The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett - Moment 87 - Dr Aria On How To Get Over Heartbreak

Episode Date: December 9, 2022

How do you recover from one of the most life shattering experiences that can happen to a person? Not only that, how do you face it calmly and with grace? In this moment Dr Aria discusses how to find and cultivate stillness in the eye of the hurricane that life can sometimes be. While it’s impossible to escape the suffering that is a part of life, Dr Aria says that it is crucial to not ask why you are suffering, but have a self belief that all will be well and see it ass a temporary part of journey to a new and meaningful life Listen to the full episode here - https://g2ul0.app.link/nvORjUciBvb Dr Aria: https://www.dr-aria.com https://www.instagram.com/dr._aria/?hl=en Watch the Episodes On Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/c/TheDiaryOfACEO/videos

Quick one, just wanted to say a big thank you to three people very quickly. First people I want to say thank you to is all of you that listen to the show. Never in my wildest dreams is all I can say. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd start a podcast in my kitchen and that it would expand all over the world as it has done. And we've now opened our first studio in America, thanks to my very helpful team led by Jack on the production side of things. So thank you to Jack and the team for building out the new American studio.

And thirdly to Amazon Music who, when they heard that we were expanding to the United States, and I'd be recording a lot more over in the States, they put a massive billboard in Times Square for the show. So thank you so much, Amazon Music. Thank you to our team. And thank you to all of you that listened to this show. Let's continue. Sometimes in life, you have these unbelievable, somewhat cruel coincidences that occur that it's hard to make sense of. And last time you came on this podcast, I would define it as, for me anyway, a pretty cruel coincidence. Because we had a conversation to do with life generally and success and the mindset and psychology and all the things that you're an expert on and for whatever reason that day I decided that I wanted to spend 30 minutes talking about marriage cheating love and asking you these very personal questions about monogamy

which I've never done before with any guest ever and which I really had no place or reason to ask you more than anyone else and it just feels to me for what we're going to talk about in part today that that was a bit of a cruel coincidence and you know one of the questions I asked you was um do you believe in monogamy and then I asked you can you love someone and cheat on them and when I listened to that podcast back i now noticed um why you laughed because it wasn't you laughed yeah and it wasn't a normal laugh it was like a real belly laugh yeah like a bit of a nervous belly laugh yeah after we came off air on that podcast you told me something and uh it even gives me goosebumps now thinking about what you said. And it gave the whole team in the room who overheard our conversation goosebumps as well.

So after our 30 minute conversation about marriage and monogamy and cheating and love, what did you say to me? I told you a story. Yeah. And that was about two weeks earlier. I'd been traveling back from London home and I got out of the train station and my wife picked me up and we got into the car and we had planned to go and have a brunch

at my favorite little spot. They do amazing Cuervo's Rancho sauce. I was very excited. And she said, let's go straight home. I've made sandwiches. And she doesn't make great sandwiches. So I said, no, no, I think the brunch is a better option. And she said, no, there's something that I need to tell you. And I said, is it bad? And she said, yes. And I said, is that about the marriage? the marriage and she said yes and then we began to drive back and I had this sinking feeling in me and we're we drove for about five minutes in silence and then I went to put my hand on her lap and she said don't't. Don't touch me, because you won't want to after I've told you what's happened.

And that's whenever it drops. And I remember that 10-minute drive back home then felt like an eternity. I was just looking out the window. And we got home. We got into the house, into the kitchen, and I was standing by the kitchen table, hands rested on it. And I said, what's happened? And she said, I've been having an affair with a man from work. And I remember just tears began to stream. I didn't move completely motionless. Tears began to stream.

And then she said, and that's not all. And she said, I'm pregnant with this child. And in that moment, I felt like I lost a lot. You know, I'd lost my wife, I'd lost life we created, I'd lost the dog, our home, her, my parents, her family, everything that I'd really held dear. If someone said, what makes a meaningful life? I would have described these things. And it felt like they'd just been snatched away, just came crumbling down like a house of cards. And then fast forward two weeks and Steve decides to ask.

And I remember because the first thing, no, no, it's fascinating because the first thing he asked was, you're married, right? And I did this high-pitched laugh and I go, yes. And then the conversation flowed on and it's themes I'd really thought about. Can you love someone and cheat on them? Does monogamy exist? Is it natural? Are we set up to live a life where we're in one relationship with one person only? And so over the past 18 months, it's been a process. And some of these themes have been very real to me.

I just, as I reflect on that conversation and when I played it back after you told me, so we come off air and we stood next to the table and the microphones and you explained to me what's happened. I'm for the first time in my life completely speechless and the thing that blew me away even more so than what you'd said to me was your ability to be so calm and rational and objective in the answers you gave and even when i listen back now although there was that laugh which was a bit of an indication um you were able to speak about someone betraying you or being deceitful with a level of calmness and apparent um emotional uh sort of restraint that i i just admired so much from someone that was right in the middle of the emotional hurricane and had just been victim of that act and um

you said that you know about the topic of monogamy. How did that change your opinion and also the subsequent 18 months of processing on the topic of monogamy? So as a quick aside, I like that analogy and we touched upon it briefly about the hurricane. And it's funny actually because a friend of mine showed me a book about a week ago, and it was different personality profiles depending on the day that you'd been born on. And whenever we looked mine up, there's a little meditation at the end, a summary, and it said, the stillest part of the hurricane is its centre. And that essentially has been a philosophy that's guided my life, where sometimes there's a storm and it's horrendous and it's raging.

But if you can cultivate that sense of stillness and calmness and clarity deep within you, no matter what life throws at you, you will be okay. Because the second part of whenever I was told that news and the tears were streaming, and I felt that sense of loss and overwhelming sadness, it was a remarkable moment where in that instant, and I can only describe it as a whisper, I heard a whisper within me, as if it was resonating from a heart that all will be well, forwards, all will be well, all will be well. And I knew even then, I knew whenever, you know, this tumultuous emotion, I knew everything's going to be okay. I will get through this. I'm going to have to walk through the desert and I'm going to have to endure horrific amount of an emotional

level, but it's all going to be fine. How did you know that? I think it's something that I've cultivated over, over 10, 15 years. And that's why I do what I do now, because I want to help other people to be able to reach that stage. And it began on a journey of, um, Buddhist exploration and understanding the nature of life. And I came to this realization that life involves suffering. There's no promise that it's going to be happy-go-lucky and really pleasant all the time. Really horrific things happen in life. And on one level, there's no way that we can ever rationally explain it away. Sometimes bad things happen, but it doesn't end there.

It's a bit like that line that someone once sent to me. Whenever you're suffering, don't ask, God, why am I suffering? Ask, God, where are you taking me? And so I've developed this ability to begin to view my life as though it's happening to someone else, as though the experience, the thoughts, the emotions are something that I can almost take it back on and have perspective. And I can see it and I can feel it, but I know that my thoughts, that isn't just who I am. My emotions isn't just who I am. That's a temporary experience. And throughout my life, no matter what has happened, even whenever it's been brutal,

it's often shifted me in a new trajectory. And there's been a new meaningful life ahead of me. And I knew even then, she's going to be okay. She'll be okay. It's going to be a tough road for her too but she'll be okay and it's going to be a tough road for me too but i will be okay anger so many people in that situation whether rightly or wrongly just because of the way that they are yeah would have reacted with anger and for some reason you were both calm in telling me you're calm now. And this remarkable thing, which I, I think I, I struggled to understand a little bit is one of your first concerns was her wellbeing versus your own. Why? Because I loved her and I was in the practice of, of placing her emotional wellbeing

and her happiness on the same level as mine, if not sometimes first and foremostly, but at least on, on equal playing field. And, and I was just so in that habit. And that was the toughest thing to let go of. The thing that I still struggle with today. And I'm still it's the one part that I realized the other day that I still had a fear of upsetting her or her not being okay. And so that's something which just, just really developed and was so ingrained. And it's interesting on the point of anger. If you said, like your wife, partner for 10 years,

married for five, has an affair and is pregnant with another man's child, how will you react? I would have said anger. I'd be furious. But't there at least not initially it was this overwhelming sense of sadness it was just that sense of loss of knowing that again that she's potentially done something that she might regret for a long time when I don't want anyone to go through that experience where they feel like they've fucked up hugely even if the the future is positive in that moment my sense is there will be regret or at least shame