women biologically in that sense are not equal

and then what happens is that women postpone and postpone and basically think not the right person not the right person not the right person and then the right person, not the right person. And then the anxiety comes. It doesn't start with anxiety. It starts also with the culture that is constantly urging you to basically to optimize to the end degree. And then suddenly you realize, oh, you know, I don't have all the time in the world. And that sense there is a differential there's a differential in biological clock there's a differential in therefore in power and i think we have to be honest about that and it's on both sides because the the if it's in a heterosexual context the woman doesn't want to lose her time and the guy doesn't want to be a sperm bank nobody likes this these scripts this is not what we're going to look for in our romantic

lives at this moment so that's the number one there is all kinds of ways we can delay we can freeze we can do a lot of things but we also have in our head the idea that we need to first meet the male partner that male partner is going to be our love partner and our love partner will become our life partner and our life partner will become the parent with whom we will have children and i think that at some point we may need to shuffle the cards and switch the order of events a little bit tell me what does that look like That means that maybe you find some, you know, 50% of the people do not parent the child

with the person they had the child with. So you may just as well, on occasion, think, who could I co-parent with? Is there someone who actually wants children? And that may not be my partner so that I don't continue

to just go and say, I have one more year. I have six more months. I have six more months. I have, you know, with this constant biological clock ticking away and feeling that at the one hand, I need you. I need to find you. But I resent my dependence on you. I resent the fact that you have all that power over me and that you're the one who can give it to me or take it away from me. That's the power story.

In your mind, when you think about that. you're the one who can give it to me or take it away from me. That's the power story. In your mind when you think about that, and I know I want to give you that… Is that controversial? No, no, no, not at all. I don't find it controversial. I find it true. I think it's… I'm glad we speak about these things because I think that it's the reality for people

and whether or not people can find themselves aligning with a new blueprint than the one they originally envisioned for themselves. Being honest about the realities of the situation, I think is essential to acceptance of what are my options and what is the most prudent course. I'm not talking about having a child alone this single mother by choice i'm talking about having a child i mean by definition don't do it alone but don't do it just alone with one other person either the nuclear model is not necessarily the best the ideal model for raising a kid either so it's rethinking a number of these very set ways that we have at this moment about how we meet, how we mate, how we have families.

And I think that we have been so creative in so many other areas of our life and have remained rather monolithic when it comes to this plot so does that for you does does that make ivf something that is just a much more for a lot of people it just makes it an option many more people should consider again not in the context of thinking that i'm going to raise a child alone but in the context of i may have support in ways i didn't originally imagine yes but that doesn't mean that i need a partner that you know i need to go out in search of a partner in order to co-parent with yeah find a co-parent and the co-parent and the partner may not necessarily be the same they may not arrive at the same time but there must be when you get to that pitch moment there need to be alternatives i agree there need to be other other other ways to create lives for ourselves

which we will do anyway often after we separate so can we anticipate those things that we change the dating part of this the idea of i'm coming with my tension i don't have a minute you know i i'm not gonna waste my time and see you for you better tell me do you want to have children and you know i had an encounter recently with somebody i care about deeply and so she meets him and he has he and she says, oh, he loves kids. And of course he says, I would love to have more kids and I'd love to have a child with you too. But then he's in the midst of a divorce and he's in the midst of trying to figure out how he's going to be there for his children that are already, you know.

And at some point he says, I can't do this now. And that doesn't mean I won't, but she does, she's, you know, if I had met him at 32, she says it would be a different story. At 36, it's a different reality. And it's these encounters, those are the stories, that plot and many other variations on that, that we see so often well if feel free to uh to not answer this if it was a too personal a situation but what can you share the advice you gave her in that situation i mean i didn't have to give much advice that she basically cut it up

cut it off she cut it off right away because but but from a place of love i mean thank you for being honest i you know i can't wait unfortunately i understand i mean i'm not taking this against you yes but i know what i want and it may not happen with you and so i can't just put myself in this situation and the the thing is do you say it with bitterness or do you say it with love and care and basically you know here is the the the it came as to actually made a post about it it was the right person at the wrong time is the wrong person we've said the exact same thing i've said the exact same line because it's not because it's it's to think that the right person at the wrong time is the right person is science fiction right it's like the context the story of people's lives and

pay attention and accept it it's it's not against you but you have to act accordingly and that's my that was my that was the conclusion sentence of this situation but when you talk about the pressure the the pragmatism you know i'm i'm on i'm on a mission and then you connect that with the attraction i think that that mission itself will make a lot of people not attractive to you this is i'm so happy we're talking about this you know i'm so happy we're talking about this i'm so happy we're talking about this because i actually think that this joins up multiple different areas it joins up dating with the very real biological pressures that people feel with the work that you have done more extensively than anyone i've ever come across on desire and how, yes, that anxiety and that pressure

is the enemy of desire and attraction and actually might make you diagnose something as attraction that is actually completely not attraction. It's something else altogether. It's fear and anxiety and the feeling of needing something and your nervous system acting up. And so I wrote an entire chapter about this in my book called The Question of Having a Child. Because it's one of the single biggest things that i see getting people into trouble in their love lives and i'm so i feel so validated by what you're saying about the exploration of other options because my theory is that the exploration and the acceptance of plan B, the plan B that becomes the new plan A, because nothing can ever stay plan B or you'll be unhappy.

It has to become the new plan A or the plan C or D that becomes the new plan A. The acceptance of that, I believe, is what allows, it actually is what allows you to bring the romance back into your love life too i mean i i i think it is liberating i think there is an oppression to this very set unmovable kind of you know constructs by how one needs to proceed what comes first what comes next the linearity of it and if you didn't catch it on the right time you are f and the great news is it doesn't stop you from still saying i would like plan a to happen but what it means is you're no longer dependent correct on plan a and i think that allows you it's empowering yeah

i think sometimes people hear it and they say like but it is actually empowering i think there are we have to do now we can choose not to have children as well and we can choose to have children in a multitude of new ways that are available and never never existed but it's important that we understand that there are actually other stories other ways to write our story and i'm also happy we talk about this because it can become very um i don't know what the word is stale static you know i think this is getting us into such interesting territory and i always you have a mind that i want to apply to everything so if i if we skip a few decades to people who are in their 50s 60s 70s who is a audience that i am dealing with at scale who have not necessarily given up on the idea of finding love.

In fact, they deeply, deeply want to find love and companionship. But they are feeling invisible, many of them. Or at least that's the story they've told themselves, is that I am invisible at this age. Their belief is that everyone my age wants someone younger. And in many cases, which is, I always think an ironic twist, but the men my age don't want me, but the younger men often do or sometimes do.

But in their case, it's either because there's novelty factor or it's because they are they're not really serious they don't want the same things as me or it works for a couple of years but then they break my heart because we're in different places in our lives or so they're dealing with that element of it that even if they have these relationships they don't seem to last with younger people or people where there's a big age gap and they're also dealing with people their age that they think are emotionally unintelligent or undeveloped or have never dealt with their trauma have never dealt

have never done the work of processing the things in their life that maybe these women have processed and are therefore coming to the table emotionally inarticulate many of them still not able to uh commit uh still not apparently knowing what they want and so the the landscape that is portrayed by some people who are dating in this age range is very bleak and it can it cannot be the only story but it's a very very common story I wonder what your advice is to people who are in that age group who really want to find love I mean i the the pain that this causes so many people is absolutely profound it touches on so many things what you're talking about and i don't know if i can do justice to to to really organize this but i think there are a few things going on that are creating,

compounding this situation. When people talk about that in search of that love, they often say in search of my soulmate, my one and only. And I always think soulmate has always meant God. Not a partner. But today we want to experience with our partner all kinds of things.

Transcendence, wholeness, meaning, ecstasy, belonging. Things that we always looked for in the realm of the divine. I want with my partner to experience the stuff that traditional relationships offered if it still is relevant economic support companionship social status family life but i also want a best friend and a trusted confidant and an intellectual equal and a fitness buddy and a professional coach and a spiritual master and a passionate lover to boot. I mean, the list is endless. And I'm thinking, wow, it's like one person for everything.

I think you find love and you experience love differently when you have created a life in which there is ample love already. That comes from your family family if that's possible from your friends from your mentors from your teachers your colleagues i we have to take the word love out of the the kingdom or the queendom of romantic love especially because if you are deeply loved by a lot of people what you will search with your partner is slightly different it's not coming to compensate for everything that is missing it's adding something i once met years back one of the early early founders of the women's studies department at one of the big universities and she was by that time

in her 80 and she was at a book party i never forgot i don't know why that thing just jumped at me and there was one man in the room and it was her husband and i said to her you know people always ask me the secret the secret may i ask you that question and she she looked at me and she looked at all the women that were there to honor and she says i've never tried to have a conversation with him when i want to talk in the kind of way that i like to talk i've got all these women i have a lot of other things with my husband of 50 something years and i thought how wise of you i mean it was half funny but I understood what she was saying it's like surround yourself with the diversity of relationships and in that context the one that you have with your romantic partner so to speak becomes a piece in a larger puzzle, rather than the redemptive force that's going to say,

you are lovable, you are desirable, you are worthy of being seen. The fact that these people tell you, I don't feel seen, is so sad. It's like, I would like to be seen in this kind of a way, by this kind of a person but i also do have other people who see me in very special ways it's that split we so have elevated this romantic bond at the exclusion of everything else that we end up feeling deeply lonely if we don't have that relationship. Meanwhile, as a couples therapist,

I see so many people who are in couple relationships and I can't say that it's the best part of their life. Does your heart go to when you hear that leave or does your heart go to make peace with the good that you're getting? All of the above. depends it depends or sometimes they say i'm here for other reasons and i say i respect that too i mean there's you know this is a complicated question do you sometimes you say you know no it's not the best part of your life but i understand that you feel that with

you have a disabled child and you feel that you need each other for this i get it i get it but that's not where you laugh and that's not where you are adored and that's not the place where people admire you and that's not the place where people seek you out when they have problems and etc etc but you have those relationships so i i more and more i'm clear and so does the research so does the work of eli finkel that we need to calibrate our expectations we need to diversify our relationships and that those are primary conditions before during and after there was i i don't know if it was david brooks but i think it might have been some quote that said you know who can you have i don't know what it was

10 000 dinners with yeah and uh or maybe he's maybe that was someone else and he said marriage is a 50-year conversation i can't remember but the the the you know a lot of people I suppose would feel that to I intuitively when I hear what that woman that woman in her 80s said I intuitively go god there is really a wisdom to that but a lot of people would see that as uh some form of settling that is just untenable for them that the person they're going to spend the most time with is the person that they can't have a conversation with and therefore feel the loneliness with. Of a certain kind there is not a single answer that is the right one here the whole issue about relationships is that these are complex issues and they don't have binary answers. And they often require us to live with the paradoxes and to tolerate the ambiguity of all of this.

If you ask me, what do I say? I will always ask, depends, depends. In some situation, I lean here. In other situation, I completely lean in the other direction. And for that matter, I don't have to live with the consequences of the decision. So I am very, very careful. Do this, don't have to live with the consequences of the decision. So I am very, very careful. Do this, don't do that. I don't think that any relationship expert at this moment can pretend to have all the answers.

Yes. No, but I think these are really, really powerful questions that you're posing. What is the baseline of what you need from a partner and what is the what are all the needs that actually you should be meeting in myriad ways in your life to decrease the dependence by the way the partner my partner is my best friend is a very recent sentence it's a very recent expectation that we have brought to marriage or committed relationships. You know, there was the best friends were the other men, women, people in the village. It makes me wonder how much of our unhappiness in love comes from that, because there is this, there's always this…

Our expectations? And our lack of historical context, you know, that there's what you just said has a historical context that actually your partner didn't have to be your best friend because you got that energy in other places in your life. But you were stuck. But you were stuck. So there's a kind of friction between progress and that historical context. But maybe, you know, without that, it's's you know we are missing we are our expectations go to a place that then becomes uh unrealistic so the story of this is this from the moment marriage was now if we talk marriage right from the moment marriage was no longer primarily an economic enterprise and it became a romantic enterprise, it became an affectionate story,

if she is less economically dependent on him, then her emotional needs become more important. So the change of the nature of our expectations, because love has always existed, but it existed outside primarily of marriage. I mean, marriage marriage was if there was love it was great but that wasn't the goal so our expectations particularly our emotional expectations have risen in parallel to the decrease of the economic dependency and i can leave i mean

you were basically married and you were stuck for life. This is one of the greatest changes that took place, is that you can actually stop and start again and more than once. And that is primarily freedom for women, because men basically have the license to cheat. So they had their diversity of experiences experiences which was much less the case for women so having no full divorce having economic independence having the ability to delay childbearing years all of these have been extraordinary revolutions for the lives of women yeah and one that's put a lot of pressure on men to up their game and and actually bring more to the table than the idea that i go out there and i provide you know it's i think that that's that there's a real conflict right now uh where men are trying to figure out what their place is especially many men

who have been brought up to think that it was enough that they just that's right did this and now they're realizing that, you know, and I think there's a lot of complaining among men about ways that they're having to grow, that it's high time us men grew in those ways. But this kind of almost segues to a question I have that I'm really curious to get your opinion on because there is a difference

between many men and women when it comes to the ability to hear someone talk about sex without immediately placing judgment without regressing and there even seems to be and maybe in it also without having one's ego bruised even when the thing that someone's talking about has nothing to do with you or is outside the context of your relationship when it's so often the case that when a woman speaks about sex she's in some way punished for it even if it's just by someone not being able to handle hearing someone talk about it and i have seen with some horror more and more there seems to be a kind of movement towards i don't even know what you'd call it but in some

ways a regression towards um more judgment and the you know the number of this seems to be this well there seems to be even on if you go to places like tiktok where i don't live but I hear these things is there's more of a movement towards this like traditional wife role that my theory is that it's when they're not when the men are feeling invisible or when they're feeling overlooked or where they're feeling not good enough, it then results in a kind of control that they try to impose. And the extreme end of this, which is you happen to be with someone who, you know, any sign that you've had a past is unacceptable to them. But then there's the more mild end of the spectrum which is people their egos get involved they find it hard to hear things they take any notion of you telling them what you would like to happen or what you'd like more of to be some kind of uh fearful thing like oh so

this is an experience you've had lots and not with me and this is why you like it and this is a people are very quick to go down those paths does your advice to women in any way differ to the advice that you give to men when it comes to the care that they have to take in talking about these things because you might see more judgment from the male side about partners someone has had the number of them the nature of them the i'm not saying women by the way are immune to these kinds of ego woundings because i think it happens on both sides but do you have anything to say about women communicating more their eroticism their inner sexual world in ways that for some men and maybe many men uh is met with more judgment i do i do sometimes think we are born women and we become men.

We start with XX and then we go XY. Men, male identity, masculinity spends a lot of time having to prove itself. Prove that you are a man. Every civilization has had in traditional society rituals to have boys go into the woods to prove their manhood. Women don't have to do so. There is a certain kind of way that biology somehow takes care of that. And you have to, masculinity is often an imperative. Be a man, prove you're a man, show me you're a man.

I mean, it always has to prove itself. And if something has to prove itself so much all the time maybe it's not that strong to begin with so i start to think that male identity and masculinity is often a fragile identity difficult to acquire and easy to lose and that's where resides this notion of if there have been other dudes before me, it devalues me. Plus, there is an entire history that it's the man who uncovers the woman's sexuality. He deflowers her. And with that, he also brings her whole experience of herself.

And he knows and she doesn't have to tell him anything because he's the connoisseur and this is a like a whole story behind all of that and so if she needs to tell him that by definition means that he doesn't know so how do you bring the modern man to actually think he wants a woman who knows what she likes he wants to please her but how can he listen to her tell him what she likes without seeing it as a criticism and an instruction and a put down and can she learn to actually say it in a way that is positive and encouraging because she has been trained throughout her whole history and when i mean history it's not her personal history it's cultural history as well that she's very clear about what she doesn't like

but she doesn't always necessarily know what she does want and that he doesn't the modern man doesn't just see it as not a put down but doesn't take it to be some kind of a devaluation yes of her that she has had many sexual experiences before him yes on the one hand you know she needs to be she needs to be very sexual and sensual but god forbid she's actually become this way because she's known some others before you you know um and i think that possessiveness and jealousy are intrinsic to love they are archaic and the question that we often have is are these archaic vestiges of patriarchy or are they actually intrinsic to love and what do you say i think that jealousy we know from all anthropological and evolutionary biology research

and helen fisher that it exists in every society. It is often differently interpreted, but the feeling of jealousy itself, the fear of losing what you have, which is the difference with envy. Envy is the wish of having something you don't have. Jealousy is the fear of losing something you have to someone else, to someone else. Jealous jealousy is a feeling that develops about 18 months into our life much later than fear joy sadness you know which are actually feelings also that you can see on people's face whereas jealousy you can't you can't decipher on the face do you think jealousy always comes from fearing losing what you have or that it can just come from someone else having had what you have that's envy that's one of the way but one of the ways they differentiate it

but the the issue is that some cultures think that jealousy is intrinsic to love and therefore it's you know there is love when there is jealousy whereas other cultures more individualistic cultures who think that you shouldn't have to be jealous. So Americans, for example, often don't say, I'm jealous. No, I'm not jealous. I'm angry. Because it feels noble to not be jealous. Because it means dependency.

It means weakness. You know, possessiveness, you know, is possessiveness intrinsic to love or is it an archaic vestige of patriarchy? It's the same question. I don't think I have definitive, you know, I can sound very confident. That doesn't mean I'm sure of much. But I don't know. I do know that people experience possessiveness. confident and um and can can really meet a woman that is powerful too and not be scared by it not feel diminished by it not feel belittled by it experiences his connection to a woman in this

case it's another woman very differently than the man who needs to on some level put her down a little bit in order to elevate himself so what would be your because and and i really ask this question with a deep love for men because i you know the there are some highly misogynistic people out there but i think that actually most men are scared vulnerable their masculinity is fragile they've been taught to find the source of their power in places that are not productive for a healthy relationship what would be your advice to men who find themselves triggered when it comes to the sexuality of the person that they're with in ways that maybe they're not even proud of in ways that they wish they could kind of unshackle themselves from and what would be your advice to women when communicating more about their sexuality and wanting their sex life to be better wanting to create that erotic world um in a way that is really productive you know i it's funny with justice because i i went

ahead and i created the card game where should we begin because i thought play gives you a way to have difficult conversation it creates a safe container you can tell stories in the context of play that you would never say in what we call real life and so i i began you by thinking, what are conversations, sexuality conversations that I would like to help people have, but without, you know, saying, now talk about this. Right. And it's like, what's something that you were told about sexuality that you realized was the biggest BS? What's a text message you fantasize receiving? What's a message that you actually fantasize writing? What's the biggest change that you made about your thoughts about sexuality?

What's a foreplay that you still remember? What's a peak experience that you have had or a peak experience that you have fantasized about? What's an obstacle that you would like to overcome? What's the hardest thing to talk about? Is it harder to talk about sex or to have sex? You prefer sex or chocolate? When do you feel most free? What's erotic for you?

Things like that. And they don't all have to go to vulnerability and to problems. They just have to say, there is a way that we can learn to talk about sexuality that is neither sanctimony nor smart Which is what often exists these two extremes. That's interesting. How do we talk about sexuality in a normal way?

You know, when did you discover yourself sexual? Do you remember your first sexual thoughts you know um when did you realize that this is the way you like to be seduced versus you know and once you give people the questions and then you give them a kind of a safe environment that where they can take risk i mean play is when risk is fun so it's about both it's not just about creating safety it's about both. It's not just about creating safety. It's about giving you the right environment to take risks. Sexuality is always risky. There is no safe sex, so to speak. By definition, and is a thing I really spend a lot of time in the course thinking about, it's kind of, people come to me. I mean, so much of this is about people having sat in my office for years on end to talk about the stalemates, the gridlocks. And I'm thinking, you know what?

I've never known people wanting more sex from talking about the sex they don't want so how do i get you in a different conversation to begin with you know when it's not just what do you like is a it's a little more than this how do you begin this very simple thing you know what is the sense with which you most experience sexuality or you can say in the world are you more tactile visual auditory you know what's your sense with which you do you think that applies also sexually when you know i think often in language right so i think what are the when i learn a new language i think what are the key verbs right to have to be the auxiliary verbs the ones that kind of create

the scaffolding for the language in sexuality as in relationship it's to ask to give to receive to take to refuse to share to imagine, to imagine. But those are... So which is the verb that you practice the most easily? And which is the verb that is most challenging to you? I can't say no. Well, if you can't say no, you're probably not that good at saying yes. I can't ask.

Why? What's asking like? Well, I don't trust people would actually give or care enough or anticipate disappointment or I feel that if I ask and i receive i'm gonna owe there's a whole psychology behind it receiving receiving too vulnerable i don't like the passivity of receiving you know so i play i all the time think what's another way in that isn't on the nose, that isn't linear, that isn't so scary that people become completely tongue-tied. And in the process of which they reveal a ton of information in this gentle, kind, but candor way. This is the art of sexual conversations.

And I highly suggest for people not to have them in bed or in the place where they just had sex because that's not a good idea you know because then it becomes an evaluation and there's about 50 of those questions that i that i think of that i say this this will change and and then when people say you you know, we talked about this, we've never talked about it like that. They didn't solve a problem. They didn't instantly gush at each other, you know, but they experienced a lot of a very different sense of closeness

and a different sense of connection to themselves. So could you give us like two more, let's say me and Audrey are in the car on our way somewhere and a different sense of connection to themselves. So could you give us like two more, let's say me and Audrey are in the car on our way somewhere and we have a moment in the car or we are taking a walk, you know, it's in the daytime or it's not in the bedroom, we're just having a moment, we have a bit of time. I also think a lot of these conversations, the park bench idea works really well for those two.

Oh, yeah, of course. Because it's way harder looking at each other. But what would be one or two more questions that could be a fun way in? Or a more peripheral way in? If you were dating yourself, what would you be annoyed with? A risk you took that changed your sexual life.

That's interesting. A rule you secretly love to break. A fantasy that you would love to experience but not with your husband because you think one doesn't do that with one's husband you know do you prefer anonymity do you find freedom in anonymity or do you find freedom in deep connection? When you were young, did you play? Did you have sexual play? What stories did you tell? And the idea with these is that even the ones that are not in any way directly or explicitly sexual,

that you're opening up a realm of thought and conversation and imagination that you would never normally visit together no the idea is this is directly related to sexuality but you have got to get out of the idea that sex is an act if you really understand when i say it's an entire language by which your whole emotional life gets expressed in this theater, then you don't think that these are derivative questions. These are the questions. Much of my work is to try to get people to stop thinking about sex as a bunch of organs that are touching each other,

because that is not going to take you very far and you're going to get bored very quick so it i opened this but not because i think i have to go far i open this because this is the definition and that's the the the beginning The beginning for me is, how do I get you to think differently about sexuality as a start? Because we have really reduced it to something so narrow, so physical. And the physical is not even the whole body. The physical is a bunch of organs. And if those organs don't collaborate, they make the decisions. Rather than a person has decisions and they can decide what they want to,

which part of themselves is going to be engaged here. You know, everybody who plays a sports game understands that there is different ways to hold the racket. But in sex, there is a kind of an exceptionalism that it's this way and if this doesn't work there is nothing you stop yeah now you know i mean there's so many other things to say but if i if i have one thing that i really think contributed to this whole exploration of sexuality and desire it really is talking about sex is a whole different story so for example I ask people who come to me in whatever context flatlined okay I don't feel much I mean the general thing in a context of relationship is discrepant desire but it doesn't really matter. I mean, the general thing in the context of relationship is discrepant desire, but it doesn't really matter.

And I ask them, I turn myself off by. I love this question. So I transformed it from the work of Gina Ogden, a dear colleague of mine. I turn myself off by or when? That's a very different question from what turns me off is. Which most of the time people say, that turns me off. How do you turn yourself off?

And then they start. I turn myself off or I shut down or I go numb or I extinguish my desire. When I feel low, when work is hard, when I stress about money, when I worry about my kids when i don't take care of myself when i haven't been to the gym in weeks where's the sex this is all the energy to the sex this is the energy okay then you say well you know if you haven't done any of these things in that long then you better do something about it before we start talking about jumping into the sack then you say how do i turn myself

on how do i awaken myself how do i ignite myself which is very different from you turn me on when or what turns me on is because if if i am shut down you can do all the things that i say to you will turn me on the shop is closed there's no response because it has to come from inside so people tell you i turn myself on when i see images but i turn myself on when i see you naked i turn myself on when i go dancing when i pamper myself when i feel good about my my about my my outcome, my performance. When people, basically, when they feel worthy, when they feel confident, when they feel self-possessed, so to speak, that's when they are turned on.

And why does this matter? Because, and I say, it's so interesting. And this is a piece that I will share with you. And actually curious if you've noticed. In the context of heterosexual couples, I hear plenty of guys who tell me, nothing turns me on more than to see her turned on. She's into it. It's great.

Because if she's into it, he doesn't have to deal with the predatory fear. She likes it. He's not hurting her. He's not forcing her. He can let go. It's beautiful. I have yet to hear many straight women tell me that. Nothing turns me on more than to see him turned on.

It's kind of irrelevant. What turns her on is what's happening to her. That could include him being turned on. But if she's not into it and he's turned on, that doesn't do anything to her. That's interesting because it feels like on some level that subverts a kind of myth or an idea. Isn't it?

About women being constantly worried about other people well that's it and the men being selfish you know uh and maybe there is still a selfish instinct she is she is worried constantly in her social role that's what she does and therefore to be able to liberate herself sexually and be able to turn inward to her own sensation and pleasure she has to not be thinking about anybody. This is the realm where it's sexy to not have to do that. Yes, yes. And that twist I find very interesting.

Yeah, it's really interesting. Because that says that what happens to you sexually does not necessarily line up with what you do socially. Or emotionally. I also love that idea of, because it's very empowering this idea that you can actually take control of your own sexual desire

by looking at the things that turn you on the things that turn you off and not just in this person but in life I can't help but wonder you know one of the big societal issues around sex drive is that not nearly enough people are moving their bodies enough or are working out if i think working out has a massive impact on the way people feel not talking just the way they feel aesthetically but just the way that and dancing yes dancing yeah don't dance nearly enough yeah i wonder how much of the the challenges we are experiencing in our sex lives have these very indirect roots that we're not paying attention to at all because we're taking

such a literal stance on what someone has to do to make us feel it or you know i just don't feel in the mood anymore or i just to explore well what don't i do anymore that maybe i did more of at a time where i felt more sexually engaged and that ignites my energy that makes me feel vibrant vital alive radiant playful those erotic ingredients that then translate into sexual energy and and that's so empowering because you're in control of that. It's not hoping someone else is going to come along with a special formula and they're suddenly going to have you figured out in a way they've never had you figured out before. And I think even then it's very empowering to find out those things about your partner, because if you know the wider context of what makes them,

what ignites that energy in them, then you can also encourage those things in their life i think it's a valuable thing to be able to ask are they getting enough of that thing that they need are they getting enough are they are they getting time to themselves or time to to work out or time to dance or time to be with their friends in that way that they need or time to feel strong in that way that they need to feel strong i think it allows us to be a support to our partners in ways that we can't be if we simply aren't looking at it through this lens i like to say that for foreplay starts at the end of the previous orgasm and not five minutes before the real thing i mean it's an amazing thing people think that they just turn around at 11 30 and they go like this on the back of the person

and they should just turn around and be all sweaty and ready. It's just like, excuse me. Nothing you do comes like this. If you want to eat, you need to prepare something. If you're going to do your workout, you get your stuff, you have a ritual, you put your gym stuff in the bag, you drive to the place, you get your drink. have a ritual you put your gym stuff in the bag you drive to the place you get your drink there's a whole ritual associated what exactly do you think sex needs to be like you know after a certain amount of time together if without you know if it's just routine

it's not going to be that interesting it's if it's ritual it will become more interesting. And that demands that people understand that sexuality doesn't start, you know, with a little rub just before. It's an energy that exists in the relationship. It's a way that people do look at each other, touch each other, kiss each other, stroke each other. That energy has to stay alive. That doesn't mean people are the whole time hot and sweaty on each other either it just means that they they don't just become functions and i think the irony of that is that the more of that we have in our lives it's i almost my brain goes to the idea of like the quickie is actually in many cases just the tip

of the iceberg because it might be something that only happened in the space of three or four minutes out of nowhere but it wasn't really out of nowhere if all of the foreplay was there and that environment of eroticism sex is never just spontaneous yeah there's always you know even when you meet the first time you've already planned you dressed up you plan the place you pick the music you there's always a plot and the plot makes it interesting even if the plot becomes a very three four minute thing and and when people understand that that it is a it's a multi-layered and multi-dimensional experience, it becomes a very different thing.

And then you can go through life. And that doesn't mean that you need to have an orgasm each time and there needs to be a penis in a vagina if it's about straight people. There's a lot of ways people can make each other feel good, experience something that's pleasurable and connective, and that that's what it is about and if people are more and more isolated as we are and if people live more and more in a contactless world as we are and if people don't go to work and they don't see people and touch

them and smell them as we are then all of this is going to have an effect on our social life, our emotional life, and our erotic life. For people that compare themselves to other couples, they hear a friend say we're having sex, you know, every day, and they worry that they're having sex once a week, or once every two weeks, or do you ever have any kind of a barometer of, you know, this is not enough? And I know that there is no one answer to that. But what do you say to people who feel in some way the oppression of the comparison? That's actually not a very difficult one. First of all, if somebody tells you they'd have it every day the next

question is do you like it is that something you enjoy right what do you assume here there's no qualitative element to that statement no i mean i'm so tired of the the measurable outcome you know who who knows you know is that what you would like? But in addition, there is such a getting-it-done focus, too. There are people who start hot, and then they go lukewarm. And there are people who started lukewarm, and then they clear something, they heal something, they work through some of their own inhibitions and fears and and traumas and and they open up in ways they never knew was possible the story of life is a little bit more you know

complex than just this then you know there are people who are mourning and they're in grief and this is the last thing you think about and then there are people who have postpartum and then there are people who you know um have menopause and then there are people who have illness and then there's so many things intersecting and then i think that sexuality is like the moon it has intermittent eclipses and then suddenly you realize oh wow it's been a while so what is an erotic couple compared to another couple an erotic couple understands the importance of maintenance sex sometimes it's been a while so what is an erotic couple compared to another couple an erotic couple understands the importance of maintenance sex sometimes it's just nice it helps you go to sleep it's it's not a big production but it feels good that's the key issue here and then sometimes you suddenly that wow we still have this in us didn't know that i could still feel that way

every once in a while it just kind of flares up you know and then this was a great night whatever we took something we drank something we we journeyed somewhere we we danced some you know and that brought up a whole lot of energy people who have a sustained erotic dimension of their life they also drop but they just know how to resuscitate they know how to bring it back it's not like they live like this for decades you know they just know hey you know what it's been a while we need to take a trip we need to go away we need some time alone let's just spend the day in bed let's just you know take a long walk and whatever it is we need to do we need to reconnect with each other and with ourselves everything you just said about the vicissitudes of people's erotic lives together in a long-term

relationship is only what people experience when they are in multiple different relationships we just don't see it we don't see that the partner that we're having very passionate sex with actually was not feeling that way for the last year in their previous relationship we just know this reality but the longer we're with someone the more we're going to see multiple realities and all of these variables intersecting that we don't often get to see on a timeline of hopping from one person to the next stress money yeah illness dying parents i mean all these things enter directly into our sexual feelings yeah which is also why i think the people who maybe are comparing their relationship sex life with single sex life that a lot of problems occur there because you're not you're never really you're often not experiencing those multiple realities that's correct with a

single person you're experiencing one kind of reality with the kind of person you keep selecting and you don't even know who they would be over time you assume they'd be like that over time oh if i'd have just kept going with that person it would have stayed just as passionate and just as wild but actually you're only seeing them in a very contained context of a three-month affair or a six-month relationship um before i get to my last question you you have two programs that i know you're you have together as a bundle right now. I'd love to just talk about them because what I love about your work is not just the obvious depth of understanding of everything that you do,

but that you have painfully taken time to think about what the practical implications of all of this work is and how people can apply it. Could you talk about these two programs and how they practically kind of, they give people a real roadmap for applying everything we're talking about today? So the desire bundle came out of the realization and the need that people said, I read your book, I listened to the podcast, what can I do? And not, And I also think that not all of this needs to be done in a therapist's office. This is what can the therapist bring to you into your home that you can try.

And then you'll know if you need more than this, then you'll come to therapy. But a lot of these things are, I'm going to help you sustain something. Enter this conversation. Create a certain energy, be proactive. And especially have the conversations that you don't even know to have. So it's very practical. There's an hour long video and then there's workbooks. And these workbooks are, you know, in depth.

Here are the exercises that I would do with you if we were working together. And that you can do alone or with each other. You can take them as couples and you can take them alone. You can take them alone because you are in a relationship, but you want to do it by yourself, or this is where you are at in your life at this moment. Your sexuality is still a part of you, whatever relationship situation you're in.

And the first one, bring desire back, is really for when people are just so stuck that there is not even a conversation possible at all or there is a non-stop chronic complaint but it's a terrible conversation so it's really about helping people get unstuck if i had renamed this thing it would be getting unstuck and because that's the hardest place from for people to to leave you know i he one person never stops talking about it the other one doesn't want to hear about it all of these these um impasses and then the second one um playing with desire is really how do we bring back more energy more intensity more juice, make it less routine, make it more creative,

more fun. And so I wanted to distinguish these two because there's no point in telling people the fun they can have when they're at each other's throat or when they're just in silence or when each one is alone in their corner or when one person feels deeply rejected by the other, or when there has been an affair and there has been betrayal. I mean, there's a ton of situations in relationships, more even than the list we had before. So it's practical.

It's simple. You don't do everything at once. You can take one question. I ask you a lot of these questions. Take one and just go with that you don't have to you know swallow the whole thing whole what suits you now but it's available for you for years to come every time you feel a dip you just say let me go see what perel has to say she have an idea here you know i i want to do something different tonight i want to

you know what can i how can i bring this up and then you go and you you do like it's like the tarot cards you pick one you don't have to do the whole course all the time it's very you know my books are i know that when people finish reading them people often say and now what do i do so these are a few things that i think you can do it's not the whole thing but it's a good start yeah everything that you do is such a beautiful blend of the idea and then the practical application so i know people are going to get so much out of these they can find them at your website estherperel.com that's right and when they're there is there anything specific they should search the desire bundle that's it the

desire bundle it will appear large so we also have a promo code for anyone who wants to get these programs it's hussy15 so for everyone out there who wants to get these two programs, the Desire Bundle, HUSSEY15 is our audience's promo code. So go check those out. And I'm really, really excited to know what you think of these. I'm, you know, Esther, I have a core of people that over the years I have quoted ad nauseum and Esther is one of those people that I think I've probably referenced more than anybody else so it's a true privilege to be able to bring you Esther's work one more question which is just relates to what you said about discrepancy in desire is there when you are with someone where you feel like i want it a lot less than they do or i want it a lot more than they do is there a key route that you take for managing those situations and how do you know when the discrepancy is just too big that it's going to be a constant

source of chronic pain and it is essentially going to rob you of your peace if you stay in this relationship? I think the first thing is to have a proper diagnosis. Has it always been? Is this new? What's happening? Are there health issues, hormonal issues, sexual pain issues, sexual dysfunction issues, relational

dynamics, past trauma that is flaring up or has been there. I mean, what is the refusal? Or what is the constant thinking? Are there hypersexuality issues? Are there ways in which sexuality and anxiety are being mixed together? And so one person says, I want it all the time. But in fact, what they want is a lot more about self-soothing and managing their anxiety than it actually is sexually in nature. So you really need to have a sense as to behind that sentence, I want,

the other one doesn't. And usually our society at this point is often geared towards the one who doesn't. You know, in history, you were ashamed if you had sex. Now you are ashamed if you don't have sex. So the pressure is often on the other side. What's stopping is, and I do think to get the proper hormonal panel is important to have a sense of what may be happening. And for both people, by the way, for both people, for all people, just people.

Then what is this discrepancy doing in the relationship? Is this become a kind of a pursuer distanceristancer dance that is driving this relationship. One person feeling guilty, but also feeling pressure. One person feeling rejected and feeling lonely. Both people ending up in the corner. The pursuer feeling that if they didn't, the other person would never think about it, feeling unloved very often. The person who is more on the withholding side

wondering what's wrong with me or stop pressuring me or is it been five days eight days ten days you know what is our rhythm here oh i start to feel the the things breathing down my neck probably time to do something the other person feeling like oh la la i don't want to get pity sex i don't want to beg i i want someone who wants me people who feel often really cherished spouses or partners but famished lovers so it's a major piece of a relationship and the the question about when is it it's the gap between the two i mean if two people are not interested they're not interested there's a lot of ways to be in a relationship but if one person just experienced

the deadening that comes with it the loneliness the rejection the refusal the lack of physical contact the lack of you know all the things that sexuality gives you access to tenderness softness abandon physicality sensuality all of that to live without that for years now it's the other one lives without that too but they don't necessarily experience missing it yes for a host of reasons so to you know affairs are Affairs are often very much linked to this. It's not like they come out of nowhere. Age, physical condition, etc., etc. And I think the beginning, beginning is to understand that the other person may be pressuring you, but what they're really feeling is they're missing you.

And for the other person to understand that if every time your partner thinks about sex they think about the sex you want they no longer are connected to their own erotic self and that a person who is that disconnected to themselves can't be feeling great either so you begin by creating a space for empathy and respect for the experience of the other that's the entry point Esther this is uh I I truly you are one of my favorite people to talk to I it it really is a it's a privilege for me to both witness from afar and sometimes up close someone who is a true master at what they do. Thank you. You know, if I was on a date, I would say, does he say this to everybody?

Well, you can look at my interviews and you'll see it's not the case. No, it's a privilege. It's a good line. Don't forget to sign up to our event on October the 22nd. Like I said, it's completely free. Anyone can join. And if you know that you want a committed, serious, long-term relationship, you don't want to waste any more time on people who aren't ready, or you have someone who's suggesting they're not ready, but you don't know how to change

it or what to do how to have the right conversations to try to progress things this event is for you go to lovelifetraining.com to sign up i will see you there this is only happening once and i don't do many of these events anymore so come join us while it's available i don't want you to miss it lovelifetraining.com is that link thank you to esther and thank you to all of you for watching i'll see you next time be well and love life you