6 Psychological Biases That Are Keeping You Single

Hey there, everyone. Before we start the podcast, as you all know, there's a lot of bad dating and love advice out there, and we want to put a stop to that. So if you're enjoying this podcast, you enjoy the content that we're putting out, please can you leave a review wherever it is that you're listening to this podcast. It spreads a lot of love, and it really helps get this message out there so we can help more women, just like you, attract the love that they truly deserve. Go ahead and leave that review, and let's jump into the podcast. He was so funny on that first date. Oh, my God, he was just so amazing. He paid for dinner, and he even got me dessert. This is going to be the man that I marry and spend the rest of my life with. Right? How many times we heard that? All right, Dr. Love, today we are going to be talking about six psychological biases that are keeping you single. And we got you today because you're the psychologist, you're the signature PhD for love strategies. And I think that this is going to be a really, really interesting topic because as you know, Gary, we as humans are deeply flawed, and we do not see the world for the way it really is, do we?

Not at all. Not only do we not see the world how it really is, we see it how we want to see it, and we have no idea that we're doing it. And so I guarantee I don't do that.

Like, I'm. I'm perfect. Like, I don't have a bias myself.

Naturally, right now, and neither do I. And so that's why we're really good to talk about this, because now these things that all humans do. Totally.

No, we are all. We all have these biases. And it's one of those things. If you can be aware of this, then suddenly at least you can try and make the right decisions. Not always going to anyways, but you can at least be aware. Just being aware that you're flawed is going to at least guide you, I think, in your love life quite a bit. Yeah.

At least it opens up your mind a little bit to start questioning things, because I guarantee there's people listening to this podcast right now who are single and don't know why and believe truly in their heart they're doing everything right, and they're. They're following that previous guidance in some way, and yet it's incorrect. And that's actually the fundamental thing that's leading them astray.

And.

And we can just kind of unearth some of those things. And help people disentangle some of the flawed thinking. It's going to go a long way to help people, and you're just going to see a bunch of things you never saw before.

I also think when you're single and you're getting out there and finding love, your friends, your family, everyone in your orbit typically will tell you you're great. Just follow your heart, keep doing what you're doing. You don't have any biases. You're not seeing the world differently than what it is. You're just fantastic. And they're. It's coming from a good place. They're trying to boost your confidence and make you feel good. And I get that. And a little bit of a dose of that here and there can be really helpful to your single friend who's down the dumps. But if we want to get done and actually get some results, we have to be aware of these lenses in which we see the world that is distorting things. It's just distorting things. And the beautiful thing is that this has been very well studied in psychology. And these are the types of biases that we are constantly, constantly working against with our clients and trying to, I don't know, kind of redefine or create a new lens in which to look at. I've been using that word bias quite a bit. Maybe, Gary, would you mind just defining what a bias is?

Yeah. A bias is like a shortcut. It's like a certain way or lens of thinking about things that may or it may not be correct. But, you know, in how we're talking about today, it's a way that's incorrect, it's fallible, it's leading you astray, and it's just like a different kind of perspective. And it's a way of just trying to make life easier on ourselves. You know, a lot of times we're doing things to try to decrease how much thought we have to put into things. And it's quicker, for sure, but it leads to problems. And so, you know, you, you talked about, like, I'm a PhD and all that stuff, and I say to students all the time is like, science is the antidote to bias. Like, you think about bias and stereotypes and all that kind of stuff. It's like science is the antidote to that because science is objective, it's systematic. And so a lot of what we're going to talk about today is like, how to solve these things is to just be a little bit more objective. Yeah. And so it's important, really Important. Before we get into these things, you're going to have every listener. Every listener at some point is going to be like, I don't do that, or, I do that. And that's not a problem. I can assure you it's a problem. Yeah, I can assure you that you do it. Just know you're going to be protective of the way you've always done things. Right. It's like, do you know. And you know this. You're a business guy. Like, what's the most dangerous saying in business? Do you know what people say that it is?

No, I don't even know.

You're saying in business is well known as. We've always done it that way.

Yes. Yeah, Right.

It's like, hey, should we do this? No, no, we've always done it this way. And that's. I'm just going to keep doing it the way we've always done it. And so people do it in business. It's a huge mistake. People do it in their love life, and it's a huge mistake, too. It's like. But I've always thought about it this way. It's like, right? And that's what we're talking about is like, how that is a problem and just not giving you the results that you really want.

And I've always done it this way. And all my friends tell me that I'm perfect. And it's.

I'm so great.

And my parents raised me, telling me how incredible I am. It's like, I remember going to my. To my mom growing up when I was a kid and asking her for, like, dating advice because she's a divorce attorney. Maybe I'll get some help from her. She's just like, adam, you are absolutely perfect exactly the way you are. Keep being who you are. You're like, mom, that was deeply unhelpful. Can you give me some actually helpful advice? And it is amazing, though, when it comes to these biases is once you really understand them. And I think I've really learned to understand them just by seeing our clients be misguided by these biases. Once you do understand them, you can be in situations and be like, oh, that's my brain playing a trick on me. Like, you're like, oh, no, no, no, no, hold on a sec. And you're almost bringing in, like, you're the rational side of your brain. And, you know, I don't know if we want to go down that road of the different parts of the brain that that kind of trigger these. These biases, but it really is one of those moments you can take a quick look at and be like, whoa, whoa, whoa, I'm falling into this trap. This is a well known psychological bias. This is going to keep me single. If I keep thinking this way, I, I gotta break through that. And so, yeah, this is, this is all really good stuff. And this things that everyone can kind of work on in their love life.

Because fundamentally what everybody wants is the truth. You want to live in reality. And so a lot of these biases operate on, like, what do you want to be true? Which is not always the same thing as what is true.

Right.

And just one, one last thing that I think is important to say that's true is you can be an awesome, amazing, fantastic person and still do all these things wrong. Like, you can. It both can simultaneously happen. It's like, just because you do some things wrong, it doesn't mean you're a flawed person. It just means, like, everyone's got stuff to work on and we can all get better at certain things. I know about all these things and I still catch myself doing several of these a week. Like, because it's just, it's just how you want to craft the world around you to work this way. And you know, we keep saying biases, but it's really, you know, you're lying to yourself in ways that makes life seemingly more pleasant, but again, leads to problems.

So, yeah, you're human. Everyone's human experiences these things. So what, why don't we kind of jump into them so we can tell everyone a little bit of what we're talking about. Gary, why don't you start us off with the first.

Yeah, so the first one, the first bias or the kind of lie that you, you tell yourself is it's something called the focusing effect, otherwise known as the primacy effect. And this is your tendency to give too much credit to early information. Like, so the initial information you have about somebody or something, you kind of double down on that, and that kind of sets the tone for everything else.

It's like he was so funny on that first date. Oh my God, he was just so amazing. He paid for dinner and he even got me dessert. This is going to be the man that I married and spend the rest of my life with. Right? How many times we heard that over.

And over and like, you know, so you think, like, oh, what's the harm in that? Well, if you're giving that first impression too much credit, it can encourage you to move way too fast in your relationship. Right. Instead of like being Slow and intentional, which is what we always suggest. It's like, oh, my gosh, it was amazing. So, like, let's go. Go, go, go, go, go, go, go. And all of a sudden, you've been on three dates, you're moving in together. You've. You're now on a full, committed relationship a week later. And it's like, that's just setting yourself up for major problems down the road. And so it seems innocent. It seems like, gary, Adam, don't be a buzzkill. Quit telling me, like, that I can't just fall madly in love. And it's like, you can, but it's not what's best.

Well, also, the primacy effect can work in the other direction as well, which is you might go on a first date or meet a guy. Maybe he approaches you from across the room, but he's really awkward, he's fidgety, and you're like, I'm not really feeling with this guy. There's something off. You know, he's just not that confident man that I always thought I wanted. Well, the primacy effect will tell you that he's not right for you, when, in fact, maybe he is a perfect man for you if you just gave him a little bit of time to get to know him. Right, Garrick, can it work both ways?

Yeah. I love that you brought that up, because it's not always that they're amazing at first. Sometimes they're just, like, a little bit of a disappointment at first. And it's like, we've heard clients is. He was a little shy. He was, like, nervous. He said a lot, or he talked a lot about himself, and it's like, okay, which day was this? Okay, the first. The first. It's almost always the first one. And then they're like. They check him off, and they're like, nope, no good. That doesn't fit my low vision. Not. Not what I want. But it's like, wait a second. Don't forget about the context. Right. I'm a social psychologist, so that it's all about how the context in your surroundings influence your behavior. It's like, you have to remember not everybody is their best self on a first date. Some people are awkward. Some people are nervous. It's like, realize that. Give people a chance. Don't just kind of write people off right away.

Yeah, that. That one about guys talking about themselves. That one comes up a lot. And I get it. There's nothing worse than meeting someone, and they just constantly talk about themselves and try to brag and so on. And so forth. But you gotta also something we always remind our clients of is like, these guys don't know how to date. They're not in a dating coaching program. They're just trying to do the best thing they can to impress a woman. And, and for many of those guys, not all of them, but for many of them, by the second date they'll take off that dating mask and you can get, get to know who that person really is. Which is why we're constantly reinforcing the message, which is if you think he might meet your love vision, even if he's not perfect on the first date, go on a second date because you're going to start to meet who that really meet that person for who they really are. And don't allow that primacy effect to take in too, too much into your dating life. Because so many people, I just think there's so much advice out there that's like, go with your intuition, go with your intuition, Go with your intuition. Whatever you're feeling right there, just move forward with it. And I get the advice and I'm not saying don't listen to your intuition. It's just don't completely rely on your intuition. Okay. You got to take into account that this bias really does exist.

Yeah. And you know, just one, one kind of tangent thought about the guys who talk about themselves all the time is like if you got looking at this from the guy's perspective, one of the guys biggest fears on that first day with that time together, it's silence. They're terrified of silence. Good point of like what do we say to each other? Oh. And then all of a sudden it's like beads of sweat. Terror. Everything's going wrong and it's like, so that's his worst fear. So what does he do instead? Filibusters. The whole thing. Because in that way you don't have to worry about the silence because you're filling the air with noise. And then it's like, good, I survived.

That's so true. I, I haven't thought about that. It's been so long since I've been single and like just talking to a woman on a first date. But I, I'm going back to my memories of like 10 years ago when you do go on that date where she's not maybe even giving you much to work with. So you just kind of fill the air with something and typically is about yourself. Right. Just to like keep things moving forward. And I' not saying again, it's not a great quality and what Guys should learn to do is ask engaging questions and really get to know you and be curious. But not all guys are good at that stuff. So give them a little bit of grace. Really interesting point.

One more thing I just want to point out about the primacy effect, and this is more later in relationships, is we give too much. Remember, primacy is where you give too much credit to how things started off. And so people will find themselves in a long term relationship that's just not cutting it. They're in a rut. Things aren't great, it's problematic, it's just, it's not going well. But one of the major ways that people convince themselves to stay in relationships like that, and again, it's, it's an unfulfilling relationship, this is not a good situation is they think back to how it was when they first got together and they're like, remember how it was when we got like, it was amazing. You were like my partner. He's terrible now, but he was amazing when we first met. And it's like, that's true. But here's the thing the research shows again, him being awesome at first isn't special. It's not special, it's just not like, you know who's awesome early on? Everyone.

Everyone. Sociopaths, Narcissists.

Yeah, everyone. The world's worst guy knows I gotta bring my A game at first. The world's worst guy. Every guy knows this. And so like when you think back and like things were magical at first, we went on dates and we had all this fun. It's like, yes, good, not special. And so what you really have to look at early on is not just primacy effect for the positive things, but like, think back, like, what were the early signs of problems and what are the early signs of problems right now in your newly formed relationships? Because the research also shows those things don't go away and they get worse, not better. So you got to focus on that stuff too.

Yeah. Which brings us to just the, the age old principle that we are constantly preaching, which is little love. Step number five is just to pace. Give yourself some time. Don't jump in too quickly. Don't make decisions that you can't go back on because you went on a couple first dates with a guy. Don't find yourself living with him, buying a car with him, buying a house with him within two months of getting to know him. Take your time, move slow, pace, pace, pace. It gives you an opportunity to see who that person really is. And honestly, you don't really know a person until you've been in a committed, exclusive relationship with them for an entire year. You really don't. I mean, honestly. So just take that into account while you're dating and getting out there. Are you tired of committing your heart to a man who only just pulls away? Well, if so, we have a very special presentation that's available to our podcast listeners. It's at a special link. It's called he commits dot com. And it's going to walk you through the five secret strategies that make make men commit. Head on over to he commits.com. it's only available for a short period of time. I think you're going to like it a lot. All right, back to the podcast.

And you know, I think the other thing is, you know, all these, a couple of these biases we're about to talk about, these things all factor in too, right? And so we care a lot about early information. That's primacy effect. That's the focusing effect. The next one that we have on our list, number two is choice supportive bias, which is like a fancy, annoying, jargony term that basically just says, we like to say, look, I was right. We like to be right. We like to, like, after we make a decision, we amplify or give more credit to the places where we are right? And we downplay the negative aspects of things.

He can be a little emotionally abusive, but like, he brought me flowers two months ago. Like, remember that time when he did that? You know, it's like, what, what are you talking about? This guy sounds awful. Well, no, he's. He does nice things every once in a while. He's. And just finding any type of evidence that supports that this person is right for you. We've all done that. I'm sure you've even done that, Dr. Dr. Gary.

And it, we, we like to, after the fact, just justify that we made the right decision and we, we're doing the right thing. Like, I had one person before talking about their relationship. She went on and on for a good 15 minutes about all the ways the guy she was with was completely, completely awful, emotionally unavailable. All like the greatest hits of all the worst things, right? And then she said, so I said, you know, why are you staying with him? And her response, dead serious, was, he's a really good mechanic.

Wow, that is like quite the low bar. That's. That's a new level of having a low bar. Interesting.

And it was like, this is exactly like, it's a, it's. You're looking for any excuse she's looking for an excuse to just say, like, she's made the right choice. She found this really special quality that he has. And it's like, I don't. You know, it clearly when you're. When you're sitting on the outside, it's really, really obvious what the other person's doing. But, like, I. I can promise you she had. She didn't see what she was doing at all. She was like, mechanic, awesome. All these other things, like, okay, we're even. Like, I'm doing okay. And it's. It's this desire to be right. It's so important. And so, you know, other ways people do this with their partner. Like, they kind of know, like, my partner's not great, but then they have to kind of justify it.

Right?

They got to support this thing to show that they're right. So they say, like, well, I can't do any better. There are no other good guys out there, so I might as well just stay. And like, that shows that I'm making the right choice, which again, clearly is inaccurate.

Yeah, I think it's just important to not be defined by your decisions in life. Like, sometimes we'll make decisions such as what profession we're going to pursue, then you find out in a couple years it was the wrong decision. It just wasn't right for you. Don't be defined by your decision. Be willing to make a change. That's what life is all about. If you decide to move somewhere and you sell your house and you make this big grand move across the country, you find out three months later it was a terrible move, I've done that. You move on. Just don't be defined by your decisions. If you end up marrying someone because you jumped in too quickly and you find out pretty quickly this guy is not right for you, he's just not right for you. It's okay. Don't be defined by that decision. You can change your life at any given time. And if we just understand this human condition, which is we're always trying to defend our decisions, just fight back on that and just realize that it's okay. We all make mistakes and be willing to move on, especially in relationships. But in any area of life, I.

I love, love, love, love that. Because it's one of those things, like people are so negative about flip floppers. People who thought said one thing and thought one way, and now they think something different. It's like, for whatever reason, we consider that a negative. But it's like, in what world, when you learn new information Would you not want to update your opinion, perspective, thought, thoughts, behaviors, etc? Right. And like that's going to happen all the time in relationships, you know, early in a relationship, you know very little. As you learn more, you should reserve the right to make a different decision now that you have different information, more data, better decisions, better outcomes. It's like a basic. Again, I'm kind of getting back into the science side of it, but it's like, that's really important. It's like when you get more information, you should revise your opinion.

Yeah, right. It's good stuff.

Cool.

Keep moving on.

The next one, the next one we have here, the bias is this idea of sexual over perception and silent. And the other side, sexual underperception bias. And so. Right. Sexual over perception. What's that look like, Adam?

Well, that's men walking down the street looking at a woman getting any type of eye contact. And he thinks to himself, damn, she is into me. She wants every part of me. My body, my biceps, my butt. Us men, we are walking around just thinking that women are totally into us.

Yeah, right.

Gary, you know what she's thinking? What is she thinking?

That same woman that you just passed on the street, she's like, why is this creep looking at me? And like she's just making a smile to like make it less awkward.

Right. Not into that guy. Well, whereas the opposite is true. Whereas if a guy is going up to a woman, maybe talking to her, approaching her, she underperceives interest from him. She'll think, well, he's not really that into me. Does he like me? Does he not like me? I'm not really sure. And I think it may come from a level of confidence. I'm sure we get into like the evolutionary psychology of this, of why men might be more like over perceptive, whereas women are under perceptive. But essentially men are going around thinking all women are into them. And women are going around thinking that no guys like them when they really do.

Yeah, the, the women underperception of sexual interest. I can't help but think, I'm sure you've probably seen the TV show the Office.

Oh yeah, right.

Like in the Office, there's Jim and Pam and it's like Jim, Pam, the entire time had no idea for the longest time in that show that this guy Jim was actually interested in her. And he's like hanging around her desk and doing all these things. And it's like, I just think, like to hold, like, what does she think he's doing? Right? What? Like really? And so here's the thing to solve this one for the. For women listening to this. Guys don't want to be your platonic friend.

Nope.

They just don't. They're not interested. It's not like a guy's out there. You know what I want? I want a female friend. Let me go find. Let me go pal around with her. And nope, it's not that at all. There's always interest.

There's.

He's taking the time.

There's interest if he's spending time with you alone or trying to spend time with you alone. If he's single and you're single, he's interested. That's it.

Absolutely.

Pretty simple. And just know that you have a bias towards under. Perceiving interest from men. That's very, very important. So keep that in mind. Whenever you are talking to a guy, flirting with a guy, I always say the AAA effect. Always assume attraction. Always assume that he's attracted to you, because he probably is, honestly. And you have a bias to think that he's not.

Yeah. And some of that just comes with something else we talk about a lot is just like, be a little more confident. Of course guys are going to be attracted to me. Like, that's how you want to. Because guess who Guys all approach it that way.

Of course.

Of course they like me. Women need a little bit more of that.

Right.

To just kind of like, help notice some of those things that are going on and just be a little bit more accurate.

Yeah.

So the fourth bias, this one, we. We kind of structured these. I. This is, I think, the biggest one of them all. We kind of nestled it in the middle to give, like, that. The juicy center of all these biases. But it's like this one's confirmation bias. We talked about how people want to be. Right. Confirmation bias is where you seek out information that shows you are right. You seek out the things that agree with you, and you avoid anything that doesn't agree with you. Because fundamentally, we don't want to update our beliefs. We just said a second ago, we don't like flip floppers. We don't want to, like, change our opinion about things. So the easiest way to not change our opinion is just look for things that agree with us, Right?

Yes.

And so if some of the things we're saying on this podcast don't agree with how you think about things, you're more inclined to want to turn it off.

Yeah.

But if a lot of what we're saying does agree with you, you're like, yeah, guys, this is awesome. And That's a confirmation bias, because you're trying to stay the same because you don't like change.

Right? And this is true. Since we're going into a political season, this is true in politics, people are very much so. When you have a pre. You already have a belief system in place, maybe you're a Democrat, Republican, whatever it is that you are, you're only going to look for evidence that supports your preexisting beliefs. And the thing is, people do this in love all the time. They even do it with love advice. Like, if you're talking to a guy and he's late for a first date, okay, and you really like this guy and you don't want to lose him, you're going to go seek, look on the Internet for any advice that supports that it's a good thing that he was late for the date. Like, and you're going to look past all of the advice that says, ooh, this is low character. This is something that's, you know, he should at least be more communicative. No, no, no, no, no, no. You're gonna look at that one article that's like, oh, yeah, he actually really likes you. That's why he was late. Yeah, like, that's how it works. I've had clients debate me due to astrology. Like, right. It's crazy. Like, they're like, well, no, he is a Gemini. So actually, all the sciency stuff you're talking about, no, I don't think so, because this is part of his stars, alignment and whatever it is that they talk about in astrology.

Crazy. All this comes down to this idea that whatever you're going to look for, if you want to look for it hard enough, you're going to find it. It doesn't matter what it is. If you look hard enough, there's enough information out in the world, you can find whatever it is you're looking for. And so when this comes to dating, this is super important because if again, first impression, like, you just kind of decide, like, this guy's a little awkward to the extent you believe that you're now going to look for confirmation in his future behavior that he's awkward, you've kind of written him off. And, like, you like to be right. You don't want to change your perception. And so it's like, oh, he did this. Awkward. He picked up his glass with two hands.

Awkward. Right?

Or, you know, he. Whatever it is, like, you're just gonna find reasons and excuses for him being awkward. Yeah, it goes the other way too. Where for whatever he comes in, he's got a smile to light up the room. He's tall, he's just gorgeous. And you're like, I'm in love. He's the one. You decide he's the one. Now, it doesn't matter what this guy does. You only hear the good stuff and you ignore all of the bad stuff. And that is a huge, huge problem because that bad stuff is all there. And you do a really good job of ignoring it, but you can't ignore it forever. And eventually it's going to catch up with you.

Yep. And I think zooming out, that's more of like kind of a micro situation on, like a. More. More of a macro when it comes to dating. I hear a lot of clients do this with online dating, where they'll be. They'll say, make a statement. That is the only guys that are online dating. All they want to do is have sex and that's it. They're not interested in anything serious. Whenever I hear that, I will immediately ask, so you're telling me if I went into your online dating profile right now, there's not a single guy in there that is actually interested in potentially something a little more serious? Well, no, that's not necessarily the case. And then before you know it, you actually look at it. Because I've used to manage profiles for clients. Like, I know this stuff. It's only about 20% of the guys who are discussing, which, by the way, is high. I get that that's a lot of people. But there are some clients who'll be like, yeah, all guys only want to sleep with me. And it's disgusting. I'm never doing online dating. And then there's some clients who have the same exact profile situation. And they'll be like, yeah, most of the guys on there actually are good guys and want to find love. Yeah, there's a small percentage that might want to sleep with me. Whatever. I just move past. It's literally just whatever belief system they have, they will then confirm it with the online dating site. And this is true also with where you live. If you say, there are no good guys in my town, guess what? You're not going to see any good guys that are your age in your town. If you go around saying, there are amazing. There's an abundance of men everywhere I go, suddenly you're going to start seeing them. It's crazy how this works.

You know, you bring up the online dating, you see this all you will have certain clients, like, I don't want to online date because there's just terrible people on there. It's not good at all. And then once they go on, they have all the same experiences everybody has online, but they're like, see, there's all this bad stuff and they ignore all the good. Right. And it's like you mentioned, there's 20% of guys online that are just interested in sex. Guess what? Guess what's happening offline. There's about 20% of guys who are only interested. Like it's the same guys. They're in both places. It's just you've decided online it's a problem. So now you're noticing it online. But you're, you really think when you go out to the, you know, the local bar or wherever, you're going to meet guys like, you don't think there's 20% of guys out there that are just looking for the same thing now you're really ignoring some really critical information that's going to have repercussions later on.

Yeah. And your language is so important with any of this. So if you ever find yourself making statements such as all men want. Online dating is just xyz. You're just making simplistic statements. These are just your biases coming out now. You're just, you're literally stating a non fact.

Right.

It's, it couldn't possibly be true that all men are like this. It's not very easily. Could we break that with just some basic evidence? So if that is not true, then all you're doing is giving into your pre existing biases and you're going to have confirmation bias and that. And then it's just, your entire destiny is going to be manifested based on this belief. That's the only time I'm going to use the word manifest. All right. But it really is like it really. You create your own future based on the language that you use. And I can tell so quickly when a client is starting to adopt a lot of our mindset strategies that we use. I can tell when they're starting to use it, when they start using different languages to discuss their challenges. When a client is coming on saying, oh God, all men are just still like this. And you know, you're like, you gotta start with your language. You gotta start with your belief system. Because if you're working based on that foundation, no tip, no strategy is going to work where some clients will come in and be like, oh my God, perfect guys, just right around the corner. I've been seeing a ton of amazing guys. I'm so excited for what's going to come. That's a winner. She's going to find love.

Yeah. And, you know, just as an aside, a little, like, homework assignment to anybody listening to this. If you have strong, absolute beliefs about things, take a moment and spend some time reflecting on what is that strong, absolute belief protecting you from? Like, what's going on that you're using that belief, you're using as a crutch, using it to cover up something else. You're using it to kind of get you past or through something because it's not accurate, but you believe it so strongly and it's. What is it doing for you? What purpose is it serving? Because you start digging into that a little bit and you'll figure out, oh, I don't really need this thing to perform, this purpose that, you know, I'm using it for. So it's just. It's just something to. To kind of, like, worth digging into. Spend a little time introspecting and getting into that.

Well, so much of it is protecting the ego. I mean, I think especially with dating, I see with entrepreneurs a lot as well. Like, as a fellow entrepreneur, people be like, oh, you can't do this or that. That doesn't work anymore. And it's like, yeah, it does. What are you talking. You're just protecting your ego because you're not doing it well. Like, let's get to the heart of it. Same thing with dating. Same thing with anything. Like, you're just protecting your ego. And I get that. I'm the same way. You want to protect yourself, and you don't want to hurt your own feelings when you come to the raw truth of reality. But when you don't come to that truth now, suddenly you can't fix anything. It's like you. You can't talk about the real issue. You can't talk about the elephant in the room when you have this ego that you're trying to protect. So just be aware of these things and these belief systems that. And challenge yourself. When you say words out loud and you're like, I don't know. I think I'm bullshitting myself. I do that to myself all the time. I'm like, I feel like I'm just bullshitting myself. I'm telling myself a narrative that makes me feel better about the world I'm living in. And whenever I do that, like, challenge it, I also have my wife, who's very good at challenging my belief systems, calling me out on it. It's very helpful. I think that's A lot of what we do with our coaching is just challenge people, but don't allow yourself. This is, this is one that this is. Of all the, the biases we're talking about, I think this is the one that we most probably talk about within Love Accelerator.

Agree. And it all comes down to the same basic ideas. Like, you have to be able to identify honestly where you're falling short so that you know where to grow. And that's what it's all about. It's not about whether you're perfect or anything because no one is. It's like, are you getting better? And you got to work on getting better. One of the things you said in there that I really like about all these biases in general is like, it's all about simplifying life, right? And so the fifth one is just basic stereotyping. We all kind of know what stereotyping is. It's really just an over generalized belief about some facet of a person. Right. About the person themselves or something about them. And really what you're trying to do is like, by learning one thing about them, you then springboard into a constellation of beliefs that go along with this thing. So it's like, oh, if here, here's one that just came up recently. It's like women were talking about looking at online profiles and what it means if a guy has bad grammar in his online profile or a typo or a misspelling.

And it's like, what do they say?

They were convinced this means he's low quality, uneducated, unsmart, horrible, no good, rotten. Like, to me it sounded like the world's worst crime. And I was like, it could just also be that he was a little sloppy. Could just be he had a typo. And it's just like you're taking one thing and you're letting that spin and it seems harmless, but when we do it about groups of people, we know it's wrong. But like, when we do it about one little thing somebody does on a date, it seems justified because like, we know if you use the wrong fork at a meal, you, you know, probably live in a cave.

Yeah, yeah. And definitely, like, depends. I know some clients that, like, if there's one little spelling mistake, they're done. You know, obviously there is a degree to which the grammar is terrible. If he's saying like, I sure, I want to see you soon and he's using the letter C instead of anything else, I don't know, I can't do. But hey, I think it depends on your level, but I agree with your point there that, like, give the man a little bit of grace. The one that I love the most when people stereotype is based on jobs. Like the bag. Yeah. I don't know. I had this guy asked me out. He's a police officer. I don't know. I delete. I dated a police officer 10 years ago. They're the worst. Wait.

Yeah.

So you're saying that all police officers, all of them are the worst based on dating One police officer 10 years ago? Is that. Is that what you're telling me? Just want to be clear. Yes. No. You know, jobs are a big one for stereotyping.

And the thing is, you know, we just have to be aware of all the places we do this in dating, Right. It's with marital history. If. And people find something to be stereotyped about, whether, like, whether they've never been married. Oh, major problem. Whether they've had a divorce. Ooh, Major problem. Whether they had a. Whatever. I mean, it's all kind. Where they have kids. Some people are like, oh, kids are great. Kids are horrible. And it's. There's. There's evidence on both sides, like, a lot of this stuff. But it's like you're making judgments about this person because of one thing. It could be their height, their baldness, their fitness, their weight, their income. But it's like you're taking one little piece of information and then spinning this narrative out of it and making conclusions that just may not be true. And it may be keeping you from a really fantastic person because you're writing them off because they have a bald spot. And you're like, yeah, bald guys are terrible. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, we're pattern recognition creatures. We're just going around looking for shortcuts. Like you said at the beginning of this. That's what a bias is. It's just kind of like a mental shortcut. And then we see a few things happen with a guy that wears a New York Yankees hat. And then, like, I don't know. I don't like those guys who wear New York Yankees hat, by the way. I don't like New York Yankees people either. But, you know, you just. You create these shortcuts, and then suddenly we actually use it in real life, especially in our love life. And it's not to say there are some patterns, like, I get it, and you want to be aware of those to a certain degree, but challenge the patterns as they come up. And if they're silly, such as all police officers or once Again, it's like bringing that all or nothing statement. Now you know, you're allowing your biases to get the best of you.

And again, it's just about catching yourself. You may not be able to help it. Like, your initial reaction is, oh, this person is from Boston. They must be a jerk. Okay, okay, that's my first initial. Like, that's what everybody in New York thinks about. Everybody from ball, they get. Okay, but like, wait a second, I'm not being fair there. I'm making, I'm being, you know, too general about this. I'm having all or nothing thinking, like, I've got to give them a fair chance and like, let's actually learn something about them before we jump to conclusions. And that's all. That's, that's how you have to deal with it. It's your initial reaction, probably not going to be able to control. But it's like the follow up. That's where the magic happens.

Dude, you're a PhD psychologist. You should be like a super nerd and like, not fun to hang out with. I love hanging out with. You're the opposite. You are the opposite of the academic stereotype, which is why I love working with you. And you know, how many, how many times have people, like, assumed that you were a certain way and then when they met you, they're like, oh, wow, you're completely different than I thought.

All the time. Like, all the time when people meet me and they're like, wait, you're a professor, really? Or it goes the other way and like, they meet me first, they have no idea what I do, and then like, what do you do? I'm like, professor, like, what? That doesn't make sense because it just doesn't fit all the time.

Doesn't add up.

All right, so the last one, number six, lies we tell ourselves, the biases we use. This one is the hindsight bias. This one's also known as the I knew it all along phenomenon, where things play out and then after the fact, you're like, oh, I knew that was going to happen. Like, you date a guy three months, it ends horribly. And in month four, you're like, after you broke up, you're like, yeah, I knew, I knew. I knew the whole time. I knew everything that was gonna happen. I knew, I knew. Here's the thing, you're lying yourself because if you did know, you wouldn't have gone through all that. You wouldn't have done that to yourself if you actually truly knew that this was going to happen all along, right?

I think there's a lot of dating coaches and. Or dating advice out there that plays to this quite a bit. Like, if a woman's like, oh, he cheated on me. We were together for four months. He cheated on me. Well, was there. Was there a red flag of this coming? Like, what were the red flags? That's why I actually don't love the word red flag, and I'll tell you why in a minute. But. And they'll be like, oh, well, yeah, I just. I always knew because I remember one time we went out and he was talking to this girl in the corner, and it was a little bit longer than that I thought was appropriate. And I should have known at that point that he was a cheater. And it's like, no, there's no way. There's no way for you to know that based on that situation. And. And they'll play on that. Like, yeah, you should have known. So now you're gonna know. It's almost like this, like, level of, like, feeding into this. This bias or like, oh, yeah, you really should have known. Next time you're gonna know. So that. That's why I don't even like the word red flag, because I don't think it accurately really depicts what's going on. I use the word. I. We always talk about relationship risk. Like, it's kind of like up and down the risk kind of spectrum here. And when you get involved with someone, some people are higher risk, other people are lower risk, and it's more of like, a spectrum than just like, this one red flag that you're going to suddenly know that he was a cheater. And I think that's why I don't love to play into that cult kind of whole idea when it comes to this hindsight bias.

Yeah. Because if they were really red flags. Red flags are easy to notice.

Yeah, right.

It's like, that's the whole point is like, these things are not always easy to notice. Yeah, right. And a lot of that, what you're just describing, I. I love that you take issue with that, because a lot of that behavior is a subtle blame the victim kind of thing where it's like, what did you do? Like, you should have noticed these things. Like, why didn't you not? And then it's like, encourages them to, like, conjure up these false signals that really actually have nothing to do. It's like, there's other things that were going on, and it's probably not that one conversation you had with somebody that you thought lingered too long. It probably has nothing to do with that. And so it's just, it's important to realize that we do this because, again, we like to be right. We like to feel in control, and we like to feel like we are kind of masters of our own environment. So we like to feel like we knew things were going to play out a certain way. Now it's really important not to fall prey to this because frankly, you're just giving yourself way too much credit or giving you, you know, putting too much responsibility on yourself. Like, a lot of times when things go wrong, like, you're not a trained relationship person, you maybe haven't had a relationship course. So how would you possibly know that some of these things that no one else would know is a bad sign? Like, how would you know that? Right? You. You, you just wouldn't. Right. And so the other thing is, if you constantly are telling yourself, I, I really didn't know all along. I knew all along. You're not giving yourself the opportunity to learn. Because before you really learn something, you just have to admit, like, I don't know everything there is to know about this topic. So I have some things that I need to learn and grow with. And if you're constantly giving yourself too much credit, you're not giving yourself the space to admit there's some, there's some room for improvement here. And it's like improvement is everything, and you have to be willing to give yourself the space to do that.

Yeah. Yeah, that's a really good point. I think that's a great place to end because, you know, look, as humans, we're all know it alls, Gary and myself included. Okay. And we just are constantly wanting to protect that. So be aware of all of these things as you're getting out there dating. When you're in relationships, it's going to constantly creep up. Even the best psychologist, top psychologists in the world, say that they fall prey to this every single day and they have to remind themselves of this. So hopefully you all got a lot out of this. And yeah, I, I really enjoyed this one, Gary. This was a fun one because I know there's something we talk a lot about inside Love Accelerator, but not necessarily on the podcast. So this is good stuff, man.

Yeah. And it's really, it's all about, you know, you eliminate a few of the things you're doing wrong, and it just gives you a lot more chance to do things right.

Yeah, Amen to that. So thank you so much and we'll talk to all of you beautiful ladies next week. All right. Thanks, Gary.

Thanks, Adam.

All right, so now we're at the end of the podcast, and hopefully you got a lot of really great information from this podcast. But as we know, information can only take you so far. It's time to take some action. So what I recommend you do now is head on over to loveapply.com it's going to walk you through a series of questions, and then you'll be able to book what we call a complimentary love strategy session. Yes, you've heard it. Someone on my team is going to get on a phone call with you. We'll understand your situation, what it is that you're struggling with in your love life, and create that strategy to help you attract that man, that relationship, relationship you truly deserve. So take that action. Go make it happen. We cannot wait to speak with you, love apply.com and yeah, let's help you create that love life you truly deserve. All right, speak soon.

Bye.

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