What To Do When Dating Feels Impossible: 4 Questions to Get Unstuck

Hey there, all you beautiful ladies. Before we get to the pod, as you know, we don't run any weird ads on this podcast. We want to deliver as much value as possible. So all we ask in return is if you enjoy the podcast, be sure to go ahead and send it to a friend. I'm sure she could use a little bit of help in our love life. Go ahead and share it and just tell one of your friends, because that's probably how you heard about this. All right, let's get to the podcast.

Gary.

If there's one thing I know for sure, it is that if dating from feels impossible, then it suddenly becomes impossible. If we are feeling like dating, we're like, looking at this goal of finding a relationship, and it feels like Mount Everest. And we have to scale up this entire mountain, through the rocks, through the cold, through the icy nights where we're just freezing and can't breathe. If it feels that way, then suddenly it becomes impossible. Welcome to the Love Strategies podcast, where we help successful women attract high value men, date with a strategy, and improve their. Now, whether you're single or dating or in a new relationship, we're here to help you dive into the male mind and provide raw insights found nowhere else, backed by science, psychology, and our own personal experiences. Your hosts today are myself, Adam lodolce, and professional dating coach and founder of love strategies, and Dr. Gary Lewandowski, a relationship scientist, professor, and our head relationship coach here at Love Strategies. Please share with a friend and enjoy. And so today's podcast is really designed for all those who out there right now who are struggling, who are looking at the top of that mountain or like, how am I going to get up there? How am I going to scale this thing? How am I going to make it happen? Our goal is to help you feel unstuck and realize it's not Mount Everest. It can actually be an incredibly fun, exhilarating experience if we do it the right way.

Yeah, and it's. It's like we've talked about a lot, is you got to get these beliefs in order before you can really start enacting strategies. And so mindset first. And you know, we've done this with thousands and thousands of clients, and frankly, people come to us in a very stuck place. And so what we wanted to do with this podcast for everybody is kind of take some of the tools that we use for our clients to help get them unstuck and share them with you today. And this really came about because in our community, one of our, our clients, we have A community where clients can ask questions and coaches are there, you know, pretty much around the clock to answer those questions and give feedback. Somebody in our community. This is a direct quote, very new. I think this woman had been in the program a week. So, you know, this is probably the question that brought her to us, right? She wrote, quote, I've come to the conclusion that men are 100% the problem, and it has nothing to do with me. So now others have, you know, at other times, there's other similar sentiments like this where, you know, it's a clear sign somebody's stuck in the dating process, where they say things like, there are no good guys out there. I'm sick of all men being so wishy washy. Online dating doesn't work. And I think, you know, it's important. Like, admit it, almost everybody listening to this podcast has felt similar. We've all been there. All of those things at one time or another feel true. Men are terrible. They're wishy washy. Online dating is the worst. All this stuff, and it comes from a place of frustration. You feel confused, you feel a little helpless, and you feel a little hopeless. But we're, that's what we do, right? We help people get around this because those beliefs are going to leave you feeling stuck. And here's the thing, they're super counterproductive because none of those beliefs are true. All men aren't terrible. Online dating in and of itself isn't terrible. You feel stuck if you haven't dated in a while, and it's more likely to feel stuck if you're out of practice. And the, the most frustrating thing with the, the folks who are really, really stuck is it's not like they're not trying. Yeah, they're, they're out there. They're running the race. The problem is sometimes they're running the race and they're running, running really, really hard, but they're just running in the wrong direction and they're running the wrong kind of race. And so, you know, it's easy to think after you're doing all this stuff and you're trying really hard, you start coming to colleague like, what's wrong with people? Like, why is modern dating so terrible and flawed? And, you know, we've even had people say, like, you know, I just, maybe I just should be single. Maybe I should just be single for, for the rest of my life. And, you know, anybody listening, if you're, if you're there, here's the most important fact. Your dating beliefs limit you much more than Your dating reality ever will. Going to say that again. Your dating beliefs limit you far more than your dating reality ever will. And so it's important to get around these stuck points because here. Here's the really great thing is I said that first quote was from somebody who had been in our program for a week in that exact same thread, right? And so it's a community, and people kind of respond to each other in that exact same thread. Another client, someone who had been with us. I think she had been with us for about a month, maybe like five weeks. She wrote. Recently, I realized the complete opposite. I realized that women can create a problem from nothing and feel offended. And it's two people in the exact. And I think those two clients actually happen to live near each other as well. It's. It just shows the difference that mindset makes. And so if you get stuck in the wrong mindset, everything can feel terrible. But once you get out of that mindset, all of a sudden the world is full of opportunity and possibility. And that's really an important, crucial first step in dating, Right?

And it's interesting because at the end of the day, it's neither women or men who are the problem, right? And it's not a gender. It's asking the wrong question, like, who's the problem, men or women? It's like, what a silly question to ask. And the thing about our belief systems that I think is so important is that if we are saying, for example, that all men are the problem, 100% of the problem, and let's say we believe that to be true, then where do we go from there? It's actually giving men all the power at that point. It's giving this belief system all the power. If all the men are the problem, then there's literally nothing you can do in your love life. You might as well give up. So it's like, even if we took the belief system, and I'm going a little rogue here, Gary, so stick with me here. But even if we believed this statement to be true, and I'll adjust it a little bit, men are mostly the problem in today's dating scene. Let's say we somewhat believe that to be true. Even if that is true, is it helpful for you? No. And there's many belief systems that we all might have that we might believe to be true or are even maybe true. But, like, it's not serving you, so why even lean into that belief system instead? The only thing that we can do is focus on ourselves and what we can improve within Us and how we can adjust our approach to dating, even if most men are the problem. What are you going to do? Start a marketing campaign to change all men? You can't do it, so it's a waste of time anyways. It's also not necessarily true. But let's just say even if we're not able to change that belief system, let's just roll with it. It's not a helpful belief system. So just constantly checking these statements that we make either verbally or in our mind, constantly checking those things all the time. And it doesn't even have to be about men. It could be about our physical appearance. Oh, I could never find love because of the way I look because I'm overweight. That's just a belief system. That's all it is. And it's not helpful. Right. It's not helpful for you right now. So why even dig into that? Change your belief system, adjust them, catch yourself and reframe. Instead of reframe would be all, there are some men out there who absolutely love the way I look. Same same type of belief statement, same thing. And can also be very true and is likely not likely it is more true than your current belief system. So constantly checking yourself is super important.

Yeah. And, you know, checking yourself. And so, you know, I'm sure there are people who just heard you say all of that and they're like, yeah, absolutely. But like, check myself, how, how do I check myself with these beliefs? And it's a fair question because it's hard because you've been living with a lot of these beliefs for a very long time, and so they're, they're stuck to you a little bit. And so how do we get these beliefs to. To fall away? And so that's what we're talking about today on the podcast is we're going to stress test your beliefs with four specific questions. And so here's the first one, right? These are limiting beliefs. These are things that are holding you back. And so you're going to have a belief. And here's the first question to ask. Is this belief always accurate for everyone? And we're just going to jump ahead and tell you the answer to that is always going to be no. Right. In the sense that, you know, people will say, there are no men where I live, there are no men to date. Is that accurate for everyone? So do you mean to tell me that where you live in your zip code, no women have ever found men? It's not true. Right. And so you have to kind of check in like, is this true objective reality? Some people will say, well, you know, I'm 78 years old, I'm too old to date, too old to find a guy. Well, is that true for everyone? So you mean every 70 year, 78 year old person out there can't find love? Well, no, it's not true. Right. And so when you come up with a belief, you state that it's true. Now I want you to go into like a lawyer mode or what I find to be teenage daughter mode, which is find the exception to whatever that you just told yourself. You tell yourself this thing is impossible. Nope. Okay, how, how is it possible? Right. What's the other side of that? And so part of it is just you have to recognize your reality because your beliefs give you tunnel vision to help you focus on different parts of reality. So if you believe there are no good partners where you live, you're right. If you believe there's tons of options and tons of great partners where you live, you're also right. Both are true at the exact same time. The good, the bad, the in between, it's always all true. And the beliefs that you have dictate where you look. And that's an important reality.

That's so true. It's really interesting. Belief systems, they permeate every part of our life. I'm just as you're speaking, like, I don't relate to the whole, you know, all men are the problem, you know, for a number of reasons. But like me personally, I've always had a belief system for the past 10 years that, like, I've been pretty overweight at certain times. And I was always like, that's just my body type. That's like a belief system that I always had. So I always leaned into it until, like in the past year, I've made some pretty substantial changes of just how many calories I'm eating, you know, because I suddenly looked at the belief system, I'm like, maybe that's not true. So now I've realized maybe that's not true. And then what actions can you take in order to disprove that false belief? You know, and then suddenly options start to appear. It's true in everything when it comes to love. If you could just be like, you know what, There are amazing guys here. Once you've reframed that into that belief, even if you don't fully believe it, suddenly your brain starts going in a different direction, starts thinking, oh, maybe he's actually at the golf club. Maybe if I just go there and go Hit balls at the driving range every Wednesday night at singles night. Maybe there'll be a great guy there. What do you know? I went and did that. There were two great guys there. Oh, my God. And then now you've completely reframed it. So it's really, really important to be thinking about all these beliefs that we say. And catch yourself when you're with your girlfriends, when you say it, make a statement. That's the moment to stress test it and ask that first question. The second one that I think is super important. And I love this question. Gary, this is yours, but I'm gonna say it, which is, how does this belief bring you comfort? Because a lot of times when we have a belief system, for example, all men are the problem when it comes to dating. That is going to naturally protect your ego. It's going to naturally allow you to not take ownership of your situation because you can't take ownership over all men being the problem. Right? That's not you, that's men. And that's true in so many different things. For example, in the weight loss thing that I was just discussing, how does the belief bring me comfort that, oh, I just have a husky body type. It gives me a lot of comfort because I was husky, you know, like, I'm overweight. That's just who I am. That makes me much more comfortable versus the harsh and bitter truth. What actually sets you free, which is men aren't all the problem. There are amazing guys where you live. You can attract an incredible guy into your life with the right strategy and the right intention, with the right belief system. And once you start reframing these things and realize that it might require you to be a little bit uncomfortable to look at the harsh truth. But that is exactly what will help you break free from these shackles of wrong beliefs that you've been living by your entire life. It's incredibly empowering once you just catch yourself and say, you know what? I'm ready to be uncomfortable with reality rather than comfortable with a just a total, you know, I'm living in la la land. It's not even in. In reality, it doesn't even exist. Are you getting tired of the guys who don't want to commit? And are you ready to attract that long lasting relationship? Well, for podcast listeners, we have a very special training that is available@he commits.com. when you go over there, you can go ahead and reserve a seat. We are going to walk you through the five secret strategies that make men commit. I want you to discover your power and make guys beg for your affection. Go to he commits.com and you can dive deep into that content. All right, back to the pod.

Yeah, and I think, you know, one of these aspects of this, you know, you talk about how does this belief bring you comfort is what of the most comforting things in our life is we all like to be right. So if you've been walking around with a certain belief, like, you know, one of the common ones that people will have is online dating is not for me, can't do it right. That's a belief and you want to be right about that. So, you know, some of those women will begrudgingly try online dating, but kind of half heartedly and then say, see it's, it doesn't work. See it doesn't work. And so it really comes down to this question of like, would you rather be right or would you rather find love? Because you can be right about thinking online dating doesn't work. And it's like it feels good in the moment to kind of prove this belief right, but really it's just a self fulfilling prophecy. Like you're part of the reason why it's not working and it's because your belief dictates your reality. Right. What's more important, like validating your expectations or finding a way to grow and improve as a person? I don't know, that's not even close to me. Like the second part is infinitely better. Growing and improving and changing is, is super important. And so, you know, people get a lot of comfort from their beliefs, particularly their beliefs about their past, like what has happened in their track record. Kind of keep going back and reliving the past and the wrong decisions or these feelings of persecute, like, this shouldn't have happened to me, it's not fair. And like, kind of continuing to like go back and lean on those past experiences can be quite comforting because again, it sort of absolves you of responsibility and it makes it like, what was I supposed to do there? There's not much else I can do, you know, very much. You know, I think your example about, you know, I like, like the word husky by the way. Like the huskiness of the body type is like, this is who I am, right? It's like it's comforting because it absolves you of responsibility. It's like it doesn't matter anymore. And it's, it's tough because, you know, so much of what coaching is about is about pushing you out of comfort zones and like challenging beliefs and it can be tough work at times, it's. It's a lot easier when you have someone by your side, but it's so incredibly necessary to have the breakthroughs that you're looking for.

Yeah, well, I say it all the time to our coaching staff. Like, if we're not making some clients frustrated, sometimes we're not doing our job. If we're not creating a visceral reaction with clients, then we're not giving them the truth. Like, if too much advice out there and coaching is like, you're so great. Oh, my God, you are just the most perfect person in the world. And we're going to manifest the man into your life by doing these weird affirmations and doing this weird candlelight thing. And that isn't in line with reality. Those things give you comfort, but it's not challenging you. And that's what a good coach does. And by the way, that's what a good partner in life does, is they challenge you. Right? They challenge you and all of these things. When it comes to our beliefs, I think, like, getting to the root of this, I'm really thinking about this. Like, people are kind of married to their ideas, and their beliefs become a part of their identity. And if you can disassociate your beliefs from your identity and actually enjoy the process of changing a belief and being proven wrong, then suddenly you're gonna get so much closer to the truth in the long term. Like, and that took. That's taken me a while, but, like, I truly enjoy being wrong. And, Gary, you've seen this. Like, hopefully you've seen this. And I think you're the same way with me. Like, we'll sometimes debate about something, and you get me over the line. I'm like, yeah, like, you're so right. I was so wrong about that. And I've seen you do that with me, and it's because we're not married to our beliefs. It's like, we have an idea, we have an opinion. This is what we think. But when faced with reality, suddenly. Huh, New belief system. Great. That's awesome. I'm so glad I have this new belief system, because now I'm in reality, and it might be a little uncomfortable for me to look at, but, hey, I'm getting closer to my goals, which is super important.

There's a big difference between being right and seeking the truth. And so many people who are not so far along on their journey are just focused on being right all the time, because that's. That doesn't force you to change. It doesn't force you to reconsider doesn't, you know, challenge you. But if you're not, if you're not challenging yourself, you're not going to change either. And so don't focus on being right. Focus on finding the truth. You know, whatever, whatever that happens to be in, whatever situation you're in, that's really important. And so, you know, that second question was, you know, everybody likes to be right. The third one is about change. And so the third question is, how does this belief allow you to avoid change? Because make no mistake, almost everybody hates change, right? Every single time that Facebook changes a little something about its interface, people freak out. Freak out, right? It's like, you know, if you've ever driven around the roads in your town and all of a sudden there's a detour, you see, people forget how to drive because it's like something's different here. Like, what's going on? We're just, we're not very good with change. And so we don't like change because change suggests that there's going to be some effort involved. And so what I think is really funny about dealing with relationships on a day to day basis is that people have two common assumptions about relationships. The first one is relationships are complicated, right? They're hard, it's confusing, it's hard to figure out men, it's hard to figure out women, et cetera, et cetera. It's like they're complicated. But equally, if not even more common, is the other assumption, which is relationships are common sense. Only one of them is true though, and it's the first one. Relationships are complicated. Dating is hard. That's the reality. And so change has to happen. And the thing that people don't like about change is change involves something which I think is actually the secret to success in all things in life. The secret ingredient to success in dating and life, I think is failure. You have to be willing to fail. You have to be willing to take a shot at something that's not guaranteed to work, right? I tell college students all the time, don't just take classes that are easy A's. That's not gonna, you know, if you already know the information, you're not like, that's not helping you. We're here to grow and improve as people. And so you gotta do things that challenge you. Everybody fails everybody. The most successful people that any of you listening know, they have failed more than the unsuccessful people. 100%. 100%. Thing is, not everybody looks at failure the same way some people look at failure. As I'M terrible. I'm wrong. This is. This is not good. And so that's not what successful people do. Successful look at failure is like, okay, that didn't work. What's next? Oh, that didn't work. Why did that not work? Let me think about why that didn't work. Let me grow and learn from that experience and go on to the next thing. And so, you know, when my daughter was younger, I was a coach of both travel, soccer, travel, softball, even a little short spat is for basketball. And one of the things I got really fond of saying to them because I always thought sports was more about, like, teaching them about life was, you know, when things didn't go well, particularly in softball, you mean you don't get a hit? Every time I would say to them, don't get defeated. Like, they would come back and they would, like, be like, oh, gosh, this is terrible. I say, don't get defeated. Get determined. Learn from what just happened now. Use that to be more determined for the next time you're out there. And it's the exact same thing with dating.

Yeah, that's. That is the learning curve of. I love that, by the way. But that is the learning curve of anything in life is that it's compounding. Learning is a compounding experience. It's not just instantly transformational. Like all the people out there who tell you how to make a million dollars over the next month, just buy my course. Yay. Like, that's not how the real world goes. It is through. You attempt something, see how it works. You ideally do it with a strategy. It doesn't work, but then you know why, I'm going to do a little bit better next time. Do it better next time. And then it continues to grow, and it compounds on itself from there. And so sometimes, in fact, it's better to fail a lot at the beginning because you get so much learning. Sometimes the worst thing that can happen is you instantly go in and you're instantly successful, and you attribute the wrong thing to your success because you actually don't know why you were successful at that very thing. You know, it's like the. It's like the woman who was like, oh, I found my husband at 25, and he was just perfect. And here's what I did. It's like, well, did you date at all? No, no, we just met, and he was the only guy I dated. It's like, I don't want to hear any dating advice from you, because you don't. You didn't fail. Like, you actually didn't learn anything because you haven't failed. I mean, you might tell me a lot about having a 30 year marriage or whatever.

That's.

That's fine. I'm sure there's a lot of failures there. But it's like, in order to really be able to change your life, like, you have to go through some of those downsides, some of those failure points. That's how you really learn. Those are the moments. So I love that. Yeah.

And I think the key is embrace it. Right. And so it's gonna hurt. Not, not saying it's not, but like, take what I say to clients all the time is like, take a moment, take a moment, let it hurt. And then you get a moment of this sucks. And then you move on and then use it as a stepping stone for success. And that's going to propel you onto the future. Right. And when it comes to dating, finding a person isn't as much about what happens to you, but it's how you react to the process. And so some of that's going to involve a little bit of change. And you have to realize how those beliefs that you hold are actually restricting you and holding you back from the change that's going to get you where you actually want to go.

Right? Yeah. And when you're getting out there and you're failing and things aren't working out, you either find love or you learn. That's how it goes. It's like Thomas Edison would always say, I haven't failed, just found 10,000 ways that won't work. You know, when he was trying to, was it the light bulb? I believe. Yeah, he's. He was, yeah. It's just like, you just keep trying and you know a bunch of ways that don't work. And that's how you get to your ultimate goal. And that's what resilience is all about. It's about being able to overcome those challenges and being willing to change our approach every single step of the way. So it's great.

So hopefully the first three questions have given you a little bit of a sense of like, yeah, I really do want to change some of these beliefs. Right. I've kind of seen how. I don't just want to say, yes, I'm resistant to change. It's not true for everybody. And so now it's like, let's get down to actually making a difference here. And so the fourth question is, how can I prove my belief wrong? And so if you had to show that your belief was wrong, online dating doesn't work, for example, what would you do? And so this is a technique that I'm call purposeful pattern disruption. And so when I was a kid, my dad was very fond of saying, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Which I think is actually really good advice. Like, if things. If it's not broke, don't play around. Like, just enjoy that it's working. I think the opposite, though, is also true. If it ain't working, don't stick to it. And so the other way to say this very simply is don't be stubborn. Don't be stubborn and stick to beliefs. Just for the sake of sticking to beliefs. Purposefully disrupt your pattern.

Yeah, I think that that's. And if, you know, obviously there's. I love your dad. Sounds awesome. There's many, many degrees of it not working or it working. But I think if it's really not working, change everything. You know, there's degree. Like, we say that with anything we do, with business, with anything within love strategy, something isn't working, we just redo it all. Like, start from scratch. Cause if nothing is working at all, you just start over and do it again. If it's kind of working, optimize from there. Like, see what tweaks you can make to what it is that you're doing. Like, maybe you're having some. Maybe you're getting a lot of dates, but you're not getting second dates. Okay. That doesn't mean you need to change your entire strategy now. We just need to focus on how to get better on second dates. Or, you know, in. In from there. And then, of course, like, if it ain't broke, don't fix it like that. Obviously, I love that. Just keep plowing through and. And keep leaning into the strategy.

And I like that idea. Like, if. If things really are not working, instead of just saying, look, I'm right, everything sucks, and dating is hard and impossible and, like, just loving that, you know, you're correct about this idea, disrupt that pattern. And so some patterns you can disrupt is prioritize different qualities. Whatever you had been looking for in a guy, look for something different, right? And chances are it's like, focus more on character and less on looks. If you had a type that you like to date, go completely against your type. Emphasize different qualities about yourself. If you've always been emphasizing X, Y, and Z, now switch it up. Emphasize A, B and C completely. Do something different. However you were flirting before, flirt differently. However you're having conversations before, have conversations differently. And if you're not sure how to do any of that. We have a whole library of podcasts to help you with every facet of each of these things. Yeah.

And don't be afraid to change. Like, I think that's the thing is we were talking about your identity earlier and being okay with redefining your identity. That's a lot of what dating is at times, especially for those who maybe recently divorced and relationships in the past, and they're like, you know, finding it difficult to date. Now is a great time to just change everything. And, like, it might be a little bit uncomfortable. Uncomfortable. But that is the point. Like, once you are a little bit uncomfortable, suddenly changing other parts of your life becomes easy. It's like, if you stay in your little bubble your whole life, then suddenly you can't change anything. But if you change your wardrobe, you change the way that you're dating, you're prioritizing different guys. Suddenly you might start looking at other parts of your life. You're like, hey, I think I need a new job. Oh, well, I've just changed all these other things. Maybe change my job's easy. You know, I'm gonna change my job. I don't like where I live. Maybe I'm gonna live somewhere else. And suddenly change becomes much easier and you start to get momentum. In fact, I saw a study one a couple years ago, but it showed that when people move to a new city, they are significantly more likely to find love than if they stay where they live. And it's not because they're moving to find love. It's just that I. I feel like they're going through a period of change. Like, there's nothing bigger of. There's no bigger change, really, that can happen usually in life than when you move to, like, a completely different city. And so we're in this state of curiosity of everything is new, everything's bound. I'm just going to, like, open my world in a different way and rethink my identity, and then, guess what? We find love. You know? And so, yeah, I was going to.

Say, talk about purposeful pattern disruption. Moving to a different city, it forces you to have a completely different pattern. We recently, this is about two weeks ago, had a client who was kind of in this stuck mode, and she's like, I just don't understand what I can change. There's just nothing I can possibly change. It's like, well, wait a second. Like, actually, let's. Let's go through your day and, like, look. And so it's eat a different breakfast, go to a different, you know, she goes to a place to get coffee. You've been going in the same place at the same time for years. Go to a different place, go at a different time, take a different class at the gym, go to a different gym entirely. Do like, there's just so many. If you really start getting in this mindset, there's so many little tweaks you can make and just varying up your routine a little bit. All of a sudden, the same people that go to the Supermarket, Sundays at 9am Are always those same people. Go Monday night at 7pm that's when guys are going. They're going at night during the week, right? And just trying those types of little things makes all the difference in the world. And because again, you know, it's this idea that dating beliefs limit you far more than dating reality. And so what I would really encourage everybody listening to this episode to do is go back through, pick a dating belief that you have and go back through and answer these four questions for your dating belief. Work on challenging yourself and challenging these beliefs because that's going to start you on the path that you need to go down to find the love that you're looking for.

Amen. Thank you, Gary. That was great, man.

Yeah, thanks, Adam.

All right, thank you so much for being a part of the Love Strategies community. By getting to the end of the podcast, you have proven that you are a high value woman who deserves a long lasting relationship and we would love to help you get there. So what I recommend you do is go to loveapply.com and you can claim a free love strategy session where someone on my team is going to get get on a call with you on a zoom session, be able to understand your challenges and see whether or not we can help you make that a reality this year. So head on over to loveapply.com apply for that free love strategy session and we cannot wait to help you attract that man you truly deserve. All right, thanks for being here.