In this Love Life with Matthew Hussey podcast episode, Matthew opens with a Regain Couples Therapy sponsorship, then takes a call from Sarah, who feels her new boyfriend is pulling away after she spent a week away on a church youth retreat. Matthew guides Sarah through a series of logical questions, pointing out that her intense early idealization may be premature and that her focus on winning his approval can lower her perceived value. He advises her to maintain her own priorities, act as if she has better things to do, and avoid putting him on a pedestal. The core message is to cultivate self‑worth, stay authentic, and let attraction develop naturally rather than chasing it. The episode ends with a promotion for a free video on “3 Female Mindsets that Drive Men Wild.”
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Hello everyone, this is Love Life with Matthew Hussey. You know, we've all been hurt in relationships. If we're not careful, we can end up shutting ourselves off completely to protect ourselves from more pain. But that cheats us out of opportunities to find the love we really deserve. So what should we do instead? I want to come back to this at the end of the show, but first let's get into today's episode. We have another caller on the line. Her name is Sarah. Sarah, are you there?
Yes, I am.
What's your question?
Okay, so I have been seeing this guy for about a month and a half now. Initially, we kind of hit it off. We got along really, really well. The more I talked to him, got to know him, he turned out to be this great guy. I mean, kind of in my mind, he's like, my dream guy in person. I mean, he just kind of checked everything off for me. So what I kind of started to take a turn for the worse was when I told him beforehand, well, I'm gonna be gone for about a week. I'm doing some work with a youth retreat for church. I'm a big church girl, so I said, I'm not gonna really be able to talk to you too much. I will try to whenever I can. So that week I was only able to call him like once or twice. And when I talked to him, he was same as usual, was saying all kinds of wonderful, sweet things to me, telling me how much he missed me. But it felt like once I got back, not that our conversations changed, but it seemed like he kind of started pulling away a little bit. And I'm not entirely sure why. I mean, he just doesn't really talk to me as much. I'm not really sure how to really grab his attention again.
So I'll tell you one thing that's changed over the course of that month and a half is you've got to like him more and more and more, right? Yeah. And to the extent that in your mind, somewhere in there, you're saying, this could be my dream guy. Yeah. Now, I'm going to ask you a couple of logical questions, and then I'm going to tell you what I learned, because when I was a teenager, I made every mistake a teenage boy can make. So I'll tell you what I learned as I started to get a little older and a little wiser about this stuff. Firstly, could he possibly have shown you enough to make you feel all of those things?
I don't know. I'm thinking about it. I mean, I guess I haven't really seen every side of him yet.
Have you seen the side of him that's dated you for three months?
No.
Or the side of him that's been in a relationship with you for a year? No. What you're feeling is a real feeling, but what it's based on isn't necessarily real. Now, I'm not saying he doesn't have marvelous qualities because he could be an incredible gentleman for all I know. But I also know that for you to be feeling this way this soon might be getting ahead of yourself. Now, there's another thing here. When I was younger, the mistake I always made was I started liking a girl, and then I would try really hard to impress them. I would do everything I could to get them to like me. But here was the problem. The whole time I was worrying about whether they liked me and I was analyzing what's going on, do they like me, do they not? I was always measuring in benchmarks. Well, they said yes to seeing me this weekend, so maybe they do like me. And then I would try and fit into their idea of what I think they would want me to be and try and be that instead of just being me and having fun. All of it started to stunt my personality around that person. And one of the most frustrating things that I experienced growing up was that there were There were girls that I wasn't attracted to, that I was completely silly and myself around and didn't care. And those girls always liked me. I would get so much attraction from those girls 'cause they would start saying, I like you, I really like you. I think you're an amazing guy. And I would say, this is so annoying 'cause I want your friend and you're the one who really likes me. What's the difference? Why can't your friend have your taste in guys? But of course, they didn't necessarily have different tastes, is that they were seeing different versions of me. And what I'd be afraid of for you is that this guy that you like sees a different version of you because you really want him to like you.
It's just, truthfully, like I totally hear what you're saying. Like, that totally makes sense. That sounds, And that was the thing with this guy is I kind of was able to be myself more whereas, and that was one of the things that he said he really liked about me, hence the kind of confusion. But I'm not sure if now maybe it's just he doesn't like me or if there's a way to really capture his attention again.
Well, that's definitely true. He may or may not like who you are. At the end of the day, that's true of everybody. We will never be everybody's cup of tea. Some people will find us to be the most attractive person on earth, and other people they take one look at us and say, that's not my type. Or they get to know us and they say, that person's not my type. But my point is, even right now, there's obviously you're spending time analyzing what you can do differently, how you can get him to like you, or how you can reignite that interest. And what I would say to you is, what would you be doing right now if you had a hundred better things to do? with your time. If you had a ton of- I'm.
Doing 100 better doing all those things.
Absolutely, you'd be doing all of those things and that would make you really attractive. I actually think what you did in the first week when you said, listen, I gotta go away for a week and I've got to do the, you know, we may only speak once or twice in that week, that thing you did there was really attractive. Because what you were saying was, I have my own stuff I gotta take care of. I like you, I wanna talk to you, but I have to take care of this stuff. that's a very attractive thing that you did. And I want you to carry on in that vein because I can't guarantee that this guy is going to get attracted to you. But what I can guarantee is if you start behaving like you have better things to do than to worry about whether he likes you, then you have the best possible chance of him liking you. Because as long as you're in that mindset of trying to impress him, of trying to figure out what he wants, it's it's almost like you're making yourself lower value than he is, and he's not better than you. So don't put him on that pedestal. And understand that if he's not into you right now, no amount of trying is gonna change that. But what you can do is focus on you, upgrading yourself, your life, continuing to do the things that you're passionate about, and letting him see that side of you, because there's nothing sexier than someone who doesn't care ultimately whether you like them or not. That level of distance and detachment will make this guy pay far more attention than asking what you can do to get him to pay more attention. Does that make sense?
Yes, that makes perfect sense. See, and this is why I think you're absolutely amazing.
Well, thank you. You've been so delightful to have on the phone, and it's such a wonderful energy. Never, ever, ever lose that, okay?
Oh, thank you. You're so sweet.
You're very welcome, Sarah. Look after yourself. We'll speak soon, I hope.
Okay, thank you, Matthew.
All right, bye-bye. At the beginning of today's show, I brought up the question, how can we open ourselves up to love again when we've been hurt? In one of my live seminars, I actually coached a woman through this in a Q&A session. and I want to give you free access to it today. I call this video, the 3 Female Mindsets that Drive Men Wild, and it's filled with empowering and practical advice that you can use today. To get your free access, just go to lovelifepodcast.com/mindsets.
