Tiger Sisters - The #1 Dating Rule That Saves You Months of Heartbreak

Episode Date: February 23, 2026

Thank you SoFi for sponsoring this video. Sign up here: https://www.sofi.com/TigerWhat if the real dating glow-up isn’t playing hard to get, landing a rich partner, or mastering “feminine energy��… but learning how to regulate your nervous system, set clean boundaries, and stop shrinking yourself to be chosen?In today's relationship-focused episode, Jean and Cherie sit down with one of the internet’s most influential dating voices, Sabrina Zohar (The Sabrina Zohar Show), to break down the psychology behind modern love. From “If I’m too much, go find less” to the question we’re all secretly asking - "Can ambitious women actually find love?" - this episode dives into what advice is worth keeping… and what might be keeping you stuck.Tune in as they cover:💥What “self-regulation” actually means💥 The difference between boundaries and ultimatums💥 Platonic vs Romantic boundaries 💥 Early signs you’re shrinking yourself in dating💥 Popular online "dating gurus" & what they're really sayingWhether you’re anxious, avoidant, healing, thriving, career-obsessed, freshly divorced, or wondering if you’re “too much”… this episode will challenge the stories you’ve absorbed about love and teach you how to choose yourself rather than strive to be 'chosen' first.TIMESTAMPS:00:51 - Introducing Sabrina Zohar 2:20 - Defining self-regulation 5:30 - How to actually self-regulate9:30 - Pattern recognition in trauma triggers12:12 - Discussing the fear responses 13:40: How to co-regulate with a partner 18:55: Exploring boundaries: Why they’re important and how to set them21:49: The reason boundaries are so uncomfortable 22:58: Setting boundaries in platonic friendships26:50: Allowing yourself to sit with emotions 32:39: Cherie’s friendship break-up 36:20: “If I’m too much… find less” - how not to shrink yourself43:45: Dating with detachment (from the outcome)44:05: How to be in your growth stage48:20: Analyzing “dating gurus” online 54:48: Conclusion and lasting thoughts🐯👯‍♀️ We’re the Tiger Sisters: Your Wall Street & Silicon Valley big sistersDecoding Money • Power • Love✨ New episodes every Monday | Shorts all week ✨💌 Want to partner with us? Sponsorships: [e-mail] trust us?▫️ Cherie Brooke Luo — 100M+ views demystifying tech, finance & MBAs▫️ Jean Luo — ex-Goldman Sachs, ex-Snapchat exec, 50+ AI patents, startup investor▫️ Together: 4 Ivy League degrees • built billion-dollar products • two startups — decoded for youWhat you’ll get (and keep):▫️ 🚀 Ivy League cheat sheets — no $250K tuition▫️ Personal finance playbooks (salary, investing, negotiation)▫️ Networking scripts behind $100M+ deals & job offers▫️ Real conversations with CEOs, operators & investors▫️ Mindset resets — clarity without the pricey coach▫️ Systems for career, money, and long-term growth💛 LET’S CONNECT~ CHERIEInstagram — /cherie.brookeTikTok — /cherie.brookeSubstack — cherieluo.substack.comLinkedIn — /cherie-luo~ JEANInstagram — /jeanluo_LinkedIn — /jeanluo👉 Hit Subscribe & tap the 🔔, then leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ review on Spotify & Apple Podcasts. It takes 10 seconds and makes a massive difference in helping new people discover Tiger Sisters.🛍️ Items:🍵 Sisters Matcha — www.sistersmatcha.com🌀 Everything else — https://amzn.to/3z0dx5b

It's not even about dating and love. It's about yourself. It's about making sure that you are the person that is sort of like ready to be loved. My mama always said you gotta love yourself more than need to be loved by other people. You can always be in your growth stage. You can reinvent yourself at any time. People can be disappointed. You can disappoint people, but are you harming them?

No, but like if your boundaries are in place and they're offended by it, maybe they're not meant to be in your life. I'm Cherie, I'm Jean. And where the Tiger's system. sisters. We are your Wall Street and Silicon Valley Big Sisters. And we're a top 10 business podcast, bringing late night sister talk meets boardroom strategy. Welcome to the Tiger Sisters podcast, where we're doing an episode with Sabrina Zohar. Welcome. Welcome. Hi, girls. She is the creator of the top ranked podcast, The Sabrina Zohar show. Could you please introduce yourself in your own words to the audience?

I'm so excited to be here. So my name is Sabrina Zohar. I'm a dating and relationship coach. I got my start because I was the girl that needed the advice. I was a hot mess and I realized by diving in and doing the work, understanding myself, understanding my patterns, and then getting certified as a coach that I was able to help other people. And so I have the podcast, the Sabrina's O-Hawr show, I've got the socials, I've got courses, I've got all the fun stuff. I'm just grateful to be here. Thank you for having me. Yay. Yay. So excited. We are going to be deep diving today and do all of Sabrina's best gems on dating, love, and relationships. And we're going to get into the really deep topics. we're going to be talking about self-regulation, co-regulation, not abandoning yourself

when you're in a relationship boundaries, both in friendship and in love and in life in general. We are so excited. Today's episode is presented by SoFi, the all-in-one finance app that helps you bank, borrow, and invest your money in one place. Okay, Sabrina, so before we get into the archetypes of dating and love advice out there, I want to dive in into some of your own teachings because you put so much incredible content out there that we've both seen and loved. Some people have described you as giving tough love to the internet, but delivering brutal truths with care and love in the process.

We love your content. I'm going to highlight the three main themes that stood out most to us in your content. Oh, please do. So the first one is defining self-regulation. I think regulating and coming from a place of self-regulation is truly the crux of how you'll be in a healthy and secure relationship. I know for me personally, like I started my entire career podcast, all of the things, because I was that girl. I was the girl that would have panic attacks sitting at night. I would wake up seven times in the middle of the night. I would look at my phone and if I had a text, I had air for the moment. And if I didn't, that was it, it was the end of the world.

And I didn't understand that all of that had to do with our nervous system, that our nervous system is really the lens at which we see things. Our nervous system is really the lens at which we, how we handle things. And without emotional regulation, you know, we think about conflict and repair. but we don't incorporate conflict, regulate, repair. And regulating is really being able to, one, access a place of choice, right? When we're dysregulated, our body is sensing that we're in danger, that there's a tiger, there's something coming after us, but oftentimes it's our cell phone. It's a person that we don't really know.

And that just triggers our nervous system, causes us to be dysregulated. When we're dysregulated, what goes out the window? You can't sleep. You can't eat. You can't drink. You don't take care of basic functions for survival because you're in survival mode. So for me, once we strip all that away, once we learn how to regulate our emotions, once we learn how to come back to the present moment, in that I can access a place of agency. I can then understand what are my choices.

I can start to get curious about how old do I feel. What is this coming up for me? How familiar does this feel? And I think the reason that most of the dating advice that we see online doesn't actually apply to a lot of people is because they're not coming from a regulated place, which is really their adult version. They're coming from all the parts and all the kids' versions of themselves, projecting that onto their people and not actually being in the present moment. I love that this is the cornerstone of all of your dating and love advice because it's not even about dating and love.

It's about yourself. It's about making sure that you are the person that is sort of like ready to be loved. Yeah, 100%. Because my mama always said you got to love yourself more than the need to be loved by other people. Because if I love myself more than the need to be loved by somebody else, what that means is. means is I'm okay to walk away. I'm okay to say no. I'm okay that if I don't hear from somebody, I don't turn to stone and not do my work and my whole entire day and nothing is in hell in a hand

basket. And I think when we come to how can I love myself more than the need to be loved by other people, it goes back to choice. I get to say I'm choosing you. I don't want you in my life. I don't need you in my life. And to me, that's a really empowering place, especially with as you guys mentioned earlier. There's so much nonsense on the internet. There's so many different versions and variances and most of them are about self-abandonment. How can I get you to like me? How can I get you to validate me? How can I get you to choose me? Well, if you're doing that, you've already lost yourself. So if someone, like you described before, basically, like, you know, if you're like waiting next to your phone for that text message, which is just all too real. Side note,

I do have a friend, like in our early 20s. Like, I remember just like going crazy. Not me, but like, being like seeing her go crazy because she's like waiting up for a text message for someone like when when will they text me back oh my god they texted me like an hour and a half do i have to wait an hour 45 before i respond it goes into this whole spiral so like if you are in that place like how do you get to a self-regulated place like what do you do so there's the intellectualization of it and then there's the implementation right so it's like the example is i if i were to say okay i'm going to teach you how to do a debt lift i'm going to give you all of the understanding and everything and you're going to know the minute you go went to the gym and actually do it, you could probably take your back out because you don't

understand, what do you mean to engage this and do this and it comes from here because you don't know what it feels like. And so I think when it comes to like that extreme, right, the person that's losing themselves because they haven't heard a text from this person, the number one thing that will change your life, especially with a lot of anxiety is the power of the pause. Being able to literally put one minute, one minute in between the stimulus to actually have a response, not a reaction. So that's the first thing. The second thing is like when we talk about regulating our nervous system, I think there's a common misconception we see on the internet, as if regulating is like doing this quick like pull on your ear and it activate your parasympathetic nervous system and now you're calm.

What regulating your nervous system means is that you are letting your body know that you're not in immediate danger and you can come back and access rest and digest. So what that also means is that's how you access choice. If I'm dysregulated, I don't believe I have any choices. I have to do this. So what regulating your nervous system in practice looks like could be going for a walk. It could be doing the shakes. It could be doing something called the silent punch where you literally like hit the air with your hands.

It could be sour candy. My favorite is sour candy and ice cubes. So one is the mammalian diver's response. That's ice cubes. So intense cold will actually activate your parasympathetic nervous system so that you can come back to the present moment. That's why they do ice baths quite often. You're causing yourself to be under it distressed

but then also calming yourself down with your breathwork so that you can handle what's to come. The other thing, the reason I like sour candy is because your brain, what ends up happening when you're dysregulated is your prefrontal cortex shuts off. You go into your amygdala. When you're in your amygdala, that's the fear center. When you're in your fear center, that's typically childhood, core beliefs, things that are coming up from the past. The way that we like to look at it is imagine if you had an office building. We'll understand this.

You had an office building and at the top floor is all the executives, right? It's all the functions, all the people that are making the important decisions. When you're dysregulated, that goes offline. So then the rest of the office building is running the show, and these are all children and parts, and none of them know what they're doing. When you regulate your nervous system, like the sour candy, your brain can't be in two places at once. So it can't have this ruminating loops and blah, blah, and then have the stimulus of the sour candy that turns your prefrontal cortex on. So the reason that I suggest something like grabbing a sour candy, sitting for a minute, doing three deep breaths is because what it does is it activates the prefrontal cortex, turns that back on. then I can say, okay, what are my choices?

How old do I feel? What's coming up for me? And then I can start to access that deeper place. Otherwise, you're an Olympic loop. And your brain is doing everything it can to understand how to get out of the discomfort instead of being able to sit in it and grow from it. I love that. I'm definitely going to try that.

It's not even in like love and dating, but like whenever I'm stressed, like anxious, pissed, like whatever emotion is coming up for me. I am now in a place where I can recognize that. Love that. That takes huge work. But now, like, there's the pause and then I'm grabbing an ice cube and putting it in my mouth and being like, I need to sit here. And like, that's like a very actionable thing that you can do. Yeah, you can hold on to them. You can literally, you could put them on your, you could put like ice water on your wrist. Like if you're at work or something and you're like, oh, I can't do that. You want to be able to just release that to your body. You could do Wimhoff breathwork every morning. That really helps activate the parasympathetic nervous system. I think a lot of people hear the, oh, I have to do yoga and meditate and breathwork. It's like, oh, actually, I would say if you're just regulated meditation is the stupidest thing you could do. Because if a tiger were running after us right now, could you sit and close your eyes and try to be, no, you wouldn't be able to.

You would need to be able to say, first, I have to be safe to access the place where I could get deeper into my body. One thing you said that I thought was really interesting was the concept of how old do I feel? What do you mean by that? It's my favorite question. So my book comes out in October. Oh. Thank you. It's called Why Am I Like This?

And really the crux of what I speak about often is patterns, right? recognition because we are just a sum of all of our parts. And so the reason I used to ask, how old do I feel and where do I learn this from is because more often than not, let's think about something when you're super dysregulated, right? So we'll use the example of the texting. It's just the easiest. Somebody doesn't text you back. And all of a sudden, the pinch doesn't match the ouch. You're freaking out. You're crying. You're hyperventilating. I've been there. You're calling your friend. You're playing FBI. You're trying to understand everything that's going on. The reason we ask how old do I feel is because very rarely are you going to say, I feel

like a 35-year-old woman sitting in my apartment right now. Usually it'll be, I feel like I'm seven. What happened when you were seven? My dad used to pull this. Ah, okay, so this is nothing to do with the other person. This is my core beliefs being projected onto them. The reason that I like to do that is, one, it gives you more agency. You start to realize, oh, it's not about them.

I do have choice. And second, you realize it's not about them. Because oftentimes we obsess and we hyperfixate over people that aren't off during clarity because it gives us dopamine. And the more I can obsess over somebody, but if I actually start to get curious about how old do I feel and where did I learn this from, then I can start to actually tap into the root of what's causing this. I love that because it's once again examining yourself, right?

You're asking, why am I reacting this way? Oh, it's because I was always the last person to get picked up when I was a child. And I was like left alone. And this non-response to my text makes me feel like I'm in that space again. I'm in the after school. I'm not being picked up. Where are my parents, right? Oh, I know. And then what happens, right? For a lot of people, they see that little version. You're like, oh, and for most of us, what's our reaction? Ah, screw them, right? Oh, God, get out of here. Stop it. Leave me alone. But when we can get curious and hold space, here's my fun neuroscience fact. When you show yourself self-compass in love, you release more dopamine than you do from an external like person. So if I can stop and say, oh, wow, yeah, it feels like I'm seven years old again being in the pickup line. Well, given everything I've been through, no wonder this would make me feel like that.

that. You've one closed the loop in your brain. You have finality to what's going on. You've understood yourself. You've validated yourself. You showed yourself compassion and you released dopamine for yourself so you're not contingent and waiting for somebody else. And like you said, you've broken the cycle. You've taken a step. You're waiting to be like, okay, I don't need to feel like that seven-year-old again. Let me give it a minute. Let me give it five minutes. Let me give it 45 minutes so that I can come back into my own as the 35-year-old woman that I am. And the biggest thing for anybody that wants know what's the difference between intuition and anxiety, right? Because it's like, if we're trying to understand, am I dysregulated? What does that look like? The biggest thing is when we think about

our fear responses, fight, flight, freeze, fawn, flop is a new one. I'm not so familiar with it, but we're flopping. Fight fright. Wait, we know what fight is, right? You're literally, you get argumentative, combative flight avoidance, right? Bop! Out, this doesn't matter. And let me also preface, anxious folks are also avoided. So it's not like it's just the avoidant attachers. Then you have freeze, right? You could just stop. You don't know what to do. fawn you people please you try to make it the beauty of all of this is that when you can actually stop and understand where you're coming from and what's happening for you then you can make choices now how do you know the difference between them intuition is very calming intuition is very if i were to say jean

do you like that color and you went no right do you notice how it was an immediate reaction there was no urgency to it it was just i don't like that versus if i said you know if i do you like this color in your life depends on it you might be getting really frantic when we're see urgency, that's anxiety. So if somebody text you and you're like, or you text the person that you're dating, why didn't they called me? Why didn't they answered? Where are they? That's urgency. That's when we know we're dysregulated versus a more secure, solid maybe foundation would be, you know, I haven't heard from them, but they're at work. So I'm sure I'll hear from them later. We don't assume ill intent in other people because we've given the space for ourselves to

understand that they're humans and probably having their own experience. I love what you just said. It's like sticking in my head. The pinch isn't worth the pinch. Pinch doesn't match the outch. The pinch doesn't match the ouch. Like that's really powerful. And so like with co-regulation, how does that work together in the sense like, when do you share with someone that like, oh, I'm hurt and maybe I'm having like a bigger response than than normal or then someone would expect because I do have, you know, history or something that's like kind of triggering for me? Like when do you share that with someone to co-regulate? Co-regulation is a beautiful thing, right? If you're super calm and I'm really frantic, if I can use your nervous system to allow me to realize we're safe, beautiful. Really, the reason that we want to, so I'll give you an example. When my partner and I first started dating, we had moved in together. And I said, hey, baby, do you want to go do this? I don't want to go home goods or something knowing me. And he went, no, and walked off. Now, to anybody else, they might go, okay, he said, no, what's the big deal? I was hell in a handbasket. I was hyperventilating. I started to sweat. And this wave of heat. came over me. Now, had I just initially in the moment been like, what do you mean? No, that's not

really fair to him because now I'm projecting and I'm using him to validate and reassure me. So instead what I had to do is I had to stop and go, whoa, okay, how old do I feel? I was like, dude, you're seven. That's dad right there. And I said, okay, so this is nothing to do with him. And I said, right, my dad's very dismissive. He would, my dad can say, just shut down an entire, you just spent seven years on a business plan and with one flip of the no, that's it. you're done. And so when Ryan came back in, I said, hey, can I share something with you? And I think it's really important to ask consent to make sure that somebody's in a place. And he said, of course, what's going on? And I used eye statements. I said, when you said no, I shut down and I got really

disregulated. And I'm going to be honest, that reminded me of my dad. He's incredibly dismissive. Moving forward, it's not that you did anything wrong, but could you just at least let me know your why so I don't feel alone on an island? And he was like, oh my God, of course, absolutely. That makes so much sense. And then I felt seen, heard and understood. I felt safe. We've never had that issue since because he understands what I need and I didn't project anything onto him. I was able to understand myself. Then I could express that to him. But if you don't have that regulation moment, even if it's doing this for five seconds or just bluh, like just doing a noise and exhale humming can activate your vagus nerve without doing any of that. What we end up doing

is we just project onto other people. And then that's just not really fair to them or yourself. Because you're not actually talking about the issue. It had nothing to do with it. He said no. what had to do with brought up in me. And now I could express that to my partner. Yeah, I really like that you provided that script that you provided that example of using these eye statements because I think when you say it in that way and your partner is similarly well self-regulated, that's not something they should take offense to, right? That's something that they should be like, I'm so happy for that feedback because I didn't understand why you seemed upset in the moment, but I wasn't sure if I should ask you. You know, so that's something that I think the more you do that, the more you can build.

like a really strong relationship. Oh, and let me preface, the girl you see that had no problem saying that was not the girl I was 10 years ago. That girl was crying on the floor, begging my ex not to leave me, was in the most toxic, tumultuous. I married my father relationship like this was a replica of that man just in another body in another form. It took me saying no. It took me learning to say boundaries.

And above all, you know how I got here, I learned how to grieve. Because part of growth, we're all in therapy, right? We're all doing all this work on ourselves. The number one aspect is that you have to learn to grieve that there are going to be people that benefited from the fact that you didn't have boundaries. They're going to be people that benefited from the fact that you played small. And then when you say, hey, I need you to take accountability and ownership, that's terrifying to them. But that's part of it. And part of growth and part of expanding something.

We have something called our window of tolerance. Your window of tolerance is how much you can handle with flexibility before you go into hyperarousal, super anxious or hypoorazel shutting down. So if we want to expand that window of tolerance, we do have to have these uncomfortable conversations. But that's going to come with grieving. Because if you and I are best friends and I say, hey, I'm so sorry, I can't come pick you up from the airport. I have an exam in 20 minutes and you lose your marbles on me. I need to be okay with the fact that maybe the friendship has run its course. Or maybe that's not the type of person I want in my life.

That's okay. That's deep. That's really deep. I like that. You know, I think people don't realize how much mental load you're carrying day to day when your finances aren't in order. I mean, we talked about this on multiple episodes and it's a hot topic that listeners ask about all the time. Yeah. For example, carrying high-interest credit card debt can feel like something that's impossible to get out of.

Like you can make all of your payments, but depending on the interest, the balance barely moves. Well, you know, our sponsor, SOFI, has a product that can help with that. Yes. So-Fi personal loans could let you consolidate all of your credit card debt into one low, fixed monthly payment. And there are no prepayment fees, no late fees. Also, funding is fast. Get $5,000 to $100,000 as soon as the same day you sign. Or, So-Fi can pay your credit cards directly.

SoFi's already helped members pay off over $33 billion in debt. And it was named NerdWallet's best personal loan of 2025. Check your rate without impacting your credit score with no commitment. Head to sophy.com slash tiger or click the link below to see how much you could save. That's sophy.com slash tiger. Now back to the show. So Sabrina, I feel like that leads us perfectly into the topic of boundaries, which is another topic that I think you do an amazing job of exploring.

in all of your content. So you kind of talk about how boundaries can be the foundation of standards, emotional safety, and even self-trust. So can we talk a little bit about why, you know, it's often so hard to do this? And then where does this difficulty originate from? And then how can you sort of express boundaries in dating? Boundaries don't keep people out. They protect what's in. And boundaries for me are a way of keeping you in my life. If I'm setting a boundary with you, that's because I want you to stay in my life. But what I'm saying is this is how I can show up sustainably. So an example, when I dated, if I told somebody, I remember a guy, I said, hey, you know, we matched online. And I said, I kind of have like my own thing of, I don't want to talk

endlessly on the app. I'd love to meet in person. It's been a full day. And his response was, well, it's the rush to the altar. And I was like, wha. And so he didn't, he disres, now here's a thing. A lot of people that say he crossed a boundary. No, he didn't. He showed me that he didn't respect my boundary. It's the same as if I said, I don't call, I don't take phone calls after nine. You didn't cross my boundary by calling me after nine. I cross my own if I answer. So boundaries are for us. And so how for me, how I start to understand boundaries are like, what did I use to accept that I'm no longer willing to? So if I know, and what I also do is my favorite DBT practice is think of future you. And so if I know how I set my boundaries of I don't answer the phone after nine o'clock or

I put my phone down at eight o'clock and I don't answer, it's because I know that future me in the morning at 6 a.m. when I'm already getting ready for my day and I have to go do things, it's going to be really annoyed that I was dysregulated all night scrolling on my phone. And so I have to think about what do I need in order to have a fulfilling and beautiful relationship with somebody? The boundaries are going to be important. Now, anybody that doesn't respect your boundaries is just telling you that they don't respect what you have to say. And so when we think about boundaries in dating, what we want to look at is a couple of things. Is there flexibility? Because you don't want super rigid. It's not like, hey, I said it's nine o'clock. It's never changing

at nine. Maybe the response is, oh, well, actually I have my friend's wedding. So of course it's going to change that night. I'm not going to be in bed by 11. We want flexibility, but we also have to learn, and that goes back to that grieving component, is that if I'm going to start to say no, and I'm going to say that doesn't work for me and I'm going to use my voice, then I have to be okay disappointing people. Now, where does that stem from? Where do we learn all this from? Let's start going back. When we think about people pleasing, not sending boundaries and things, I want us to look at in the lens of, am I being hurtful or harmful? Am I hurting your feelings? Because I can afford to hurt your feelings, right? If you were to say, Sab, I'm only in town one day, can you get lunch?

And I said, guys, I'm so sorry. I have a huge meeting. You might hurt your feelings. Versus, Sab, I'm coming to town. I need you to drive me to the hospital because I have one surgery and I have no one else that can take me and they have to have somebody that checks me in. Yeah. Sorry, Mommy needs a self-care day. That would be harmful to you. So when we're thinking of boundaries, I can hurt your feelings by saying no, but am I harming you or myself in the process. Now, the reason boundaries are so uncomfortable is because I'll give you an example for me. I go. up in a narcissistic household. Where when you grow up in a narcissistic household for me, my personal experience is that the head of the household, the narcissist in the home, we revolve

around them. So they are the sun and you are the planets moving around them. So setting boundaries as a child meant that I could get hit, meant that I would be alienated, meant that I could get in trouble. I wasn't allowed to say no. I wasn't allowed to give an opinion. So I learned there's something wrong with me. I'm a bad girl. If you just play quiet, if you just do what everybody else wants, they're going to love you. That's maladaptive because here I am in my adult life doing that and these people aren't my parents. So oftentimes we learn that in childhood depending on and it doesn't have to mean that you had big T traumas. I want to clarify that for anyone listening. That doesn't mean that you had trauma, but you had little T traumas. And little T traumas could be my mom worked

full time and wasn't home as much. Okay, that still impacts you. That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with your parents, but that's still left a mark on you. And so if we learn, that's where I go back to how old do I feel and where did I learn this from? Oftentimes, it'll tell us where boundaries feel uncomfortable. Yeah. Something for me over the last like year and a half that I've really come into is boundaries not really in dating as much, but as in friendships. So I think it's so interesting that like boundaries, when you talk about your boundaries or set a boundary, like where do your friends or the people who are in your life, where do they fall

and how do they respond to that? I think it's super telling because for me, I'm in my Saturn return. Oh. Oh, my, yeah. I know, right? It's crazy. But like you said, like once you set a boundary and you see how people respond, like, do they respect your boundaries? And, like, we're adults at this point. Like, I'm, I just turned 30 and, like, people can be disappointed.

You can disappoint people, but are you harming them? No. But, like, if your boundaries are in place and they're hurt by it, like, or they're offended by it, maybe they're not meant to be in your life. Yeah. Maybe we should change their relationship with them. Yeah. I'll never forget.

I had a friend of 10 years, right? And you think, oh, this you're like close as besty. We were together. Like, if we weren't texting, we were calling. If we weren't calling, we were together, right? Like, it was that type of almost codependency to the point where most people didn't understand the friendship. They would see us together and they're like, you're so warm and engaging and she's so cold

and stoic. And I think I attached to her just because she was there. And I'll never forget, this is when I, this is in 2022. And that was like the year for me that I started changing the way, that I dated, I changed the way I showed up. I started to realize, like, what am I holding on to these people? Yeah. And we were supposed to go out.

And it was like a whole night. And I had my clothing line software, before I started the podcast and everything, before I had this whole career. And I was on like a 14-hour shoot day. It was one of those like, you're up at five in the morning. Not even. I was like up at four. We had the whole thing. It was like 8.30 at night.

And we were all supposed to go to dinner. And I text everybody saying, hey, I just finished. I'm so tired. I can meet you guys at dinner really quick. I'm like 8.30 for me. That's like Bartholona for me. Like this was a part. I'm in bed now at 830.

But I texted of the group. And it was like 15 of us. It was like five. of us going to dinner and then a bunch of us meeting after. And one of them was this girl. And I said, I am down to go get dinner, but I'm going to call it a day after I need to go home. I'm exhausted. Everybody else was fine. Of course. No worries. We'll see you out. She was the only one that wrote me, you wasted my time. If I knew this whole attitude of like, today was my only day off. If I knew you were going to waste my time, but not wanting to go out.

And I said, hey, babe, you know everybody else that's going out. Like, you're friends with everybody. And that was the moment I realized like, oh, I don't want this friendship anymore. And I ended the friendship. Now, I'm not saying everyone has to be that extreme. That was the straw that broke the camel's back. But it was that type of disrespect towards me being honest and vulnerable. Hey, I'm struggling. I really need to go home. I don't feel well. I'd like to show up for you in the capacity that I can, but this is all I can give you. And if somebody can't just understand where someone else is coming from and show a little bit of empathy, that's not somebody I need in my life. And I have, truth be told, I've never been better. I feel like I am currently going through a lot of what

you went through in 2022, where once you start to set boundaries for the first time, it's very revealing, like how other people respond to it. And you can be quite shocked and disappointed and sad. And I think I might be going through some of that like grieving that you described. How do you approach it? Is it just like, okay, I recognize that this is how this person is going to respond and I'm not going to try to change them. I can only control myself. and I just need to move on. Is that it? Like you just go through the grieving period.

Do you have any like tips for that? I think it's a valid question, right? Nobody taught us how to grieve. Who's really ever sat there to be like, here's X, Y, and Z and this is how you get through it? Yeah. I think it's a few things. I think when back to regulating, right?

Really having like your tools in place, whether that be when the grief hits like, do I grab a sour candy? Do I go for a quick walk? Do I do 20 jumping jacks? Like, what do I do to kind of shake it? Honestly, what I've done before when I get like trolls on the internet, I'll punch the air pretending I'm punching. And then I swear, it's very cathartic.

But it allows my nervous system to be like, oh, look, you fought it off. You're safe now. But I think what it comes with grieving is like, you're not going to feel better until you feel. So the fun fact about feelings and emotions is it takes 90 seconds for an emotion to run its course. Like, if you really just sat with it, like, let's say right now, both of you were feeling really shitty. And I was like, let's sit with this. If I had you tap in and say, tell me the color, describe the shape, the texture, tell me what it is. By the end of 90 seconds, I could put all of the money that I have that you would.

would say, oh, it dissipated. It's not as bad because we have to allow our bodies to feel in order to move through it. Then we can start to listen to the narrative and say, what do I feel right now? Like, if you want to give me an example, what is a thought that you've had as you're trying to go through this grieving process? Maybe a thought is like, oh, wow, I really, I thought we were better friends than that. Like, I feel really disappointed. I feel, I thought, like, it's like, I gave you so much of myself. And now that, that was. when I need you, the moment where I need you, like, you're not showing up for me. And context is, as Jean's sister, she is such a giver in her life.

Like, I don't know if it comes across on camera, but like, you know, she's my sister, but like she gives to me, she gives her a family. She gives her all. And that's like in every aspect of her life. So I just know that she's, she has just so much love to give to other people. And trust me, I, like, if my sister walked into this room right now, I'm an older sister. And she said, I like, that shirt, I would have had to take it off to give it to her. So, like, I understand.

and wanting to give everything. But then at the end of the day, we have to say, well, who's doing that for me? And if I'm not doing that for me, so I think, like, for instance, if that were me, I would say, you know what, I have given a lot to this friendship and relationship. And now I'm going to give that to myself because this no longer works for me. I'm allowed to be sad because given what I've experienced, it makes total sense that this would bum me out.

We're validating your experience. But then we look and say, what can I learn from this? Moving forward, I can't be this giving. They need to earn my trust because I'm feeling depleted at the end of this, and this doesn't work for me. Even just that, right? you're allowed to go through your day and say, my heart feels heavy. Cool. You know when it doesn't work is when we shame and blame and try to get rid of it. That's when it's like you're just going to keep cycling

because what the brain loves to do, the brain loves to finish things. And so if it doesn't have something to finish, it's like, oh, what are we focused on? Can we hyper focus on this all day until we have a closure for it? You create your own closure. One thing I'm working on, which is exactly what you just mentioned is that I will feel bad about something and then I'll feel bad about the fact that I feel bad. That is, I think, my worst spiraling habit because I'm like, why am I feeling bad about this? It's not that big a deal. Like it's, you know, like I should have moved on by now. Like I've already had my grieving time. So then I'm like, why am I letting myself be dragged down by this? So that's the sort of like thing that I think probably a lot of people who are high functioning and have some sort of level of

underlying anxiety or perfectionism or high achieving sort of tendencies, I think a lot of people go there. Let me ask you. Just hard on themselves. Who taught you that you should be over it? Like, where did we learn that? I should be over it by now because that's shame, right? I should have known better.

I shouldn't be doing this. Where'd you learn that? I think it's like you said, it's back to your survival tactics, right? Growing up, like growing up, if you had these like big T or little T traumas, it's something that you have to move past quickly in order to sort of survive your life. your day to day. So then let me ask you this. If she were here, right? If your little was here, what do you think she would need to hear from you? Like, it's okay. Everything's okay. Okay, I'm going to try that. And I hope you don't mind me putting it on the spot because I find

it fun for people to see how it really is. Oh, wait, I'm next. I have something to share with you after that. Perfect. That I need your help with. So, okay, so if we say if you're little, let me ask you that, if you came to me really struggling and I went, you're going to be fine, don't worry about it. Would you believe me? Or would you be like, okay, cool, thanks. Maybe What we can offer that little is that was never your job. Your job was never to figure out how people, how you're going to make people happy. Your job was never to figure out. And I'm so sorry if I've dismissed you like people did when we were kids.

And I'm so sorry if I did that to you. That's how we grieve. We grieve by going to the parts of us that are saying, but I need you. And we get to say, I'm here for you. That's some inner child work. I love inner child work. That's some inner child work shit. Fanning her.

It's okay. And that's the thing is like you're allowed to feel seen. You're allowed to connect with her and say, you're right. Someone taught me that that's what I need to do, but that doesn't mean I believe that anymore. And I give you permission to let go of that. Yeah. And I think the other thing, the part two of what you're talking about is setting the boundaries. And then once you've maybe let go of the relationships that are not aligned with those boundaries, it's going into new relationships with the boundaries.

And like forming those new relationships based on the basis of these boundaries. Yeah. What did I use to accept and I'm no longer willing to? that way if I enter in saying I used to accept somebody taking advantage or I used to allow it because it's I think there's a way that we can say it right I think for a lot of us we'll try to shame and blame ourselves of like I'm so dumb how could I have done this instead of oh I allowed it I made a choice for myself maybe not a conscious one maybe one out of trauma maybe a right an attachment right I can hold that space but like I even think back on my really gnarly relationship where the one

I was saying was my father I'll take full ownership that I wasn't doing the work I was not present It's not all him. I also played a part in this. I never walked away. I was terrified. I didn't set a boundary. I don't hold shame for that. But what I do is I take accountability of that so that at least I can say, now what are my choices moving forward?

Because to your point, you are very giving and loving and you have so much to offer to the right people. It's the people that have earned that place in your life because if they haven't earned it, I'm not giving them the keys to my castle because they say it's a pretty house. And so they have to earn that place in your life because then you feel reciprocal and you feel like your cup is full. And if not, that's okay. You're making choices for yourself. Thank you. All right, next.

But actually, though, I love this conversation about boundaries. I'm in my sad in return. I've had a really traumatic friendship breakup that happened about like a year ago. And friendship breakups sometimes hurt more than romantic breakups, especially if it's like with a really close friend in this experience. It was with a really close girlfriend of mine who I like let into my life. introduced to my family and like stayed at my family's place and really opened up to her and treated her like a sister like I would and it didn't she didn't reciprocate that and when I said a boundary it was this really contentious conversation where she couldn't accept my boundary and

couldn't really own up or take accountability for what she had done and what had gone down but my thing is my like shame slash trauma loop that I go through is I should have known better or why did I let this person into my life, like, so quickly? And I get mad at myself. I'm like, I should have seen this coming. Why didn't I see this coming? There were red flags along the way where I was just like, oh, that was a little bit off. Or, oh, she treated this person this way, but not me.

So, like, maybe it won't happen to me. So then after this all went down, I'm like, I'm still kind of recovering and grieving this friendship because it was very, very meaningful to me. And so, yeah, I don't know how to kind of get out of, like, that. narrative where I'm like I should have seen this coming. So when we say I should have seen this coming, usually what that is is I have the perception of control, right? Because if I had, if I could have seen where this went wrong, then I wouldn't be in it. And that's what we learn as childhood, right? If whatever the scenario is, whatever the situation is, wherever you learned that, like I know for

me, when I used to should, should, should, that was because I was hypervigilant around my dad. So if I could figure out when he was going to change his facial expression, when is he going to get angry, is he going to hit us? I can protect myself. You can't. It's moving. target. And so I think instead what I would say is, okay, and we're going to do the littles again. If you had your little sitting here, you're saying that to her. Every time you attack yourself and say, you should have known better, you idiot. What could you think? You're saying that to a six-year-old. And then we wonder why we recoil. But instead, maybe we can tell her, I'm so sorry I talked to you the way adults did with me as a kid. I am so sorry that I have adopted that. You know what?

You have every right to have made mistakes because you're a human. And maybe what it was was that you really wanted love and you really wanted to welcome somebody in because you both are giving. And maybe you really wanted to have somebody that would reciprocate love to you in the way that you show love. And now you learned just to earn that place in your life. And that's okay. Yeah. You're allowed to go through experiences and you're allowed to be sad that it ended. But we can also say, well, let me ask you this.

What were you scared of happening if you did walk away earlier? What kept you? What kept you going in the friendship? The social structures in place, right? You know, like friend groups and people talking and like maintaining, honestly, like a perception or like a semblance that like everything is okay because there were friend groups and and things in place that I didn't want to, you know, rock the boat or rustle. It's funny though right now because now you're on the other side of it, right? How is the friendship group? Did it rock the boat? Did it ruffle feathers?

No. It's over and I'm, I mean, not the friendship group, but like the friendship is over and I feel better because of it. And there weren't all these like massive consequences, social consequences that I had in my head. Like those didn't even play out. It was just like what I was afraid of. And often what I hear is also a little, like a little girl saying, if I say something, I'll ruin the family, I'll ruin the household, I'm going to ruin the structure. I can't be the reason this doesn't work. So I'm just going to make it work. And now it's the same as when I hear people say like, oh, I don't want to be too much, right? I don't want to say anything. I don't want to push them away. Okay, well, if me saying something to you pushes you away, then I never had you to begin with. So what am I scared of losing? Okay. This is the, this is the third one that we wanted to get into, the third concept of I'm too much. Yeah. I'm obsessed with this because I need to hear. hear what your perspective is. Like, if I'm too much, find less. So honestly, we've seen your clip on Instagram from a few weeks ago where you mentioned this. And it's basically, you say, if I'm too much, then go find less. And can you talk about how people often fall into traps in dating because they end up shrinking themselves or trying to change the other person because they

want so badly to be chosen? I'm too much came for me for my dad, right? I was too much for him because he would leave. He had no space for our emotions. I was always in the household of like, God, Sabrina, be quiet. Stay small. Stop taking up so much space. So I felt like I was too much, but not enough.

Right? That's that fun dichotomy of trauma of like, is there something wrong with me? Why do you keep leaving? I'm not enough for you. But then when you're here, you don't have the patience for me, so I'm too much.

Whoa. Right? All of a sudden we're like, oh, that's not a fun place to be. But really, when we start to date and we feel like I'm too much, usually what that is because you're with people

that don't have the bandwidth. You're with people that don't have capacity. You're with people that might be emotionally unavailable. So you even having a need is too much for them to handle. And that's why we have to reframe. So there's something called fusion, right? It's like a parts work terminology. I don't know this.

And so I love parts work. IFS is one of my favorites. And when we think about fusion, so let's say we say, I am this. Like I am anxious attachment. No, no, no, no. You have that. You are not that. Okay.

And so when we fuse, I'm too much. No, no, no. There might be parts of me that are. You're right. Maybe I'm too friendly. Maybe I'm too this. I could be. Maybe I'm too beautiful.

I'm just too sexy. And so like when we're to all of these things, where you have to start to defuse and start to ask like, where did I learn that I'm too much? Who taught me that? For me, it was my dad, right? My father taught me I'm too much because he didn't have patience for my emotions. But I have a partner now who thinks I'm just enough because I stop when we try to shrink and we try to fit and we try to mold and we try to do.

Then what we're saying is I'm self-abandoning. What I want doesn't matter. Who I am doesn't matter. But I need to be good for you. Because if you tell me I'm good and you. You validate me. I'm okay. But that leaves us empty because it's a moving target.

This person's always going to be shifting and changing and morphing. But what really makes something beautiful is when I can take up space. Because if I'm too much, then go find someone that's less. That's fine. You don't need to love me. That's the energy, honestly, my whole career. When I started, first my podcast was called Do the Work. Then we got a cease and desist.

I hope you trademarked your name. If I can teach you anything. Then I called it the Sabrina Zohar Show. And I have people all the time. I have ADHD. My brain works differently. I talk fast. I curse a lot.

Like I'm wippy, right? And all my life society has told me to play small, del it down, don't be so big, be a good girl. And now I get to take up space and say, oh, if you don't like my show, kick rocks without shoes. I don't really give a shit. You could find another show. Not everything is for you. And I think that we've gotten a time where you get a participation award if you did something. No, you need to learn that that wasn't a good job and you didn't deserve that and you didn't earn that.

And that's okay. And so I think for when we're talking about if I feel too much, I need to understand how old do I feel and where you learn that from. because I don't think the adult us genuinely believes that. And I'd be curious if both of you had your littles here, do you think they're genuinely too much? Or do you think maybe they just didn't have somebody around and knew what to do with them? The latter. Yeah. Yeah.

I think the negative loop that I get into or like the narrative is like a version of like I think I'm too much or like I feel like I'm a burden to people. Both in romantic relationships and in friendships, am I asking for too much? Am I, you know, just am I a burden to you? I don't want to feel like a burden. And that's like, you know, six, seven-year-old Shari, like, not asking for a lot as, like a kid, but feeling like I'm asking or doing too much. Right. And because that six-seven-year-old Shari was taught that her needs were too much.

That doesn't mean that your mom was a bad person, right? Maybe she didn't have capacity. She didn't have bandwidth. She's a single mother raising two kids. As an adult, we can consciously understand that. But as a fat-a-brain six-year-old, you can't understand that. So what we have to remember is our nervous system is formed around those experiences, not around what we have now. And so we have to rewire that part of being able to say, like, even my own doctor now, because I was having blood sugar issues.

Now, guess who has to, before every meal? I have to sit there and repeat. I have to do three breaths and repeat. I'm safe because otherwise I don't eat. Because I get so dysregulated in my day. I can't think about functioning that I have to do what I need to do to come back to the present moment and realize there's no one running after me. Dad's not taking everything from me. He's not calling the shots.

I'm an adult now. That takes repetition. That takes small little micro yeses. that takes time. Yeah. I love how once again, this is a concept that is, it seems on the surface to be about dating and love and relationships. But again, it's about yourself. It's about doing the work in yourself. And the term you used was self-abandonment, right? Like that's so powerful. Yeah. When you self-abandon, that's me saying yes when I want to say no. That's me doing, right, we've all done that. I know. I don't know one woman, at least to this day that I've met that has never seen.

said no or that I've never said yes instead of saying no. Whether that be in a sexual context, whether that be professional, personal doesn't really matter. It's societal. It's societal. We are taught to be smaller. Like we talked even on the podcast, the Sabrina Zohar show, where you guys run. When we are like when we have this society as women that we have to be in a specific box, right? Don't take up too much space. Don't make noise. Be good. Even as something as simple as like, go kiss your uncle. And you're like, I don't want to. Go do it. I don't want to do that. We don't get a choice. You don't have a choice. You don't have a choice. You don't have a choice as a kid, but now you do. And so I like to think of it through the frame. Like I have every single

day on Instagram, I post a photo of little me, whatever age she is. And I talk about it because I want to reconnect and show the beauty, right? I can look back on the hot mess of me, the girl that slept her way through Manhattan. That was a hot mess that made a lot of mistakes. And I look at her with so much love because I know she was doing the best she could. Yeah. And I know that I have no anger towards her, because if I didn't have her, I wouldn't be where I met now. And I think we have to be able to say, the more we self-abandoned and the more I say I want you to like me, do I even love myself? And that's a really big question because if I're dating or in a relationship, if I don't stay true to who I am, if I don't stand for something, I fall for everything. Yeah, I think that's something that takes a lot of repetition. It takes a lot of practice. It takes a lot of the concept of doing the work to look back at yourself and be like, you know what? I did the best I could with the information that I had, with the capacity that I had at the time. And that was what I did.

and I did the best that I could. Yeah. That can be something that's hard for people to do. People might be me. I've heard him. I met him. Maybe I was Jean-Nor's Jean. And I used to be her.

Like that's why I, when I speak like this, it's one thing if I was like, well, I'd been married for 30 years and I met my husband at the grocery store. Go try it. No, no, no. I ate shit. Like I used to not be able to say no. I couldn't keep a job. I was so anxious.

I couldn't sit still. I couldn't form sentences. I would, it was palpable the anxiety around other people to where now when even my family sees me, they're like, oh, you really have done the work. Like, you're a different person. It's like nine years of every day. And here's the beauty. I'm not done.

I've got, until I take my last breath, I hope to work on myself because if this is it, if this is it, ah, I don't want it, right? Like, if this is all it is, I think we could do better. But it's more about being able to say, what is my control and surrender to the outcome? That's to me, like dating with detachment. business with detachment, anything. It's not that you detach from feelings and emotions. It's that you detach from the outcome.

And you say, I'm going to do my best. And if my best isn't enough in this situation, that's okay too. But I can't control them. I can only control me. I think that's a very similar theme that we talk about all the time on Tiger Sisters podcast, the idea that you can always be in your growth stage. I mean, you should always be in your growth stage. You can reinvent yourself at any time.

Like I've said before, the person that I am sitting here today is a totally different person in a lot of ways than I was a year and a half ago, right? Like, if you told me two years ago, you would be doing a podcast and that would be your main job, I would be like, what are you smoking? Like, what are you talking about? Like, no, I work in tech. Like, I'm head of product at Snapchat. Like, this is who I am. I'm corporate girly. So I think that that's such a strong, like, pillar of belief to have for every, you know, person watching to be like, I can change who I am at any time. I'm always in development. I'm always growing. And if you're not okay to let go, life is going to be really tough for you. All right. My whole thing was like, what's my background?

I was in fashion. I own a clothing company. And I was supposed to be on Shark Tank. Like, that was my trajectory. Not dating, not relationships, not any of this, not podcasting. I was on set for Shark Tank. Like, it was my moment. I'm next to present. Like, I went through every step along the way. And then I got sent home. And I was doing my meditation. I'm visualizing it. I literally was holding the set to go out and give it to Mark. I'm like, this is my moment. And I lost all of it in one foul swoop, right? One moment of so sorry, we can't fit you on today. And I went home and I lost myself. And then they did again a month later. And I remember just being like, what am I going to do with myself? And then my dog got sick. And then I lost him a

month later, I realized in that moment, I could be one of two things. I could woe is me. I could lament. I could do all these things. I could try to take the ashes from this burning building and rebuild. Or I could be the phoenix that rises. And I could say that this was happening for me, not to me. And I could take, and that's a huge ACT is acceptance and compassion therapy. And a big pillar of ACT is being able to find meaning in our situations. Not the like, everything happens for a reason. Not always, right? Like, I didn't stub my toe for a reason. I just did. Like, I just hurt myself. But if I can extract and say, but when I stub my toe, instead of screaming and yelling,

I was able to take a breath and come back down to the moment, oh, look, it's working. It's the little moments that we start to see growth. It's not that, like, you're going to wake up tomorrow and be like, oh, I'm holier than now. But you all of a sudden realize, oh, my God, I didn't freak out like I normally do. Or that guy cut me off and I didn't even notice. It's the small little things. Yeah. I just want to say, you don't need to hear this from me, but I am so proud of you.

Just like hearing your whole story. Like I knew bits and parts of it, but just hearing you say it out loud and the journey you've been on and all of the self-introspection and now you're sharing it with everyone, sharing your tools. Like, I'm so proud of you. You're amazing. You're amazing. And because you're being so vulnerable and sharing not only like your wisdom, but your personal stories and anecdotes. And your pain. And your fuck-ups.

Yeah. Miss Goose. I love it. It's helping. So many people out there. Feels seen. Myself included. Thanks guys.

I was going to say you guys are an inspiration too. But that's the beauty of like growing and evolving together cumulatively. Like I'm a bigger fan of like longer table, not a higher fence. Right? Like what is it? The ships that rise and the tides. Rising tides. Helped with the ships and all that.

Because when you're alone and island, you feel like it. And I think that's why truthfully told the reason I started TikTok, which was like my, it was my Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus moment of like, no one's ever going to see this. They did. And I remember my brother's friends called him and we're like, what is she doing? Like is your sister like lost her shit? And he was like, uh, I'm going to go visit her. And then he came and at first he was like, what is that? And he sat down and he was like, oh my God, wait, you've like built this whole thing. Because when you start to realize like, you're not alone, here's a harsh reality. You're not a snowflake. And like, that's the thing is

we're not all these like unique things. We all have, all of us have had different life experiences in this room, but we can all relate to the same core feelings and beliefs of is there something wrong with me? Do I belong here? Am I too much? That doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with you. That just makes you human. I love that. So Sabrina, I love how all of your advice comes from your lived experience and comes from all this really deep work you've done. There are a lot of, I guess, self-declared dating gurus on the internet who have a lot of catchphrases. There's the Daddy Academies. There's the Sprinkle, Sprinkles. There's the, if you wanted to, he would. What is your general take on all these different schools of thought?

to me, those are outcome driven, right? And that's to me why I don't like them. It's very like, do this to get this, do this to have this outcome. The one thing you can't do is control other people. And that's why for a lot of people, business might be really good for them, right? I know how, because in business, there's no emotions in it. If I do X, I get to Y, I get to Z. Right? If I do this, I work hard. I get a promotion. I get my money. I get my job. I keep climbing the ladder. But that's not how relationships work. And so when I hear like the Daddy Academy, or the sprinkle, sprinkle, if you wanted to, what I really hear is like, one, you're teaching people

how to self-abandon, right? If you wanted to, he would. Well, first of all, want and do are two different parts of the brain. I could want to be a millionaire, but here I am not being one. Is that because I don't want it bad enough? No, that's because I have trauma. I have different, like, things that are out of my control. And I think a lot of people throw bumper stickers on because it makes them feel like, oh, 140 characters or less.

It's the same thing I hear about, like, avoidance are the worst people. Like, they're not tomagachis. These are human beings with their own lived experience that we have to hold space for. And I think, like, for instance, the Shira Seven, sprinkle, sprinkle, sparkle, whatever her stick is, I had to block her because I never attacked her. I never went after her. I never, because I don't have time to, right?

I am too busy doing my own thing to give a shit about what other people are doing. And she loved to make content because apparently I was teaching women how to be low value, not high value, right? Because there's a difference, apparently, in her world. I was teaching them to be low value by being independent think by because I said coffee dates were acceptable because here's my thought process. Sure, you're basing the value of your worth based on what you do with somebody, but not who you are, not fundamentally what you believe. And the reframe I had was, okay, well, if me going on a coffee date

is low value, then that means that if I go on a dinner date, I really don't value myself, because I've never met this person. And if I'm going to spend two to three hours and let somebody take me out when I don't know them, that sounds like a waste of my time versus I'm giving you 30 minutes of my time and let me see if I want to see you again. That's how I determine value is based on my morals, my ethos, and my ethics, not based on clickbait and not based on views. And I think a lot of the dating advice is keeping you stuck and single longer than you need to be because it's about the outcome and not about the inside. It's not about who we are and what we are and challenging our thoughts. It's about if you do this, you'll get this. You know what you'll get. You'll probably get dickpicks.

I'm sure. Unsolicited. Yeah. Oh yeah. But I don't think that by if I do, this and if I tell a guy that he has to take me to dinner instead of drinks that all of a sudden he's going to see me at more valuable. Person might just see you as a nuisance. That might just see you as rigid. They might see you as stuck up and they might see you as the princess treatment. But I don't actually think that that has anything to do with your worth. I think who you are is your morals, your ethos, your ethics, not if you're going to go to dinner

or coffee. Yeah. I think the most like toxic or pernicious things like coming out of the like TikTok gurus in that way is the wanting to control. someone or wanting to control the outcome because like it sounds really good for a sound bite you know if you wanted to he would or like all these sprinkle sprinkle stuff but I think again like in reality like we are all humans and like trying to control someone else or like being controlled by someone else is just like not good for anyone. It's like we are like strong independent individuals in our own right that's like self-healing we're both two pillars and we put two pillars together and we can like effectively communicate we'll be stronger together. But like the second that like I don't know any. Any. any idea of like trying to control another person's actions, whether like manipulating them or like trying to get them to do what you want. Like it just never works out. It's too calculated, right? Like I went against all those rules. My partner and I slept together on the first day. I left and I was like,

I've never seen that go again. But to be fair, before we left, I looked him in the eyes and people are shocked at that I said this to him. And I said, hey, I had such a great time with you. And please know, like, your girl needed to get some. I said, but I'm going to be honest, I don't do casual and I don't do friends with benefits. If you call me, that's because you want to build something. And if not, I won't take offense to it, just don't waste my time. And I remember people ask me like, why did, like, Ryan, why did you like that? And he was like, oh, she wasn't afraid to lose me. She was more afraid of losing herself and not being true to herself.

And he was like, I love the strength and the way that you showed up, not being afraid that if he didn't like it, a doodaloo. I wasn't losing anything. And that's what I think is missing from a lot of this content is it's very, here's how to, don't text them back, wait this, don't do this. You are not high value. And there's even, have you seen the dating coach on TikTok that says, in her bio, seven years, not one fight with my husband.

And she, oh, wait for it. Oh, here it is. She tells you to wait three months to kiss somebody. Is there somebody to get four kisses a year? I'm like, what is this not? Like, I'm sorry, but here's a harsh reality. Not everybody wants to do that. I wouldn't.

And I'm a woman saying that. If a man told me I'm waiting three months to kiss you, I'd be like, yeah, find somebody else. I was go to church. I don't know what to tell you. Like, this isn't my vibe. Yeah. You're allowed to be who you are that doesn't make a knock against you.

And I think too many of these things are you have to fit in this corner, in this square in order to be right. And I look at it as like, let me expand your perspectives. And if you want to expand your perspective, come on in. I think the difference is that a lot of these like dating gurus kind of give you these formulaic things to do that would be an expression of a value system, but they're not really teaching you the value system itself or like teaching you how to build your own value system. Agreed. Whereas like I feel like a lot of your work is like inward looking to be like, okay, what do I truly believe? Like, what do I value? Who am I and what kind of partner fits me? Yeah. As opposed to a lot of stuff out there is just very like one size fits all. It's like,

do this, do this. These are the rules. And if you do these rules, if you follow this blueprint, you'll get this outcome. If I had listened to it, I wouldn't be with my partner. He didn't text me every single day. He wasn't super overtly. He wasn't obsessed with me off the bat. Like it wasn't any of that. We were two grown-ass adults having a grown-ass relationship and being honest and transparent and having hard conversations from the get. We never allowed it to go. To this day, we don't allow that because there's no point in us being together because we're making a conscious choice every day that we're choosing each other. Not that I'm waiting for him to choose me or that I have to be something to be chosen. If I'm too much, go find less. I love that.

And on that note, I think we'll wrap up. Yeah. Incredible. Oh my God. You are so wise, Sabrina. Thanks, go. Thank you for being with us. Thank you for having. We learn so much. And for everyone who's watching, where can they find your content? So the Sabrina Zohar show on Spotify Apple. You can see you gals on there as well. And TikTok, Instagram, Sabrina.org, the Sabrina Zohar show. My name. Somewhere along the lines will find you at YouTube and all the fun stuff.

Great. And your book coming out in October. Yay! Pre-order! Not yet, but soon enough. Yay! Awesome. We'll see you guys next time on Tiger Sisters Podcast.

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