In this Love Life Podcast episode, hosts Stephen Hussey and Matthew Hussey discuss the challenge of one‑sided relationships that many people experience during COVID‑19 quarantine. The episode opens with sponsorship messages for Regain Couples Therapy and American Giant, then moves into a definition of a one‑sided relationship—where one partner’s needs dominate and the other’s are consistently subsumed. Matthew shares a client case about a long‑distance couple who only speak on the phone once a week, illustrating how fear of being perceived as high‑maintenance or needy can keep people from voicing their needs. The hosts explore common fears (being labeled a nag, triggering conflict, or causing a breakup) and argue that these anxieties lead to silent pain. They introduce a metaphor of "relationship colors" to explain balance: a healthy partnership blends two colors into a new, equal hue, whereas an imbalanced one is dominated by one partner’s color. Practical advice includes approaching conversations with confidence, calm, and emotional neutrality, and communicating expectations firmly to raise respect, attraction, and self‑worth. Throughout, they promote a free confidence‑building training at thebravestyou.com and invite listeners to email the show. The episode ends with encouragement to avoid scarcity mindset and to prioritize clear communication.
Chapters
This is an ad by Regain Couples Therapy. Let's be honest, loving your partner doesn't mean you always like them and guess what, that's normal. Regain offers couples therapy that's flexible, affordable, and 100% online. Whether you're reconnecting or working through conflict, Regain is here to support you both. See why people wish they'd try couples therapy sooner. Visit regain.com/couplespod to get 10% off your first month. That's regain.com/couplespod. Support American-made, tariff-free clothing with American Giant. They aren't affected by tariffs because their clothing products never left the U.S. Get 20% off your first order when you use promo code STAPLE20 at american-giant.com In.
A really balanced and positive relationship, two colors blend together to create a new color altogether. a beautiful bright new color that is the representation of both worlds, both personalities, both sets of routines, both sets of ideas.
Well, well, get in here, you little rascal. How the heck are you? Macy here and oh my have you been working out? You look fantastic and I see you've showered this morning. Wonderful news. Hello, welcome to the Love Life Podcast with me Stephen Hussey hosting of course my brother, big brother Matthew Hussey at podcast and I'm popping my head through the door to say hello as usual and check everyone's okay, make sure things are going well. I hope things are in your world and We are talking about a relationship issue today that is universal, but we're also specifically applying it to being in a quarantine situation a lot of us are in in this coronavirus. I don't know if you've heard of it that we're going through right now. But it's the problem of being in a one-sided relationship. And this can happen even with someone you really like that you think is a great person or you're really attracted to. But you can suddenly realize that your needs are constantly being subsumed into their needs, and it seems to always be on their terms, like the kind of things you do together, the activities you do, who you hang out with, or in this case, how often you speak on the phone, on text, how much communication you have. And suddenly you feel like, well, it's always on what they need and their expectations are never on mine. and that's a scenario many of us can relate to. And so if that's something you've been through, that's what we talk about in this clip. And before we jump in, there is a link, as usual, Matt mentions in the clip, and as usual, he doesn't quite specify the link. So, the link is thebravestyou.com if you want to get the free confidence training he talks about, thebravestyou.com and I'll be back at the other side of the podcast to clarify that again when he mentions it, so I'll mention it again, but thebravestyou.com All right, that is all from me. I'll catch you on the other side. Over to Matt.
Hello, another week in isolation. There was a woman who I had the pleasure of working with for a little while this morning who told me of an issue she's got with her boyfriend who is now long distance. They live about 30 minutes apart. They're not seeing each other. I asked her, are they speaking every day? It was just a casual question. I didn't know that anything would come of it. I said, oh, that might be interesting. it must be tough. Are you speaking every day? And she said, well, actually we text every day, but we speak on the phone about once a week. And I thought, oh, that's interesting, because I don't know many people who in a relationship can get by on just one phone call a week. Not to say that there's anything wrong with that. There are many ways to have a relationship, and it depends on how each person feels. But I know for me, that wouldn't be nearly enough. And so I said to her, Is that enough for you? I said, who is it? You don't like talking on the phone? Does he not like talking on the phone? She said, well, he doesn't like talking on the phone. I said, well, have you talked to him about it? She said, well, he's kind of stubborn. And she kind of almost shrugged that off like it was a cute quality of his. And I said, well, do you want to have that conversation? And she said, well, I don't know. I mean, I think it's good for me anyway, because I need to focus on my independence. And I think this is actually a good time for me to do that, is to focus on being more independent. Now, I'm always interested in those moments where people find ways to square in their own mind something that maybe isn't meeting their needs. Because clearly this person, because even when I said to her, do you like speaking on the phone? She lit up. She said, oh, I love speaking on the phone. I said, so this is not a situation that's meeting your needs. I get that you wanna be more independent or that you feel that's something that you could focus on during this time and that's wonderful. But there's a quote from one of my favorite movies, Interstellar, where Matthew McConaughey's father-in-law says to him, Never trust the right thing done for the wrong reason. And I would apply that in this case that whilst it may be a good thing for her and all of us to focus on our independence and our ability to take care of ourselves or self-soothe at times. In this case, it was being used as justification for her not speaking up about her needs, which really wasn't happening because she was afraid of what might happen if she did. When we're afraid to bring up our needs, what is it we're scared of? We're scared that we might be seen as high maintenance. We're scared that it might lead to confrontation. We're scared that we might seem weak. or needy or overly vulnerable, and that will be perceived as unattractive. We're afraid that we'll be perceived as a nag. At its most extreme, we're afraid that rightly or wrongly, rationally or irrationally, that us bringing something up could precipitate a breakup. We've pictured the unhappiness of someone leaving, but we're not associating with the unhappiness we already have in our needs not being met. We are already in pain if our needs aren't being met. in the situation we're in. We're not avoiding pain, we are in pain. We're just in a different kind of pain. That's something that can be avoided by A, approaching something with confidence, with calm, and of course we're gonna have emotion, but try to have some emotional neutrality in the moment so that you're able to make your case without losing control to your emotions where you now get angry or excessively upset when you're trying to just communicate that, hey, this is something that's important to me. It may not be right or wrong that you don't want to speak to me as much as I want to speak to you, but it's not enough for me right now. It's not enough connection. I see a relationship as a blending of two colors. You represent a color, he represents a color. In a bad relationship that's imbalanced, where one person holds all the power or is in the driving seat and dictates the the rhythm, the routine, the atmosphere, the environment of the relationship. It's almost like this person has this really dominant color and one person comes along and puts a droplet of their color in there just to stain that color slightly, but ultimately it remains this person's color. So the entire relationship now is the color of this person. If you've ever been in the driver's seat, you've noticed this in reverse. You know, they added a tiny drop of their color to you, but ultimately the hue of the relationship, the color of the relationship was your color. In a really balanced and positive relationship, two colors blend together to create a new color altogether. A beautiful, bright new color that is the representation of both worlds, both personalities, both sets of routines, both sets of ideas. We of course retain our individual colors, outside of that, but the relationships color is an equal representation of the two, as opposed to this person retains their individual color and also make sure the entire relationship is their color as well. So ask yourself this question, whether you're married, whether you've been together a few years, or whether you're just starting out with someone. What's the color of your relationship? And is that color representative of a balanced blend of the both of you, or have you, through a desire to appease, to please, to placate, to hold on to that relationship, allowed it to become 90% their color and 10% yours, all the while pretending to yourself that their color is yours too? If you're watching this and thinking, oh, I want to be braver. This is going to require some bravery and I want to push myself to get outside my comfort zone. Then I invite you to watch a training where I coach a woman on stage and show her exactly how to do that. And I think by watching her you'll also see how you too can be braver and get out of your comfort zone. So go to this link. Check it out and I will see you there.
And once again, that link for you is thebravestyou.com that is thebravestyou.com Go to that link, you can get the free training. Alright, pickles, that is it from your old pal Steve today. Just because we're in unusual circumstances, a strange situation, It doesn't mean we have to accept less. It's very easy in this scenario to get into a scarcity mindset where we think, oh my God, this is the only thing I've got. I've got to hold on to it. This person I'm talking to, this person I'm seeing, it doesn't mean we shouldn't communicate firmly our expectations. Every time we do, respect goes up, attraction goes up, our self-worth goes up. Only good things come from communicating what you need and asking for that from the person you want to be with, because that's who you should ask it from. Okay, I'm going to head out now. If you want to email the show and I urge you to do so because I'd love to hear from you, you can email podcast@matthewhussy.com and I will read every single one that comes in my inbox. That is it. I'm heading off now. Have a wonderful day wherever you are. Take care of yourselves and I will see you very soon. See you later.
