Love Life with Matthew Hussey - (Rewind): "What If He Changes For Someone Else?"

Episode Date: April 28, 2023

Sometimes you have to let someone go because of the pain they bring to your life. But what if they seem to improve their behaviour with their next partner?! It can be incredibly frustrating to see an ex who appears to be fixing their issues that previously drove you crazy now the relationship is over. You have an envy for their new partner who seems to be getting the best side of them. How do you get over your feeling of resentment? And how do you stop worrying that his bad behaviour was somehow YOUR fault? In this clip, Matt and Stephen discuss how to move on from the past and be free of resentment for your old relationship. --- Follow Matt @thematthewhussey Follow Stephen @stephenhhussey --- ►► Stop Waiting and Start Creating the Happiness You Deserve NOW - Claim your spot on my Virtual Retreat, June 2 - 4, 2023 → MHVirtualRetreat.com

You are imagining that he's suddenly going to be an angel with the next person and there's some deep dark part of us that thinks that the reason he's going to be an angel with the next person is because we weren't good enough. Hey everybody, it's Matthew Hussey with the Love Life Podcast. I am excited to share this clip with you today. Let's get into it. So we had another email from Sue. She talks about a guy she's been with who belittles her. She's sensitive about her height and he makes these comments where she feels belittled and condescended to. He also talks about other women in a way that's inappropriate. And she mentions at the end of her email how she feels frustrated that someone else is going to have him and without the BS,

and it drives me crazy. So she's trying to let go of this guy, but some people have said, well, I feel annoyed because what if I let go of this person and they change for someone else? They're going to be a better person for someone else. And if they just didn't have these couple of annoying traits or traits I'm embarrassed about or don't like, then it would be great. And maybe they're going to be that great person for their next partner. Well, that's an enormous, enormous assumption because you're saying that that person will have completely evolved into a new human being, a much more enlightened version of themselves by the time they reach the next relationship. And what signal did you get from him that that's true, given that he did all these things?

What evidence did he give you for the fact that he's becoming more enlightened? Now, if what you're saying is he's going to find someone he is more afraid of upsetting, or he's going to find someone that, I don't know, he's more deeply attracted to and is going to behave around them as a result, then really what you're saying is this is someone who's well behaved only if they're afraid or if they're around someone that they deem to be of a certain status. Character is consistent. I don't want to be friends with the person who's really nice to me, but nasty to the next person that they can get less from, or that they decide for whatever reason

is not as important or as valuable as me. I don't want that person as a friend. I don't want that person as a business contact. I don't want that person in my life. I can't trust that person because what happens when I'm not as valuable to them? What happens when they're bored of me? What happens when they feel like they've extracted the value that they want from me? Then that person is all of a sudden going to default to their actual true behavior, their true selves. If the only reason he's on his great behavior in his next relationship is because he's with someone that he decides he really doesn't want to lose, then that's a tremendous shame for her because she's not learning who he really is. You should be pitying the next woman, not envying the next woman. Because if he suddenly goes into the next relationship a better person,

it's probably because he wants something, not because he's become a different person. Because you have no evidence for the fact that this man has become so enlightened and now someone's getting the best of him as a result. The best of him, if someone sees it next time, will likely just be a manipulation. And it will be a shame for that person that they're not seeing who he really is, because all they're seeing is the side of him he's presenting in order to get what he wants. Which by the way, there's a good chance he did with you in the beginning. If you remember back, there's a good chance that some of those things you saw, that some of the more positive sides of him you saw

in the beginning when he was trying to get something. The rest was what you saw when he was being who he really is. That someone you want back that's someone you envy someone else getting that's that's not logic talking it's that's your own insecurity talking that's your the the self-loathing the masochism talking that's saying i'm so awful that i i just brought out the worst in this person but when he meets someone who's not awful they're all of a sudden going to get a wonderful person and that's just untrue you can not be right for someone that doesn't mean that they treat you in a terrible way or in a disrespectful way. It means they leave because you're not right. But your insecurity

is telling you that somewhere along the way, you either deserve that behavior or, you know, he was like that around you because you weren't good enough. And now you're envious of the next woman you think will be good enough who's going to get great behavior. I don't care how great she is. She's still stuck with someone who behaves in that way. It's just a matter of time before she finds out. You think there's a kind of, there's like a projected imaginary envy. It's like an imaginary envy of something that hasn't even occurred you are imagining that he's suddenly going to be an angel with the next person and there's some deep dark part of us that thinks that the reason he's going to be an angel with the next person is because we weren't good enough. But that's the lie. He might like the next person

more. That's possible. He might be more attracted. There might be any number of things that he decides he wants in that next person when he sees them as all shiny and new and exciting and hot. That may be true. Doesn't make him an angel. It doesn't mean you weren't good enough. It means you had someone in front of you who treated you poorly and disrespectfully, which is about them, not you. And you overvalued them in spite of all that, and are still overvaluing them now. And like you said, Steve, you're overvaluing, you're valuing some imaginary version of them. It's a complete hypothetical situation where you're imagining him and this other imaginary

person being wonderful in this wonderful glowing beautiful relationship full of kindness and and and empathy and compassion and sensitivity my god there'd be one hell of a transformation if that's the man you described yeah yeah it's so much it makes me think how much looking at some of these replies you know talking about you know we talk about your why this is one thing we've talked about on the retreat we talk a big part of the retreat we talk about you know your why and so much of when people's why is just fear it always leads to thinking small. It always leads to these protective decisions that lead to us like, I'm fear being alone. I can't break up because what if I don't find anyone else? What if I break up and he turns out to have been the perfect man. And I was an idiot. And there's so much of like putting yourself in check with,

I'm scared of this. I'm scared of this. And your result becomes inertia. It just becomes just close up, stay the same. I could make a bad move here. So I'll do nothing. I'll just sit in this situation. And I feel like the flip is when you start leading.

And there's not like a non-corny way to say this, but it's almost like, yeah, your decisions have to be about like, what's the loving move next? Like what's the move that shows the most faith in myself, the most self-love, the most belief in my ability to you know get what i need ultimately but i feel like that's just something we easily forget because we make the the you know god to us is the keeping of this relationship that becomes the God that we worship that becomes the outcome that we that we live to to create is that we keep this person that we love we keep this

person that we think highly of and we'll do anything to keep that person. And in the meantime, we run roughshod over all of our standards and all of the things that are important to us, our own needs, the kind of relationship we actually want to be in all of these things become secondary to keeping someone and it's and it's look steve this is not an easy switch to make because we have to it actually requires some faith it requires some faith that if I make my outcome the standard that I would like to have for the relationship instead of having the outcome be keep this person at any cost, then the standard is what I'm using to define my success. And it not only makes you more attractive,

you have to have faith that actually living by that standard of what a truly beautiful relationship is to you is going to be more attractive, is going to make you stand out more. And that a relationship that can't, that can't be a beautiful relationship by your standards isn't worth keeping. You have to have faith that it's actually better to let go of something that, that cannot, cannot coexist with your vision of a beautiful relationship. You have to have a,

you have to have faith that if you lose that thing, it's, it's better. Because it won't make you happy. Keeping someone who's making you unhappy can't make you happy. I hope you enjoyed that episode, everybody. Don't forget to leave us a review on iTunes. I will be reading them.

We read them out on the longer episodes of the podcast. So maybe yours will be read out. And I will speak to you in the next episode. Thank you so much for listening to the Love Life Podcast. We'll see you soon. Bye.