Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel - Esther Calling - Will This Heartbreak Ever End?

Episode Date: September 22, 2025

Nothing changes us quite like our first love—or our first heartbreak. After falling in love for the first time in his late twenties, he now finds himself navigating the pain of his first breakup. He comes to Esther in search of clarity, healing, and a way forward. Esther Callings are a one time, one hour interventional phone call with Esther. They are edited for time, clarity, and anonymity. If you have a question you would like to talk through with Esther, send a voice memo to [e-mail]. Want to learn more? Receive monthly insights, musings, and recommendations to improve your relational intelligence via email from Esther: https://www.estherperel.com/newsletter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Just for me to hear it directly from you, rather than in writing, just tell me the question and a little bit about the context of your question. Of course, yeah. So my first relationship ended around a year ago now. And as I'm 29 right now, it ended when I was 28. And I've been having a really hard time ever since. With ups and downs, luckily, it has. hasn't all been completely depressing, but it has been quite a hard time.

And I reconnected several times after a breakup with my ex and that didn't help. But that's also part of the issue, I think, and the question that I have is how do I let go of someone that is not into me in a romantic sense anymore? And I know that's for the better because the relationship was very hard and had very, or had many toxic dynamics that were not good for either of us and so my primary question is how to let go of a heartbreak that is your first heartbreak at the age of 29 which complicates things maybe a bit and of course there are way more details to this in my own history as well that led up to this point Rinse takes your laundry and hand delivers it to your door,

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What's important for me to know about your first love? the troubles of the relationship, the relationship school that you went to in your childhood. What is important for me to know? I think that the relationship itself, and it took some time for me to know this, but looked somewhat familiar to the relationship that my parents have still to this day.

Which is? emotionally detached from each other as well which also had an effect on me and my siblings and although they did their very best they also and primarily my mother came from quite troubled backgrounds with large families and also no emotional or very little emotional availability from their parents and that's something that when I was younger I never really stood still by until my sister first like asked me the same question like do you ever feel unheard by emotionally unheard or not seen by by my parents and she first asked me that when I was like 18 and I didn't really connect to that question very much so I told my sister what are you talking about

exactly more or less I was like well no I was just to occupy with my own things at the time and I was not, I didn't have any like real relationship experience back then. And so I was just doing my things, enjoying myself with my friends and things like that. So yeah, I was like, I was surprised like, no, I have no clue what you're talking about, basically. And over the last couple of years, that made more sense already, also before my relationship with my now ex-girlfriend. But now that's relationship, concluded and also somewhat during the relationship, I felt so seen in that relationship by my first girlfriend that I attached myself way too quickly to the relationship as well. And that was a dynamic that we created together. It felt somewhat like love bombing, if you could say it like that. But I was just as much there as my ex-girlfriend was.

so yeah i think that that's a little bit of context like in regards to my youth so i didn't know that i missed love closeness connection affection as well physical affection affection affection yes but when i met her everything in me was screaming longing and yearning for all of it, big gulps. Yeah, very much. And I allowed it, I welcomed it. I scared myself, I scared her, or none of the above? No, no, because I started dating and I was still a virgin before I started dating, and that

was at 26, I started dating and I met several wonderful girls, but none of them worked out. And I think I met around seven or eight girls that I dated at least a couple of times, most of them, some a little more, some a little less. And then I met my ex-girlfriend, and I was also so desperately looking for a relationship, which wasn't healthy, but I had no experience whatsoever. So I was just like a fish looking for food in an open ocean without any food. And then I met her and she came out. Hold on. I was like a fish looking for food in an open ocean where there was no food. That is quite an image.

Describe it for me. Yeah, so there were a couple of dates back then that I attached the first one, actually, which also felt quite wonderful after like the second date we kissed and, after a couple of more dates we ended up in bed and that was my first time in that sense I had experimented way before that time when I was younger but it was it had nothing to do with love so that was the real first time and I got so attached for you slow down slow down you're telling me so many things and so many important things is it okay if we slow down of course yeah yeah if you can help me with that

So let's take a deep breath, first of all. Just to bring a different rhythm inside your body. So this was your first, maybe not your first sexual experience, but your first partnered experience that involved, love. Yeah. So you were a virgin, you were not a virgin.

I was a virgin. It was not my first sexual experience, but I was still a virgin. And how was that for you? Was she? Or she had more experience than you? No, she, I believe she came out of a relationship of eight years. So she had quite a lot of experience. And I was quite open about the fact that I didn't have any experience.

And that first time, was both beautiful, a little awkward, and a little, a little forced almost on my end. Meaning I didn't really want to, but I thought I should. Meaning what? No, no, I wanted to, but the force bit is actually with a problem that I discovered, and I didn't really know that it was a larger issue until then, but it was that I had great trouble getting to an orgasm and that was my first time so I didn't think too much of it but I almost like in my head I had that picture of it must happen like it is supposed to happen like I'm a man like so it was yeah it was in that sense forced in my own in my own mind and I felt

that I was taking long in achieving an orgasm or in ejaculating? In, I think, achieving an orgasm. They're not the same. You know that. No, no. Yeah. And

you experienced that how? You were surprised, you were curious, you were anxious, you were worried, you were... What did that represent, if anything? I think I was somewhat worried that it would not happen. Before? Not so, no, not before, because I didn't have the experience to really know until then.

And there came a point while we were intimate, me and that first girl that I dated back then. And she came to a point where she said, like you don't have to orgasm per se. like we don't have to force anything and rationally that made complete sense but emotionally i was like i'm not sure if i really felt like a failure but i felt like yeah but it should happen right like why can't it happen and that made it forced and in the end i'm not even sure if it happened anymore or if it happened i did it myself and i came to know after other girls that i dated that that that was a larger issue. I think it's mostly caused by stress or performance, anxiety, or however you want to call it,

something along those lines. What do you call it? I think I would call it. Yeah, there's a beautiful Dutch word for it. I'm not sure if you know the English translation, foul angst. Fear of failure. Fear of failure, yeah. I think that's maybe one of the key factors there.

would call it fear of failure to perform. And what I noticed when I eventually met my ex-girlfriend, I had that same issue. And initially, the first time we were intimate, she was somewhat shocked that I tried to finish myself because I can imagine you don't encounter men with this issue every day. Like, there are most likely other men that have similar issues. There are men that have issues with coming too soon. but she was quite surprised and we talked about that and I explained that I've never been able to come from penetration before and then we started working on that and I stopped masturbating

and after a month she was able to let me come and then things improved and we were able to or I was able to come during penetration and I think part of that was the fact that we fell in love so quickly, almost unhealthy quickly, that I was on cloud nine, basically. I was out of this world, like I just switched to a new job. I found my first girlfriend back then. We were not official, but things were going really great. So I just, I was elevated by that feeling. There's nothing wrong with that.

No, I know, I know. There's nothing wrong with that. that's why we call it falling in love we don't call it climbing step by step tell me something just on this issue itself you had experience

with orgasm and ejaculation but primarily through masturbation and you basically have learned how to let go with yourself but not not with a partner, until then.

Yes. There are trust issues involved, there are control issues involved, and there are basically consequences of bad habituation. Yeah. When you spend many years primarily masturbating, you develop a certain habit of pressure, friction, speed, you name it. And it becomes exactly... The default.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Taylor made. you know as you exactly like it and you don't have to temper with anyone else and you don't have to synchronize and you don't have to learn how to stay connected to your own pleasure to your own sensations

while at the same time staying connected with the other person but it sounds like you were able to create that together both of you yeah okay and you were on cloud nine because it's a beautiful feeling and you had a new job and a new girl and a very elated experience of nascent love. And so far so good.

So when does it start to turn that you say, I miss the woman, I don't miss the relationship, or I miss the beginning. I don't miss what followed. Yeah. So I think that the relationship itself became quite difficult early on. Difficult means what?

Yeah, my ex-girlfriend two months prior to us meeting for the first time came out of a what you would call a situation ship I think that lasted. I'm not sure how long exactly before, two five, maybe six months which was also quite

hard on her and yeah, it was quite toxic for as far as I have heard of stories. And I think that she, from the very start was very scared of me leaving very early on. And after a couple of dates with my ex-girlfriend, she sent me a screenshot, I believe, of her deleting her Tinder account we met through Tinder. And I sent a screen recording of me deleting my dating apps, but I had paid for Tinder platinum

for six months and I still had three months remaining. So I deleted the apps, but I didn't delete the account. And she was quite surprised to hear that after the next day. and asked me, like, why do you need a backup? Why do you need to keep your account as a backup? And I was like, well, we've only met a couple of times and I really enjoyed spending time with you, but I have no clue how this will go.

So under some pressure, I also deleted the account because I did view all the excitement of the connection that I had with her. So that was the first little kind of discussion. It was not really a fight, but I can also voice my opinion as well. So I voiced my opinion, I was like, well, I don't need a backup, but it's just because I paid for six months, and that's expensive. So who knows what happens here? I will not use it, but I think that she didn't really trust me not using it

because of previous experiences. She had quite a few of relationships and dates, and many of them had their own issues, like many relationships that still have. I realized that, of course. Tell me if I hear you, well, when we may. met, there was a lot of beautiful elixir between us, but also very quickly did we bring to each other, anxieties, insecurities, vulnerabilities, fear of abandonment, fear of lack of attention, fear of neglect, that kind of pre-existed even meeting. We brought them in the suitcase

and we opened the suitcase right in front of the other and said, help me. You could say that. Save me, cure me. Yeah. Take all these bad feelings away from me. And both of you did so? Yeah. What did you learn about yourself and what did you discover?

Since you're the one who I'm talking to, what did you discover about what you missed, what you wanted, what you needed, what you hadn't had. Yeah, let's start with that. I think a couple of things that stood out to me pretty early on, that at the moment, or at that moment, I didn't fully comprehend yet, but after a couple of months, I started to slowly understand that the lack of affection that I lacked, I think, in childhood as well, but also in my adolescence and growing up and becoming a teenager and my early 20s, the affection that I received from her. matched the affection that suited my inner child to say like that, that suited my, my mental being. It was the ocean with nutrients. Yeah, that was the ocean with nutrients, exactly. And also our conversations with which could both go very in depth about our insecurities

and our, like, our paths and things that I've missed and that she, missed in previous partners or also in childhood and sharing those experiences, but also the feeling of, that primarily for me was so profound, the feeling of feeling so safe with someone else to open up and be completely vulnerable and to feel like you're, or to feel myself like I was finally completely myself, if that makes sense. And when I, like, that relationship got so difficult, so quick, but there almost was no hair on my head thinking that I would ever let that feeling go. There was one time that I also considered ending it because it cost me like all of my energy basically. And still I couldn't do it.

Still, I could not break that relationship because of, I think, because of the. feelings of a loss that I would have to endure for the affection that I would lose, the emotional intimacy that I would lose. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. We have to take a brief break, so stay with us, and let's see where this goes.

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brand new. Show me all the things PDFs can do. Do your work with ease and speed. PDF spaces is all you need. Do hours of research in an instant with key insights from an AI assistant. Take a template with a click. Now your Prezo looks super slick. Close that deal. Yeah, you want. Do that, doing that, did that, done. Now you can do that, do that with Acrobat. Now you can do that, do that with the all-new acrobat. It's time to do your best work with the all-new Adobe Acrobat Studio. How did it end just to get a sense of the full circle? How did it end? So it officially ended January of last year.

And it ended. There was no, at that point, no particular event that caused a breakup. But I think, and I had seen that throughout the relationship, that my ex-girlfriend also had to deal with a lot of internal emotions around the relationship as well. I think those were both a combination of the relationship itself and the past experiences that she had. And it was right around Christmas, 2023.

And we were heading to her parents, actually. And this is just one of the more clearer bits that I remember. And she discussed with me that she thought that we should like end this after Christmas. that we should just do Christmas for our parents because of everything they had organized. We should just do that. And after that, call it quits. And that was not the first time we broke up for a week earlier that year.

But you would break up because what? What would create the cycle? I understand that you try to break up a few times and you would come back or she would come back. So what was the circle? You know, when you say it became bad, quick, I mean, you're very clear. It became bad, quick, but I just couldn't bear the thought of losing the physical affection, the connection, the emotional intimacy. Even though it was becoming more and more fraught and I could rely on it less and less, I was holding on to what it once had been and what I now knew it could be possible and what I wanted to.

find my way back to but that's not how it happened so if you gave me when you say that Christmas stands out why this thought wind should end that was part of the conversation every time

there was an issue one of you would say this will never work or something happened that said this is fraught this is not possible and just be as concrete as can be I mean I know I'm fishing with a broad net and I'm...

I understand, yeah. So, in the beginning of the relationship, when we would face difficulties, we would both get into discussions that would end in dynamics such as she would expect things of me that I felt like I couldn't give to her at that point, more time together, while the relationship was already quite difficult in the beginning. I was quite avoidant, I would say, somewhat avoidant in the beginning primarily, and she was quite anxious, so she would need more closeness. I would pull back a little because the relationship got sour points or sour bits quite quickly. I still loved her dearly and I didn't want to lose the connection, but I felt like I needed a little bit of space to get my head back on my body.

And that would mean that she would think that I was just putting away and like that the relationship. relationship didn't matter to me or not as much as it mattered to her back then. And that dynamic changed over time, like at the second part, let's say, like the second half of our relationship, I wouldn't enter that dynamic anymore. I would just like hear, try to hear her points because I also felt unheard at many occasions when I try to voice my perspective. And I saw that her emotions were quite serious and she could get really emotional. And that's something that she was very honest about from the very start, that she could get very emotional in both positive and negative ways.

And I just tried to deal, the second half of the relationship, I tried to deal with the turmoil of the relationship, basically. And do what? And do what? So, for example, the fact that I made an only-fence account long ago, which I had used long ago and which I still had. had. Did not use in a relationship, but she asked me in the middle of the night, I believe we were going to bed late that night. And she asked me whether or not I have an only fence against. I'm not sure how she came to that. But I think she was also looking for reasons.

And this is also where my intimacy issue comes into play, which also made her insecure about me maybe being with another woman, having somebody else on my mind. I think that plays into why she was thinking things like that. Like, is there something else going on here that I don't know? And she asked that and I told her, well, I still have an account, but I have not used it ever since and also not when I was dating, I believe. And she was quite shocked by that and the fact that I didn't tell her. And then she wanted to look at my phone and I would become quite defensive because I was

like, why don't you trust me? because we've had rushed issues before. So I felt, yeah, not seen before. There was also an instance where we were intimate together. And she found a hair around my genitalia. And she was convinced that it was somebody else's. And I think this also comes into an insecurity bit about our intimacy, being so hot and cold as well, because we developed,

I'm going all over the place so if you want to intervene let me know I will how did you know yeah because I know when I start to explain this that I go all over the place but you get lost

a little bit you get lost and you create a kind of a distance between you and the emotions so you're telling me there were trust issues from the start

that you may not have done big things but you did just enough to elicit her worry and her distrust and her suspicion and then she would do just enough to instigate your distancing you're not being emotionally available as you had well learned and so quite early on each of you set the other one up

in their most vulnerable parts you withdraw she gets suspicious and agitated what was the presence were there other women involved was there porn involved was there anything to play around all of this I had a couple of dates before my ex-girlfriend and I still had a couple on my Instagram followers list and I followed them

but they were not on my mind at all anymore like I might think of them occasionally but not in a romantic sense or anything like that I watched Born back in the days before I started dating and while I was dating I watched every once in a while or daily activities No, before I started dating, I think I watched almost daily with periods of maybe a week of now watching and then a week of each day of the weekend and maybe every other day.

So that fluctuated a little, but quite frequently. And how did it end? I asked you that before, but I don't think we got to the answer. The relationship. Yeah. I mean, how did it, there is the beginning of a series of endings, and then there is the final ending, so to speak, and then there is the ending inside that hasn't happened. Yeah, yeah. So there are three endings here.

Yeah, the real ending of the relationship, I would say. We officially broke up in January of 2024, and then we tried, I called her maybe three or four times each week one. after the relationship ended and she was quite clear that she did not want to continue and I just kept over-analyzing the end of the relationship and

after I called her that four time we ended that conversation which also lasted a couple of hours I believe and a couple of days later she asked me to visit her and to talk and she wanted to see and try if he could fix things a last time

one less time so we tried that from like February of 24 until a little bit into March of that year and then it finally really ended I would say May I stop you?

One thing I'm hearing you say is I grew up in a very detached way with people that were kind and loving but not particularly expressive or emotionally attuned.

And part of what I think you're telling me is when I start to feel, it's like opening a faucet at maximum capacity on the spot. I don't open the faucet a little bit and then increase the stream. I open it right to the maximum. and the first feeling becomes a watershed, instantly leading to obsession.

Yeah, I think there's some truth to that at least because what I tried to say earlier, that first girl that I dated, I noticed that I very quickly developed a lot of feelings. And I was quite aware of that as well. So I had that rational part of my brain saying, this does not make sense I know that you're head over heels right now

but this is reality and this is just the first girl that you dated so get your head back on this is most likely not real and it ended up not being real and it took a couple of weeks and I was somewhat sad about that

and then I continued dating and I moved on but it's very it is very real the feelings are very real oh yeah maybe what you says, I just met this person on what basis am I already imagining

a whole life, et cetera, et cetera. But the feelings are very real, and there is no filter. It's very interesting. The gap between how you emotionally rush

into something, flood it, flood yourself, try to hold back with reason, but don't succeed one a yota, go at full speed, and then sexually you practice in some way delayed gratification you hold in you hold in you hold in with the person it's the exact opposite from what happens to you emotionally yeah in one place you're like gushing out and in the other one you're holding holding holding and only alone under complete supervision and control of your own hand can you let go. And I wonder if you've ever thought about that, the gap between the emotional gush and the

sexual withholding. I don't think so, actually. Not in that way. But it makes complete sense. Sit with this for a minute. You don't have to answer me right here, but just let this land and then tell me if what, how. I think that the thing you just described as well with my as soon as I get the chance almost or feel safe enough of my like emotion gushing out and like just becoming a waterfall basically that sense of safety that I feel at that moment feel so um or for me so rare. that I think the fact that I have the problem with getting to an orgasm is more or less or maybe even harder of a of a of a hurdle to overcome I think those two are interconnected as well because as soon as I felt more and more comfortable with my ex-girlfriend I noticed and I knew that from the very start that it was most likely something that happens in my head.

So the more unfiltered, or what you may call out of control, I don't think it's about that. But the more, the bigger the emotional watershed, the bigger the sexual restraint? I think so, maybe. You're controlling one with the other. Do you mean that the bigger, the emotional connection almost, the harder the, Mm-hmm. Is that what you mean? Yeah, but I'm not just talking about the quality of the connection.

I'm also talking about the fact that you feel completely taken over and like it's an obsession. Now, falling in love is an obsession. It has all the features of an obsession, but it's a qualitative connection, you know, resemblance. And so part of what happens is that. after that, we start to ground ourselves a little bit, you know, terra firma, let me put my feet and ground myself so that I am not like a leaf that can be blown in every direction at any moment by anything the other person says does or doesn't. And because we have a regulatory system inside of us, sometimes our mind regulates our

body and sometimes our body regulates our mind. Yeah. I mean, they go back and forth in a very interdependent way with each other. But I'm just noticing the contrast between the flooding of the emotional and the restraining of the sexual. I think that's one part of the question deeper in me is how to gain control over both the emotion. and my body as well

and get those to imbalance. I think that I... No, no. It's not about gaining control. It's about not losing the connection with yourself while you are experiencing an intense connection with someone else. It's about staying grounded. If you stood now with me in the office,

I would ask you to stand, and I would come and I would just push against you and you would actually resist by staying steady while at the same time welcoming the push rather than falling backwards because it feels so unstable so chaotic so without structure

you know we have always a structure and a loose movement we go back and forth between structure and spontaneity between what happens and what is built and what you experience is it becomes all happens and the build gets lost and that gets scary We'll be back with a session right after this. And while we love our sponsors, if you want to listen to this session ad-free, click the try-free button to subscribe to Astaire's office hours on Apple Podcasts. During the Volvo Fall Experience event,

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You can find the AccessPod now on YouTube, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. So you end your relationship, because I'm going back to your original question, and you say it wasn't really good what happened there. I don't exactly understand why you call it so toxic and negative and hard. But at the same time, when you say, I can't get over it, means what? I look for her in every other woman. I keep remembering the good

and I forget where we landed and where we ended I can't accept the failure what are we holding on to I always felt I also had some self-esteem issues like I had severe acne in the past which also left scarring on my chest and my back

and that played a usual and why I always pushed women away romantically until there came a point where I had a child wish and I hope to start a family one day and find a partner and hopefully for a long term. So I had to push through my own insecurities and started dating and each time I met a new girl, things improved in that sense. And after six months of dating and finding my ex-girlfriend, I felt so exhausted and it almost felt like the coming of Jesus that I found that girl and that we had such great chemistry it felt like and we did at the time that I now am so afraid well I know that I can find love again

it's not that I rashly don't know that but emotionally my emotions just continue like continue to end up with her in my mind so I keep holding on to the things that we have and thinking about how difficult it might be to find that elsewhere, forgetting the fact, rationally, I know, but forgetting the fact that it might be way more healthy than the relationship that I had with my ex and I understand that that relationship was so complex that you maybe don't, it's hard to get a grasp of what exactly that toxicity means, but I also don't want to show her under the bus and I made mistakes, she made mistakes, we both have experiences that we carried over and carried into a relationship.

And now for me, the most difficult part and the thing that I struggle with the most is the fact that I feel inadequate, that I feel that I'm also scared about how hard it can be to find a woman that is willing to accept me for who I am. And the right person will accept that, of course, but accept me for who I am and the struggles that I have with intimacy, because I love to be intimate. I love the body of a woman that I love. But with that, I can completely understand that for many women, that can be a great obstacle. That's something that plays in my mind as well.

Like how I'm, I overcoming the fact that I need to start dating again. I hope to find someone who accepts that and is willing to discover that with me, which is also a beautiful thing. I agree. I agree. But and, no but, and this may not be a watershed. This one may start very differently. Love stories, I was just thinking, they're like pieces of music.

They start in a different key with a different rhythm, with a different volume, with a different introduction. You've known one. Yeah. It's the first one. It's a very, very important one. But it's not by definition the one that shapes everything that follow. No. You know?

I know that. So the next encounter may be much slower. The next encounter, you may basically say, hey, I want to tell you something about me, sexually and emotionally. it changes as we get more connected but at first I enjoy pleasing you more than anything but it may not be in this one predictable heteronormative way

that we are all taught is the neck plus ultra and to actually instead of hoping it doesn't happen and trying to hide it you actually put it right up there as something about you that you know

and that changes with time. It's the same in reverse. When a man has rapid ejaculation, they sometimes need to say, you know, I need to get really comfortable and things change. But sometimes at first I get a little, you know, ahead of myself

and I don't really stay grounded enough in my own body. I think that just talking about it as a performance anxiety misses the boat. That's kind of, you know, adhering to a whole set of male competencies that you need

to be able to perform. Performing is much less important than the pleasing. Please them and you'll perform perfectly fine. It doesn't matter what you do. And put the focus not on can I perform and can I be adequate and can I be

competent and will my body betray me and will I not be able to control this and will will my way into orgasm, that in itself usually kind of makes it worse. So, less performance, more pleasing.

But also, different love stories, different musical introductions, different rhythm, different ambiance, and therefore different lyrics, different words, different story. And

anybody will talk about you know what have you learned from your relationship history that's a beautiful question one can ask you what's a mistake you hope you won't make again what's something that you would like to do that you didn't do last time or be more than do and as you grow older everybody will come with more stories and you will come with more stories and that will become your relationship resume. Yeah.

The one that you don't bring to work, that doesn't talk about all the jobs you've had, but the one that determines so much about how you live. Yeah. So you asked me, how do I get over my first relationship? And I don't know that that's exactly what we did. But tell me, since we arrive at the end, what is this conversation like for you? very I would say

almost refreshing in a sense what I get out of this talk right now I think perspective most of all how you just explained how the issue that I have around my sexuality

how that can actually also bring depth to my like my personality and bringing my personality and that depth to a new partner so that's also something along the lines of the insecurities that I have around the scars that my that the acne left that's also something that I almost started to wear as a trophy as like yeah but this is me so take it or leave it no this is not me this is me at this is me at this particular moment of my life with you in this situation.

You're not static, you're not unchangeable, and you're just learning. You're learning a whole new realm of experience. Definitely. So that sentence of, you take me as I am, take it or leave it, you accept me because this is it, this is me, ain't going to help you. That doesn't mean you find someone

who constantly criticizes you but you don't put yourself into a box and I'm saying this in very short way because we have to stop but don't put yourself into a box let yourself grow

let yourself process let yourself learn let yourself make bad mistakes or simply mistakes for that matter or choices that you don't think lead anywhere be a good friend

to yourself in that sense speak to yourself the way you would speak if a friend was doing the same thing yeah that's also something

that I've quite a lot of work on yeah so it's not one thing it's developmental meaning it's history of life story of life

and I'm just going to put three dots at the end of the sentence because we won't be able to put a nice bow here no no no I've learned a lot over the last year and I still do and there are many times that I feel actually so alive because of this heartbreak as well maybe sounds a little weird in pain but alive these two go very much together as well thank you so much thank you too

This was an Esther calling, a one-time intervention phone call, recorded remotely from two points somewhere in the world. If you have a question you'd like to explore with Astaire, could be answered in a 40- or 50-minute phone call. Send her a voice message, and Esther might just call you. Send your question to, producer at esteraparel.com. Where should we begin with Esther Perel is produced by magnificent noise? We're part of the Vox Media Podcast Network

in partnership with New York Magazine and The Cut. Our production staff includes Eric Newsom, Destri Sibley, Sabrina Farhi, Kristen Muller, and Julianette. Original music and additional production by Paul Schneider. And the executive producers of where should we begin are Esther Perel and Jesse Baker. We'd also like to thank Courtney Hamilton,

Mary Alice Miller, and Jack Saul. Thank you.