Matthew Hussey argues the idea of 'the one' is statistically impossible and harmful. People either stay in bad relationships convinced they found their match, or jump between partners chasing perfection. Love isn't destiny, he says. It's built through effort and investment.
I have a particular problem in my profession and that's that people constantly ask me how do I know when I've met the one? Or they'll ask me how do I find the one? The problem for me is that when people ask these questions I have a hard time telling them the truth about what I actually believe. That's a lie. I used to have a hard time telling them the truth about what I believe. Now I find it much easier. The one doesn't exist. Not only do I not think it's real but I'm glad that the idea of the one isn't real. Firstly, why it's not real. Take Jane. Jane has met the one at her college class. In fact, he just happened to sit next to her in her sociology class. She says, he's the one. I'm so happy that I finally met him. And what an incredible world where the one was sitting next to me in my sociology class. That would be an incredible world, Jane. Because there's seven billion people on earth. This is slightly simplistic, but let's say 3.5 billion of them are men. many of them are too young and many of them are too old. We're left with approximately 1 billion guys. Let's just put these numbers into context for a minute. 1 billion guys. One of those guys is the one. Let's take a woman who meets three guys a day, every day for the next 50 years, which we already know is a ludicrously high number of guys, because most women don't meet three guys a day. But let's say they do. Over 50 years, that's around 55,000 55,000 guys that she meets. Well, 55,000 guys as a percentage of 1 billion is 0.005% chance that she'll meet the one. Now think about that. That's meeting three guys a day for 50 years, and she still only has a 0.005% chance of meeting the one. And yet we look around and we know anecdotally that far more than 0.005% of women have found a guy that they want to spend the rest of their life with. So why are these numbers so different? Here's the point. We want to believe in the idea of the one. Human beings crave this idea. One of the reasons I believe we crave it is because we like simplicity. We don't like the idea that many people could be the one. We like the idea that there's one person out there that's right for us. It's what movies have taught us. It's what books have taught us. And it seems neat and tidy because if there's just one person out there, then I can just keep searching for that one person who it's supposed to be perfect with. What we have to do is we just have to sit back and wait for the one to arrive. and when they do, we'll know about it. There's a reason that I don't like this concept. What happens when you're in a relationship and the one cheats on you? What happens when you're in a relationship and the one starts disrespecting you or treating you badly consistently? There are two schools of thought on this. One person would say stick around because they're the one. You have to fight it out and make it work because they're the one. Which of course is a recipe for living your life out with someone who doesn't meet your standards. the other person would say, no, leave, because that means he's not the one. Leave, because the one is still out there. They're not the one. It's what leads to chronic relationship hopping. It's what leads people to consistently leave relationships when they find out they're not perfect and passionate every single day. Part of the problem is that we live in this incredibly entitled society. We have this entitlement culture where we believe, we're led to believe, that we're supposed to just find the one and it be amazing, that we're entitled to that. And I think that's a problem. We're not entitled to something, but to have the opportunity to create something. And this to me is, this is my big argument. You know, I'm not a cynic. People will be watching this and this is what you'll see in the comments is people go, oh, but Matt, life has meaning and it somehow brings the one to you and that's how it works and you just don't get that. You're a cynic. I'm not a cynic. I believe that the idea of love at first sight is the most unromantic idea there is. If we believe that the one comes ready-made, We know we don't really have to work on a relationship. This person comes to us ready for us. And I think that's an abhorrent concept. The idea that I could look at someone across the room and oh, they're just right for me and they've done nothing for me but they're just right for me. What an insult to a marriage of 50 years where people look back and go, Look at what this person has done for me. That's what makes them special, is how much they've invested in me, what we've built together. The idea of love at first sight is an insult to long-term relationships.
