The #1 Sign You’re About to Find Love

Mutato nomine de te fabula narratur. Change only the name and this story is about you. You ever just feel like too much has happened? Like your confidence has been knocked one too many times, that there's not enough time on the clock for you to have the things you used to want? Maybe someone broke your heart, after you gave them everything. Maybe someone made you feel small and unimportant. 2 years ago, a woman named Anne stood up at the back of a retreat, my retreat. She was crying. Life had left her feeling worthless. Tell me what's on your mind right now.

That I'm not worthy.

Does the pain come from somewhere? Is there something that happens in your life that makes you feel not worthy when that comes up for you?

I'm stuck.

What she didn't know, standing there with tears in her eyes, is how unrecognizable her life would be 2 years from this moment.

Oh my God, Matt!

Anne!

How are you?

I'm well, thank you. How are you?

Oh my gosh, I'm like—

It's been, what, uh, 2-year journey since we met.

Yes.

And was it October 2024?

It was September.

September?

Yes, I, I remember very well.

How long have you felt this?

7 years. I was married for 19 and a half years, and I felt alone and unloved. And I was just ashamed that my marriage didn't, didn't work.

And that, I assume, started to really affect your worthiness even back then, right? Because if you give everything to someone And you still feel like they don't see you. That's a very painful thing to experience. That— was that true for you?

Yes.

So there was a divorce 7 years ago?

10 years ago.

10 years ago. So what happened 7 years ago?

And then immediately after, like 8 months after, I met a man talking about being in a toxic relationship. It was probably ranked the worst. It got very toxic, and the first fight and the first cursing and the first calling names.

Did you notice that quickly?

I didn't. I just thought the relationship is like— there's no perfect relationship. So even my first one was at 65% good. This one, 70%, okay, I'll take it.

So how does that story affect you now? What does it— what does it stop you doing, or how does it affect your life? How does it affect your behavior?

I didn't believe that I could— I deserved anything. I feel like I'm not living.

When someone's been feeling unworthy for years, telling them to their face, you're worthy, is probably not going to do a lot. That belief is just too deeply rooted. But we can look in ourselves or our past to find something that we do or used to do that didn't carry the burden of unworthiness. What were you like, Anne, before this? Maybe something we used to do just because. Something we used to do for fun with a level of freedom or abandon. For some of us, it's that we used to dance. I used to laugh harder. I used to not think so hard about what I was gonna say.

I used to sing.

You used to sing? So what was the part of you that used to sing? Tell me about that part.

I was in a church choir for years, and I realized I liked to sing.

Something that we enjoyed before someone made us feel self-conscious about it. But when she sang, What's it like for her to sing? Do you know? Do you remember?

I was— I felt free. You saw how weak I was, weeping, and I was speaking really softly. I don't speak like that.

I want you to look at this. There's this part of you. Do you want to give her a name? The, the, that part of you that sang and sang with love and freedom. What do you want to call her?

It was my childhood Vietnamese name.

Which is?

Tram. T-R-A-M.

So this is her, Tram. What do you feel when you see that? Because that makes you feel something, right?

I'm sorry. I don't want to take everybody's time.

On one hand, Anne was being polite. She was being conscientious to the rest of the audience, which I appreciate. But for Anne, this seemed to belong to a much larger pattern, a lifelong instinct to make herself smaller, more agreeable, and easier for everybody else. So right at the moment where she expressed this fear of taking up space, I asked her to stand up. Anne, would you stand up for me? But I asked her not to stand up as Anne, but to stand up as Tram. In fact, Tram, would you stand up for me, please? When you just said, I'm sorry, I don't want to take up everyone's time, that wasn't Tram speaking. That was this part speaking. Okay? I want to speak to this part for a moment. Tell me about this part. What is it? How does it show up in your life? How does it protect you?

So my American name is Anne, and I am an immigrant, so I grew up in a different country. And a lot of time I feel like I have to put on a— I have to be Americanized.

I have to please everyone, and I have to be a different Is it true that this person didn't exist until you didn't feel seen in your marriage, or is it true that this person actually existed way before that?

Now that you said that, I'm sure it started way before that.

The playful part of Anne hadn't disappeared because it had simply stopped existing. It just didn't feel like life was a safe place for that part of Anne to exist. So it got hidden. This is the part of you that makes you quiet, makes you think you can't stand up in a room, makes you feel like you can't take up space. This part is constantly telling you what to do, isn't it? When our mind decides that being ourselves gets us hurt, it starts searching for another way to keep us safe. And for Anne, that was people pleasing, avoiding conflict, and taking up as little space as possible. The strategies we develop to avoid being rejected by other people This is the exile. This is the part of you that got banished, and this part banished it.

Why?

Because if you continue to be her, you're never gonna survive. This carefree little girl who loves to sing and does it with love in her heart, If you continue to be Tram, you're gonna get eaten alive. So what's gonna happen if you talk to Tram on your own? If Tram gets too much of a voice, what does this part of you, the manager, say? What's the danger?

I, I think the manager takes over.

By this point, Anne had adopted the word manager for the protective voice that we were describing. Her manager was the side of her that was Always trying to manage the risk. To please everybody. To avoid conflict. To stay small. To not ask for too much. To not give anyone a reason to reject you. Now, there was nothing wrong with her wanting to protect herself. The problem was that this manager had come to believe that keeping Anne safe meant keeping Tram hidden. Tram's just a child who's excited. Do excited children have opinions? Do they have thoughts? Yeah, of course. They're full of them. 'Cause if we let her speak too much, she's gonna start upsetting people. She's gonna fuck this whole shit up that you have carefully constructed to never have to have conflict with anybody. Tram wants to sing and be loud and be bigger, but this manager can't allow that. Because if she does, she's gonna take up too much space. So the question became this: could the same protective instinct be given a completely different job? This part of you, Tram, she's not thinking someone is hurt, someone is taking more than they're giving to us. She's not thinking that. She's just like, love. That's Tram. She's awesome. She's great. But what Tram needs is another part of you that takes care of her, not that banishes her and locks her up and doesn't let her come out. What she needs is a bodyguard, a guardian, whatever you want to call it. And that guardian isn't there to make Tram smaller. The guardian is there to make sure that Tram gets treated right. The manager clears the way for Tram. And if Tram keeps running into a painful situation, the manager goes, nope. What clicked for you during that exchange that we had?

We keep telling ourselves that we, we're not worthy, but that's the inner child speaking.

Does it— do you feel it?

I can see the bodyguard.

You can see the bodyguard.

I just wanted to understand why I felt that way, and you made me understand. You have to own it, and you have to believe that you deserve it.

Just right there, that was the first time you smiled like that. That was a little bit of trying. Give this woman a giant round of applause.

Thanks for taking up your time.

Say that, say that again. Say that again.

I said thanks for taking up your time.

Hey, wait, wait, wait, wait. She said, thank you. That's fucking awesome. Hey, I want everyone to realize that's huge. Let's just pause for a moment. She didn't say sorry. She said, thank you. Now, that may sound like a tiny change in language, but it's not. It's evidence that in that moment, We can receive attention without treating our existence as an inconvenience. For Anne, that is exactly what happened that day, and it represented a fundamental shift in her mindset.

It took that retreat for me to tell myself that yes, I'm worthy of love. There is a man out there that can see me and sees me and loves me because of who I am, because of my personality, what the values that I have, um, and it's gonna love me for the rest of my life and doesn't want to be with anyone else but me.

That version of you didn't just give a gift to you, didn't just allow you to receive a gift. The version of you that was bigger gave a gift to everyone else. Everyone, everyone in this room saw a piece of themselves in what you just mapped out for them. If you are watching this thinking, I want to experience doing the same work on myself that Anne did on herself, my live retreat is happening in October on the 24th and the 25th. It's the last in-person retreat I'm doing for some time. So, for anyone who's been on the fence or been thinking about this for a long time, now is your chance. I have someone I love dearly who is available to speak to you on the phone about the program. His name is Billy Jennings. He's been with me since the beginning. He's amazing. You'll love talking to him, and he can help you determine whether this is right for you. I'll leave a link below. It's mhretreat.com. That link will take you through to his calendar. And if you know this is right for you, take advantage while it's available because it's not going to be available next year. I hope to see you in October. Now let's get back to the story.

Toward the end of the Fort Lauderdale retreat, I felt like a new person already, and I didn't want to stop. I didn't want to go back to the old track. And so I was telling myself, That I needed that momentum.

Did you join Club 320 there in Fort Lauderdale?

Yeah, I joined Club 320, and it didn't take me long to, to make my decision. Took like a minute.

After the retreat, Anne stayed in our world. She became part of Club 320, my private coaching community, where the work didn't have to end when everyone else went home. Didn't we have a Club 320 call one month where you were in the car and you were telling me—

That was April. April of 2025. I feel like I'm being too trusting, at the same time too doubtful, um, when I, uh, am in a relationship, especially this new guy. I was dating this guy very, very, um, privately. We even like go out in public that much because I wasn't even sure.

Has anything happened that your intuition has told you is, uh, in any way concerning?

So the red flag that might be a red flag is that he loves me because number one, I don't have tattoo, number two, I don't date online, and then number 3, I guess being Asian, I'm a little bit of submissive.

Nothing you just said to me made me feel happy as someone who cares about you. I was waiting for Anne to tell me, I love him, or I care about this person, or I'm really having a great time with this person because he treats me like X. It feels to me very reminiscent of situations in your past where you have not been treated as someone's equal?

And I'm like, well, uh, I mean, you were just direct and you didn't hold back.

Do you— if you said to me, what describes Anne? Do you think I would say no tattoos, doesn't online date, is submissive? Would you say Matthew Hussey really gets me? If I described you that way? You wouldn't. You'd feel like he knows nothing about me. He doesn't see me. And I want to have you remember where you were on that retreat, the pain you were in, the pain of being in a situation where someone did not respect you as their equal and did not see you, did not validate your experience. Did not get you, and how painful that was at the end of it all. Your job now is to see from here that there are signs here that there's another person in your life that you're giving a lot of time and energy to that isn't really seeing you. All I ask. Is that you be in this relationship the person you left our retreat to be. The last relationship that was bad, you stayed 10 years. This one, you stayed 3 months.

My previous relationship, I tried to fix it instead of running away from it. I'm like, I'm gonna fix him. I'll change him. Well, no. I'm not that Anne anymore.

Over the following year, I got to see more of the woman that we had spent time with in that room. She came with us on a Club 320 getaway to Cape Cod. She formed friendships. She laughed more.

It smells like jasmine. Hmm, it reminds me of Vietnam. Oh, we were upstairs having Dinner or something, and just casually I talk about these guys, and then you're like, don't, don't. I don't remember how you said it, but I just, I knew. And I'm like, yeah, I'm not gonna go after these, this kind of traits anymore. I became more confident. I believe in myself. I got stronger, wiser, and then it all come, all come in like a package. It's just a matter of time that someone sees that in me.

What a powerful statement that is, like for us to do this work on ourselves, because that's the thing, right? Sometimes we do this kind of work and. We're like anxiously waiting for something to happen. But to say, I've done this work on myself, I can trust that the change is real, that it's foundational, and it's just a matter of time before someone sees who I've become.

Focus on the process of becoming a better person than the result. Because I'm like, in the past, I was just like, okay, I'm— I want this guy, blah, blah, blah, blah. ABCD. Now I just want to be this person. And like you said, and like I said earlier, someone's gonna see it. It's just a matter of time someone will see it.

And then one morning I got this message. When I got that email, it, like, I lit up. It's so, so exciting. It's so obvious to me why I'm speaking to you now on a vacation where you're celebrating your engagement to this wonderful man.

I have been myself. Which is the greatest thing. And I, I told Chris since day one, I said, this is me. This is all the past. You know, everyone has a past, and this is my past. Um, this is my issues, my troubles, my, my problems. I've worked on it. Um, this is who I am now. And he's like, I love every single bit of it. One day I'll, I'll probably surprise you and take him to go see you at your retreat or something, because he was like so intrigued of all these stories that I told him, how I become myself today.

I want to give you 2 guest tickets to the retreat to come and be with us this year if you'd like to accept them. We have 2 VIP tickets for you and Chris.

I'll be there.

Anne was engaged. And I was thrilled for her, but after the initial excitement wore off, I found myself thinking about something else. Because being engaged isn't what moved me the most. Being in a relationship by itself is not proof that somebody has healed. The question I kept coming back to was this: Who was Anne when she met him? Had she genuinely learned to stop abandoning herself? Had she learned to let herself take up space? Had she learned that she didn't have to become smaller in order to be loved? Because if the answer to those questions was yes, then this really wasn't a story about an engagement. It was a story about someone who had genuinely changed her relationship with herself and the way she was showing up in the world. That is what I wanted to ask her.

I met both the asshole and Chris, the love of my life, the same month. Actually, the same week. So last year when I met Chris, I was just being myself, at peace. Wasn't even like— wasn't focusing on anything. I was just working out and, you know, being myself. Then I went to Cape Cod, and he had asked me out right around then. But I'm like, I'm going to this Cape Cod retreat, and we'll catch up when we come back. But that was the beginning. We just talk every day and got very close. And because I did that, I saw how perfect Chris is. He saw something in me, um, and he said this almost every day, you smart, you wise, you beautiful, and you have a good soul. And he said, that's just perfect. Um, And like I said, I'm just taking it all in.

Do you know what, like, is— I find really fascinating is that this asshole and this incredible sounding man you're with now, who's like, just seems to see you and truly love you and he's got your back, they were side by side at the same club. Our life Can be completely different based on these choices that we make. They, they were in the same place, and if you go one way with the asshole, and you didn't just leave after 3 months, if you— if that turned into a 10-year relationship, it would have— your life would have crumbled. And just, you know, a few feet away is a guy that— You could have an extraordinary life with, who treats you well, who sees you, who's kind. I have to ask because it's a memorable moment for me from that day. How much do you think Tram comes out in your relationship today? And do you feel like Chris sees Tram? Tram, would you stand up for me, please?

It's funny because he started calling me Tram. Um, I probably think all of me, everything of me, the bad, the good, I don't even care anymore, you know, because like I'm just feeling so peaceful and at ease. And it's because I told him everything since day one. I'm not hiding. Um, so there's no surprises.

To me, what you're describing is like a full integration of your personality and all of these different aspects of you. You talk about him accepting you. To me, like, the star of this whole conversation is that you have accepted you because you put yourself in a place where you did show up and you are— like, I love how many notes you make. And I love the fact that your Club 320 journal Is with you right now in in on your vacation for your engagement. I love it. I saw that. I was like, oh my God! That's so good that you brought it with you. It's amazing, and it speaks to the fact that you're just you know you you keep these lessons dear to you, and you keep using them, and that's amazing. And I'm I'm so grateful. You know, you didn't have to spend this time on your vacation. To celebrate your engagement. I— it means the world to me that you did.

No, no, the one thing about Chris is I have all the freedom in the world. Isn't that great, Matt? Because I never thought I would have it. Yeah, if I said I'm going to the retreat October, okay, go, because that's what Ann wants. Seriously. And if he has something busy, I would go and And I don't have anything in October. October is my birthday anyway, so I might go. I'm like 90% sure, 'cause I wanna see all of you guys and I wanna hear these stories and I just want them to have the same result that I did that day, September 2024.

I think the thing that struck me the most about my conversation with Anne was the sense of inevitability inevitability about good things happening in her life. I really believe that the changes that Anne made were so foundational, so fundamental, that had she not met the man she did when she did, I truly believe she would have met somebody else. I believe something else incredible would have happened in her life. So we must never let what has happened in our lives, no matter how much has happened, blind us to what can happen in the future. Thank you for watching. I will see you next time.