Sex With Emily - How to Be a Master Dater w/ Matthew Hussey

Episode Date: August 4, 2021

On this show, I’m joined by relationship and life coach, author, and YouTube personality Matthew Hussey. We discuss whether or not “casual dating” actually exists, why rejection is actually a GOOD thing, how dating apps have changed the dating world (and how to actually meet people IRL), and the root cause of problematic dating patterns. Plus, Matthew shares his exclusive three layers of confidence and tools to build your self-esteem. After all, who doesn’t find confidence in hot AF?We also talk about how we can use relationships to learn about ourselves, why it's important to feel embodied while dating, how much you should invest in a potential partner, why falling in love quickly can be a red flag, and the importance of therapy and mentorship. P.S.Make sure you subscribe to hear Friday’s part two of this interview. Things get even juicier...For more Matthew Hussey visit matthewhussey.com howtogettheguy.com YouTube Instagram TwitterFor even more sex advice, tips, and tricks visit sexwithemily.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Is the effort equal? You know, do you send someone, it's fine to send someone a text in the morning and say, hey, I hope you have a great day today. You know, how are you this morning? It's okay to send that text. Don't send it the next three days. Let's see if they do this. Hey. Look into his eyes. They're the eyes of a man obsessed by sex. Eyes that mock our sacred institutions. Betrubized, they call them in a fight on day. You're listening to Sex with Emily. I'm Dr. Emily and I'm here to help you prioritize your pleasure and liberate the conversation around sex.

On this show, I'm joined by Relationship and Life Coach, author and YouTube Personality Matthew Hussey. We discuss whether or not casual dating actually exists, why rejection is actually a good thing, how dating apps have changed the dating world and how to actually meet people in real life, and the root cause of problematic dating patterns. Oh, PS, make sure you subscribe to our podcast because Friday is part two of this interview, and things get juicy. All right, intentions with Emily for each episode join me in setting an intention.

What do you want to get out of listening to this episode? Well, I set one, and my intention is to give you a very practical look into what makes relationship work, and what gets in the way of building a great partnership. We have a new article on our site which isn't asked Emily. How do I tell a new partner about my fantasies? Okay guys, remember wherever you listen, we love when you rate and review the podcast, it totally helps us. And finally, if you want a question answer, just call my hotline 559 TalkSex or 559-825-5739 or just message me, sexwithfamily.com slash Ask Emily. Alright, everybody, enjoy this episode.

Matthew Hussey's here and in your YouTube and podcast feeds to show you the ins and outs of love at 34 he's demystifying dating in the modern world. In addition to hosting in-person retreats his book Get the Guy was a New York Times best seller and he has millions of followers on social media with almost 400 million views on YouTube. Matthew's goal is to make women feel empowered. Welcome to the show, Matthew Hussie. Yeah, I, you know, I've thought a lot about what my goal is,

because I, when people ask me, what's the, you know, what's your mission, what you're trying to do? And this might sound quite philosophical start, but I just, I think life is hard. And I like helping people feel less lonely in the process. Whether it's because they're single and they want to be with someone, but they haven't met anyone yet, which can be really hard, or whether they're just going through difficult

emotional issues and challenges in their lives. And I've built a career on putting out my ideas online in videos and I'm really, more than I want to find someone a relationship, I want to help someone be less online in videos. And I'm really more than I want to find someone a relationship, I want to help someone be less lonely in life. And I don't see that them as the same thing. Because we are the epidemic of loneliness right now, right? It's gotten even worse probably during the pandemic.

So less lonely. Well, I want to back up from it though, because you started working with men, initially, right? And then you started working with women at such a young age and just thinking about, what was it where you're like, oh, I could help these women? What were the questions that you were like,

I got this about my problem? Here's what gave me some early confidence. I was working with a lot of men. It was like, over a three year period, it was close to 10,000 men I worked with. And I got to the point where I realized, well, women were asking me, can you do the same thing for us? Because they were hearing about me. And at the time, I realized, well, women were asking me, can you do the same thing for us,

because they were hearing about me. And at the time, I thought, well, I don't, I don't try to figure out different. I don't know you, but I do know guys, I know myself. And I learned quite a lot about human dynamics at that point. So I said, I could talk to you about guys, and they were like, great, like, let's do that. So we don't know, right?

We don't need to know about us, we wanna know about men. The first thing I did was I actually picked up some major books. That were written for women in their dating lives and that actually gave me confidence. I had something to bring. So what for like the rules or what were you reading that it was like. One of them was the rules. One of them was the rules. I suppose I was interested to learn at that time that that was a kind of seminal book that had been out there for some time and was a huge best seller. And you know, I was interested in in the lessons from that. And in all sorts of things I was reading, not just that book, there were just a lot of things that I thought that doesn't

feel true to me. Let's talk about that. So what was the advice? Because when I think about the rules and the advice that it was like, way for him to call, never be available out of Friday if he's calling for the weekend, they should call by Wednesday. Be busy, don't answer, don't be needy. And what was wrong about all the advice then?

You know, what are you doing? And by the way, I will say this, because if I were the people who wrote the rules watching me right now, I'd be annoyed in the same way as someone watching my old videos. Right. You know, says, I watched a bunch of Matthew Hussie videos, and there's a whole bunch of ways I disagree with them. Well, there's a whole bunch of ways I disagree with myself too. When I look back on my old content, there's a lot of stuff I'm like,

I wouldn't say that anymore. No, I'm the same. I have them edited. Like, how old did I say that? Like I cringe, I guess. Yeah, so I don't want to paint a picture of kind of going after anyone's work in that way, unless I really can't stand it. But you know, there was one particular message in that book, which is, if he's not approaching you, then he's not interested. And that almost was like at the core of what I knew not to be true for me and so many people, because I had actually spent most of my life avoiding the very people I was interested in. Because of fear, rejection. Yeah, I agree.

You asked me to help a 92-year-old lady across the street with her bags. I could do that any day over the week. But at that time in my life, as a teenager, especially, if you'd have asked me to go and talk to the woman I actually was attracted to, that was tantamount to death. Yeah. Or if you got rejected, that was, and for most men, that persists in their lives. You know, that we can all, most men, if they're honest, can associate with having a lot of nerves about walking over to a woman that they find really attractive.

So it appeared to me that actually the very inverse of that advice was true. Okay. That the more you like someone, the less likely it was that you would go over there and approach them. Okay. Now, that's changed actually a little bit because now with dating apps you can approach with relative ease. Knowing that the rejection doesn't sting nearly as bad as walking up to someone in a coffee shop or a bar. You do that and that's real social rejection.

If people were approaching are you encouraging people to do that anymore to go up to people and well as if we needed another spanner in up to people and well as if we needed another Spanner in the worst yeah for that as if we needed another another another thing that would make that difficult You know we already pandemic yeah, we already had dating apps which have stripped most of us of our social skills right because now I can just Interact with lots and lots of people with no real repercussions. I don't have to get good at talking to people. I don't have to get brave. You know, of course, we still have to go on a date and that's the part most people forget.

But on top of that now, you have a pandemic that has made us at the very least awkward, trickier, but I still think people should do it. I still think we should take the small step to say something in person. And if I could give people one piece of advice on meeting people in person, it's say something instead of nothing. Okay. Because so often we get in our heads and we think, I've got to say the perfect thing, I've got to somehow win this person over, I've got to seduce them with one powerful life. But what most people actually need is a green light,

a green light for an interaction, whether it's man or a woman. We need a green light for an interaction. We're looking for that cue from somebody else that it's okay to invest a little of ourselves. It's kind of like walking down the street. If you walk down the street and a stranger smiles at you, it doesn't matter. Man, woman, young old, the street and a stranger smiles at you, doesn't matter, man, woman, young, old, whatever, if a stranger smiles at you, in that moment, you're quite likely to smile back.

And it's not that you didn't want to smile, is that you were waiting for them to smile, because you don't want to be the weirdo smiling at the stranger and they don't smile. Now, a lot of us, by the way, this is what's kind of interesting about life is, someone's, we walk down the street, we walk past someone and someone smiles at us. And by the time we've registered that they smiled at us and we want to smile back, they're already past. It's true. Does that have a smile on your face, right? Yeah, well, that's the thing you have.

But that's exactly it. How do we do that? By having a standard for yourself that has nothing to do with other people. If you have a standard of warmth, I think about this a lot. Sometimes I told you before this, I'm introverted by nature, but I've learned how to be an extrovert when I need it. And I'm a big believer in before I go to a party or I was just at an event in Connecticut where I was around a lot of people, even to this day, I have to sometimes

really psych myself up for those situations because I'm like, oh, God, got going interact with a whole bunch of people and do small talk and do this. Some of that is just the effort of it all and the fact that I don't love small talk, who does really. But some of it is ego too. It's, oh, God, I'm going to be in this room and I don't know anyone, and am I going to feel special? And am I going to feel like I'm standing there and I don't know anyone it's going to be hard to talk to. It's still that kid in me that feels that way.

Now, as an adult and as someone who does what I do, I also have the tools. So that's really handy. And one of the psychological tools I use for myself before I go into that room is I want to have a standard for the warmth that I give. Okay. That has nothing to do with how warm this room is Because we go into a room looking for warmth. Looking for someone who's gonna unlock our loving, compassionate, warm, friendly side.

And if we actually instead take responsibility for unlocking other people's warm, compassionate, friendly side, then we will have a magnetic effect everywhere we go. Instead of going to a room to be changed, we go into a room to change the room. That's such a good practice. That's so true, because I'm thinking about we're talking about dating.

Should you approach and you not? How approachable are you? Like, when you go to a bar, and back in the day before we were all obsessed with our phones, you'd be with a friend or you'd be looking around. You had to. You couldn't be on your phone, but now we're all on our phones. You don't even realize that your body language is shutting off. You're not approachable.

So people are like, oh, no one ever hits me. No one ever talks to me. And I think how do we recognize what we're doing that's making us not very approachable? And how do we become more so? We want to meet someone. I do think that we have to almost reverse engineer it and say, what are the things that when people do them make me feel in, in dear to that person. What makes me feel like I'm comfortable with another human being. And then really look at yourself and say, be really, really honest. Am I doing any of those things when I walk into a room, you know, or when I go into a restaurant with a bar,

am I looking up, like simple things? Am I actually looking up and at the room? Or is my head in my phone? And we know most people's heads are in their phones not because there's anything that interesting there. It's really not. It's because it's a comfort blanket. It's smoking, you know, it's like, it was smokers kind of look cool and indifferent because they always have something to do. People on their phones is the same thing. It's like, no, no, no, I'm not, look at me. I'm not a loser. I have something to do. Right. I'm from checking Instagram posts. Exactly. Do you ever look somewhere around and everyone's on their phone and they're always on Instagram?

Like you just look to the left, the right. Yeah, because it's, it's, you know, I'd be the last person on earth to say how addictive it is, but it, there's, I'm getting lost in this mosaic of lives and stimuli and colors and patterns and aesthetics and moments, none of which are my life, none of which are the room that I'm actually in, none of which are the people that I'm actually surrounded by. You know, you've got someone who is surrounded by other people, but looking down in their phone, saying, I can't meet anyone. It first is about lifting our gaze to the world that's actually around us, to the world that we're actually inhabiting, opening up our body language to the room. What we do is we go and find a corner of the room or a table and we close off to the room

and everything points inwards and we close off to the room and everything points inwards and we close our space down. We're in this big room with lots of people and then we close our space down and our energy down and it becomes a really brave thing someone has to do to come over, turn you around, lift your gaze up from your phone and try and say something. If the way that you are with your your gaze up from your phone, and try and say something. If the way that you are with your body language and where your eyes are looking and what you're doing, is something that requires someone else

to be disproportionately brave to come over. That's why you're not being approached. You wanna lower the amount of bravery required for someone to talk to you. And even not even just if you're sitting up because people might be saying, I don't sit in bars or I don't sit anywhere, but even when I'm going through the airport, I'm just out walking down the street. In my neighborhood, I really make an effort just not to be on my phone just to be observing

what's going on around me because there's always potential to meet people if that's what you're looking for. But there is an openness and a warmth to you. You know, even such small things. It's why it's hard. It can be hard to teach for the very reason that these things are subtle. It's hard to tell people who watch your podcast.

Emily's a great hugger. They don't know, but I will, Ken, you give me a hug and you're a great hugger. I thought you were a great hugger. But there's a warmth and a feeling of like, oh, this is someone who's comfortable in their skin. Yeah. This is someone who's comfortable with affection.

This is someone who's open and all of that you get from a hug. And in that moment, you go, oh, we're gonna get along. Yeah, right. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah. We're gonna get on. This is gonna be easy. All from that moment, it's an openness. And in a way of

vulnerability, not being afraid to be open. And I think of conversation that way too, you have to risk saying something and someone not not giving the same warmth back, smiling and someone not smiling back, revealing a little detail about yourself and someone not choosing to reveal anything about themselves. All of those things are cues and we sometimes worry, I'm not going to get it back, but I actually see it differently. I see it as you'll get it back from people who are like you. The kind of warmth that you want to bring into your world,

you won't get it from everybody, but you'll get it from the right people. And that's how you'll know who your people are. Right. You'll know because of the way that you react. You become this beacon that other people like you will be like, oh, there she is. Right, exactly.

I think it's like what you talk about in your work a lot about. We spend so much time worrying about the people that are going to reject us, why they left us, why they go to us, why they didn't return the call. But I always say, and it sounds so cliché, but like, well, then they're not your person. They just did you a favor, the fact that they didn't call you back or the fact that they got it was only one date and it wasn't a year. But we spend so much time on that. I think, don't you, you've helped probably a lot of people. We can't make it as like a year, but we spend so much time on that. I think, don't you help? Probably a lot of people, we can't make it

as like a judgment about ourselves. We did something wrong that we're a bad person. It kills me when people were like, oh, they just want to obsess for a week about someone they knew for a day. Or, but if we know that we did that, they would say, big do the best you could. You bring that out there, then it's like,

nope, they're not my person. Or if they're not into what you, I'm looking for a relationship right now and they're not, let's say we said that. Great. then it's like, nope, they're not my person. Or if they're not into what you, I'm looking for a relationship right now, and they're not, let's say we said that. Great. So now you know, right? So. But there are so many ways to unpack what you just said because.

Unpack it, Matthew. If you take, if you take the scenario of falling in love too quickly, that can be a sign that someone's not ready for a real relationship. Because you can't possibly have fallen in love that quickly. This isn't based on anything real. This isn't based on the actual person. It's not based on the qualities they really have. You can't base it on how great of a partner they are

because you have no idea what kind of a partner they are. You can't base it on the kind of person they are when you're sick and you need comfort because you've never been through that together. You can't base it on the kind of support they give you when you are get a promotion. Right. You can't base it on anything because you literally know nothing. They feel so good. I feel so seen. You know, when you get loved bombed or whatever, they think, this is that connection. This is that person but right. No, I feel so seen thing is one nice thing to have. But by the way, you also can't possibly have been that seen.

Because you can't possibly have conveyed that much in the space of a date or two. Right. Right. Forget where I heard this. But your date is your representative meets their representative. Your bodyguard meets their bodyguard. You know, it's like you've put forward a version of you, but it's not the whole you. There's a lot you held back. There's a lot that hasn't come out yet.

So even if they made you feel so seen, they might be a wonderful listener. They might be an empath who can really connect with you, but you have no idea what kind of team mate this person is going to be, even if you feel seen. You don't know that. And by the way, I don't say that to suck the romance out of early dating far from it. I think that it can be a wonderful thing, but it has to be tempered with the reality of where you're actually at. Beyond the date you're on. Don't be on date too with someone else who's on date too, but really you're on date 52.

It's just like our feature tripping where we're like, the picture that they're gonna be Mr. Mrs. Wright because we're gonna have a whole life together. Just be present pay attention to what's happening on the date. Exactly. I think that's part of it too that I feel like, and I know we're talking very heteronormative terms. I know this goes for everybody, but I was just telling

some young women this who are, just out of college, it was their first dates, and they were saying, like, they really wanted this guy to like, and they're like, oh, I hope he likes me, I hope this, I'm going to do this for the date, which I wear, what should I say. And I was like, well, I think the most important thing is to pay attention to how you feel about them. Like, do you actually like him? I mean, I've done all the things, the mistakes where I was like, oh, I just wanted to like me. So then I said to this woman, it was like her first real day. I was like, get it to your body.

When you're there, think about like, how do you actually feel with him? Because we get caught up in the, what does the aftermath mean? Do they text me? Do they not? Were they into me? But you know, part of it is being very, be on the date you're on. Be present. What's happening? Like, do the can do I feel good?

Do I actually like this person? Don't take a hundred percent of what you should be doing from how you feel about him. Okay. How you feel about someone is very different from what they're doing in relation to you or what they're giving to you, what they're investing in you. How you feel about someone is like saying, how do you feel about your favorite actor? Get a best. I love them.

Oh my God, they're so talented. They're so good looking. They're so charismatic. That's how you feel about your favorite artist, writer, actor, whatever. That has nothing to do with you. It's separating how highly you think about a person in isolation from what you can actually build with them. Because what you can build with them is about the dance between the two of you.

It's not about how wonderful you think they are. There's a completely different thing. And people, you know, I've said it ad nauseam over my career. People invest based on how much they like someone and you shouldn't but invest based on how much you like someone. You have to invest based on the mutual exchange of investment. Okay. This happening between you, invest in someone who invests in you. Now look, in the beginning, someone has to move. Right, you can't just, if you sit around and say,

I'm just gonna wait for someone to invest in me, then you can have a stalemate. Someone has to move. Someone has to say, hey, how are you? And then, oh, we have a conversation. Someone has to say, should we go out sometime? Oh, one of us asked us the other one on the date. Someone has to say, I like you, sometime? Oh, one of us asked us the other one on the date. Someone has to say, I like you before the other person says, I like you.

And so on. There's always got to be someone who steps in closer. That's fine. That is a very small form of investment, but then you test, you invest and you test, you see, if I move forward, do you move forward? Or do you stand still? Or do you move backwards? And come to think of it, why do I find you more attractive when you move backwards? Why, though? What's going on with me? Groucho Marx said, I wouldn't want to be a member of any club that would have me as a member. Contained in that is the problem with most people's confidence in dating. You like me? There must be something wrong with you. You don't want me?

No, we're on to something. Yeah, right. We're gonna take a quick break to your word for our sponsors, but we come back. Matthew breaks down how to stop dating people who aren't right for you and find a truly good match. If they're not into me, it must mean they're more valuable than me. Right, they're more valuable. So I'm going to go after them, or it must mean they're scarce. We want what's scarce. We value highly what is scarce. No one scares.

Well, and there is. There's so many people on the planet. That's true. We put people on the planet. And someone can just be, by the way, in a phase of not investing in their life, and then you come to take that as a measure of their worth. Meanwhile, here's the great irony of it. You could have someone who was the bad boy five years ago.

But now has gotten to a stage of their life where they're like, you know what, that wasn't fulfilling me. I actually want to give to someone. Yeah. And then that man shows up and really meets this person head on and she's like, hmm, why are you not making me because she wants to be the bad boy or she. Right. Like that. We were you're missing that thing. Right. And like the irony is that he, he, maybe he was that thing at some point in his life, or he was that thing to somebody else yesterday. But now he turned around to meet you. And we, you know, we have a lot of, we have a lot of issues

that blind us to the fact that there's someone in front of us who's actually trying. You know, you said, what about when someone is, they were trying and now they're not, and that confuses us. We have to get to a point where we say consistency, consistency of behavior is going to be attractive to me. Right. Okay. I'm not going to do the calculation of, but last month, he said he liked me, or it doesn't matter, what's he doing now, And what's he doing each week?

Or she, you know, what is it like? What is this person doing on a consistent basis? Because this thing of constantly second guessing if someone likes you and someone who constantly makes you feel like you're second guessing yourself about whether they like you. What is that you're attracted to? Right.

What is that you're in? Or some of us are, you know, our childhood traumas, our issue, we play in the relationship because we think that, yeah, we are not, well, I guess all of our greatest fears is that we're not lovable, but we think, oh, I'm not lovable or I have to, the chase, if it's hard, it means that it's worthwhile. If I had to chase it or if someone makes me feel bad, that's familiar to how my dad may be feel. And so it's not conscious for many people, but that's what it is.

No, and it's, I need to it is. I need to close that loop. I need to get some closure on the fact that my dad didn't give me that attention. And now I'm gonna find someone else who's like him, but this time I'm gonna get it. And the problem is, and the thing that, even though those things you're right are unconscious, once we start to realize them,

we can say, well, what's happening here? I'm making my dad God. I'm making my dad God in this situation. I'm looking at this person going, well, if I only I could get their love, well, who are they? They were a human, a flawed, screwed up human, not someone to run your life around trying to trying to please or trying to fix that hole that someone left behind is really, you know, part of growing up for all of us is Recognizing just how human our parents were right. They did the best they could yeah They did the best they could and they may have been in so many ways just absolute train wrecks

And now you're running your life around trying to please a train wreck that imitates someone who who is a train wreck going up. I always say you have to do the work. You have to do the work on yourself. Otherwise, you keep repeating patterns. You keep dating like, why do you, you know, I stayed the same guys over and over again. My 20, I was like, oh my God, that's the same until I realized that, you know, I think they weren't available, but it turned out I wasn't emotionally available. You know, that's often what it is. You guys, if you've heard that, like if you keep dating people who aren't there, they don't show up. You're the common denominator, right?

So I had to look at that. But how do you get people to do the work? I always say when you break up with someone, don't jump right back into a relationship, but maybe look at yourself. Look at the patterns. Like, how do you help people kind of look at those mistakes they're making in dating to make better choices in their next relationship. So the next partners.

Well, I think some things are learned by dating a different kind of person than the person we normally date. I do think that you learn a lot from that experience because you see a different way of loving. You know, if you suddenly start dating a person who in an argument handles an argument compassionately and doesn't try to cut you emotionally in an argument. And you're arguing and they say, listen, I really don't want you to feel that way. And I didn't mean that. And you know, and they suddenly like you hear a new language around an argument. And you sort of it's uncomfortable in the beginning. Because like, no, this is where you say a really mean nasty thing.

And this is where I give you the silent treatment for the next three days. And what's going on? And you start to, at least here, and be present in a different language. Whether you can rise to the occasion is a different thing. But you learn a new reference point for how an argument can go. You know, now you may not want to have to date to learn that lesson, but you can even learn that lesson by just surrounding yourself with new people in life.

I believe so much in mentorship, whether it's formal or informal. People kind of take mentorship too literally. They think a mentor is me finding someone in life and saying, will you be my mentor? This person starts, it's a mentor is just anybody that you have some proximity to that is from a world or a life or a level of knowledge that you don't currently have.

And while's Moses can teach you something. And I've had the beauty of traveling in my life and meeting all sorts of different people and getting such different perspectives. And, you know, sure of therapy, I applaud anyone who is brave enough to go through therapy. I think it's a tremendously difficult. Me with therapy?

Yeah, I still do therapy. Okay. I see someone regularly because I don't, it doesn't matter what you know, we're so close to ourselves, we're so close to ourselves, I think I'm an incredibly self-aware person. I can still have someone who knows me well enough, who's read my patterns, tell me something that I'm doing or have done that surprises me. I'm a man. I've always given myself such credit for being so evolved and so self aware.

And that just taught me something about myself that has been like a smack in the face. And I say that to people, I do retreats every year. And I say the same thing to people. This isn't about, I know more than you. This is about get outside yourself. Get someone who you trust, who's mind you value and respect, who can have a perspective on you that you cannot have on yourself. I can't see my hands. You see me. I can't see me. I see my hands and my legs. I seem to be in some sort of container

walking around, but I don't see what you see. Right. We have to be open to that feedback. You have to. So even if you don't do therapy, put yourself around new people, the challenge, all of your ways of thinking and doing things. That's one of the ways to be more aware of your patterns. Is that part of it? Tell me about your retreats because I know that they're so successful, you've been doing them for a long time. It's mostly women, right? Is there a similar theme in all these years? Like, what is the most common thing that comes up in the retreats?

What are we getting from it when we go? So, so people, a lot of people, well, a lot of people think they're dating retreats, but they're actually not. I know, that's what I love. They're, they have, we don't even really talk about people's love lives on this retreat. We have some people who come from,

come from the perspective of saying, I have hit a point in my life where I have achieved an awful lot. I've achieved many of the things I thought would make me a more confident person. And I do not feel the confidence in myself that I thought I would feel by this stage. I thought my demons would go away with that promotion

or that business. They never go away. Okay. They just get smaller and you contain, you learn to deal with them. But they suddenly wake up in a world where financially or in terms of their work, in terms of their status, even in their age, they're like, man, I'm at this age and I'm still paralyzed by this stuff. I'm still gotten plastic syndrome. I still don't feel good enough.

What is it going to take now to change that? And so we teach a model for confidence that changes that I have other women who come and then because we now have a virtual retreat. So people do it from all over the world. Okay. There will be people who say, I'm at a crossroads in my life. I want to actually know what to do next. I don't necessarily feel like my life has the purpose. I want it to have. I don't even know what I'm passionate about and I want to throw myself into. I'm trying to figure out my direction. After the break, Matthew opens up about the ways he's grown and changed in his relationships plus he answers my five quicky questions.

I'll be right back. Okay, so you just said you do a confidence exercise because confidence, I guess people think, and I think I've heard you say this too, I was writing down about your quotes, but like, it's not like a light switch. You don't just like, I'm confident that check that box. It is a practice to be confident. And we all go through stages where we feel more and less so. So how do you put a confidence exercise?

So I teach a model on my retreat that shows how there are actually three different layers of confidence. Confidence isn't just this one. Confidence is defined in the dictionaries of feeling of certainty about something, but that doesn't give us the full picture on our own confidence. Our own confidence is divided into three layers, the first being the surface, that's how we come across, how we walk, talk, act, and what that portrays about our level of confidence. And we all know that on some level that can be faked, although that's actually easier said than done. Right.

But that's all the outward signs. We then have the lifestyle level. The lifestyle level is the things in our lives that underpin our confidence. At least I suppose on a egoic level. So you might be confident and maybe not just on any egoic level, but even on a sort of a Maslow's hierarchy of needs on a security level. Right. A job of the car. I have the good. I have all these things that give me confidence. I have a dog I love. I have friends I love, I have great parents, I know three languages or I play an instrument or all of these things that accumulate to kind of make us who we

are and be able to say, look, secure and safe and I'm a person of value. We know the dangers of that layer of confidence. It's fleeting, it's not real, right? Friends, go relationships, go, our job can disappear, change. Yeah, you cancel. And we often on the lifestyle layer, we base an enormous amount of our lifestyle confidence in one or two main areas. So if you have a relationship that you've made your entire world, then actually your lifestyle layer is not made up. Yes, it's made up of different things, but 90% of it is made up of this one thing. And of course, we know what happens when that goes away. It doesn't just feel like the death of a relationship. It feels like the death of us. That's who we were.

Like if you're going to wake up, you mean, or that relationship, whatever it may be. Don't put all your eggs in any basket. Right. And that's exactly it. On the lifestyle layer, people do put all of their confidence in one basket. And that's why that area makes them particularly vulnerable. And it's why in a relationship, by the way, that person then has a kind of emotional gun to your head the whole time, and is loaded by your own insecurity because you can't bear the thought of them leaving,

because them leaving is like a death of you. So now you'll do anything to make them stay. And now you start dropping all of your boundaries, dropping all of your needs, subjugating yourself to them, doing anything you can to make them happy and so on. So on the lifestyle layer, it's about diversifying our confidence. And on the retreat, I take people through a real,

a very intense process of diversifying their confidence. Because it's not that whilst we can, from a, a, a, suppose a kind of enlightenment perspective, say, we shouldn't base any of our confidence on that egoic kind of identity-driven level. It's just the construct. It's not really us. But we live in a world where we do spend our time doing things, and those things can give us confidence. But they're not confidence that should be relied upon. They're a luxury item, because the deeper level of confidence that the essential item is the third layer, and that's the core, and the core is one of the most profound things that I do with people on the virtual retreat,

or the impersonal retreat. Our core confidence is about our relationship with ourselves, and what I do with people there is begin a new relationship with themselves and for some people Begin a relationship because they've never had one right they've had a relationship with the world They've had a relationship with life. They've had a relationship with other people But they've never had a relationship with themselves right and that relationship is gonna determine a whole lot about Our lives like they have negative self-talk or they just don't really believe in themselves They don't masturb believe in themselves. They don't masturbate, for example. That's an important relationship. But there's a disconnect there too.

Yeah, exactly. That's it. So people on the core even believe, if you think about it, even even believe in ourselves, which is important. Belief comes from being able to do something usually. It comes from having had reference points for the fact I can do this. And some of us, there's areas where we haven't got reference points Right, like we might be have every relationship. We've been in we got cheated on and so when someone says you have to believe that you can find a Relationship with someone that won't cheat on you. It's like well tell me how to do that because every single relationship That person is cheated on me. I get that all the time people like I everyone cheats him. You're everyone this and that It's like well clearly there's something

that you're bringing to the table you're not seeing, but. Well, there's something you're ignoring. But yes, I think in some ways belief is overrated. The idea that we have to believe we can do something is overrated. Okay, so don't say just believe that you cannot be treated on to go back to your point.

The thing that you have to change the idea that you can do something to the idea that it's necessary that you have to, that when something is essential to your being, when something is essential to the way you want to live life, you no longer really have to worry about whether you can. You just, you just do it. I mean, I was 21 when I lost out on a really big job interview And I at the time I was weighing up this job Versus starting my own business and I screwed up this interview royally I mean I went in and self-sabotage the crap out of this interview and They didn't give me the job and all of a sudden this option that I thought I had should I start my own business

Should I go and work for this big company? Oh, the choices. Suddenly someone took away half the choice and said, well, you ain't getting that anyway. So now I went, I have to make this business work. It's essential, I have to. And that's a different feeling from, could I make this business work?

And in our relationships, do you need to believe that you're not going to be cheated on? Really? You just need to believe that a life where you don't take risks in love is in a life worth living. Yeah. To take risks and be okay with someone leaving you being hurt is part of it, right? Yeah, but it's so hard. It's so fucking hard.

It's so painful to be betrayed or to have your heart broken To have someone you know to feel truly crushed. Yeah, by a situation is so It's so painful and it doesn't mean when that happens you have to rush back out and do it all over again next month But they're just to a point where it's almost not about whether you can trust people. It's about personal pride Okay, it's about something bigger. It's about something bigger. It's that, yeah, someone can do that to me again. Of course they can. I can't stop that, but I have survived this before. There's something to that. I'm still here. I can keep going. And I have most likely new tools now. Yeah, we learn the lessons from the past. We have to learn them now. I've learned lessons or I've gathered new intelligence or and therefore I can do

this again. It's not this doesn't have to be a thing that breaks me and even if it happens again, I can have true pride in the fact that I showed up and I do think I think there's something that's underrated about a situation where you, many people have been in a situation where they gave their all to a relationship and were crushed in the process, just someone's steam rolled up and they never saw it coming. Was underrated, I think, is that those relationships where we truly give our all really can show the best of us. If we get a chance to see who we can be when we're at our best, when we really are showing up to something. And after a breakup like that, you get to look back on yourself and be proud of who you

were and what you gave and the way you were willing to show up. That can make you like yourself more. Because as we rock bottom, we will say they hit rock bottom. It's when you really grow. I think that going through a breakup like that and realizing that you that you survived, that you've learned a lot will make you so much stronger in another in the next relationship. And to then ask the honest question of yourself, which is, was there anything I was ignoring? Well, if I really look at that now, what was I ignoring? What did I not speak up about?

Right. And this is true in every relationship in our lives, even in work. Yeah. Like what are you not saying? You are sure of let go of people where you went. The thing I let go of them on the thing, the reason I decided I didn't want them in my company anymore. I knew two years ago. Oh, yeah, always. Yeah. I knew that years ago and I didn't talk to them. I didn't have the conversation or when it kept happening, I kept ignoring it. We had the conversation and then they did it again

and I just thought it was too much effort to bring it up again. You know, or I said to myself, it'll go away on its own. Maybe they'll, you know, you can see that and it's a great lesson when you say, ah, well, I'm not crazy because I actually did see this, this and this. And I chose to ignore it. No, that doesn't mean it doesn't make them right. It doesn't excuse what they did. But what's going on with me that I chose to ignore that come to think of it.

How many difficult conversations am I avoiding in my life? That's a really good practice. I've been doing that lately too. I was reading some book about this on my trip. It was like, make a list of all the conversations you're not having. And it's such really good practice. I've been doing that lately too. I was reading some book about this on my trip It was like make a list of all the conversations you're not having and it's such a great practice. It really is Your life will improve in direct Yeah proportion to the number of difficult conversations you're willing to have exactly I guess what I could do is like when people say oh

I broke up with this or someone cheated on me. They think if someone cheats on them Are they're clearly toxic then they have no responsibility in the relationship. We also need to look at even if someone cheated and you were saying, terrible, you're 50% of that relationship. There were some things you could still look at in yourself and that saying you drove them to cheat. But what part of it did you accept? What part of it were you not addressing? Right. So I think that asking yourself the honest question all the time in any situation, what would I do differently faced with that situation again faced with that relationship again? And my God, I mean, I've had my heart broken and and and then reflected on it and looked back and thought, well, okay, there were these things that I didn't agree with or there are these things that my God that wasn't a very fair way

For that to happen or this to happen or whatever and that I wasn't responsible for but I know that I would never do that again I know that what are some of the things when you look back at Matthew dating five years ago that you wouldn't do now good question I got a whole I couldn't God I could give you so many if I look at the last 10 years of my life I there's been all sorts of different versions of me. In my 20s, you know, I always thought I was such a great guy. Me. They're like, this is my work. I work well with women.

I thought I was a great guy. And I thought, you know, because I treated people in one respect, I treated them well. I was respectful. I was generous. I was chivalrous. I was, I've always been a kind person. I was respectful, I was generous, I was chivalrous, I've always been a kind person. I love people, I was raised to be kind.

Kindness is like my highest value, but I was selfish. Not realizing how much I'd made everything about me. Not realizing how careful, if you really are being a responsible adult, how careful you should be with people's hearts. And how easily you can do damage with people's hearts. Such a good consciousness to have right now because I think a lot of us, and I, oh my god, I was, I was not great to date years ago. You know, I think we all,

but I think it's when you don't have the answer to those questions. You're like, I'm still perfect. I'm still perfect, you know, I think we're always learning. See, I look back now and I'm like, does, there's a part of me that goes, does casual dating actually exist? Yeah, it exists, but it doesn't work. But if it doesn't work, it didn't exist. Oh, okay, God, it's a tell me. Let's talk about casual dating. There's usually most of the time, someone who's less casual than the other.

Yeah, there's always one person who wants more. Yeah. Always, yeah, yes. And there's one person pretending to be more casual than they are. Mm-hmm. That is true. That is true. It gives me a friend. To friends with benefits. People like, yeah, that won't really work. Oh, just having a good time or whatever, and then you're the same friend who just said, I'm just having a good time four weeks later is crying.

Going, well, you're like, you're like, you're like, it was a good time. I thought this was just a fun little jaunt you were having. But no, we do get invested very quickly or one person gets invested very quickly. And we hear terms constantly, this hook up culture, hook up culture. There's certainly a decent amount of hooking up going on, but I question the idea that it's all so casual and carefree. Because I do think people get hurt more easily than we give it credit for.

Yeah. And I know that in my life, there have been times where I've been willfully ignorant to how much my behavior might have affected someone. Yeah. How much I was ignoring how much someone liked me and what they wanted. Yes.

And they weren't saying that they wanted all of that. Right, but you just can tell. And I know. And you continue entertaining the situation because it's fun, but you also know that week by week, you're on a track to hurting this person more and more or vice versa. And you know, I just, I know that looking back now, you know, I'm glad of the person I am today and the lessons I've learned, but it's sad to me people I hurt along the way. Yeah, that's part of it.

I mean, I didn't know at the time, but I was like, I don't really want, I really say I don't want anything serious, and then I would probably act as if I did, and then I'd pull away, I guess I could have regrets about that, I could make amends, but I also think I've learned that so not what I want, it's so not interesting. I didn't know myself well enough, I didn't want to get hurt, I didn't want to, I can see all that now, so I think it's okay. I think as long as we evolve. Less than I just sound like someone who's always been on the power position, I also can point to times in my life where I was too needy or to you know when my anxiety got the better of me. Yeah. And where I

I forgot myself you know I came out of a relationship and went I was nowhere to be found. I had dismantled myself to please somebody to try and be what I thought someone wanted to run around their schedule to and you lose yourself in the process. Yeah. And that's a sure sign that something is wrong. If you are losing yourself in a relationship. Absolutely. I've definitely been there where I know that they were giving up their lives for me.

They didn't have a lot of friends around. You were just always in the power of being. Yeah, because I was afraid of being heard. I had a lot of stuff going on. I think I was a always in the power of me. Yeah, because I was afraid of being heard. I had a lot of stuff going on. I think I was a lot in the power of position. So did that manifest itself in sort of having a pattern of choosing people that were safe? I think so.

Yeah, I chose people that were like into me, or they like me. So it couldn't hurt you because the dynamic was, they were more into you than you were into them. I think so, because there were things that were important to me. I always dated very nice good guys. I never was into the bad boys or things that felt very unattainable, but I always dated guys that were right away, they were just in, they were kind, they were good.

But I think that I didn't know how to have difficult conversations. I didn't know what I wanted. I didn't know how to really be in a relationship for a long time. That's why, if I were, I started this career because I was like, I do not want to repeat that. What is wrong with me that I, that sex didn't, within say is interesting after a while, sex got boring, that I thought that we have

the marriage as a divorce, sex is often one of the problems. I was like, I don't, I want to learn how to not be that. Given that you started from a position of talking about all this stuff at a time when you were like, I don't, I want to learn how to not be that. Given that you started from a position of talking about all this stuff at a time when you were like, you know, looking for something a different pattern than you were experiencing, what was it like for you running those two things in tandem, talking about the subject whilst also sort of

having you. I was going to ask you the same thing because I've grown up doing this show. I think it's been, and I didn't say I was the extra before, felt the expert, like early, I'm like, you're the expert. I'm like, I'm learning with everybody. But for me, yeah, it's always a challenge to walk the line and to be like, well, here's what I'm going through. I'm human too. I'm struggling or I'm in a relationship that's ended and that's really hard, but I'm here to help you. Like, how do you show? You probably go through a heartache and have to show up at a retreat.

You're like, I'm fucking miserable, but I'm here to help you. So I just think when you're in the healing professions or the helping professions, we're also human. Like your therapist is a perfect, they don't sleep in the office, they like a bad, you always think like your therapist is just sitting there all day there to serve you. They know, but that's part of being human.

I think I've learned so much. I wouldn't want to date me who I was 15 years ago, but now it's like I feel like I've learned about, I think most've learned so much. I wouldn't want to date me who I was 15 years ago, but now it's like I feel like I've learned about, I think most of his communication, I didn't know what have different conversations. I would always fake, I fake a lot of things, fake orgasms, fake, whatever I just want to be a like me,

it's just so different now. Now I'm like, I'm so equipped to have open conversations and to love and be loved. I feel that, I feel that. And I know my issues and I talk about my issues. Like this is where I struggle. Like I think it's okay. I think I just think it wasn't okay to talk about.

I was, you probably get this like a free to be needier, a free to be like I was the anti needier. I was like so independent. And I still am. I think that that's a challenge. I'm a cheer slow independent. But like I want to be loved. I want to be in a relationship, you know.

So it's just, But it's, but it makes for a very three dimensional person coming out the other side of that. Because of course, you still have access to all of those very strong parts of you. But when you then couple that with the softness of being able to be vulnerable, be open about yourself or the warmth, or the even being self-deprecating or whatever, it creates a very attractive, three-dimensional picture that we don't have when we're trying to be a caricature.

That's it for this episode, but subscribe, and stay tuned for part two of my interview with Matthew Hussey when we get into how to tell if your partner is actually invested in your relationship. We talk about love bombing bombing and how to spot authenticity on a date, the importance of consistency, oh, we cover a lot.

So be sure to subscribe for the next episode. Thanks for listening to Sex with Emily. Be sure to like, subscribe, and give us a review where every who is in a podcast and share this with a friend or a partner. Believe me, if you got something out of this, they will too. We released two to three episodes a week, find me on Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.

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