Dating Disappointments: Why You’re Closer to Love Than You Think

In this video, I want to talk about what you can do to feel better after a string of disappointing dating experiences. Maybe you're feeling a little hopeless right now. Maybe you feel like you've just taken one too many knocks and it makes you want to throw in the towel altogether in your love life. Well, I'm going to give you 10 pieces of advice in this video that I have learned and accumulated over the years of doing this that I think are going to help you feel a little better a bit little over the time that it takes to watch this. I'm Matthew Hussey, by the way. If you're new to this channel, thank you for being here. I released this new book, Love Life this year. If you haven't got it yet, grab a copy. And if you haven't yet tried Matthew AI and you want to ask me a specific question about your love Life, go to askmh.com and give it a try. Okay, let's jump in. Firstly, I'm sorry, I'm sorry if you've been having a hard time in this area of your life. It is one of the most painful experiences when we want to find love and we can't seem to find it anywhere. Not only that, but it feels really, really difficult to even find a reason to hope. It feels like we've never been further from meeting the right person for us. And with every new knock, it just confirms this suspicion we have that, that it's never going to happen for us. So let's dive right into these 10 pieces of advice, this wisdom that I have discovered over the years for people going through this. The first one is to realize you are not alone. It could be a very isolating experience to feel like nothing's happening in our love life or we keep getting heartbroken, we keep getting rejected. But the reality is we are in very good company if we're finding it challenging to meet our person. One of the most painful things about not meeting someone or struggling to meet someone is the story we end up telling ourselves about that situation. That I am not good enough, that I'm never going to find someone, that I'm not worthy, that it's easy for everyone else and hard for me. But none of those stories are necessarily true. Other people in great numbers are having the same difficulty as you finding love. And when we recognize that, it doesn't take away one part of the difficulty, which is that we want to find love and we haven't found it. But it does take away that added sting that is this is personal to Me. When we depersonalize it, we lower the intensity of that pain. Number two, recognize that it's actually okay and normal for it to be hard to find love. We are looking for a roommate for the rest of our lives. This is not just finding a new friend. Where you can have a friend that's great in some ways, not in others. In the ways that that friend doesn't quite meet our needs or isn't right for multiple situations, you can go, well, I won't see that friend in this context. I'll find another friend for that. You can have many friends, but for those people who want a monogamous relationship, you can only have one partner. And when you have one partner, we naturally expect more from that partner than we do from any one of our friends. Now, we could take that too far sometimes. Esther Perel, in a recent interview with me, talked about the fact that she did think we took it too far, that we expect way too many things from one person, that we should be getting from an entire community of friends and partners and family. But even with that logic in mind, we are likely to still expect more from this person that we're going to spend more time with than probably anyone else in our lives. So if it's hard, tell yourself that's normal. Number three. Remember, you only need one. Even in a sea of disappointments, of rejections, of people who don't get you or you don't connect with, you only need one person who does get you, who does want a relationship. And when you find that person, none of the others will matter. It is this weird thing that when we are in the middle of a string of bad dates or heartbreaks with people who didn't want the same things we did, or coming off the back of a difficult relationship or a really wounding situation where someone has rejected us, it can feel like it all matters so much. But what's bizarre and wonderful is that the moment you meet the right person for you and it works, none of the rest of it matters at all. All of a sudden, all of these things that felt like they mattered so much completely dissolve. All that matters at that point is, oh, I found my person. So it's normal to feel like all of this matters so much, the heartbreaks, the disappointments, the rejections. But know that there is also, for you, likely to be a failure of perspective right now, where what you can't see is just how little any of this is going to matter when you meet the right person for you. Number four. Don't turn your current disappointments into a story about how amazing your ex was. This is a really easy trap to fall into. Every disappointing date makes your ex seem better and better. You start thinking about this person that maybe broke up with you a year ago or that it didn't work out with, and the story becomes more romantic all the time. Every time someone is disappointing. Every time you don't connect with someone or you feel no chemistry or you go on a date and the person's just weird, you think, my ex was so great. This is normal. But it doesn't make it true. Just because you're in front of someone disappointing in it doesn't make your ex better than they really were. Connect to the ways that your ex was disappointing because I promise you, there were some important ways. Even if the ultimate way your ex was disappointing was that they left, that they didn't choose you. If you're telling yourself they were perfect except for the fact that they didn't choose me, well, then they weren't perfect. Your ideal person is the person that is sat in front of you is wonderful and chooses you. Here's what you need to remember. There is someone better for you coming. Don't allow yourself to be distracted from that future by letting the disappointing person in the present make you go back into your past. Number five. When you're out there looking for love, don't compare someone new to history. When we meet someone for the first time, we are forming an initial impression based on knowing very little about them. And in the same way that we are doing our best to convey to them how great we are and what wonderful qualities we have and some sense try to convey what an amazing partner we would be if they were to choose us. Someone else is trying to do the same thing. They're trying to show us what kind of person they are in life as a friend, as a partner, as a lover, as someone who can be relied on or trusted in, they're trying to give you a sense of their deeper qualities which are very hard to communicate on date one. It's a really terribly difficult exercise for both parties involved. And what happens when we're feeling frustrated in our love lives, when we're feeling a little hopeless and disappointed? We're very quick to compare this facade that we're seeing right now not because someone's doing anything wrong, but they're just doing their best with their first impression to an entire history that we have with somebody else. It's a bit like when we move somewhere and we meet a couple of new friends and we start to get to know people. And we say, you know, they're great, but they're just not like my friends back home. Of course they're not. You don't have 20 years of history with these people. Your friends back home have been through ups and downs with you. You've got all these memories together, you've been been through hard times together, you've shown up for each other in myriad situations. So there's no way that the new friend can compare with the history of the old friend. And the same is true in our love life. A brand new person coming into our life cannot compare with the history that we have had with an ex. Even when that ex wasn't good for us, they're still competing with all of that history, with all of that sentimentalism and nostalgia that goes with it, the depth. So in a way, we have to give the present day the benefit of the doubt, knowing that if this person who just arrived in our lives, providing they have the right raw materials to be a partner that we need and want, were to be in our lives for another five years or 10 or 20, we would build up the same history with them that would make us feel the way about them that we have felt about someone in the past. Number six, get back to just being interested in people. When it's been a long time since we even connected with somebody, it can make us feel like our person doesn't exist. And that develops a kind of impatience in us where we go on a date and our fuse is shorter and shorter and we are looking for things that are wrong in people and would become judgmental. And, you know, people talk to us and very quickly we're like, oh, you just said that thing, you just did that thing. Or you're this way, you're not right for me. Here we go again. It makes us resentful of people. And that energy now starts to filter into all of our interactions because we are this heat seeking missile for the right relationship. We have a sense of what we want and anytime someone doesn't fit that, we get frustrated with them. Why am I even on a date with you right now? You're clearly wrong for me. You're wasting my time. We have to start to step back a little bit and just get interested in people again without all of that expectation of you have to be the love of my life. Let me just get interested in people. When we come from a frame of being interested and curious in people, not evaluating them for the role of love of my life, but just what do you like As a person, we start developing a generosity of spirit, which is one of the most attractive things that we can have. It's a bit like when you go traveling and you're not looking for people to be your friend for life, you're just looking to meet interesting people when you travel. And because you're looking to meet interesting people, there's a kind of generosity of spirit in the way that you ask people questions and get curious about them and have conversations. It might be worth seeing if we can apply a little more of this to our daily lives. When it comes to love or life itself, how could I have a little more generosity of spirit that could be breed more curiosity about someone, about what's interesting about a person, about what's impressive about the person in front of me, even if they're not right for me, what's unique or interesting or impressive about this person, what's different about this person. And when we do that, sometimes, not all the time, but sometimes, we might even find ourselves getting surprised at the ways that this person unexpectedly becomes someone that is interesting to us in ways we didn't anticipate. Number seven, expand into new pools of people. There is something about being disappointed and frustrated that makes our lives contract. We make our lives smaller. We start to go into defense mode and we start to shut down. We say, I'm just going to hang out with my friends, because that's more rewarding. But in shutting our lives down in this way, we stop expanding our lives into new pools, new communities of people that might actually hold different people than the kinds of people we've been meeting already. This might mean getting out of the bubble of your friendship group. It might mean getting out of the bubble of your place of work or your industry or your neighborhood, and into new communities of people that hold lots of interesting and surprising people. It can be fascinating to see how big the world feels when we do this. Instead of concluding that there's no one out there, actually go out there, make your pool bigger, and you'll start to see how many people there really are that could be a potential for your love life. Number eight. When you are searching for love and you're feeling disappointed, but you're looking for the real thing. Do not waste a minute on unrequited love. Situations where you have a crush on somebody, where you can't get someone off your mind, but that person rejected you, that person didn't call you back, they never asked you on another date, it felt fizzled out. Don't waste any time telling yourself that this person is the right person for you. Look, it can be really bruising to our ego when we like someone and they decide that they don't like us back, at least to the same level, or that they don't want something from us. It can be crushing even. But we have to distinguish our ego losing from us losing love. When someone doesn't want us, we are not losing love. It is our ego losing. And that's painful, don't get me wrong. But it's not the same as the tragedy of losing love. And too often we turn an ego death into the death of love. And this great story of what could have been. That's where we get ourselves into trouble. Someone who doesn't choose you cannot be right for you. Someone who doesn't see your value cannot be valuable to you. So we have to get into our mind that it's okay for me to feel bruised. It's okay for me to feel in pain because my ego got hurt. But I mustn't tell myself a story that I just lost love. It's a lot easier to get over an ego death than the tragedy of losing love. So tell yourself, the next time I like someone more than they like me, I didn't lose love. I just lost a little face. Number nine. Get around people with better stories. Misery in our love lives is contagious. It bonds with other misery. Bad beliefs about the people we're trying to attract, whether it's men or women, attract other people with those bad beliefs. Men suck. And then someone else says, men do suck. And you say, we should be friends right when we are are in that place of negativity and nothing works and everyone sucks. We get around other people like that and all we hear is more horror stories. But remind yourself, you are not in the market for horror stories. You are in the market for love. And if you're in the market for love, you need to get around people who believe in it. You need to get around people who like men or who like women. You need to get around people who have a positive story to tell about it. In the same way that if you wanted to start a business, you don't want to be around a bunch of people who tell you it's horrible and you'll never stop working and it makes your life a misery. You want to get around people who actually find the joy in it. You want to get around people who actually get the appeal of it. The same with having kids. If you want to have kids but you're scared, don't get around a bunch of people who tell you it's the most awful experience in the world. Get around people who are like, this has given my life so much meaning. Or I've never been more happy. Or, you know what? Yes, it's hard. Yes, there's sacrifice, but my God, is it worth it? You have to get around people who are telling the story that is productive for you to hear because there is no one reality. It's not that the bad stories are untrue and the good stories aren't. There are true bad stories, true horror stories, true crime. Audrey I have a wife who just watches true crime all the time. It's become the story of my life is psychopaths and sociopaths. But that's a story for another time. There are bad stories that are real, but there are also good stories that are real. So the question for us becomes which stories serve me more? Who do I need to put myself around for me to stay a believer in this process? To stay a believer in how powerful love and relationships and finding a great teammate can be? Who do I need to be around to still believe in men? Who do I need to be around to still believe in? In women. Too often in life, people fetishize the bad stories and they enjoy sitting around and talking about them with other people. But do we want the story or do we want love? If you want love, get around better stories. Before we move on to the final part of this video, number 10, I just want to say to everyone out there, I know that the holidays are upon us. I know what painful and difficult time that is for so many people, especially the people that this video will speak to the most. The holidays are one of the most difficult times for people who are missing love in their lives, who feel lonely, who feel the pang of wanting something that they don't have or that they lost, or people who are in heartbreak. If that's you, I want to send my love to you right now. As a community. I want us to collectively love each other. Leave a loving comment in the comment section of this video for someone who needs it. And I also want to let you know that for anyone who needs emotional support over the holidays or to be able to go to someone for advice, Matthew AI is the perfect place that you can go because you literally have this voice that can speak to you. It will be my voice that can speak to you and help you when you're in a low moment. And the right words at the right time are magic. They can transform our day. So if you haven't tried it yet. Go to askmh.com and give it a go. I promise you, if you haven't tried it yet, you really have no idea how much better this can make you feel. So go give it a try. Now it's free to try out, so just check it out. All right, number 10. Remember that dating is just life. One of the things that we do when we want to find love is we almost start to see dating and looking for love as this compartmentalized part of our life that lives in a box. Like I'm living my life most of the time, and then I have to date. And it's a bit of a strange abstraction and an unnecessary one. It's a little bit like how people who are deep in the world of mindfulness, the real kind of masters in that area, will tell you that at a certain point, although it can be useful to build a ritual, a habit around meditating for a certain amount of time every day. You know, I Met meditate for 10 minutes a day, and when I am in those 10 minutes, I'm meditating, they will say that at a certain point, that becomes a weird kind of abstraction. That actually meditation and your life are one and the same. That there's no moment in your life that can't be a meditation. Whether it's doing the dishes or going to the gym, or having a beautiful conversation with someone, every moment is an opportunity for meditation. Meditation and life are one and the same. And in some ways, the obsessive focus on meditation being a to do is part of the thing that works against you in being mindful in life. The same is true in our love life. All of life is an opportunity to approach our day through the lens of openness and curiosity and generosity of spirit towards other people, and a little bravery sprinkled in here and there, and talking to new people and having a fun flirtation here and there, and just being open and being expansive, putting ourselves in new communities. Like I talked about, by doing this, we just create possibility. And that possibility isn't something that we say to ourselves, I'm not creating possibility anymore. The possibility is created by the way that we are, not just what we do. And when that possibility gets created, our only job is to be open and curious and to some extent, brave enough to follow where it leads, to explore it. And if somewhere along the way, in that expansive and generous approach to life that you take to adventures and experiences and people, you happen to come across someone who sees this wonderful, expansive person in front of them and wants to keep seeing them, then that will be an incredible bonus that will mean you finding love as you're living your life. It won't be that you found love because you were obsessively dating. It will be that you found love because you were openly living. So don't separate dating from life. They can be one and the same. Thank you so much for watching this video. I hope that in the time we've spent together, if you were feeling a little devoid of hope at the beginning of this video, if you were feeling sensitive or bruised by the way that things have been going or just feeling like you're over it, my hope is that this video can not only make you feel a bit better, but maybe just restore a bit of optimism and a bit of life. Leave me a comment, let me know what you thought and thank you as always for spending some time with me. I'll see you next week.