ASK THESE 3 QUESTIONS When Dating To See If They're RIGHT FOR YOU! | DeVon Franklin & Lewis Howes

So when it comes to setting expectations in any area of life, you gotta know is it realistic or unrealistic viS-A-Vis control. And you gotta ask is it spoken or unspoken viS-A-Vis communication. And when we start to do these.

Tools, I think you gotta have a dream.

The School of Greatness. Really?

Yeah.

Please welcome Lewis Howes.

You're just a symbol of inspiration and truth and life for so many people. And you really inspire people not only with your career and the business sense and the producing and the entertainment world, but also in the relationship side of things. this is what I know you as and respect you as the most. And I know you've been married almost a decade now.

Yes.

And there are probably things you learned the first couple years of marriage versus the last couple years of marriage, especially during a pandemic and during trying hard times.

Yes.

What is the biggest lesson you learned about marriage and relationships, being in a committed relationship during an extremely adverse time of the world? What's the biggest lesson for you?

How much time you got? Bro, listen, I've learned so much, right. But here's the number one thing that I've learned. We have been sold a myth.

Ooh, what is that myth?

That love heals all, you know marriage is the answer. Like, if you're not married there's something wrong with you, like you got to be in a relation. Like, we've been sold a myth and here's what that's what I mean about the myth. We have held marriage up like it's the top of the mountain. And when you get there, all of your problems are answered and gone.

That's not true.

It's not true. And that, that I. Because, you know, from. From being, you know, from a kid, we're watching movies, we're watching television shows, we're listening to music. It's all about love. It's all about finding it. It's all about getting to that mountain of. Oh, when I find the one, then I can relax. No, marriage is like getting to the beginning of the mountain.

Oh man, base camp. Base camp.

And guess where the summit is? And guess what? That altitude is high.

It's hard to breathe up there.

It's hard to breathe up there. It's jagged, it's not a smooth ride. That's what marriage is. And so, you know, understanding and coming into the myth of it, it's like, oh, got it. I love my wife, she loves me. The union is great, yet we got work to do. And until we do our work, the union itself can't subsidize it. And so that myth, that marriage is the answer, was one of the myths that I came completely directly had to confront. And what I realized- When did you confront it?

What year in the marriage? Or what day?

You know what it was is that it was gradual. It was gradual for me. And part of that gradual revelation was looking for the marriage to bring me a certain level of fulfillment that I was not actually pursuing on my own. So, don't get me wrong. Yes, marriage is great, love is great, it can be fulfilling. However, if we are not actually doing our work and finding out what makes us happy, what makes us fulfilled and we're relying on the union to do.

That.

We ultimately find ourselves becoming manipulators.

To get what we want.

To get what we want. We're trying to like- Because we expect.

That that person or the relationship is supposed to provide us.

Exactly.

What is the relationship supposed to provide us?

Here's what I believe a great relationship provides, right? One, first and foremost, let's look at it for a minute like a business, right? So if you have a business and you have a partner, what makes a great partnership? when both bring something to it, right? 'Cause you have a partner.

Yeah, if your partner is just taking everything and not adding value to the business, you're like, why is this person making money?

There you go.

Why am I paying back into this person?

There you go. There you go. So when you look at it that way, the purpose of a relationship is both people making a contribution so that that contribution enriches the lives of both, right? So I'm bringing something, you're bringing something, now we both, our happiness, our joy is enhanced. It's not created, this is very important. The myth is that the marriage will create your happiness, it's not true. It can enhance it if you already have it. So, if you have a partnership both people are bringing their contributions and then as a result, your business thrives because you have two people who are committed. Here's the second part both going in the same direction.

Right.

Is that related to values then or is that related to values?

It's related to values. It's related to purpose. I had one of my friends, we were talking and they kind of gave me this visual. And so I think this is, and it was very helpful when it came to marriage and relationships and how to think of them. So they were like, all right, So I want you to look forward, like do a visualization, and I want you to look forward. And when you look forward, I want you to see God. I said, okay. And they said, Now start walking to God. I said, Great. I'm walking to God. Now they said, Now your partner is right next to you.

Right?

So hold their hand. Great. I'm holding their hand, and now we're both walking to God. It's beautiful. Now, turn to your partner, and then they turn to you, and now try to walk to God.

It's challenging.

Exactly.

Sidestepping over there, you know? He's like a crab or something.

Exactly, precisely. So when you talk about the, you know, what is the purpose of a union? A purpose of a union is that when you have your right purpose partner, and that person is committed to you and you're committed to them, both are heading in the same direction, you both can walk together. But when you're trying to get somebody to a direction that they otherwise may not want to go.

They're turning the opposite way.

They're turning the opposite way or they're trying to get you where you may not want to go. You can't get there from there. So, I believe that the purpose of a relationship is one, making a contribution to each other's happiness. you know, having that partnership.

Not making the other person happy.

You cannot do it and I talked about this.

Contributing to the other person's happiness.

This is why I wrote the book. This is another myth. This idea how many times have you seen it in movies? How many times have you heard people say it? Oh, this person makes me happy. Oh, they make me so happy. It sounds so good to say. But what happens when you say someone makes you happy? It means you are outsourcing your happiness to that person.

Yeah.

Because that same person that makes you happy can then make you mad. Okay, so then tell me who's in control of how you feel.

The other person.

Exactly.

So why don't- They're a victim to.

Their- There you go.

Their way of being, whatever they're doing.

Their way of being, their mood. But here's the reality. No matter how much somebody loves you, it's impossible for someone outside of us to contribute to our happiness in a perfect way 24/7.

So, is love enough? No.

No.

Is love enough?

No.

You can love somebody and not stand them. Right? Right? I love my wife. My wife loves me. We still have to do our work and make the commitment to walk this thing out.

Right?

Like we still have to communicate. We still have to understand like, oh, okay, that's your issue or that's my issue, right? Like, so love is great, but love is not enough. And that's the myth. People think like, oh, if I love you. That's all you need.

That's right.

A good line of love.

No.

You makes me feel good when I hear that. Right.

But it's not all you need.

No, you need compatibility.

You need compatibility.

I need compatibility. Like when you have compatibility, when again, you talk about people going in the same direction, it's like, okay, cool. We're committed to going in the same direction. We're committed to the same type of life. we're committed to allowing each other to be the full self that we were created to be. That to me in addition to love is what can make a great marriage or make a great relationship. But love alone is not enough. There's a lot of people you love you can't stand. There's a lot of people you love that you broke up with. Because you say, you know, I love them but we're just not compatible. And that love may never go away.

Mm-.

But so often we're romanticizing love in a way that it produces so much pain in those who don't have it.

As a movie producer.

Yeah.

That produces a lot of movies around faith and love and community and connection. I'm sure there are some lines in your movies that you produce. You didn't write the scripts.

No, I didn't write.

You produce the scripts. You produce the movies that have lines like this. that maybe remind people of this way of living. You make me happy or whatever the line is, right? I'm sure there's somewhere in one of your movies. As someone who's producing certain movies for entertainment, knowing that sometimes maybe there's a line in here and there that, mmm, that's not really true for you or where you're at in relationships. How do you navigate that? I'm saying it's right or wrong, but just how do you navigate that as a human knowing that's coming out and some of that entertainment.

Right, in the movies that I do, I always try to put in truth. So this point of view is something, you know, the movie that comes to mind that I worked on when I was an executive was Jumping the Broom. And that was a romantic comedy, you know, an upper class family, working class family, you know, the son from the working class family marries the woman this daughter from the upper class family in a weekend wedding in Martha's Vineyard. And Laz Alonso and Paula Patton were in that film. And my wife, Megan, was one of the stars of that film. And we started dating at the premiere from the premiere about nine months after production, which was very cool. And in that movie, we intentionally put, worked on that to make sure we put real truth on the difficulty of like, yeah, two people can love each other, but then what do you do with their families? How do you navigate conflict? How do you navigate an overbearing mother? How do you navigate, you know, parents who have a certain image for what they wanted for their daughter and who their daughter's marrying doesn't align with the image? And so that movie has a lot of truth in it. And ultimately, you know, we didn't cut corners at all, and that's why the movie was so successful. And I'm getting ready to do another romantic comedy, and we're putting more truth in. So for me, I'm always mindful and cognizant of how I feel and think about love. And I try to represent that when I'm doing movies that are on that subject. Because I'm not trying to sell a fantasy, right? I want to sell the reality and that, yes, you can win and yes, when you find that partner that you fall in love with.

But there are challenges.

There's gonna be challenges.

And there'll be more challenges of different classes and different backgrounds.

Absolutely, absolutely.

I'm a big believer, whether this is true or not, that we talk about, we write, We podcast on the things that we become experts on the things that we need the most.

Yes.

So the School of Greatness, I talk about all subjects. So it means that I'm flawed in pretty much every area of life.

I don't believe that.

And I'm constantly looking for more wisdom to improve, right?

Yeah.

Where do you feel like in the relationship side of things that you, I think I asked you this question last time a couple years ago. Where do you feel like you still need the most improvement? in relationships for you.

Yeah.

So I need the most improvement in a number of areas.

How long do we have?

Exactly. Let's get a new piece of paper. Hey, hey, hey, I have not perfected this thing and I'm working on it every day and anybody that tells you they perfected it, they're gonna lie about everything else. So the first area that I'm working on and you may relate to this, because of the work that you do. You know, my father passed away when I was nine years old. You know, he passed away of a heart attack when he was 36. And that was a very traumatic, you know, experience for me and my brothers. So my older brother's three and a half years older, my younger brother's three and a half years younger. And so coming out of that, you know, no money, my mother didn't have money for therapy or anything like that. And so, you know, we were in church and we watched movies. Yeah.

Right.

And so, and then also I was very active in school. And what I began to see is like, oh, okay, if I perform or achieve at a certain level, people would say, oh, Devon, good job. Pat me on the back. So I said, oh, got it. So the more that I serve at church, or the more I achieve at school, or the more that I do my chores at home, the more approval I would get. So what I began to do was I began to seek that out. And I began to become really good at meeting everybody else's need. And so that persona, right, of like, oh, you need something done, give it to Devon. Right? It's like, oh, yeah, I'm your guy. I can do it.

Right?

Because I was finding my value in all of the achievement and all of the approval that came with it. In middle school, people started calling me Mr. Perfect. And at first, I was like, oh, this is great. I love that. Oh, wow, Mr. Perfect, right? But then as I got older, it became a trap.

Mm.

Why? Because I'm not perfect. No one's perfect.

But I had this image that I.

Had to live up to. I had this expectation of myself that, oh, I've got to do everything perfectly, right? So, getting to your question. A lot of pressure. Oh, my goodness.

Are you kidding me?

It's exhausting. It's exhausting. That's why I talk about in the book, I had to kill Mr. Perfect. I said, I got to let go of this persona because, you know, I'm not that and I need to be who I really am. And so, when you talk about what the area I need to improve on. So, you know, bringing that into marriage, Right? Like, hey, I'm here to serve, and I'm here to be the best husband I can be, and I'm here to give, and I'm here to sacrifice. Oh, that's beautiful.

But when it crosses boundaries.

But here's the boundary though. The problem is that no matter how altruistic you or I may want to be in our relationships with our women, If we do not first acknowledge that we have needs, our altruism is flawed.

How so?

Because we are serving in order to fill the hole in our soul. To get approval. To get approval. There you go.

To get a pat on the back.

There you go. And then also it's like, oh, well, no, I don't have any needs. No, I'm here to meet your need. No, you're human. I'm human. I got needs.

I think I can relate to this big time for most of my life. Up until recently, I would do things in order to receive love in relationships. And I would not do things.

If.

Someone got upset at me, I would not do those things anymore to just try to make them happy so they would continue to love me. Even when it would cross my boundaries or when I didn't agree with something, I would do it to make the other person like me, love me, be happy with me. And then I found myself resenting myself the longer that would go on because I was doing things that I didn't believe in or didn't agree with or there was a boundary of mine that was crossing my line to serve someone else. I think it's learning that balance probably, like navigating and learning how to communicate expectations, which is a lot about in your book, which I love. The whole book is about setting clear expectations and not going into a relationship with the viewpoint of, well, this is the way a relationship is supposed to look based on society. Just thinking that the other person knows what you think and they know and you know what they think and having that is not going to work.

It ain't gonna work. It ain't gonna work.

And after nine years, not to put your marriage on the spot or anything, but after nine years, How important is still communicating expectations nine years into marriage?

Man, it's every day, right? Really? Oh, oh, you can't autopilot this thing.

You can't say, this is what I expect one day and then it'd be good for the rest of life.

Never. It will not work. It won't work. And here's why. I go back to our flaws, right? We're all flawed. All of us, and all of us have traumas and tragedies and things that we have experienced in our life that we have compartmentalized. And that's why I go back to this earlier thought of like, you know, the myth that marriage is gonna, you know, it's gonna save you and it's everything. The reason why I think that's a myth is because the more you are with somebody and the more that you love them and they love you, the.

More that those flaws, fears come out.

The fears come out. The trauma because of vulnerability. and you're actually sharing your life with someone and you're allowing someone to see who you are. And there's also certain things you don't know that you've gone through that have impacted you to the level that they have.

It's coming up now.

Exactly. And so, in a great relationship it serves as a great mirror. So, when you talk about setting expectations you know, nine years in it doesn't stop because all of us are changing. And also to that point, we have to learn to communicate. We have to get our words out. We have to say, okay, you know, hey, babe, can I expect this? Can you expect that? Let's get to the middle so that we understand, okay, cool. Here's what I can hold you accountable for. Here's what you can hold me accountable for instead of assuming. And that assumption, again, no matter how much they love you, no matter how long you've been together, no one can read our minds. No one. No one, no one. And so, when you start behaving and then here's what happens. Dude, we have these unspoken expectations. Unspoken expectations are relationship killers. You have this unspoken expectation. You treat the person as if you have spoken it and they know it.

And you fault them for it.

And you judge them. You judge them when they don't meet the expectation they may not have been aware of. And then you make a false assumption about their intentions. for you.

They don't care about me. They don't believe me. They don't think about me.

There you go.

And they're selfish, whatever.

There you go. And so in our head, we become the judge and jury over somebody.

Without even telling them.

Without even telling them.

What they were supposed to do.

Exactly. And giving them the opportunity to say yes or no.

That's it.

That's it. Because too often in relationships, we're trying to control. And so, just because you have an expectation, it does not mean that person is obligated to meet it. That person has to agree. That person that you're with is free the same way you're free, okay? And if they want to meet that expectation, great. And if they don't, then you can talk about what that means. Hey, okay, you know I have a certain expectation. Okay, that's not something you want to meet. All right, let's talk about if we are compatible. Let's talk about if we are going in the same direction. Very important instead We suppress. We allow these feelings to fester. We get mad. We then get bitter. And then someone asks us a question. We turn a cold shoulder. It's like, well, why? Because we haven't actually communicated. We haven't actually asked the question, Hey, can I expect this from you? Is this okay? Is this all right? Is it not? Is it cool? And so that's why in the book I spend so much time talking about communicating expectations. learning to set expectations just because they love you doesn't mean they know. And I have seen so many relationships go by the wayside because there was this idea, this myth that oh, just because they love me they're supposed to know what I want.

No.

They don't know. Everybody has a different upbringing.

Exactly.

They were exposed to love and marriage in different ways. And so, what may look like love to somebody may look like debt to somebody else.

Exactly.

So, you got to communicate and find the the happy medium of what works for your relationship.

How do we learn to love ourselves so much that it doesn't matter what our partner does or doesn't do?

Oh man, Lord have mercy.

Is there a way where you can fall in love with yourself without a sense of ego?

Yes.

Like, I'm God. But love yourself so much that it doesn't matter if your partner meets your expectations communicated or uncommunicated. whether they're supporting you in the way that you want or not, whether they're proud of you or not, is there a way that we could do that? Or should we be expecting something out of our relationship in return?

You know, either way, bro, listen, listen, man. You know, listen, my views on this may be a little contrarian, so I'm just going to take my chair. Yeah, yeah. One of, so I'll answer the love question in a minute of self, but I want to hit the piece that you just hit, which is the expectation, right? Yes. I personally believe that if you give to get in a relationship, you are on thin ice and the sun is coming out. Because.

Ah, I melted.

Right, right, right. Because again, What happens is you're not free. You're not free. You're not actually giving from your heart because that's what you want to do. You're giving from manipulation.

To get something in return.

Because it's to get something in return. So you're treating that relationship like the stock market. Well, yeah, if I give a certain amount of money to a certain stock or portfolio, I can expect a certain return.

Hopefully it goes up.

Right, hopefully it goes up. But that's the dynamic. But relationship is not stocks, man. That's somebody's heart. That's somebody's life. And so when you're investing in someone with the hope that they'll do something for you, you're messed up.

What if that person never contributes in the way you contribute, let's say, after years? Is it the right relationship still?

Okay, this is true.

Should you let go of the expectation? Well, I don't need that in return. Great.

So here's how I think you answered it. And I want to hit the love part too. So, I believe everyone should give freely from how they feel and want to feel and they give to that person because that's what's in their heart to do. Over time, it's not an indictment on that person if that person isn't giving as much it just may be a revelatory about compatibility, right? It's like, oh, okay, got it. the person that's giving, I'm in a relationship, you're in a relationship because you have needs, you want those needs to be met. Oh, okay, I'm seeing there's an imbalance. I feel great about everything I'm giving but I also recognize that there's some needs that are not being met and maybe there's some compatibility issues we need to talk about.

Or you can communicate about it and see if that's right.

That's exactly right. Like, hey, look, I have needs, I'm in a relationship because I want people to contribute to these needs. I'm going to be fine no matter what but in this relationship because I actually love the idea of someone else contributing to my well-being. So, you have to assess it and see if there's compatibility and alignment, not pointing the finger. Because so often, we're so ready to point the finger. Oh, this person's not giving as much as me. Oh, it's like no, no, no. If life is a mirror, what is the mirror reflecting? What is a relationship reflecting? And oftentimes in my experience, relationships are the greatest teachers. Greatest. Of who we are.

Greatest.

Right.

Who we are and who we aren't, okay? Like, and too often, people run from difficult relationships. I believe that you should, whatever the lesson is you got to get about you, before you break up- Heal it.

Within the relationship first.

There you go. Because then you take that healing to the next relationship.

Yes.

If your relationship is revealing your own brokenness and your issues that you got to deal with, and then you're saying to that other person, oh, it's your fault. That brokenness and that healing that you didn't do, you're taking it wherever you go. That's going to be the cycle. It's going to repeat.

So, what should we do if we're in an environment of a relationship that is not working, that people are being triggered and there's arguments and fights and frustration, and you're just not able to see eye to eye, you're not facing the same direction, we shouldn't say it's your fault, I don't deserve this piece out.

No, no.

What should we do? Internally, whether we're with that person long term or after three, six, 12 months, we realize this isn't the right fit, but I'm going out in a different way.

Yeah, so it goes back to the original question in this section, which was, How do you love yourself? Ooh. So there's a scripture that says that the whole Bible can be summed up in, you know, love the Lord God, your God, with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself.

What does that mean?

This is so interesting.

A lot of times- you- don't love yourself. You're gonna love your neighbor with a lot of anger and frustration.

But this is why we see a lot of what we're seeing in our world. because we so focus on the neighbor part. But we don't focus on the self part. Love your neighbor as yourself, right? So, how can I love anybody well if I don't love me well? So, when we talk about loving somebody, so often in relationships or dating, we're looking to love someone, we're looking for someone to love us. But do you love you? Loving you, me loving me comes, it starts with appreciating who I am. Flaws and all. Going easy on myself. Too often we are the people that talk to ourselves the worst.

Worst over and over.

Over and over. We would never let somebody talk to us as badly as we talk to ourselves. That's not love. Love is like, it's okay. Yeah, you know you've failed. Come on, get up. You're good. You're gonna be all right. All right. What did you learn? What do you gotta do differently? It's a lesson. It's not an indictment. Loving ourself, we come to find out, well, what do we like? What do I like to do? What are the things that contribute to my happiness? And let me prioritize those things. When we love ourselves, we really start to appreciate. We start to say, oh man, you know what? I'm gonna be all right. I'm gonna be okay. and so often we don't do that. We're looking for other people to do the work for us that we're not doing ourselves. That's why there's always this imbalance. That's why we can never really find contentment. Why? Because it starts here. Prayer, meditation, working out, eating right, whatever the things that contribute to your happiness. You and I have to make a committee of one to do those things. Period. Whatever those things are that bring you peace, don't wait until your partner does it. Don't wait until you get in a relationship to focus on it. Do it now. And one of the biggest challenges is that if you are already in a relationship or you're in a marriage and it has become so codependent that you don't do anything unless they give you permission. You know, oh, you don't want to go work out? Okay, I won't go work out today. Oh, you want to cook? Oh, let's go, right? There's nothing wrong with wanting to do things together but what are the things that you like to do?

Who are you?

What's in your heart? So, before you point the finger, hey, this is not working and you're the problem, everyone has to do a self-assessment and say, well, okay, well have I done my work? Am I doing my work? Do I love myself? What should we assess in that process?

What are the things we should be asking ourselves?

The thing you should be asking yourself when you are assessing who you are, one.

When you're frustrated in the relationship, when you're fighting, you're arguing, you're not seeing eye to eye. Oh, great. You think they're the problem. they're not understanding you, what should we ask ourself?

Well, first of all, what am I actually frustrated about? Right, let's start there. What am I frustrated about? What are the problems that I am having? Because so often we don't even communicate with our, like we're not even clear, right? What the problems are. What are the areas of frustration? What are the problems? And then, Before you go and try to solve it, you then have to ask, what is my contribution? Because everyone is making a contribution to the very problems that they can't stand in their relationship.

What is my contribution to this problem?

Correct. What is my contribution to the problem? Because once we, because it's so easy. It's easy to point the finger, but it's really hard to point the finger back at ourselves. It's really hard. And so before you start doing, hey, before you start doing this and you're not doing right and you're wrong and you're pointing the finger at whoever you're in the relationship with, you start to do this assessment and say, okay, what's really the problem? What's really, have I not been communicative enough? Have I not set my expectations? Have I been too harsh? You've got to really start doing the assessment of yourself and then bring that conversation.

I think also to go even deeper is like, why is this triggering me?

Exactly.

Why is this a problem for me?

Yes.

Maybe it's not the other person's doing something to me, but the trigger of it is something I haven't healed or addressed from the past.

Yes.

And that's why I'm triggered.

Yes.

But they're just being them. and, you know, depending on the situation, but it's like, what's the root of this frustration for me?

Dude, this is so true. And this is why I talk about this in the book. I talk about how expectations are the secret software that run our life.

Yeah.

And, and what I mean by that is that we don't actually sometimes react to life events. We react to our expectations of events.

Right.

So if situations or people exceed our expectation, we're happy. if situations or people don't, we're devastated.

So what should we do? Have no expectations?

No, you can't do that because expectations are like blood pressure. You know, too high, it's not good. Too low, it's not good. Because expectation, we need motivation. Expectations are our hope, right? So we do have to have hope, but we've got to set it properly. Because so often when our expectation is not set to your point that you made, we end up reacting based upon an unset expectation. And so It's not that what the person is doing is wrong. It's that we have not set expectations for ourselves. We haven't identified what those triggers are. We haven't identified, oh, wait a minute. Wait a second. They're not the problem. It's how I'm looking at it is the problem. So in order to set expectations, I have every person that reads the book ask these two questions. One, is it realistic or unrealistic? How do you know? comes down to one word. This is how you determine if your expectation is realistic or unrealistic. Control.

What do you mean? Are you trying to be in control or...

If it's within your control to do it, you can expect it. It's a realistic expectation. If it's out of your control, you cannot expect it. So I'll give two examples. Your podcast is amazing. It's incredible. One of the most dynamic podcasts in the world.

Thank you.

No matter how hard you try, you cannot force somebody to go listen to it.

No, can't. I can hope.

Hope?

I can have a range of what I think people will listen to.

Yes, I can have a target, I can have a goal. But if I put, if you put an expectation of like, hey, it's gotta be a million by next month, I would argue that's unrealistic because it's out of your control.

Right.

What's in your control? I want to produce the best podcast with the best conversations and the best guests with the best marketing and the best publicity all in your control. Realistic to expect. Now, let's apply that to people. You're in a relationship. You know, I want this person to love me in a certain way. I want this person to, you know, have this amount of sex. I want this person to go work out. I want this person to go eat. I want this person.

Can't control that.

You can't control it.

You can communicate it. You just set up the structure for it.

But you can't control it. And so often our expectations with others are unset. Why? Because we're trying to control what we don't. You and I only control ourselves and the remote. Wherever the remote, that's it. I can't control anybody else ever. and too often we spend so much energy trying to get someone to behave and live in the way that we want instead of behaving in the way that we want, right? Living the way that we want. And if we live the way that we want, then whoever we're in the relationship with, either that is going to compel them to say, hey, hey, you know what? I like what you're doing. And then you say, Hey, I like what you're doing. So let's do that together.

Right.

Or it won't. But when we try to get somebody to be what we want them to be and do what we want them to do, that's called manipulation.

What happens when we are in a relation, when we are trying to control or manipulate someone else in an intimate relationship or they're doing that to us? What happens?

What happens is love goes down. Fear rises. Here's what I mean by that. The fear of if I don't do this, they're going to leave. So that person, you know, everyone has different degrees of self-determination. And so in a relationship, when you've fallen in love and you really care about somebody and they're asking you to do something or be something, that could be a very compelling thing to do even when it's not who you are. And so, the fear of if I don't, will they leave? Okay, so then it becomes a performance-based relationship.

It's not good.

It's not good. I'm doing this because I don't want them to go, but I know it doesn't bring me joy. So, it no longer is love leading the way. It's fear. It's fear. It's fear. And okay, you know what? I'm going to do this because this is what they want and I'm going to become this, but every moment that I do it, and it's not in my heart is a moment that my soul gets crushed. Every single moment.

This is my life. This is my life up until now where, you know, not all the time, but I could see a pattern in my past relationships where I would just do things to make the other person happy, even though I didn't want to do them because they were angry or upset or frustrated or whatever. They had some expectation. and I would sense like, man, the love is going down a little bit, a little bit. But I, when I took responsibility and accountability, it's like, but it's not their fault. I'm the one choosing to do these things because I'm afraid that they're gonna be angry at me or that they're gonna leave or they're not gonna love me. So it's my responsibility to stand in my truth.

Yeah.

In those tough, challenging moments when someone's like, you don't support me, you're not doing whatever they're saying.

Yeah.

It's tough to do that. We're triggered, it's challenging, but I think if someone's gonna leave you by you standing in your truth and being frustrated by you constantly, then that's maybe not the right fit for you.

Well, not only is it potentially not the right fit, you gotta think about something. You gotta put yourself at the end of your life. And you gotta say.

You posted a quote on Instagram recently about this. Yes.

I saw it. That's a good quote.

One of the regrets of the dying.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I use that as a prompt to get people to think about in your life. But if you do that, so let's say in that dynamic, you become what they want you to be even though it's not who you really are. You get to the end of your life and can you live with doing what was expected but never what was destined? Can you live with doing what was expected but never what was destined. And if the answer to that question is no, then you gotta make some changes. That's so tough. It is.

Why does love trap us? Because I'm speaking for myself.

Yeah.

Because I don't want to say the world does this, but I sense that a lot of other people do this. When we feel the sense of chemistry and connection and intimacy and vulnerability and love, Whether it's real or not, we sense that feeling of intimacy with someone. Why does that trap us? And we stay in these things in general, I'm not speaking for everyone, but we tend to stay in these things much longer than we should. Like you'll hear people say, I knew I should have gotten a divorce seven years ago. It's like they break up with a divorce. I always ask them, when did you know that you weren't supposed to be with this person? five years ago, ten years ago, the day I got married.

Right?

You hear these things and you're like, well, why do we stay?

Right.

Why is it so hard for us, this trap of love?

Right.

Why don't we get out of it sooner?

Right. I mean, there's so many, there's so many reasons. The reason that comes to mind is worth, self-worth.

We don't believe we're worth it or we're afraid we won't find something as good or what do you call it?

What I mean is that It can take a while for you to come into a revelation of what you're worth and that you are worthy to be happy and pursue happiness on your terms and come to the revelation that, you know, this dynamic is no longer, you know, making that contribution to my life.

Not that they're bad and wrong.

There you go, right, right.

Not that it's all their fault.

There you go.

It just wasn't the right fit.

And for me, you know, when you're in that situation, It can take a long time for you to get to the place where you feel enough worth, where you're ready to say, you know what? I'm going to endure the fear. I'm going to endure the challenges to make that kind of move. So when you talk about love, love cuts to the core of our worth because we all need it. And when I say love, we all need love, I don't mean just romantic love. I'm just saying we all need to love and be loved. I think it's just part of our humanity. It's just part of how we were created. It's part of our divinity, right? God is love. God is in us. We love, right? And we serve. And so part of that love is, oh man, I want so much of it is focused on giving. Because think about it again, think about how we're socialized, right? Oh, you do the right thing. Oh, mommy daddy loves you. Oh, you know, oh, I want to, but it's not like, you know, do you love you? Do you know you're worthy? Do you know that you are worth it? Do you love who looks back at you in the mirror? Do you love who looks back at you when you take the selfie? Because at the end of the day, love becomes complicated because we never actually get there with our worth and who we really are. And so, we go into the relationship and we haven't really done the work. We kind of feel worthy. We don't quite feel loved and we bring all of that. That's a recipe for this, you know? And here's the thing. It's okay, right? Love is like a rocky sea, right?

You know what I mean?

You're on, hey, we're on the boat, man. It's going to be rocky. That's okay. because we all have our stuff. So it's not about finding somebody who don't have stuff. You want to find somebody who can help you with your stuff. Who's willing to help you with your stuff. So that as you bring things that are difficult, they're like, Hey, it's cool. Let's work this through. But you both find a healthy way to do it. But one of the reasons why I think people stay in things is because of worth. And you need time to get to a place, and some people never get there. Where you realize what you're worth, because at the end of the day, I go back to happiness. It's like in peace and joy. You know, we only live this life once. You know, I'm a Christian, I believe in heaven, I believe in that. But I also believe that this earth, this life, this particular existence, we only get it once. So, when you really put that in the broad scheme of things, you think, okay, am I living right now according to my choice? Yes. Am I doing the things that bring me joy, bring me peace? Or am I allowing things in my life that are working against it, no matter what they are? It could be a relationship, it could be a job, it could be a living environment. Whatever it is, I have to take control and do this assessment and then make the decision, okay, from a relationship standpoint, if my relationship isn't everything I wanted, okay, what do I need to do to fix it? But first, I gotta fix me. And I gotta work on me. And I gotta love me. And as I love me, it will then help me learn how to love others and make the assessment. Okay, you know what? Maybe this person is gonna be able to walk with me and I walk with them. Great. Maybe not. But let me not just point the finger and do the work. The other thing I wanna hit is when you talk about setting expectations, that second part of setting expectations is communication, right? is it spoken or unspoken? We talked about this earlier. You've got to actually ask the question. So even in this situation, when you talk about difficult relationship, this scenario, instead of making the assumption, whatever your area of frustration is, sit down and frame it as a question. You know what? I was expecting that in this relationship that we would sit down and eat every night at seven o'clock.

Right, because this is what we did with my family. There you go. So I just assumed. That's why I just assumed.

You would do the same thing. Is that your expectation? Is that something I can expect from you? And let them say yes or no. Oh, okay, so for you, like, you don't ever expect to be home at seven.

You're going out to dinner at seven.

You're going out at seven. Oh, okay, got it. Okay, okay, all right. Okay, great. Wow, now we're actually having a real adult conversation, right? We're having an adult conversation because we're taking accountability. and we're communicating. And so when it comes to setting expectations in any area of life, you got to know is it realistic or unrealistic viS-A-Vis control. And you got to ask is it spoken or unspoken viS-A-Vis communication. And when we start to do these tools, you know, it does free us up. Because the reason why I wanted to write Live Free is because so often we're not. And when I say live free, what I mean is that when you and I live free, When anyone lives free, it means they are not under the mental, physical, or emotional control of anyone or anything. That's what living free is. Living free means, so when we get into a situation and we start to feel like, oh, this person is starting to feel like this person is making me mad or contributing to my discontent, then I would say to that person, okay, pause for a minute. Pause for a second. It's super easy just to turn all your attention to what they're not doing, right? No, no, no, no. How do you want to feel in the situation? What will give you more power in the situation? What will give you more peace? Okay, you know what? I'm identifying that there are some things in my relationship that are incompatible.

Yes.

I am going to spend some time observing what those things are and identifying if there are certain things I can live with. Yeah. and what I can't.

Right.

And communicating about that.

Communicating those areas that I can't to see if it's possible we can set our expectations together.

The biggest challenge you'll find is when you communicate those things out of expectation or anger or frustration, the other person is probably not gonna be able to receive it. If you're already making someone wrong for what they're doing or not doing, it's very challenging to have an adult conversation, bro. And this is something I've been there before. I've done that and I've received it.

Yes.

And it's challenging to do, but when you come from a place of 100% responsibility, accountability, and figuring why is this triggering me? Why is this really affecting me?

Dude.

Then you can come from a calmer place of like, okay, I didn't like this, but I don't need to make you wrong for this in this moment because we can talk about it, come up with an agreement, that then moving forward, we can either live up to or not, and then we can make a decision if this frustrates me.

Correct. I mean, I have, it's challenging, but it's good work. And for me, you know, that's, you talk about flaws, like that's an area that I have been, you know, outside of identifying what my needs are and being okay to admit those needs. One of the flaws, man, is that, you know, I have a really strong sense of right and wrong.

And if someone's not doing that, according to me. That's wrong.

Right, right, right. So if something ain't right, dude, I'm like, that's wrong. So when Megan and I have had moments of disagreement, I have at times mishandled it completely. 'Cause I have in my mind made the decision that on that particular thing that she may have done that I didn't like, she's wrong.

For you?

For me. But no, no, no. For me, came as I evolved and as I grew. Initially, it was like, no, that's wrong. Wrong in the world, not just wrong for the world. So here's the problem with that. The problem is when I make the decision and judge her action as wrong, the moment I bring it up, I bring it up in a way of attack. And anyone when they feel attacked, It's gonna, they're gonna get defensive.

Defensive.

You can't do that in a relationship. You can't do it. You can't do it, but it happens all the time. It does, man. And dude, what would happen is I.

Would, you know, get on my self-righteous, you know, soapbox.

I can't believe we did this.

There you go. There you go. What were you thinking? There you go. Judgment, you know. What you gonna say?

Oh, you're right, Devon. I'm a bad person. Everything you say is truth. Right? No, dude, listen. I learned the hard way. What that did was it pushed her further away.

Right.

It doesn't mean that the point of what I was bringing up, whatever we were dealing with, didn't have merit. Didn't mean that. It just meant that the way I went about it was wrong. And my intent was not being realized because I came at it from judgment and I'm right and you're wrong and da-da-da-da. So as I bump my head, I realize, oh, got it. The way I see the world is the way I see the world.

Yeah.

It's not exactly how the world may be. So when I use how I see the world as the way that she has to see the world, I am the one with the problem.

Yeah.

Because I've got to understand and take into account the two different perspectives. So what I had to learn to do is express it from here. My love.

Yeah.

When this happened, here's how it made me feel. Here's was my takeaway. Is that the right way to think about it? So instead of doing like this, I had to do like this. Oh, yeah, when you said that, I felt this way about that. Man, how can we... And that approach, bro, that approach is what then brings the communication.

Then she wants to be contributing in a more supportive way.

And also just talk it through, right? Because it's not a pointing the finger. I'm not pointing the finger at her. she's not pointing the finger at me, we're actually talking about it. So she'll say, Hey, there are certain things that you do that make me feel this way. I said, oh, okay. Now, here's another hard truth. There's some situations I'm like, I'm not responsible for those feelings. Right.

Doesn't mean you have to change who you are.

No, I love you, I understand what you're saying, and you know I love you, period. I understand you feel a certain way about certain things. That's not my responsibility.

Right?

So the same way that I feel about certain things, you're like, Hey, that's not my responsibility, right? Yeah. I still got to go do my work. I still have to go on my journey, and I still have to continue to get to that place of peace and healing and contentment inside the journey.

If that makes sense. On a scale of one to 10.

Yeah.

Of jealousy. 10 being extremely jealous human being. One being not jealous at all. Where would you say you lie?

In life or like relationship?

In relationship.

Oh man, I'm not jealous. I'm like a one for me.

Did you ever used to be jealous in relationships?

Never. And I'll tell you why. Because I love me, okay? So I'm like, yo, listen, I ain't jealous of no other dude. I ain't, I'm not. And then the reality is, if any woman that I was with found, you know, for whatever, more comfort or, you know, was like, hey, I want to go over there, experienced that person, God bless you. God bless you. We're not the right fit then. Not the right fit. And if I was a jealous person, I couldn't be married to my wife. You know, my wife is one of the most successful, I mean, first of all, she's beautiful, but she's also one of the most successful, you know, women, you know, actors in Hollywood, you know, she's an icon, she's known around the world, you know, I mean, she's got man, she's got men, you know, I mean, literally. you know, and men all around the world, you know, desire her and would probably do anything for her. And that's who she was before we got married. So if I was the jealous type, I couldn't, I'd be miserable.

Miserable.

Miserable, 'cause right now she's in, you know, New York on a TV show. I'm here in LA.

You gotta have trust.

And you gotta have trust, right?

So if I'm a jealous man, oh man, I.

What is jealousy saying about us? Insecurity, massive insecurity. I don't feel safe with me so I don't feel safe with you.

What do you mean I don't feel safe with me?

Meaning, if I am secure with who I am and I feel good being alone, right. I feel safe in my isolation, I feel safe in my loneliness or periods of time when I'm by myself. Then I trust that you're going to feel safe and you're going to honor whatever needs to happen. But if I don't feel safe like I don't really like being alone much and I don't really like being by myself then you don't feel. No, what are you doing? What's the problem? What's happening? So that insecurity and not feeling safe with self, you transfer onto the other person. Because if you're content with your personal time, you tend to be more content when others have personal time.

You're not worried.

You're not worried. And then also one of the things that could happen is that you got burned in the past. Someone did you wrong, they violated your trust, and so fear has crept in. and so, that fear is driving your jealousy.

Yes.

You know, I'm afraid that what happened before is going to happen again. And so, as a result, I'm transferring that previous pain onto my present situation. And that's always a recipe for disaster, right? Because the person you're dating is not the person you dated.

You can't expect them to repeat the same thing.

Exactly, now but here's the other thing because life is a mirror, right? And whatever we put out we get back. If you keep putting that out, if you put it out on the last situation, this person you're dating may not be a cheater at all. But if you don't trust them and you keep getting mad at them.

You're gonna push them away, they're gonna wanna cheat.

It's like, again, everyone has to be the keeper.

I'm saying it's okay, yeah.

Right, but that energy that you're putting out is sometimes the energy you get back even from somebody who may not be predisposed to do those sort of things.

Not saying it's your fault that someone breaks up their integrity.

Correct.

But you might have influenced it in a way.

Correct. And so, the person that's jealous has to one, get control of that security and two, get control of that fear. And also, say, you know what? Listen, if that person I'm dating is foolish enough to step out on me.

That's on them.

That is on them. That's on them. 'Cause they don't even realize what they just did. They don't even realize who they're missing out on. Right. Period. End of story. That's it. So on the other side of that jealousy is this idea that's not ideal in your head, that's just not true.

So I feel like maybe until five or six years ago, I was probably in my 20s, I was probably a seven on the jealousy scale.

Whoa.

Then in my, I was very insecure. I had false confidence, but very insecure. secure.

Yep.

Maybe I was like a five into a seven in that range. And then in my 30, early 30s, I was more of a three, right? And then when I hit 30, probably three or 34, I was like a one or zero. And something switched inside of me where I was like, okay, exactly what you just said. If someone cheats on me or is flirting with someone or whatever, texting someone, that's on them.

Yeah.

It's not on me. And okay, goodbye. Like, I love you and I want.

The best for you.

Right.

And I don't know if that just took me time and maturity, but you, it sounds like you had this at birth.

I don't know if I had it at birth. Jealousy was never my issue.

Yeah.

You know, I was never, I've just never been the jealous, the jealous type at all.

You know?

What was your biggest issue? My biggest issue has been and continues to be vulnerability.

Being vulnerable.

Very, very hard. Very hard. Expressing what I feel.

Why is it challenging for you to express exactly how you feel in a vulnerable, non-frustrated way?

I'll tell you why. Because I go back to, you know- Mr.

Perfect?

Mr. Perfect, for sure. I mean, that area of time, that period of time, you know, that wound, you know, losing my father, you know, this is devastating. I mean, you know, it was, and I talk about this in the book, you know, when my father, so my father was an alcoholic. He was in and out of the house pretty much my whole life. And so when we would see him, most of the time, my memories of him were, you know, him being drunk. So he was like, I think when we were, and I was like, man, maybe five years old, he left and, you know, was just out. Like, for him, alcohol was like somebody being on. like hardcore drugs. And so he was intermittent for from between five and nine when he passed away. Right before he passed away, he had gotten clean. He got a job. He had a place. We went and saw him, you know, we were like, Hey, he's like, Hey, you know, he worked at this restaurant. Remember we went to the restaurant multiple times. On a Sunday night we got the word that he had a heart attack. He went to the hospital. That Monday after school, me and my brothers and my mom, we go to the hospital. We see him. He's up in the bed just like this, having a conversation. And he said, Listen, I'm so sorry for what I've done to you all. He said, I want to get back in your life. I want to get my family back. I'm coming back to church. That's what he said. We were like, Wow, okay, maybe Dad has changed. The next day, we're getting ready to go to the hospital. The phone rings. Mother picks up. hear this screech, this yell. You know, I'm nine years old and I was literally sitting on the couch reading the Shel Silverstein book where the sidewalk ends, because we were reading that for class. My mom yells and we knew what that meant. She's crying profusely, she rushes, she gets us in the car, we go to the hospital. One of my aunts is there, she is with us in the waiting room. My mom goes away for a long time, and then finally she comes and she says to me and my brothers, I want you to come with me. Didn't know where we were going. We go, what I now realize was the morgue. And there's my father laid out on a cold, you know, steel slab. And she said, Kiss your father goodbye.

Wow.

So we walk over, man, and I'm telling you, you don't you don't know what cold is until you, it's the.

Cold of the day.

So I remember to this day kissing him on his forehead. And in that moment, I'm like, what the heck is this? I don't, I don't, I don't know. I don't know how to, I'm feeling stuff I don't even know how to deal with. So I'm just gonna shut that down.

All the emotions.

I'm shutting it down. I can't survive like this. I'm shutting it down. So, you know, Hey, I'll lean into Mr. Perfect and all these things. And so as that achievement started, I mean, from that age, I'm just going to drive. I'm going to put all my focus on succeeding and I'm going to get straight A's and I'm going to do this and I'm going to be on student council and I'm going to play basketball. I'm going to do it. I'm just going to work my way out of so how I never have to focus on how I feel. Never have to do it. So as I did that, you know, again, in the public, it's like, oh, successful, you know, successful at school, successful at college, all this. But where I failed the most was in my personal relationships because I couldn't express how I felt. Okay, Devon, you've taken me out on a date, but how do you feel? No, I'm good, I'm good. No, no. What's going on? Like, how do you really feel? Like, you know, like, what are you thinking? Oh, no, I'm thinking great.

No.

That vulnerability, man. It was like a lock. And as I've been married, I've had to, even to this day, work on expressing the things that are hard to express and not wanting to talk about a problem. It's easy to talk about problems. Oh, I don't like this. That's easy. But like, oh, this makes me feel really good. I really like when you do that. I really love this. Here's how I really feel about it. I'm really afraid about that.

You don't say those things as frequently as you do.

I don't say those things as frequently as I want.

To.

And I realize the, especially with us being in the position that we are to be able, we've been blessed to be able to help people. The only way that we can continue to grow in that help is to grow here and to grow in that vulnerability. And that's something, man, that I work on. Because in some instances, man, it feels very uncomfortable, really uncomfortable. Like, ah, it's easy. I can stand up in a stadium Full of 20,000 people and speak much easier than sometimes one-on-one, me telling my wife how I feel about certain things.

And that's powerful, powerful reflection. And something that I've learned personally over the last, I was a lot of that until eight years ago. And man, the moment I started to be vulnerable, it felt like I was gonna die. It felt like like done it.

Doesn' it felt like Oh, God, it.

Felt like I wanted tor I don't know, run away. Every time that I was about to be vulner, I was like, The world is going to make fun of me. No one' is going to love me, if I show this vulnerability, peoplep are to laugh at me, my business is going to suffer, all these things. And it's been an eight year practice of being vulnerable consistently. in every episode, any moment that brings vulnerability.

Yeah.

Not shying away, but leaning into it. I tell you what, it gets easier. It gets easier. I haven't mastered it, but it gets easier. I love that. And I just remember the first time talking about some dark stuff, I was like, I want to die right now. I want to die. Like, it felt like so uncomfortable.

Yeah.

That I was like, I don't want anyone to look at me the rest of my life.

Wow, dude, I know that feeling. I don't know, yeah, I don't know.

Dude, I know that feeling.

Especially with someone you're intimate with and you love, you feel like, You want to just like run away? You know, I mean, you know, definitely it's gotten easier, but I'm not at.

That, at the point, at the Lewis house point.

I would give you, I would give.

You, I would give you, I want to get there.

I'll give you a challenge.

Please, I'll take it. I'll give you a challenge. Give me the challenge. And I know you're at the busiest time of the year probably right now. Yeah, it's crazy. Launching movies, launching a book, you know, all these opportunities. I would take 10 minutes a day for the next 30 days with your wife or someone in your life, someone you care about. doesn't have to be a wife every day, but someone in your life, a conversation where you open up and express your feelings in a very vulnerable way. And you say, I'm dropping full guard. It's gonna be 10 minutes. You know, then you can move on. But you do 10 minutes a day with someone where you do real talk. Phones are aside. You say, you know what? Whatever it is, I'm really afraid of this. I want to tell you how I feel about this. I want to share with you something I've never shared before with anyone.

Wow.

Whatever it might be. And figuring out who it is to share with the thing. Sure. You know, you don't have to share your deepest secret to a friend or something, but to your wife, to friends, family. 10 minutes a day for 30 days. I'd love to see the vulnerability challenge.

I would love to see what you.

Create from it because it's gonna be extremely uncomfortable. Ooh, man.

But as you know, when you lean.

Into that uncomfortable moment, like on the other side of it, you're gonna feel a lot more natural in the discomfort.

No, I love it. I mean, first of all, You know a great challenge when it's like, I'm like, yo, that's challenging.

You're like, I don't want to do that.

That means I shouldn't do it. Exactly.

I'm like, oh, bro, that's man. That's real. If you literally scheduled on the calendar, 10 minutes. Yeah, 10 minutes. Like, yo, with each person you wanted to talk to.

And maybe it's your wife every day.

Or maybe it's a friend or whatever. It could be a colleague, a business partner. Wow, that's good.

I think it'd be powerful.

For anyone at home listening or watching, I challenge you. And if you're down for the challenge, think about it. I'm down, man. Think about it.

You're down?

I'm down to do it. Because I'm gonna text you in 30 days.

I'm gonna text you in a week, every week for 30 days. I'll let you know when I'm starting.

I'll be like, All right, bro, here's.

Day one of day one of 30 days. Here we go. Okay. All right, perfect. Because I'm gonna hold you accountable when you're ready. Hold me accountable. Because that is powerful. That is so hard, but I'm open to it, man. I'm open to it.

Because honestly, that's why I wrote this book. It's about living free. I want to live free.

I don't want my vulnerability or lack thereof to control me.

Here's a question for you. You've been married, when did you get married? What month?

June.

June is-- so it's almost 10 years.

Almost 10 years.

Or is it nine years now?

10 years in 2012.

Okay, so it's nine years.

Excuse me, 10 years in 2022.

Yeah, gotcha. So it's almost 10 years. And how young are you?

I'm 43.

43. So imagine 54, which would be 20 years.

Yeah.

If all goes planned that way.

Yeah.

Let's say you're 20 years married and you're 54. What would 54 year old Devon say to 44 year old Devon about what he was proud of you for doing?

Oh.

And what you should let go of for the next decade.

Oh, wow. That's deep, man.

Proud of you for taking on, which helped you get to that 54 year old state, which is, wherever you're gonna be and the thing that wish you would let go of now so you can get there faster.

Okay. So the proud of would be, you know, I think just taking on this work, you know, like taking on the work of, you know, not running from your problems, you know, figuring out who you are, you know, committing to that path, doing the work, learning to love yourself, like, you've taking on that, now, that 10 years from now, I think that my 54-year-old self would be like, man, that's really been great. I think the thing that he would say that I need to let go of is like, how do you put it, man? There's still a lot of, at times, I'm ambitious. And that angst.

That wanting more, that creating more.

Me too, man.

I wanna build.

Let's go. Bill, let's go. You know, like come on, every day. Ah, you know. And so I think that he would.

Say.

If you would have let that, nothing wrong with having ambition, but doing it more from this standpoint. stop doing this, let it come to you.

Stop forcing.

Yeah. And it's not always just a forcing, but it's also the, if this doesn't happen, then that won't happen.

Goes back to expectations.

There you go. And if that don't happen, then this is what that means.

And I'm not worth it.

Right.

Which is not true. So he would say, I wish you would let go of that sooner, because the sooner you let go of all that angst, about who you are and your ambition, the more things are just gonna open up for you. Because again, that programming of Mr. Perfect and I gotta do it, it's something, I'm killing him, but that programming is still there.

It lingers every day.

It lingers, man. So I think that my 10-year-old, 54-year-old self would say, that's the area that you need to have let go of sooner. Because that's an area that still trips me up right now.

Yeah.

And when do you feel the most loved?

Man, that's a great question. I feel the most love when people just do random, just small acts of consideration. That's when I feel most love. I feel most love, not like when, you know, it's the times when you would express love. But those moments when, you know, it's just a random day and there's just little things that let you know, Hey, man, I see you. Man, dude, I just want you, I just did this for you. You know, because I know you're working hard. You know, I just want you to know, Hey, I'm thinking about you.

Yeah.

Whatever, whoever, however it comes. Those are moments when I feel the most love.

I'm like, Wow, that's deep, man. When's the moment you felt the most loved that you're allowed to share in your marriage? in any relationship.

Wow. That's a great question, man. Louis, you come up with big questions, man. Man. I'm like, dang, bro.

It's not the school of average, man. Man, no, no, no.

Shoot. It's gonna be called the School of Vulnerability.

Exactly. Exactly.

Forget greatness, man.

Greatness is vulnerability.

This is true. There you go.

That's part of it. You can't be great, I don't think, without tapping into that as well.

Bold and vulnerable. One of the times I felt the most loved would probably be, I just go back to when you said it. I mean, there have been other times, but the time that comes up the most is when we first got married. And I just remember that it wasn't like a specific gesture. It was just like, oh, wow. You know, like, I'm the middle child. I was the last kid, I was the last of my brothers to get married. And so I did have some doubts around, you know, love and if that was going to happen for me. And, you know, and when Megan and I started dating, you know, it really was just like, oh, okay. Like, oh, wow. Okay. You know, I can just be who I am and that's enough. You know, I don't have to perform, you know? And so I think that that feeling of love is something that has resonated till today, where it's just a general like, Hey, I accept you for who you are, you know, and that acceptance, you know, so it's not like, oh, you know, she bought me this or she did that. It's a general acceptance of like, you, who you are right now is enough.

That's, yeah.

Yeah.

That'd make anyone feel loved, I feel like.

Yeah.

Being accepted for who you are.

Absolutely.

Not being wrong or made wrong for who you are.

Right, right.

Do you feel like, speaking of weddings, do you feel like weddings set us up for failure in marriage?

Absolutely.

The performance, the everyone comes, the celebration, this is the greatest day, the hype of it, the year build up, and then you go into day to day life. You never recreate that.

It, I don't, I don't, whoever, I mean, I feel like, Let's spend as.

Much money as we can on one, Night.

Oh, what?

And then always think about that.

Always think about it, look at the pictures, and then that's it.

And be like, oh, but he's not doing this for me, she's not doing this for me.

Right, right. And I'm like, whoever created the weddings, man, it was like, you know, it's a great night. It's a great night. It's a great night. Yes, so I talk about this in the book, that I talk about a portion of it. I say that most people don't realize that wedding vows are our expectation agreements. So you're setting the tone for what can be expected, you know, through richer or poor, through sickness and hell, you know, till death do us part, right? So you're saying you don't even realize, oh, so this is what this person can expect from me. But we don't actually then negotiate the finer points of what that means.

I can do whatever I want to do, and you got to live with it.

There you go. It's like, no, no, wait a minute, hold on a second. Is that what I I was green too. Right, right. But the wedding itself is a performance. And don't get me wrong, like I think that there's a version of how it could be done, like in all honesty, I would advise people get married privately and then celebrate. Like, you know, say hey, we've done this, we did it privately, personally.

And then we're just- Let's bring families together.

Let's bring families together to have a good time. But that wedding day. creates so much expectation in a fantasy that sometimes if you don't literally, like that fantasy can be a cloud that hangs over the whole man, right? Because it's like, oh man, you know, everybody looked perfect and beautiful and amazing, and then you get in the day to day and you're like, it ain't nothing like that. So, you can put it in its proper context, you know, but I think, again, the fantasy, and we started talking about the myth, Right? The myth of marriage, so much of it's romanticized through the wedding, you know, through the ceremony.

And this is gonna be like this forever.

This is gonna be like forever and everyone's gonna, you know, be so happy. And that's the other thing that's so crazy, is that so many people wanna rush singles into that.

No, man.

And it's like, no, what are you, what are you doing? Why are you rushing? Why are you pressuring someone? into this, like, no, take as much time as you need before you make the decision to get married, because you then have to be accountable to somebody else. And that accountability and that sharing of your life comes with expectations. It comes with compromise. It comes with sacrifice. And those are things to not rush into. You want to make sure if you're single that you are going into marriage on your terms. Not because your family is pressuring you, not because your friends are already married. Those are terrible reasons.

Not because she or he is pressuring.

You to get married. That's right.

That's not because they're pressuring you to get married.

Or else they're going to be angry at you. There you go. Don't do that. No, you're doing it because it's what you want to do. Because you are living free and you.

Are choosing this as the next evolution of your life.

Yeah.

It's tough though when everyone's pressuring you, right? It is, but you know what? Again, this is how you think about pressure and that type of pressure. so you go shopping, right?

Everybody goes shopping.

You go shopping, and you're trying a lot of stuff. You know, you were people like, oh, try that on. Try that. It looks great. It looks great. It looks great. Right? And everybody say, oh, yeah, get that. Get that. Get that. Get that. And they go ahead and they're like, okay, yeah. So I should actually wear that. I should get this. Okay, great.

Yeah.

Wonderful. So all these clothes that you have just tried on now they're at the register, and then all those people leave the store. And there you are.

Do I really want these things?

But you're gonna have to pay the bill. Yeah.

You gotta pay the bill. And do I want this thing right now?

So everybody that pressured you to try all this on, they're gone.

Oh man.

They're gone. They went on to their lives.

You gotta pay the debts.

You gotta pay the debt. Wow. You gotta deal with what you just bought. So when you think about marriage, if you're getting that kind of pressure, you gotta ask yourself, At the end of the day, I'm going to be responsible for this. And if I acquiesce to the pressure, whoever is pressuring me, they're going to go live their life and you are going to be stuck dealing with the repercussions of a decision that you did not exercise full control over.

How many people do you think have marriage remorse? Buyers remorse? How many married couples have that like a day or a week later, like, Oh, I really didn't want this.

I think it's more than people know. Because it could, we go back to expectations. There's this expectation that marriage itself is going to make you happier.

Yes, it's not.

It's not, it doesn't. It doesn't. If anything, marriages reveal how much more work you need to do. So, unless you are ready to do that work and you're ready to take it on, sometimes marriages can actually inflame dissatisfaction because you have to then face you. That's one benefit of marriage is that you have to face yourself. Sometimes we run our whole life and then we finally get into marriage and it's like, oh, so this is where I am. This is who I am. This is what I'm about. And so you've got to be willing to do that work.

When you got married, what was the one or two things that you realized, oh, this is who I am or this is what I'm still facing that I get to work on that you were like, maybe you're running from or you didn't even think was there.

You know, it's like, again, I think, I think when I got married, part of it was having too much consideration for the public. And I don't necessarily mean because we're in the public eye, I don't mean like the general public. I'm just saying like the public of our families and other people. I think that when I was thinking of marriage, I was having a consideration about, oh, okay, we live this way or we do these certain things, thinking about how that would be perceived.

Man, that's a lot of pressure, isn't it?

Totally.

But then so as I got into it, it was like, oh, no, it ain't got nothing to do with anything public. This is all private. personal. The marriage, the quality of the marriage has everything to do with what happens between us and how we do that period in the story. Everything that happens out there will only be an outgrowth of what happens here. So kind of breaking that for me mentally, even thinking about others, family, anyone else giving that consideration. No, let me give consideration to her. Let her give consideration to me and let's give consideration for the union. The other thing, that was eye opening. And this may sound really kind of trivial. It brought me to a revelation that I'm an individual. You know, like, oh yeah, I'm married, but I'm still me. I'm still me. I'm still me, and I still have to do the things that make me happy.

That fill you up.

That fill me up, you know? 'Cause again, I'm going into marriage thinking like, oh yeah, we're gonna do this together, we're gonna do that together, we're gonna do this together. And as some of those things that I thought we were gonna do together didn't happen.

And she said, I don't like those things. You don't like those things.

Exactly. Then I was left to reconcile, like, oh, I'm still an individual. Okay. Right, so we can't do those things together. Does that mean I don't do those things? But I want to do those things. So coming to a revelation, I'm still an individual, even inside a marriage. It was a big rev, it was like, oh, and it came with some pain. It came with some frustration because I was like, oh, okay, right. Okay, I guess I still have to live life. I still gotta go on my journey. You know, and okay, if there's certain things that she doesn't want to do with me, you know, and there are certain things that I don't want to do with her that I have to be okay with her still doing those things. And she needs to still be okay with me doing these things. And that, ma'am, that was tough. That was tough. Because again, the idea is like, oh, you know, you found your partner and, you know, we're gonna do everything together and we're gonna go... And it's like, not always. But does that make it less than? Does that mean that there's less love? No, what I've learned is that love expands when our capacity to accept each other expands.

Oh, man.

Gosh.

That's huge.

It is so easy to love someone when they fit your narrow definition of what they should do. It's easy. Somebody does everything you want. I love you.

Right.

You're perfect. There you got one.

There you go. But can you love them the more they don't. Can you appreciate them for becoming their full self? That to me is love. The more I can accept somebody for who they are, the more I can really say I love them. Because if we accept somebody for who they are, we're also accepting things that they do that we can't stand. Let's just be honest. Right? And again, it goes back to living free. If I live free, I got to give everybody else a chance to live free, especially in a relationship. And that's where people get it mixed up. Even if someone is married to you, you don't control them. They don't control you. They have to have the freedom to experience life and become who they are, obviously within the confines of the commitment. And you have to have the experience to live life and experience that freedom, obviously, in the confines of the commitment.

With your agreements and everything.

Yeah. Correct. this idea, you know, it's like singleness is taught like, okay, when you get married, two have become whole. And that's like, but that psychologically, it's like, no, two holes, you know, become three. You know, you're bringing your whole self and there's a new entity, but you're still yourself. And so, you have to service the entity and you have to also still service yourself. And that love grows the more you say, okay, you know what? I accept, I accept, I accept, I accept when you talk about, you know, God is love. God loves us through all of our imperfections, through all of our craziness, all of our, you know, madness, all of our up and down. There's no like, oh, at point God no longer loves. No, I love you, period. So when we practice that kind of love, right, that's when we really.

Because.

Going back to something we talked about earlier, if anybody really wants to heal in their life, if anybody really wants to go to the next level, practice this type of love.

Acceptance.

Yes. Even if it's time to let somebody go, I'm gonna do it in love. Because I've realized that this doesn't work. And here's why, because I'm doing this and I'm going here and that's okay. you've actually given me a great gift because maybe I would have never done this work if I wasn't with you for this period of time.

That's true.

And maybe, you know, you took me as far as I could go and I've taken you as far as you can go, right? And maybe there's another situation for both of us.

Right.

But I'm going to let you go or I'm going to move on in love. I'm not moving on in hate. I'm not moving on in anger. I'm not moving on in bitterness. it's love, right? Because I love you so much, I don't want to contribute to your life in a negative way any longer. And I love me so much that I don't want you to contribute to my life in a negative way any longer. But I'm doing it from a place of love. If you really want to go to the next level, man, it's all about that.

That is true, man. I have a few final questions for you.

Yeah, please.

Let's say there's someone watching or listening who's single right now. A lot of people seems like are single in the world that want to find someone and they get caught in the trap of, oh, this makes me feel good and this person looks good on paper or I could see a future for us. But they haven't gone through the mess with that person yet. They're on the first date, first couple months, everything's fine. What would you say are three questions that you should ask the person you're dating to see if they're even potentially going to be the right fit long term? Three questions where you would get the information if they were 100% honest with the answers. You would get the information you need if this is a potential good to work out. Worth investing in.

Where are you going? What do you see? So where are you going in life? What are you going? What's your destination? What are you pursuing? What's your purpose? That's the number one question. Where are you going? Because here's the thing. Too often in dating and singles, the first instinct is about me. I want to know is this person right for me. How do you determine that? Instead of asking a selfish question, you want to know where they're going. It's like an Uber, right? You put in the destination because you know where you want to go. You would never get in an Uber that's going a place you don't want to go. So the first thing you do when you get an Uber, you say, Hey, are you the right person? Okay, yes. Okay, great. So now I know I'm going to go where I need to go because I've checked that to begin with. Too often, we're so worried like, Does.

The person like me?

Do they care about me? Before you even worry about that. Are they going the right way? Are they going in the same direction? You know, what do they value? So number one, where are they going? Two, you got to ask the question. What do you see? So what is that about? You want to get into their head. What is their vision for their life?

How do you perceive the world or what do you see for your life?

What do you see for your life? What do you see for your life? Do you see yourself married? Do you see yourself with kids? Do you see yourself living in this city or do you see yourself moving to another city? What do you see? And then the third question is what do you think about me?

Interesting.

Because those first two questions, when you hear those answers, you may not even ever need to ask the third. Because you could decide, oh, you know what? This person's going in a direction that I don't want to go. They're seeing stuff I don't see. I don't need to ask what they think about me. I've actually learned that maybe this is not the right person for me. Okay, cool. But the third question, the reason why I reserve that, to ask yourself last is because you need to have these other ones first. And then you need to ask that person when you say, Hey, what do you think about me? That's a vulnerable question. But you need to know. And just men, in dating situations, people can hide. It's so easy when you get infatuated with somebody to hide, right? And you don't ever want to ask, what do you really think? Because you're afraid if you ask that question, the whole thing is up.

Yeah, because they can say, well, you're a lot of fun, but I don't really see this long term.

You need to know that. As soon as you start to have feelings for this person, you need to know that question.

Man.

Because then as a person who lives free, you then can make the decision if you want to continue. So, if you decide to continue, this person says, hey, you know what? I only see this as a physical thing. If you have that information early, then if you're as an adult, you can make the decision, okay, you know what? Fine. This person sees it as only physical, fine, I will keep going. Or you know what? No, I don't want to do that. But don't be afraid to ask the question. Don't be afraid. Where are you going? What do you see? What do you think about me? If someone's single right now, ask those three questions, it's going to change your dating life right now. Because there are people right now that are watching this. They're dating someone who is manipulating them and they don't even know it.

Because they haven't asked the questions.

Because they haven't asked the questions. And the person they're dating, it's so easy to show up and say, oh, I love you and think about you, da, da, da, da. But no, no, what are they really thinking about what's really going on?

And you're living in the expectation world. If you're not asking the questions and communicating, you're having expectation, oh, they're hanging out with me because they want to be with me long term. That's not true.

It's not true.

Maybe it is.

Ask the question. Right. And listen, listen. And listen, I've been married nine years. Before that, I was single for a long time. As men. As men.

Right.

In general.

Come on. As if any woman watching this, you better ask these men these questions. Seriously. And if you're a man, you got to ask your woman some questions because it's so easy to get into a situation and if they don't ask, then you don't know. Hotel.

Right.

So you could be with somebody for months and you're thinking one thing. And if they say, Hey, well if they didn't ask me if we were exclusive then... It's not on me.

It's not on me. Yeah, it's not my fault. It's not my fault.

I'm just having fun hanging out. We're just dating. Just dating.

Yeah. Right?

So any man, any woman listening to this, you gotta start taking control of your life and asking the hard questions. Why? Because it's either cry now or cry later.

Or years of pain and frustration.

Which, man, not only years of pain, but there's certain pain is with you for a lifetime. You could have in a few months, you know, asked some questions, got some clarity, and made some decisions. But if those questions were never asked and you're in that situation for years and it never was going to work, you could live with that pain for the rest of your life. That's what's at stake, man. And so I would encourage anyone, you know, start taking this seriously and ask the questions. And whatever someone says is a reflection of them, not you.

Don't take it personally.

Don't take it personally. Yeah, period. I mean, you know, I. I talk about this in the book. There was a One of the only real time I got my heart broke was, you know, this one girl I was dating and, you know, I thought we were gonna get married, right? And let me tell you, it didn't happen. And I was devastated, man. I cried and everything. I was like, oh, man, I can't believe it. This was years and, I mean, you know, decade before Megan and I even met. And what I realized, and at that time when that hurt, I felt rejected. I felt less than. you know, I struggled like, I'm like, wait a minute, you know, in dealing with Mr. Perfect and vulnerability, and I was vulnerable and it didn't work. And I was just like, oh, I don't know how to deal with this. And so for years, I internalized the breakup, that it was an indictment on me. I'm not good enough. I am not good enough. I don't have what it takes. I'm not lovable. All of this I internalized. And it took years for me to realize, that was a reflection of her and where she wanted to go and what she wanted. Nothing to do with my adequacy or inadequacy. So if someone is dating and they're afraid of rejection, if that person decides to move on, they're not being rejected. That person is deciding, I want this and that's where I want to go. Don't internalize it. Take it in as if you aren't good enough because it's not true. It's a reflection of what that person is going through, not an indictment on what you are.

Yeah, so hard to do, but.

Hard.

Set yourself free when you can do it.

You do.

You gotta live free.

Yeah, man.

Speaking of live free, people gotta check out your book, Live Free, Exceed youe Highest Expectations. And when I went through this, it's really a book about setting expectations with yourself and other people and making sure that there is no expectation that is unset.

Yes.

You know, because when we have an unset expectation, it's gonna hurt you and the other person and the relationship.

Absolutely.

Whether it be career, business, family, intimate, whatever it is.

Yeah.

Never expecting something and you break it down, give lots of examples, hide a lot of different pages that I really liked. Your expectations must be communicated. And I love this quote that you added from Berné Brown, Compassionate people ask for what they need. They're compassionate because their boundaries keep them out of resentment.

Yes.

And when we have those boundaries, we're not resenting other people.

You got that right.

You also say anything we suppress, we empower. I think is, you know, we empower that thing to continue to like live within us.

Yes.

And it takes over our body, our mind, our emotions, everything. We suppress that. That's why, you know, I like to talk about sharing your shame and you don't have to share it publicly.

I love that.

But sharing it to a priest, or a therapist or a friend that you really trust, sharing that allow you to set that free and be more empowered not by the shame but by your purpose and your mission moving forward. So anything we suppress, we empower. A lot of great stuff in here. I want people to get the book, the pressure to live up to what isn't real. There's a lot of powerful stuff in here that will help you in your life. It'll help you in relationships but just whether you're a single relationship or not, It'll help you in your life. So make sure you guys get a few copies. My man, Live Free, Yavon Franklin. You guys got to get the book. It's powerful.

A couple final questions for you.

Yeah, please. Before I ask these final questions, people need to follow you on Instagram. I love your Instagram content. You gotta do more of the, maybe I just haven't seen it in the last couple weeks, but you used to do a lot of the kind of praying, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Self-prayers. I do it. I do it. It's been about two weeks.

But yeah, I didn't see it recently, but yeah, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Powerful stuff. I love that stuff. But Devon Franklin over on Instagram, Devon Franklin, Twitter, Devon Franklin official on Facebook. But everywhere Devon Franklin, check you out. You got a bunch of other books as well.

Check out the other books.

A lot of good ones on relationships. This is a question I've been asking.

People that I really respect.

And admire.

Okay.

So I'm gonna ask you who are in, who are in seeming healthy relationships.

Yes.

You can only see from the outside what's actually happening, but which is a whole nother conversation about is there actually an amazing marriage out there that doesn't have challenges after a decade? I don't know. It doesn't seem like there is, even though someone could put something online, but behind the scenes, right? whole other conversation. That's the next podcast.

Okay, okay, good.

What is the thing? The question I ask is, what is the thing about your wife that you love the most?

Oh, okay. It's a good question. That's a very easy question. You know, I love her freedom. You know, she has always been someone, you know, who always has prioritized her freedom and her desire and commitment to be who she is and to live life you know, in the way that she sees it and do it on her terms. And I love that, you know, because I haven't always been that, you know, as we've been married, I've been shedding and working towards, you know, living freer. But she has always been someone who has done that. And I look at that and I admire it, man. I admire that about her, just her ability to live her truth, to be fearless, to be free in that way, you know? you know, again, I've gotten freer over the years, but when we first got married, especially, you know, I was very like, you know, perfect. Everything had to be perfect.

You know what I mean?

Like, hey, we gotta get everything in order here, you know? And that has some value to it, but I certainly wasn't free, you know, in terms of living my truth and just being okay with who I am, no matter what people may think about that. But she's always done that, and I've always admired that about her.

That's cool. Yeah, it's good to know. This is a question that you've answered before, before, but I'm going to ask it again. It's called the three truths question. Okay. And if people want to hear the previous three truths, you'll have to go back. We'll link up the previous episodes so.

You can see what-- Right, I don't.

Even remember what I said a little while ago. Exactly, exactly. So this is a hypothetical scenario. Imagine it's your last day on Earth.

Many years away from now.

You can live as long as you want to live, but eventually you got to turn the lights off. Okay. And you go to the next place. And for whatever reason, You've got to take all of your written work, audio work, video work with you. So everything you've ever said, this book, any book you ever have, it's got to go with you to the next place.

Okay.

So no one has access to your content anymore. But you get to leave behind three things you know to be true. You take out a piece of paper and write down your three truths, which would be the biggest, three big lessons you would share with the world that you learned. This is all we would have to remember you by. What would you say of these three truths for you? I probably would repeat what.

I wrote and said last. Oh man. Here's what I would say. God is love. Faith works and Jesus saves. Those would be the three things.

I like it.

I'm looking at the previous ones. They're similar, but not the same. Oh, okay. So if people want to hear the previous three truths, go check that out. I love it. Devon, before I ask you the final question, I want to acknowledge you, my man, for always being real with me. Thank you. I love our friendship, even though we don't get to hang all the time. Every time we come back on, I'm just like, Man, I want to spend more quality time with you. I appreciate the effort and the energy and the attention, the detail you put into your work, into your words. into your books, into the movies you make. Everything you do is at such a high level. And I really appreciate and acknowledge you for, for being an inspiration and also for being real about relationships and your own personal relationship. I think every relationship's got its own challenges, different seasons of life with challenges. And for you to be open about it, you know, in a respectful way, is, is really inspiring. So I acknowledge you for for constantly doing the work yourself in marriage, in relationships, and being open about it. I think it inspires the rest of us guys. Thank you, man.

Hey, we in this together.

We're in this together, man.

As my uncle used to say, who was my pastor growing up, he said, I'm just one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread.

Exactly, man. Hey, we all trying to get a couple of crumbs, man.

Give me a couple of crumbs.

Give me some.

Yeah, yeah, give me some.

Okay, man. Final question, what's your definition of greatness?

My definition of greatness is peace and proficiency. What I mean by that is when I think of those who are great, they are incredibly proficient at what they do. And in the midst of that proficiency, they're able to tune out the pressure and find the peace of their purpose and whatever that may be. That when you really see the greatest of the great, they are extremely proficient and they have that peace in the midst of it. And that's what makes them great and makes all of us say, wow.

Yeah.

You know, one of the greatest of all time, obviously, Muhammad Ali, who's, you know, inspiration into the world. You look at his proficiency in the ring, but then you look at his piece to say, hey, take the title. I'm not going to compromise who I am. And then the proficiency to get it back.

Right.

And the piece to tune everything out. Everybody said he couldn't do it. When I look at those who are impacting the world in a great way, I see a combination of both. Because you look at people and you say, how can you be that proficient and that peaceful? To me, that's greatness. My man, Stefan Frank. Thanks, brother. Appreciate it.

Appreciate you. Appreciate you, man. Appreciate you. It's powerful, man. If you want to know the secrets to becoming more attractive, then check out this powerful video with relationship expert Stefan Speaks.

In most situations, when it takes months, you have not fallen in love, you've learned to tolerate them. You've grown accustomed to them.

Wow. All right?