Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux - I AM 43 AND I DESERVE LOVE! CALL IN SHOW

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Sept. 12, 2025 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

02:18:04

I AM 43 AND I DESERVE LOVE! CALL IN SHOW

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	So the question I was I've been struggling with is should I give up on love?
	And what I wrote in is I will never give up on finding love because more than anything, I want a wife and a family.
	But I'm in a rough spot after a difficult breakup with a woman who didn't want to get married after two and a half year relationship.
	I was previously in a sexless marriage for most of my youth, and I wonder how that, my religiosity and my history are affecting me now, and what I can do to make the most of the time I have.
	I'm 43, and I know you're a Pink Floyd fan.
	I've got time just thumping in my chest all the time.
	I'm empathic, loving, well into my self-knowledge journey, spiritual.
	I make good money as an IT professional.
	I'm tall.
	People have even told me I'm good looking.
	Work out regularly.
	I've been porn-free for the for two years.
	It's so discouraging how hard dating has been after my 2016 divorce.
	I know you spend a lot of time talking about relationships with callers.
	And after a very excuse me, after a very recent breakup from a two-month relationship, I found I thought was promising after the aforementioned two and a half year relationship.
	I feel I could use an outside perspective on what to work on and do differently.
	Right.
	I appreciate that.
	And you know, looking for love is is a big challenge, and I'm happy to uh chat about it.
	And I mean, happy to hear about childhood.
	I'm happy to hear about um the last relationship.
	Where do you think we should start?
	You know, first I just want to say that uh I've been a listener for a long time.
	Your material has really helped me out a lot, uh and I really appreciate that.
	Um I guess that's starting with uh the recent two and a half year relationship, because that's been it's kind of been the epicenter of my life for the past six months.
	I'm sorry, how old are you?
	I'm 43.
	43.
	Okay, got it.
	Sorry, go ahead.
	Yeah, so I met that relationship two and a half years.
	I'm going to refer to them as the big breakup and the little breakup just to keep it easy in my head.
	But the woman I met in the big breakup, we met in a Christian um singles group, and you know, it was it was a great relationship, as far as I could tell.
	That's why it's been so hard.
	We got along well, talked had great conversations, did lots of things that we enjoyed together.
	Um she told me at the very beginning that she wasn't sure if she ever wanted to get married, and I should have listened to her.
	Um, because about a year in, she told me we went to a wedding for one of her co-workers, and after that wedding, she told me she never saw herself up on the altar.
	And naturally, that scared the shit out of me.
	And I was I was so afraid to lose her, I didn't I didn't really pressure or push her.
	Um I tried not to.
	I mean, I did um I did push to get married in different ways down the line, which I'm sure we can get into.
	Um gosh, like, you know, we got to the point where she really did not want to get married, and uh all she would tell me is that she needed time to herself, and she wasn't sure if she could put together, put forth all that being a wife and mother required.
	And so we broke up last fall, and it's it's been devastating.
	I've never felt grief like this before.
	I'm so sorry.
	How um how old is she?
	She's 34.
	She's 34.
	And so she met you met when she was like what, 31 and a half kind of thing, right?
	That's right.
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	Got it.
	All right.
	Okay.
	And as you said, you didn't really ask her, or she had some indications about hesitancy towards marriage, but um it wasn't as much as you thought could be overcome.
	Is that right?
	Yeah, that's right.
	You know, I've always um felt that You do you pay attention to what people do, not so much what people say.
	And we I met her family that Christmas.
	Um I met her, I spent quite a bit of time with her family.
	She's met my family on several occasions.
	Um we're both religious.
	We spent a lot of time going to church together, had really deep and intimate conversations, as you would expect for two and a half year relationship.
	So it seemed like okay, you know, this is it.
	She wants, I mean, of course, I'm projecting my own, my own desires.
	Um, and I was afraid to tell her to really ask her, like, well, what do you what do you want?
	And she would always tell me something like she wasn't sure what she wanted from her life, and you know, that's manifested in in this breakup.
	But yeah, um, I wanted to change her mind, so to speak, and thought I could.
	Okay, and so she would claim to be religious, uh, isn't uh is she Christian, right?
	That's right.
	Okay.
	Specifically Catholic.
	Right.
	So isn't Catholicism somewhat embedded with, you know, go forth and procreate?
	That's what I thought, too.
	No, no, that's not what I think.
	Isn't that what it is?
	Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
	So she's not that religious.
	Well, she is.
	I mean, she would not miss church.
	No, no, but it's who cares about going to church.
	What matters, I mean, I'm not not that it doesn't matter, but it's like saying she goes to the gym, but she doesn't work out.
	I mean, the whole point of going to the gym is to work out, and the whole point of going to church is to live the values, right?
	Yeah, can't argue with that.
	So what was her what was her explanation as to why she claimed to be Catholic, but didn't want to get married and and procreate.
	Now, again, she wants to be a nun or something like that.
	Um, but what was her what was her theory about that or her story about that.
	Well, you know, um she would emotionally block up when I would really push her.
	I I would ask her these questions, exactly that, what you're asking me.
	Um, why don't you want to get married?
	What's what's to stop?
	What's the deal?
	And she would she would start to cry and just emotionally freeze up and I feel bad.
	Um, and I'd want to Oh, so she was manipulated that way.
	Like, uh, I can't, it's too upsetting.
	It's just a way of avoiding answers, right?
	Yeah.
	I mean, I'm not trying to, you know, besmirch your your affection or your love for the woman, but that's not that's not fair, right?
	She she knew you wanted to get married.
	And it's it's not fair to not answer the question.
	Yeah, and you know, in fairness, I didn't want to hear the answer if it wasn't gonna be no.
	And still just know that.
	What is another what is another central tenet of Christianity?
	Thou shalt not bear what?
	False, false witness.
	False witness.
	You don't lie.
	So if somebody says, why don't you want to get married?
	Who wants to get married?
	You have a responsibility to tell the truth.
	So again, I'm trying to figure out where this super duper religiosity is coming from.
	Yeah, it's it's not to see religion as a series of rules, women tend to see religion as a series of comforts.
	Men follow religion regardless of the discomfort.
	Women often resist religion's discomforts and follow it for serenity for sanctuary for solace, but they don't a lot of times don't quite seem to see that religion exists to go against our instincts to prevaricate or to lie or to mislead or to exploit.
	And we don't obviously she's not here, so we don't have to get into too much detail, but um, why wasn't she married?
	That's a heck that that's that's another good question because I was her first serious relationship at 32, 31, which is very late.
	You know, she was a good looking gal.
	I thought I had struck the law, I thought I'd struck gold to meet somebody that was in my age range, but also had not a ton of experience.
	And well, without asking yourself the question, how is this amazing?
	Um is this amazing woman still on the market?
	Right.
	Right.
	You know, I've done a lot of reading on after the breakup on attachment styles.
	Um, and I know it's not necessarily philosophical, but it's been helpful for me.
	I definitely tend toward anxiety in my life.
	I've done a lot of work to curtail that and to work on that.
	Um after reading about avoidant attachment styles attached or avoidant people in general, that's kind of the my working hypothesis as to what happened, where you know, we got too close, and for whatever reason, in spite of all of her beliefs and religiosity and all of that, she just couldn't deal with being close to someone and pushed me away.
	Okay.
	She couldn't deal with that.
	I'm not sure what that means.
	Well, um, you know, when we first started dating, we had no problem talking about anything, or so it seemed, but it it was early stages, right?
	And then I again when I when I pushed her, when I when I, you know, I so for example, I'd say, let's read this book on relationships to get ready for marriage.
	And she didn't really want to read the book.
	Um then I'd say, let's go talk to let's go talk to a priest, you know, and figure out what's going on.
	And she didn't really want to do that either.
	Sorry, the religious I'm sorry, the religious woman didn't want to talk to the priest for advice.
	Yeah.
	All right.
	Yeah.
	And you know, in retrospect, I could see I could see the the red flags.
	Um I don't know why she didn't.
	I don't know.
	Well, you know what?
	I really want to take responsibility because she told me from the beginning that she wasn't sure, and then she told me when she told me at that after that wedding that she wasn't sure if she ever wanted to get married.
	I was so scared to lose her that I just buried it.
	And you know, what I should have done at that moment has been what's like why the hell why the hell don't you want to get married?
	What the hell's going on?
	Like uh this is a big deal for that.
	Yeah.
	Um my anger is is there.
	I I'm I feel like so all my emotions are just within uh arm's reach right now.
	Uh-huh.
	But you're right.
	Maybe not that aggressively, but uh I really regret just like rolling over and not really tackling it head on at the time, and instead kind of adopting a strategy of, well, I'll show her how awesome I am and then change her mind that way.
	Right.
	Okay.
	And so you met her 31 and a half, you you broke up when she was 34, is that right?
	That's right.
	Okay.
	And you don't have any idea why she didn't want to get married but wanted to date.
	You know, I asked her out and she said she's not sure.
	Now, she seemed very enthusiastic in the early stages of dating, you know, with the affection, and we never got we never had sex all the way.
	Um we came pretty close.
	She was enthusiastic about that.
	And given my history of being in a sexless marriage, I was like, oh, okay.
	This lady, you know, she's um she's we aligned on values and she likes sex.
	This is awesome.
	Um I assume if you like sex and you like the company of a man, you like affection, you know, you like all doing all the things that couples do, then you would want to continue that forward and get married.
	So yeah, it's been really frustrating because uh experiencing all of that and then getting to the point where, okay, let's do this, and then we don't, because she says she's she's not not available for that for whatever reason.
	Um when we broke up, actually, she wrote me a note and she said that her commitment level doesn't rise up to what's required for marriage.
	And she's not she's not confident that she will be able to stand beside me no matter what.
	Okay, I I don't really know what that means, but all right.
	Yeah, I'm I'm right there with you.
	Okay.
	So um tell me the things that you liked about her.
	Well, you know, um in hot crazy matrix, uh, they say that like the the standard is the crazy starts at a four, right?
	And I feel like as far as looks go, any woman that's takes care of herself and isn't overweight, probably starts at a five or a six.
	She was about there.
	You know, I wasn't initially attracted to her looks.
	Um, but then she told me that she um took concealed carry classes from a guy that I was also training with, and my interest level shot up to like an eleven.
	So I liked her conservative values.
	Uh she's she was smart.
	Um she was a scientist, chemist, she studied chemistry and work in the lab.
	So we can nerd out about science stuff together.
	We talked about religion and faith extensively and connected on that.
	So I really appreciated that.
	Her family was decent, definitely some issues there, but considering my previous relationship.
	It was like a walk in the park, what it felt like.
	And besides all that, we just we had a lot of people.
	That's right.
	Okay, got it.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, and besides that, you know, we were into the same kind of things outdoors, camp camping, hiking.
	Um I'm in the mountain west now, so that's that's a lifestyle.
	And she's an adventurous person, so she was always down to go with me and go out in the woods and hike up a mountain.
	Um so we had a lot in common.
	And I've listened to enough of these calls to know by asking myself, well, what are the virtues?
	Um she was a caring and loving, especially.
	No.
	I was gonna say to her.
	No, no, come on.
	You you can't you can't say that she strung you along with maybe maybe for a couple of years, knowing how that you're older and you want to get married, and then just by golly, she but she's just such a kind and loving person.
	No.
	I'm I I'm I can't give you that.
	I mean, that that's just that's functionally impossible.
	That's fair.
	So what do you what are you trying to sell me here?
	And why?
	You know this one, right?
	You know, you you know.
	I do.
	I mean, nice try, I guess.
	I do.
	I I will admit, you know, um, you know, I've heard a lot of these calls and being on here with with you, it's it's definitely I'm feeling like a lot of people.
	I just want to get away from automatic talk, you know, like, oh, she was just nice and she was sweet and she was this and she was that but none of that's particularly true.
	I mean, if it was true, then she wouldn't have strung you along in this kind of way, which is unbearably cruel, right?
	I mean, she she took up, and it's one thing she's in her 30s, you're in her 40s, you're in your 40s, right?
	So she took you from your late 30s to your early 40s um without a an answer and without giving you a clear answer until the end, right?
	I mean, that that's not that's not caring.
	That's not caring for someone.
	Yeah, and she would probably say something like, Well, you were fine with it.
	You know, you um I told you I didn't I wouldn't want to get married when we first met, and then I told you after a year, and you know, you stuck around.
	It's probably what you're saying.
	Sorry, did she say from the very beginning she didn't want to get married?
	No, she said she wasn't sure.
	So that's a lie then.
	I mean, if she were to say, I said I didn't want to get married, when she simply said she wasn't sure, that's a different matter, right?
	Right.
	Right, because there's uncertainty there.
	Well, there's a lot of so that's bearing false witness as well.
	Now, of course, she might say, Well, I thought maybe I would or could or whatever, right?
	And then, don't you know, it just turned out that it didn't really work for me.
	Gosh, don't you know, right?
	So, yeah, I mean, that's that's that's certainly a possibility, right?
	Uh and and what do you th do you think that's the case that she was open to it, and then she wasn't?
	Something happened over the two and a half years that she just didn't want to get married, I guess to you.
	Well, that's kind of scary.
	You know, that I just didn't cut the mustard on some level.
	Um, I've been spending a lot of time.
	I mean we shouldn't have to theorize because did she indicate that there were things that were deficient in the relationship.
	No, no, she told me it's not you.
	It's a typical it's not you, it's me.
	That's what I got.
	Okay, so but she went from maybe wanting to get married to not wanting to get married when she was dating you.
	So what changed?
	Or was she lying from the beginning?
	That she just knew she was never going to get married, but she didn't want to tell you because she wanted to date you.
	You know, when the last conversation we had, she told she she she said, sorry that you were the guinea pig, which implied to me that maybe I was in her mind trying out what it's like to be with a with a man to have a boyfriend and maybe think about marriage, but in the end, she decided that it wasn't for her.
	Aaron Powell Okay, but why not?
	What did she say?
	At least what did we don't know for sure, maybe, but what does she say?
	Right.
	Well, what she told me is over several conversations, is that she has a lot of need for a lot of free time to herself, time to herself.
	She's an extreme introvert.
	And that if she's married to me, she doesn't know how she could navigate her need for time and space and still fulfill her duties as a wife.
	Okay.
	So she knew that about marriage to begin with, so what was the maybe?
	That's a good point.
	And you know, we spent a lot of time together in the first well, throughout our relationship, I was basically at her house like four days a week.
	And we'd have conversations like, well, maybe we're spending too much time together, we should take some time apart.
	But I never got that.
	She'd always mentioned something like that.
	And I'd say, like, okay, that's fine.
	You know, I'll go do some my own thing on a Sunday evening or Saturday afternoon or whatever.
	And it seemed like it was fine.
	I never got the sense that I was smothering her.
	So I'm quite I'm quite confused.
	Um by by that, that she knew that she that as a Christian, the purpose of dating is marriage, and we both agreed on that.
	And uh that eventually those demands would be made on her time, and she dated me anyway.
	Okay, do you know why she was an introvert or so introverted?
	Did she have any trauma in her youth or was that just her nature, or what was the story there?
	I didn't experience her as that introverted.
	Like as a directly.
	Yeah, no, I I get you.
	Those were her words.
	Um and I was always confused by that as well, because my experience with her is that our time together, I never got the sense that it was too much.
	Or that she was overwhelmed.
	Um she does have some trauma in her past.
	Sorry, sorry, I was a little confused.
	I thought she told you explicitly that you were spending too much time together and she needed time apart.
	Did I misunderstand that?
	No.
	Uh I think maybe you misunderstood the degree to which with what you're telling me, right?
	So you you said she was an extreme inver introvert and that Sunday nights or whatever she'd say we're spending too much time together, I need time apart, right?
	But then you can also say she didn't give me an indication of how introverted she was or how much she needed time apart, because she said that to you directly if I understand what you're saying.
	No, no, that's fair.
	That's fair to say.
	What I wanted to add the caveat that the that conversation, we're spending too much time apart, let's not spend Sunday nights together.
	No, no, spending too much time together.
	Right.
	We're spending too much time together.
	Okay.
	Let's take a Sunday apart from each other.
	That conversation happened maybe once every two months.
	So And how was she with socializing with say your friends or your family?
	I mean, did she seem introverted in that way as well?
	No.
	No, she seemed normal.
	Normal.
	I know that's a what does that mean?
	I get it.
	Just normal amount of gregariousness or sociability.
	Okay.
	Got it.
	All right.
	So maybe the introverted thing was an excuse.
	Possibly.
	I know that word, right?
	I mean, it possibly, yeah.
	Maybe she was a space alien.
	That's possible too, I suppose, but I don't know how to how to navigate the vaguely possible stuff.
	Uh okay.
	So what is it uh how how did it end?
	Was it anything that happened in particular when it ended?
	Yeah, I was getting really frustrated and more.
	I guess I was putting more pressure on our relationship with just what the fuck are we doing here?
	What are we doing?
	Um the day that we broke up, I had set up an appointment to talk to a priest for the two of us, and let me back up a little bit.
	We went to a wedding, uh, another wedding with a mutual friends, and this couple had met before we did.
	And here they are getting married.
	So it was a very difficult wedding for me to sit through because I'm like, I I want to be up there, I want to get married.
	Why are we still in this nebulous dating phase?
	So after that point, I think my patience was pretty much at its end.
	And I so I had made a I had made an appointment to talk to a priest, which she agreed to go to and then canceled, and then I went anyway.
	And when I went, I talked to the priest, and you know, got some advice from him, spiritual advice.
	And then I shared with her that I went to the priest, and here's what he said, and then that started the conversation that ended our relationship.
	And basically, you know, she said, I'm done.
	I'm not gonna do this, I'm not gonna get married.
	So we ended up taking a two-week break, but that ended up in us breaking up after the two weeks were over.
	And why was she upset as a Catholic or as a Christian that you went to talk to a priest to get advice?
	Aaron Powell She wasn't upset that I went to talk to the priest.
	She was I think upset that this marriage question kept coming up and kept coming up, and it wasn't going to go away.
	And my it seems to me that she was just I'm done.
	And was she done in kind of like an angry way or or what?
	No, she was I could tell that she didn't want to hurt my feelings.
	And that she was it was difficult for her to make that decision.
	Uh she had indicated that in the months before, and I didn't know this, that she was emotionally tormented by the prospect of getting married and feeling a lot of pressure to get married.
	I really regret that we didn't talk about it.
	Because I didn't I didn't know that she felt this way.
	Not until the very end.
	But basically what she said was, I'm emotionally tapped out and I've got nothing.
	I don't know.
	I don't know what that means, emotionally tapped out.
	Um something like I can't stand feeling this way anymore.
	So I'm gonna make these feelings stop by breaking up with you.
	And the feeling this way was related to you guys getting married and you wanted to get married, right?
	Right.
	The pressure that she was experiencing.
	Okay.
	Right.
	So she doesn't want to have kids, she doesn't want to get married, and that's just the way it was, right?
	And at some point, I mean, was you did you get a sense that there was anything that changed wherein she was open to the idea of marriage, and then she wasn't?
	Not a black and white shift from open to not.
	Well no, of course it's not a black and white shift by definition, right?
	It's gonna be subtle.
	But uh that's my question.
	Was there anything that you noticed or or thought about?
	All I can think of was that wedding that we went to for her coworker, where two days later she said she doesn't see herself up on the altar.
	And I found out later during our breakup conversation that she expected me to break up with her in that moment.
	So I've wondered if she intended to break up with me in a subtle way.
	You know, not breaking up with me directly, but saying something that would make me break up with her because I want to get married, and she basically says she doesn't.
	Okay.
	So was it just her looks?
	Was it mostly her looks that had you so hopeful?
	That's a big part of it, if I'm honest.
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	I mean, that's that's a risk, right?
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	So you spent two and a half years with this woman, she ended up not wanting to get married, we assume in general, but certainly to you, right?
	Right.
	And why uh and how long ago did you break up?
	That was last fall, so about six months ago.
	Okay.
	And how long have you been listening to what I do?
	Over ten years.
	So why the hell wouldn't you call me?
	Honestly.
	Um, let's be honest.
	Why not?
	Yeah.
	I I was I was so enthralled that a woman gave that gave me the time of day that I was attracted to.
	Everything just kind of fell by the wayside, and I was off in happy lala land, I get, you know.
	I mean, I didn't tell you.
	Yeah, but you're not a teenager, bro.
	I mean, you've you've got a tortured relationship with a woman where you want to get married and she's kind of flitting around like some butterfly in a windstorm.
	And you've been listening to me for ten years, and you know, you can do whatever you want, obviously, but I'm just kind of curious why you wouldn't uh call me.
	I felt something I felt some pretty substantial fears.
	I I didn't I was I I I I was terrified of losing her.
	And I didn't even want to look at the fear.
	I'm just like the that fear is in his or the fact that you're living in terror of losing a woman after years of dating is a seriously bad sign, isn't it?
	Yes, that is.
	You know, it's like if you've had a job for two years and you go in every day with your palms sweating that you're gonna get screamed at and fired, that's a toxic work environment, isn't it?
	Yeah.
	Yeah, and thinking about how how attractive do you think it was to this woman for you to be so cucked and terrified of her and feeling out of your league and out of your depth, and she's too good for me, and I've got a beg and my God, that's gross to women as it would be to a man, right?
	I mean if if there was some woman who was just completely terrified of you and and just always nervous that you were gonna dump her and you know, month after month, year after year, I mean, wouldn't that get kind of exhausting and annoying?
	Yeah, absolutely.
	And you know, so let's let's go let's go to childhood, right?
	Because this is this is childhood stuff, right?
	That you have no leverage, that you've just got to cross your fingers and hope and beg, and then you get angry when your needs aren't met, and then you fear again, all right.
	That's gotta be a mom thing, or maybe a dad thing, probably a mom thing.
	So let's talk about your mom.
	Where to start?
	The very beginning?
	My childhood.
	Um they what I remember my childhood is being dragged to church against my will.
	The religion was laid on really thick and powerfully.
	My parents did not get along from for as long as I can remember.
	And it was centered around the religion.
	Um my mother wanted everybody to follow along in lockstep.
	And my dad was like, Nope.
	Uh, you know, I'm not I'm not there.
	I'm not I'm not on on the same page.
	So you have to talk to me like I'm not you.
	Right?
	So you're you're saying things that make sense to you.
	How on earth am I supposed to know what you mean by my mom wanted us to walk along in lockstep and my father didn't.
	I have no idea it's lockstep refer to religion.
	Does it refer to chores?
	Does it refer to obedience to the parents or or the mother?
	Like I so tell me tell me stuff like I don't know it already, because I don't.
	Yeah.
	And that's that's automatic speak, right?
	So you've got to be alive to the conversation and be aware of what I know and don't know, and not give me automatic language, which is stuff you've talked about to yourself a million times before.
	So let's try try that run again with your parents not getting along.
	Yeah, thanks for the guidance.
	I I'm surprised at how anxious I am.
	Um my brain, I I'm trying to access things and feeling blocked.
	But I'll try to talk about the block then.
	Um what do you think is blocking you at the moment?
	Uh well, I want to do a good job on this call.
	Uh I want to get whatever.
	No, no, but it needs to be said.
	Yeah.
	So you can't try to do a good job on the call.
	Yeah.
	I should just do.
	Well, because we be honest.
	Yeah.
	Right.
	Like, I mean, if if I say I want to sit in the chair, right, I just go sit in the chair.
	I don't sit there and say, well, I'm gonna try and sit in the chair, and I've already got a strain to sit in the chair, and I want to get sitting in the chair right, that wouldn't make much sense, right?
	This is just an honest and direct, you know, bro to bro conversation.
	So uh don't worry about trying to get things right, and don't worry about um uh self-editing or or saving time or or anything like that, you know.
	Just be aware that I don't know anything about your history.
	So don't assume I know anything, because I don't, right?
	And let's, you know, just sort of take a deep breath, it's everything's fine, and just try the telling me about your Yeah.
	Because you also said like the differences was in religion, and then you moved on to something else.
	I don't know.
	I don't even know what religion they were.
	Rastafarian and Zarastrian?
	I don't know, right?
	So I don't know anything about what you're talking about, and you so you can't sort of, you know, like hey, you skip rocks on the water, right?
	Just think think you just sort of go on the surface.
	I need to know what's going on.
	Um tell me a bit more about your parents' marriage on the assumption that I know uh nothing.
	Well, it wasn't good.
	They fought a lot, um constantly screaming at each other.
	And it was a pattern of there would be a lot of like overly over the top lovey dovey with a perfect couple and then a horrible fight.
	So with the perfect couple in public or private, or for the kids or for others, or at social gatherings or church.
	I I'm not sure where where's the perfect couple and then the screaming at each other.
	What's the w where the where are the two circumstances or environments?
	I remember mostly in in the home to us, to their children.
	Oh, okay.
	So they would portray themselves to and how many siblings do you have?
	I have two siblings.
	Okay, so they would portray themselves To you guys as the perfect couple.
	But then they'd be screaming at each other.
	And what proportion of the time were they fighting or screaming at each other?
	Probably half half of a given month they would be screaming at each other.
	Is that right?
	Well, I'll just go with my my gut feeling right now, yeah, about 50-50.
	So real um strong switches between we're totally in love and we love each other and we absolutely hate each other.
	Right.
	So that would be a little tough to sustain, right?
	Yeah.
	And they got divorced about um ten years ago.
	Right.
	Okay.
	So it's a bit schizo, right?
	To to be screaming at each other and then say, hey kids, we're the perfect couple.
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	All right.
	And tell me the difference in discipline or approach to that sort of thing between your mother and your father.
	My mother would discipline with a look and disappointment and emotions, I guess, because she she never spanked, she never spanked us.
	My father did, but it was something like a swat on the butt through clothes.
	And what I remember about his discipline is that it was almost like laughable, like, oh really, this is all you've got.
	This is what I'm in trouble for.
	And he wouldn't be he wouldn't follow through with things like grounding or so I would get in trouble for something.
	I can't I can't even remember what, maybe coming home late, later than I said I would.
	And so it'd be a where were you?
	Why'd you come late?
	You're grounded, you're grounded for a week, and then after two days, you know, he'd forget about it.
	But with my mother, um she would she would discipline us for almost like thought crimes.
	Uh what I mean by that is if we were watching the wrong kind of movies, or I remember having a set of PC gamer magazines, this is back in the 90s, and there would be advertisements in them for say Doom or Quake, and they would be like a demon or something on the advertisement,
	and she would look at that and be like, this is a demon, and she'd rip out well, one, she would go through all my magazines and rip out those advertisements and throw them away, which drove me crazy.
	But also she would uh you know, she would make me I don't want to say I said she didn't spank, but sh she would she would be mad at me, and that was almost worse than the spanking, if that makes any sense.
	Well, what was it like when she was mad at you?
	That's a good question.
	I remember strongly not wanting to disappoint her.
	So I think most of it, most of what I remember now is the internal shame of disappointing her.
	Now, what did she what would she do?
	She would scream, you know, she would uh she would yell and pray loudly in a way that made me feel like I was going to hell.
	Oh yeah, yeah.
	That very self-conscious uh Lord save these children, I can't, you know, all the sort of stuff.
	Exactly.
	Okay.
	Did she uh call you names?
	No, she didn't call me names.
	Okay, so but you got the impression that you were going to go to hell.
	Yeah.
	I mean, that's really unpleasant for kids, right?
	It's terrifying.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, and I remember being told that I'm not going to make it to eighth grade.
	Because what do you mean not make it to eighth grade?
	I'm not making it to eighth grade because the rapture's gonna come and you know the the second ending times as well.
	Like you're going to hell on Tuesday.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, my mother was.
	Well, I mean, did your father correct her?
	Nope.
	All right.
	So then they both were.
	I mean, I don't care what your father's beliefs were, that which you let stand, you participate in, right?
	Absolutely.
	Okay.
	And uh what about your father?
	He was always at work.
	And I didn't really see much of him in the house.
	Except on, you know, weekends, things like that.
	But uh it's not like the weekend would come and he's off work and we would go play ball.
	I would see him around the house more on weekends.
	I have a very very strained relationship with my father now, and all of the my feelings about my father are directed at things in the present, not so much back then, um, when I in my early childhood, uh in my early childhood, what I remember is that you know, he suffered from IBS, so he was always sick in some way.
	I found out later that he was put on benzos for anxiety issues stemming from uh fights that he would have with his with his brothers and his family.
	Sorry, at what age?
	Um this would have been in the mid-80s, and he was born in the mid-50s, so he would have been in his 30s.
	Yeah, in his 30s, okay.
	Yeah, and Benzos can be, I mean, well, just ask Jordan Peterson, right?
	I'm pretty addicted, yeah.
	Yes.
	They can string you out pretty pretty rough.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, there was one particular time I remember where he had a panic attack in public with me, just me and him.
	We were going to the mall or something.
	And you know, he had a panic attack.
	I didn't have no idea.
	I had no idea what was happening.
	All I remembered is that he was in the bathroom for an extremely long time, and then the ambulance showed up and you know, he was carded off.
	So yeah, it's I there's not much coming up for me for my dad when I was young.
	It's like he let my mom run the show until moments when he didn't, and then he'd get extremely aggressive and violent.
	And he never hit my mother throwing objects across the room, smashing um smashing plates and things like that.
	And how often would this violence occur?
	Um I want to say once a month to once every three months.
	So it was fairly rare.
	But it was often enough that I was quite I quite I was quite aware that my father was capable of having a temper.
	And was he a sort of yellow or screamer uh as well?
	Did he call names as well?
	Yes, he absolutely did.
	Um what would you hear?
	I don't recall I don't recall him calling me any names or my siblings any names.
	He would direct names at my mother, though.
	He would he he would call her things like in Spanish, um, the hypocrite.
	Um fucking bitch.
	Um this is mostly when they were arguing about religion, and then they would they would both scream at each other and and hurl things kind of on that level at each other.
	And what would they be arguing about with regards to religion?
	Well, my father always felt that religion was a money grab, and they existed just to bleed people dry.
	And there's probably some of that stuff going on.
	There's a lot of prosperity gospel, um, which for those who don't know what that is, is uh it's a theology where if you give a church, a church a bunch of money, then God will make you prosperous in return, kind of like a tit for tat thing.
	So like a Ponzi, yeah, okay.
	Yeah.
	Yeah, so my my mom would be.
	I mean spiritual Ponzi, right?
	That the money just magically shows up the more you give, right?
	Okay, got it.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	And also my my mom wanted my dad to go to church with us.
	She wanted him to be a spiritual leader, and he wasn't.
	That just wasn't his thing.
	Well, he was an atheist, was he?
	He wasn't a strong atheist in that he professed to be an atheist, but he certainly did not live like a Christian.
	Well, didn't if he said organized religion is a money grab, he certainly wasn't religious, right?
	Yeah.
	That's fair to say that he wasn't religious.
	So that's interesting.
	So your mother chose to marry.
	Well, do you know if he changed his view on religion?
	Maybe after he got married?
	No, absolutely not.
	So she married somebody who was an agnostic, let's just say agnostic or whatever, right?
	Or a weak atheist.
	So your mother married someone who was an agnostic and then was really upset with him for not being religious.
	Yeah.
	She she became religious a year into their marriage.
	I don't know the full circumstances as to why she became religious or what what happened there.
	Oh, so she changed.
	Did you say he changed?
	No, she, your mother changed.
	She changed.
	Yes, she changed.
	That's right.
	Okay.
	So she said she wasn't religious, to your knowledge, and then she became religious after she got married.
	She grew up Catholic, but wasn't as religious as she was.
	So she had religion in her history in her background and had an experience where she left Catholicism and had a revival experience or something like that a year.
	I don't know.
	More fundamentalist?
	More fundamentalist, yeah, that's a good way of putting it.
	What's your cultural background?
	Um my mother is Puerto Rican, and my father is from the Dominican Republic.
	Okay, got it, got it.
	Okay, so she had she left the church, the Catholic church, and then she became um fundamentalist, right?
	Like hell Pellfire Brimstone End Times, uh, you know, the the uh uh i if if the car's empty, it's because of the rapture kind of stuff, right?
	Yeah.
	Yeah, the whole nine.
	And then they struggled to make it work.
	Your father remained skeptical, and your mother, I assume, stayed or got maybe even more fundamentalist, is that right?
	That's right.
	She doubled down.
	And what were what would they fight about in in detail?
	So my father was uh besides the religion, um, and I guess focusing on that for a moment.
	Um like I said, she wanted him to go to church, she wanted him to be a spiritual leader in that in the family, in the household.
	He wasn't, so she resented him for that, and she poke and prod and push and you know, demand that he that he do that.
	So all of that was one huge area that they would fight.
	Another was that my father's a philanderer, he's a womanizer.
	Um he's been he's been that for us.
	Wait, who's a philanderer?
	Hang on.
	I mean, just actually he's the pick my he's Puerto Rican.
	My mother's Puerto Rican.
	You might have so Dominican, right?
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	Which is not any better.
	Yeah.
	Six of one half doesn't the other.
	Okay.
	I'm just getting myself off the floor here with stereotype confirmation.
	Okay, good.
	Yeah, he would brag that he had like, you know, when he was in college, he'd have like a girlfriend in one dorm room and another girlfriend in the other room.
	Um so my mother would find obvious evidence of him cheating on her, and he would deny it, and they would fight about it.
	Loudly.
	I always thought, like, Dad, uh, how do you know I think once she actually found uh a card that some other woman had written him, a love letter, basically, and he denied it existed.
	Kind of like that Shaggy song, you know.
	It wasn't me.
	That's basically what he would do.
	That's basically what he would do.
	And um So they were married for how long?
	You said they got divorced ten years ago?
	Yeah, so they were married for about 35 years.
	And do you know what caused the divorce?
	A lot of things.
	I mean, I should say there was a lot happening during that time.
	Um their fights would get more and more loud and uh verbally abusive.
	Uh you know, police would be called, things like that.
	And My father.
	I think I think things just broke between them in that.
	My mother finally got up the gumption to leave, leave him to leave the house.
	And I was living in a different place from they were.
	And I offered, like, hey, mom, get out of there.
	Come over here.
	And I don't want to make it sound like I instigated their divorce because it had been a long time coming, but I certainly felt happy that they were apart now and they had space from each other.
	And your relationship with your parents now?
	With my father, it's pretty much non-existent.
	I don't talk to him.
	And uh where we stand is I I wrote him an email basically saying, you know, there's ABCD things that I expect you to talk about with me or take responsibility for, and he refuses to do that.
	And we can get into what those things are.
	Um with my mother, I talk to her fairly regularly.
	Um she's mellowed out a lot in her religious fervor, and we have enough in common that from a religious standpoint.
	That I can talk to her, and I've I've expressed to both of them confronted both of them on much of what I'm sharing with you now.
	My mother was apologetic.
	Um she felt sorrowful that we went through all of that as kids and sorrowful.
	She she caused a lot of she did.
	I mean, I can't punch someone and say, I'm so sorry you got punched, like I wasn't doing it.
	Well, like for example, I I told her about my experiences as a young man, a young kid going to church, being dragged to church by her.
	And I told her how I felt about all that.
	And she said, Hey, I'm sorry that I'm sorry that you that I put you through that.
	I'm sorry that you did that.
	I did that to you.
	And as I'm saying that, though, that was a while ago.
	That was probably seven or eight years ago that I had that conversation with her.
	And now I'm saying this out loud.
	I'm questioning whether or not I confronted her fully.
	I certainly confronted my father fully.
	I found that easier to do.
	And I'm not surprised.
	I'm not surprised about I'm honestly I'm feeling a lot of resistance talking, talking negative negatively about my mother.
	And I've listened to a lot of these calls, and I know how this goes.
	And I'm kind of surprised.
	That's terrifying.
	Screamed at you, frightened you.
	Stayed with a philandering violent man, kept you in his orbit, chose him.
	You know, pretty recently I confronted her on that.
	I'm like, why did you choose my father?
	And he said, Well, he he was a good man.
	And I was like, what?
	that doesn't make any sense because of a b c d e and she got pretty upset at me for bringing that up you you you Thank you.
	Sorry, I thought there was more.
	Um was your father very good looking?
	I mean, how was he such a philanderer?
	Uh he had game, as people would say.
	Um gosh, I kind of wish I had some of that.
	You probably don't.
	Wish I could get trash women to sleep with me.
	You probably don't.
	Especially these days.
	Oh, tell me about it.
	Uh okay.
	So your father wasn't was he good looking and charismatic, or just more charismatic?
	I think he was more charismatic.
	And very persistent.
	That's the way that that's how he broke my mom down, as far as I understood the story.
	You know, he he he pursued her for probably six months.
	And she kept turning them down, kept turning them down, kept turning them down, and eventually she agreed to go out with him.
	And they were they were a thing.
	It kind of blows my mind that that works as a method to get a woman.
	Okay, and your last girlfriend, what did she think of your family?
	That's a good question.
	Um she spent a total of probably two weeks.
	So two week-long trips over um one with a year between.
	And sorry she got along on a circle level.
	Um she's Scandinavian from the Midwest.
	Okay, so she's a white girl.
	And she was going to the sort of Puerto Rican and uh Dominican household, right?
	Yeah, but she spent more time in my brother's house than with and she didn't she has never met my father or spoken to my father because I I wouldn't allow it.
	I pretty much cut him out of my personal life at that point.
	She met my mother.
	She my her and my mother got along.
	Um as Christians and as women, you know, there's kind of two groups in common.
	And there wasn't there wasn't any drama.
	You know, uh it kind of felt like, oh well, this is my girlfriend, you know.
	Oh yeah, this is my brother.
	Let's go do touristy, fun touristy thing since we're on vacation.
	And uh, you know, we talk politics a bit.
	Um she's conservative, as am I, and my brother's not so much, so um there's a few interesting conversations, never anything where we debate um aggressively or anything like that.
	But all in all, she she got along with my my family.
	And never complained about them, which I know isn't a very high bar, but okay.
	All right.
	Okay, so I think I've got some good background information other than uh if you could tell me a little bit about your sexist marriage.
	Oh boy.
	Yeah.
	So I met uh my ex-wife in high school that was pure pure physical attraction.
	I mean, I was 18 years old, senior in high school, and immediately um I was just blown away that a girl liked me back because up until that point, you know, I'd had several crushes.
	Nothing was reciprocated, and really struggled.
	So why why were you so down on your uh attractiveness?
	That's a good question.
	I think I just always assume that girls don't like me on some level.
	Yes, I understand what the definition of down on your attractiveness is, but why?
	I'm really struggling with that.
	Why?
	I think I I wasn't very direct with with girls when I was in school.
	I I have crushes from a distance.
	And then my feelings would just get to the point where I couldn't stand it anymore.
	And I'd write some girl a love letter or something, and then it wouldn't be received well.
	So I took that as evidence of girls don't like me.
	And sure, maybe that I mean looking back now.
	What sort of girls were you attracted to?
	The cute girl in my class.
	I I can't really think, or the cute girl on the bus.
	I mean, that's it was all looks-based for sure.
	I I don't remember like at that age liking anybody for anything beyond that.
	Well, your parents only loved each other for reasons of sexual attraction, I assume, or they were only with each other because they didn't seem to like each other that much as people, right?
	Yeah, that's very lust is uh less is the basis, and you hadn't seen any value that men and women could provide to each other from a moral standpoint.
	They just had sex and they fucked and they fought, right?
	Yeah.
	So what are you supposed to do except follow sexual attraction?
	Because you you you didn't have any examples of quality of character or personality, right?
	Yep.
	God, that hurts to say.
	I really my mother was very pretty and and slender and charismatic and guys chased after her, even though she had a kind of a horror show of a personality.
	It just taught me a lot about a lot of men, right?
	And you know, some decent quality men too, but just looks, looks, looks, right?
	It's uh it's a cliff edge, right?
	That many a man falls off.
	Yeah.
	And I'm struggling with that now.
	Because it's hard to I don't know, like it's hard for me to say agree to date a woman that's overweight.
	Um a lot of it is I was not attracted to her.
	Yeah, but the overweight is different.
	An overweight thing is a character flaw.
	As a whole.
	So that that's a different matter.
	Um I mean, for a lot of men, it's like, well, I if I stick my dick in her, all of these rainbow virtues are gonna come out.
	Right.
	If I if I'm attracted enough, uh I can I can just make do with what comes, right?
	And look, I'm not saying I've been above this my whole life.
	I'm not, you know, I'm not like Zen like above, oh, as if this ever happened to me.
	So I get that, I sympathize with all of that.
	But I mean, certainly in your 40s, right?
	You gotta look for qualities of character.
	Especially if you've been uh listening to me for 10 years, right?
	Mm-hmm.
	Absolutely.
	So the last girl.
	Uh sorry, sorry, tell me a little bit more.
	How long were you married and how long was it sex?
	Oh, well, it was sexless from the very beginning all the way through until the very end, and it spanned about 15 years.
	Um sorry.
	So I guess you had no sex before marriage because you're Christian, and then after marriage, she said, I'm not having sex after marriage either.
	Well, I wasn't Christian.
	I okay, so I grew up Christian, but I went through a crisis of faith um when I was in high school around the same time, and I abandoned Christianity completely.
	Um her family was Catholic, but she wasn't particularly Christian either.
	Um our relationship was sexless, partially because I had pretty serious porn addiction that started when I was in my preteen years.
	Um she was sexually repressed by her family.
	Um lot of emotional abuse in her family and history.
	And when we got married, we just did not after after being in a relationship where we didn't have sex for seven or eight years, you don't just automatically just have what to do or um I was I was I was terrified.
	And I as I say that, um it's pretty heartbreaking to say that.
	And sorry, I don't know what you mean, terrified of what?
	I was I was scared, like so we got married um under very stressful circumstances, and what were those?
	Well, so her mother controlled her life completely, even into her mid-20s, um, to the point where she was afraid to we were gonna go on a cruise with some friends, and she knew her mother wouldn't let her go, which I know sounds ridiculous for a 25-year-old woman to be in that situation, but that's what it was.
	And I was a double married woman, right?
	No, we weren't married at this point.
	I'm sorry.
	Oh, I'm sorry.
	You met in high school, but you weren't married at 25?
	This was right before we got married.
	Okay.
	Um so I was at my wit's end, and in my mind, I was just setting an ultimatum.
	Like I'm I'm gonna invite her on this cruise, and if she goes with me, great.
	If she doesn't, then we're breaking up.
	Um I asked her, we're gonna go on this cruise.
	And she said, Nope.
	Uh my mom was not gonna let me go, and I'm not gonna ask her, basically, is what she said.
	And I made her go.
	Um instead of breaking up with her, I said, no, we're going on this cruise.
	So I drove her to her house and got her stuff and then drove to place a go because she wasn't married yet, and she was concerned you guys might fool around.
	No, she was for she was afraid of her mother.
	No, no, but what was her mother afraid of?
	Well, they're Nicaraguan.
	Um they were at the top of the food chain during the uh you know the 70s, and when the communists took over there, she lost everything and saw horrible things, you know, people getting executed and things like that.
	Um so she was a hateful person.
	Um that was my experience of her.
	She was always angry.
	Um she was extremely very, very quick to launch into tirades and insults, like if you fucking asshole, you're an idiot, you're a slut.
	She called her a slut, her daughter a slut to my face when we were together once.
	Yeah, but I mean, this was similar to your parents' marriage, so this is all just familiar stuff, right?
	Yeah, with the exception that her husband was a complete and total pushover.
	Like he never said a word.
	Whereas my father and my mother, it their fighting was more even-handed.
	So in this family, her she was basically a uh a tyrant.
	Okay.
	So you got married and then there was no sex.
	There was no sex, right?
	Until until years later, when she developed, my ex-wife developed a crush on her boss, and my reaction was something like, wow, you have a sex drive.
	That's amazing.
	Instead of being furious.
	Um so we had agreed to have an open marriage, although I stipulated that that guy was off limits.
	And we were starting to have sex.
	Sorry, that's quite a leap here, right?
	Yeah.
	I'm sorry.
	So you she's Christian, and she says, I want a non-monogamous marriage so I can have sex with other men.
	No, I'm sorry.
	My ex-wife was not.
	I mean, she was Catholic on paper, but she was not a Christian.
	She never went to church, she never prayed.
	Okay.
	She didn't live as a Christian.
	So she wasn't a Christian.
	And you what was your belief at the uh faith at that time?
	Um I was an atheist for most of my twenties until this situation with my ex-wife.
	Um I just I went into meditation and became a Buddhist to study Zen Buddhism for about 10 years.
	Yeah, I can understand that living in a sexless marriage might make you want to master your desires.
	Huh.
	You know, I never got that connection until you just said that.
	Like how how did I get help?
	It seems so obvious now.
	And that's that's that's kind of a thing in my life is me just dealing with it with things.
	Okay, hang on, hang on.
	So she develops a crush on her boss, and then she wants she wants to open up the marriage, is that right?
	Yeah, she wants to fuck this guy.
	Right.
	And you when you say sex is marriage, you're talking about like from the wedding day onwards, nothing or just very rare?
	Nothing.
	Like zero sex for 15 years.
	We for 15 years, yeah.
	And was it that she was aware of your viewing of pornography?
	Is that was that her excuse, or was there something else?
	Our communication was terrible.
	Um all my sexual energy was going into pornography.
	So I didn't pursue her.
	And we didn't talk about it.
	Which I know sounds crazy, but your pornography was a barrier to the sex life.
	And that's just because you didn't pursue her, or was she aware of your usage?
	I don't think she was aware of the extent of my usage.
	Because I was I was I was beaten off to porn probably every day.
	And I got go through great pains to hide it, and she never really caught me.
	But why why did you Why did you stay married?
	It's a good question.
	I mean, did you you didn't want kids?
	Because you know, as far as I understand it, that's the traditional way to do it, right?
	Right.
	Right.
	I was passive in my life.
	I had no, I had no sense that I had any agency that I could choose to divorce my wife or to leave her.
	It didn't work.
	But you would get it annulled, right?
	If you got married in a church.
	If there's no sexual activity, you can just get the marriage annulled, and then it's like it's not even a divorce.
	It's like it never was, right?
	Right, but that didn't even cross my mind.
	And I will say that for probably the last five to eight years, probably the last five years of our relationship, so maybe a year or two after we got married.
	This is I'm stuck, I'm stuck in this marriage.
	There's no way out.
	You know, I made these vows.
	And that's this has been a pattern for me where I stay in a relationship way too long.
	But I I don't understand this relationship.
	It's not a marriage.
	I don't I don't even know what to call it.
	Marriage is about sex.
	Right.
	That's why marriage isn't because people have sex and sex makes babies, and babies need a two-parent committed household.
	So marriage is about sex.
	It's about the regulation and focus and discipline of sexuality.
	Right.
	So I don't know what to call this.
	This is like a saying I have a job when you don't get paid.
	You don't have a job.
	You got something, but it ain't a job.
	Right.
	Did anyone else know?
	Did you talk about it with your brothers or your parents or friends?
	Or did you get any feedback or advice or what?
	I had a ton of shame about about it.
	Could you imagine?
	You're married to somebody, you don't not have sex with them.
	So I never told anybody out of shame.
	I just pushed it down and trudged on with my life until until I couldn't.
	So you said the last five years was like you were more conscious and aware of how bad it was.
	That's right.
	Yeah.
	So what happened then?
	Well, talking to people, um, seeing conflicts with my ex-wife and and my friends.
	Because we were long distance um when I was in college, and I had a whole group, I had a whole social circle that didn't meet her until until we were married.
	And then they were like, who the fuck is this?
	We thought you made this person up.
	And um there was class.
	My friends, when they finally met my ex-wife, they they they were f first of all floored that she actually existed because they hadn't they hadn't met her.
	And they're not.
	But they were joking, right?
	They didn't think that you'd made up an entire marriage that you were lying, did they?
	Well, that's a good point.
	Um, pretty pretty bad set of friends if they think that you're a pathological liar.
	And still want to be friends with you.
	Well, sorry for putting it that way.
	That's that might have been misleading.
	No, I'm I just want to make sure I understand.
	I don't mind if you were using a hyperbole, I just want to know if it was.
	Yeah, it was hyperbole, for sure.
	Okay, like, you know, I have a girlfriend in California, you know, when you're a kid or something.
	Okay, so so they were just kind of joking about it.
	Okay, go ahead.
	Yeah, and they must have thought it was strange that um sorry, let me collect my thoughts here.
	Um, no, that's fine.
	So you started to talk about your sexist marriage and people is that is that right with people.
	Um I wasn't that direct with people about it, but I was aware that our marriage was dysfunctional and wanted better for myself.
	And this is about the time that I picked up the meditation and was interested in self-knowledge and personal growth and those things.
	And we were growing apart because our whole relationship up front apart.
	That's fair.
	But if anything, our relationship was based on her needing me to escape her family.
	Whether she actually did or not, I don't know.
	Um if she what would have happened to her if I wasn't in the picture.
	But I certainly needed the validation of Being her savior at the time.
	And as our marriage progressed, she became more and more independent.
	So that basis of why we were together.
	Well, these are just had two roommates masturbating in separate rooms, right?
	So I don't even know what to call that.
	Shared history.
	Trauma bonds.
	Anyway, so what happened?
	I want to make sure we get to the sort of central point of your question.
	So what happened at the end of that marriage?
	she I agreed we can have an open marriage but that guy was off limits she ended up drunk at this guy's house late at night and had sex with him I This guy also has a reputation with the boss.
	Right.
	And he he had a reputation for getting women drunk and sleeping with them.
	So there's He's a player like your daddy.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	But for me, um I found somebody and was talking to them, and my ex-wife was really jealous and wanted me to not talk to this person.
	So I was like, fuck this.
	I'm out.
	You know, I'm the this I can't stand this anymore.
	And honestly, at the at this point I'd reached a level of complete exhaustion emotionally.
	Like I I hate to say it, but I I didn't care whether she lived or died.
	Um which is a horrible thing to say.
	I I can't believe I let's not judge it.
	Don't worry about it.
	I don't care about the judgment.
	Let's just go on by the honesty.
	Okay.
	That's how I felt.
	I didn't care if she loved or died.
	And I'm just like, I'm done.
	I'm out.
	So I initiated a divorce and it was a really painful process.
	I mean, it's always.
	Divorce sucks, but um she didn't she didn't want to go through with it, so I had to do all the all the legwork and track her down.
	She wouldn't answer my phone calls.
	I had to have I had to have her served um a whole nine.
	And we didn't have any kids or property, so there was nothing to fight over.
	She just wanted to be a good one.
	I'm pretty sure you didn't have any kids.
	Otherwise I just fair.
	Okay, and how long ago did you get divorced?
	Or did was it finalized?
	Um that was 2016, so nine years ago.
	Okay.
	And then you had a couple of relationships and then the two and a half year one, or was the two and a half year one the only major one?
	The two and a half year that that was the only major one.
	And how many other women did you date or sleep with since 2016?
	Well, I met a woman at basically a music festival and slept with her.
	At that point, I had like no basically I had had not masturbated in like four months doing the nofab thing, and um I was horny enough to just go nuts, right?
	So I was not particularly attracted to this woman, but she was there, and it it was really clear that that was not going to be a relationship long term.
	Um I dated someone a few years after that for about a month.
	And actually really liked this gal, but this is during the period when I was still going through my divorce process, and when I told her I wasn't divorced yet, she dumped me on the spot.
	And that was after only about a month.
	Yeah, I mean, that's wise, right?
	I mean, yeah, you there's no point getting people going through divorce, they're just a wreck, right?
	Right.
	Right.
	Okay, so then you got involved with the woman for two and a half years, and now your basic question is you said you're not gonna give up on love, so I'm not sure where I can advise you with regards to that.
	But what's the central issue that I could give you feedback on?
	Well, I feel like I'm doing something wrong in some sense.
	And I mean, dating sucks these days.
	Everyone says that, everyone talks about it, but I I I don't want to give myself that excuse.
	So in a sense, I mean that's what you want out of dating or romance.
	I want a wife.
	I want a family.
	I want to have kids.
	You want to have kids?
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	Okay.
	Right.
	Okay.
	And do you make good money?
	Yeah, I do.
	And uh, you know, over six figures.
	Okay.
	And uh how are your how's your asset base or your asset situation?
	Not the best.
	I you know, I make good money, but for the past, I mean, after my devo I wasn't made I I've been making good money fairly recently in my life.
	So I haven't had a lot of time to save.
	Okay, but you didn't have kids.
	So where's all your money gone?
	I'm just asking you the questions that a sensible woman would ask, right?
	Yeah.
	Thank you.
	I've uh Did your wife work did you have to pay for her too, or did she work?
	She she did not work.
	I I paid for her almost around.
	Are you kidding me?
	You paid through the fucking nose for a sexless marriage.
	That's depressing, isn't it?
	My God, that must have cost you.
	Half a mil?
	Six hundred, seven hundred thousand dollars?
	More?
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	And bro.
	I got fucked over by by my father financially too.
	Um long story short, um.
	I bought a house in 2008.
	You can just by that, you probably know where this is going.
	It wasn't my house, it was for my family.
	And uh You mean your parents?
	My parents, right?
	You bought a house for your parents in 2008.
	Because their credit was 2006, I'm sorry.
	So you're paying for a wife who won't have sex with you and you're buying a house for your parents who abused you.
	That's right.
	Okay.
	And it ended in uh foreclosure and bankruptcy.
	My bankruptcy.
	Okay.
	Right.
	But sorry, I thought that you were only buying the house because your parents' credit rating was bad.
	Did they not have enough money to pay the mortgage?
	Well, they did for a while until the interest rate started to go up.
	I mean, it was the worst possible situation as far as a mortgage goes.
	So not sustainable in the same way.
	Exactly.
	Okay.
	Yeah, I mean, that's why you should go with fixed rate.
	My personal opinion, not financial advice, but my personality.
	Absolutely.
	Yeah, you need you need uh predictability in financial matters.
	Okay.
	All right.
	So what did your wife do all day?
	Nothing.
	I mean, she went to school.
	Um she wasn't a student.
	You paid you paid for her bills, her food, her health insurance, her rent, and you also paid for her to go to school?
	I did.
	Wow, man.
	You're a sugar daddy with no sugar.
	No sugar.
	Man, did you say this out loud is really it's I mean your father has a lot of money.
	I'm feeling a lot of shame right now.
	Yeah, I mean, this is this is insane.
	I I've never heard of anything like this, honestly, and I've been doing this a long time, and I'm not trying to make you feel bad, but this is incomprehensible.
	Yeah, I'm feeling a lot of shame about this.
	No, no, it's not a matter of feeling shame.
	I just these are the questions that you've got to have an answer to.
	Otherwise you can't get a quality woman.
	Because a quality wom woman is gonna grill the living shit out of you, brother.
	Because she's gonna say, wait, you're 42, you're an attractive guy, you make six figures plus.
	How the hell are you still single?
	And I don't know, man, you're gonna have to find a way to explain all of this because this red flag's all over the place, right?
	Yeah.
	Yeah, and it's it's hard for me to hear right now because I feel like I have got a healthy sense of self-esteem.
	Like I'll ride my motorcycle.
	I'm not saying you shouldn't have a healthy sense of self-esteem, but you gotta understand how these absolute disasters occurred.
	How did you date a woman who didn't even really want to get married when you want to get married?
	How did you pay for a woman through the nose for 15 years?
	And then she wanted to open up the marriage and fucked her boss who you specifically begged her not to or told her not to.
	Like that's m my my question.
	And if you were a younger man, I'd you know we'd do more childhood and sympathy, but you've been listening to philosophy for a decade, and you're in your forties.
	Which means you don't get the excuse of childhood and youth, right?
	Absolutely.
	So what the hell with my ex-wife, I really think it was my porn addiction.
	I just had no drive.
	I was No, no, no.
	Come on, man.
	Come on.
	Do you think that if she was having sex with you every day, you'd have a porn addiction?
	No, I wouldn't.
	Right.
	So it's cause and effect, right?
	Right.
	But it's also in my mind a spiral.
	Uh or maybe not a spiral.
	Um vicious circle, thank you.
	Yes.
	Right.
	Okay.
	But uh look, the porn addiction is not great, I'm not gonna pretend otherwise.
	But if she's not having sex with you and you're not getting divorced, like men need orgasms for health.
	Like you can go look this stuff up, right?
	Look at the prostate health and so on.
	Men need orgasms for health.
	They're not optional.
	Wow.
	Yeah, when you put it that way, and I know this.
	Um I have been holding myself back.
	I mean, I don't do I don't do porn anymore, right?
	But I feel like if I don't masturbate and I go out in the world, then I've got more masculine energy and I've got more drive to pursue women and that's helpful from a certain standpoint, but Yeah, listen, I'm not trying to give you advice on health or or what you do with any of this kind of stuff.
	I'm just saying that it's not just the porn addiction.
	No, I c you're right.
	I can see that.
	Because of the all the emotional abuse, I mean, all that was there and our lack of communication.
	Sorry, what was the emotional abuse?
	From her from her family.
	Wait, from her or from her family?
	From her family.
	Okay, but not from her.
	No, not from her.
	Okay.
	Got it.
	Okay, so you need to be able to answer these questions.
	You know, why did you get divorced?
	Oh, it was a sexless marriage that became an open marriage, and then she had sex with the guy I told her not to, and she agreed not to, right?
	Okay.
	And then the moment that I found someone that I was attracted to, she wanted to shut down the open marriage, is that right?
	That's right.
	But she wanted to stay married and have you continue to pay the bills.
	Right.
	The HM is walking away.
	At least keep a good house.
	Nope.
	Did she cook?
	Did she clean?
	Did she take care of your bills and your finances and did she do any of that?
	Not really.
	I'm sorry.
	I know that's not very much.
	No, that's fine.
	I mean, I'm sure she made toast or something.
	Okay.
	Yeah.
	All right.
	So why should you get love?
	Like you want it, sure, like you want it, but why should you get it?
	Why should I get love?
	Because I offer love in return.
	Okay.
	I'm affectionate.
	How hang on, hang on.
	What evidence would a skeptical woman and a woman has a right to be skeptical if you're single in your forties, right?
	What absolutely empirical evidence would a skeptical woman have that you offer love?
	I mean, you were not in a selfless marriage, but a loveless marriage.
	In fact, you were being exploited horribly.
	So you didn't offer love in a fifteen year marriage, right?
	And then you opened up the marriage to appease your wife, right?
	Wait, when you say I didn't offer love, what do you mean by that?
	Well, she didn't you didn't love your wife.
	How could you?
	Because I allowed this to happen.
	Well, you're in a sexist marriage.
	You yourself said you didn't communicate about anything.
	She gets attracted to another guy and immediately wants to sleep with him.
	You let it happen.
	She doesn't clean house, she takes all your money.
	This is not a woman that's worthy of respect and love.
	Absolutely.
	I'm not c I'm not trying to colour between like outside of the lines here.
	I'm just going off what you said.
	You didn't love her.
	What's to love?
	What nobility and virtue and passion and strength was there to love.
	Nothing.
	Nothing.
	It's like a something hanging off your jugular.
	Wrong kind of sucking, bro.
	Yeah, absolutely.
	Okay, so there's no love in your marriage.
	And then you date for two and a half years ago, who or woman who's not really sure she wants to get married, and then the moment you start pushing marriage, she bails.
	That's fair to say.
	Yep.
	So as soon as I have needs.
	Right.
	So now of course, you grew up not knowing how like you grew up seeing people who didn't have a fucking clue how to express their needs without screaming at each other.
	So I've noticed that when you veer into need territory, you get aggressive.
	When you started talking about talking to your ex-girlfriend about marriage, you're like, what are we fucking doing?
	So I don't think you know very well how to express your needs without being aggressive.
	Because how could you?
	I mean, your parents didn't know how to express their needs without being aggressive, did they?
	No, they didn't.
	Now, earlier at the beginning of the conversation, I sort of quite suspected this, so I quite deliberately, but honestly, said, I don't know what you're talking about, right?
	Uh-huh.
	Like when you were talking about the religion and this and that, I didn't know what you were talking about.
	And so I expressed my needs for you to treat me as if I didn't know what you were talking about because I didn't, but I don't think I did it in an aggressive fashion.
	I just said, here's what I need to make this an effective conversation, right?
	Right.
	So can you think of a time in your life where you've expressed a deep and vulnerable need without feeling aggressive?
	I mean, I know that there's a lot of times when you silenced it, say for 15 years, but was there a time when you were able to express a deep legitimate need or a vulnerable need, all needs are really vulnerable, without getting aggressive.
	I don't think I was aggressive with my ex-girlfriend, the two and a half year one when I was suing married.
	You expressed the conversation to me in a very aggressive manner.
	Do you remember you said, What the fuck are we doing here?
	Yeah, this was your characterization of the conversation, and I said, Well, I hope you weren't that aggressive.
	Do you remember?
	Yes, I do remember that that came up in the conversation, but I feel like that came up because of the anger I'm feeling now post-relationship.
	No, I get it.
	But bro, you understand it's the fight or flight mechanism.
	Every deep fear is associated with significant anger.
	Right, you ever see these scare videos?
	Someone jumps out at someone behind the door and they just punch them in the face?
	Yes.
	Or you scare people and they get angry.
	Yeah.
	So you said that you were terrified of expressing needs with your ex-girlfriend because you're terrified that she was going to reject you, right?
	And leave you.
	Right.
	Right.
	So all of that fear is also associated with anger.
	Because people who frighten us also make us angry.
	So then when you finally, after two and a half years really begin to express um, we could say a little less than two and a half years, eighteen months or two years or whatever, when you finally begin to express, like I really want to get married.
	Right?
	So how do you overcome that fear?
	With anger.
	Anger.
	Yeah.
	So if we're being chased, let's say by, I don't know, a dog, right?
	And then we're finally cornered, We turn around and and we when we run, we're frightened.
	If we're finally cornered, we turn around and what are we?
	Angry.
	I agree.
	Yeah.
	So that the it shifts from flight to fight, right?
	Even cornered rats will attack and bite things twenty times or a hundred times their size, right?
	Right.
	So you pushing down all of this terror and this fear emerges as what when you finally want to make your needs known.
	Anger.
	Right.
	And I'm sure, even if you were calm voice, I'm sure that your ex-girlfriend sensed some of this anger, and that may be partly why she bailed.
	Right.
	Because she would see a part of me that she's like, Well, what is that?
	I've never seen that before.
	She told me she never seen it.
	I don't believe there are any secrets in relationships.
	I think she knew that you were terrified and gave her all the power, just as you were gave all the power to your ex-wife.
	So you were terrified of her.
	And I I I guarantee you she knew that deep down.
	Women are experts at reading men.
	Men are pretty good at reading women, but women are even better.
	So she knew all of that fear.
	She also knew exactly how much in lust with her you were.
	She knew all of that.
	And rather than having an honest conversation and saying, you know, really, I don't want to, I really don't want to exploit you.
	Like I know that you're really scared of me.
	I know I feel like I have all the power, and that's too much power.
	It's not healthy.
	I I don't want to uh have this this kind of power over you.
	This is not this doesn't feel good, right?
	I mean, you've heard me, of course, in these calling shows a million times saying, Look, uh, I'm not gonna tell you what to do.
	I don't tell people what to do.
	I don't want to have that kind of power, that kind of stuff, right?
	Right.
	Because I vehemently reject having power over other people because it's an illusion.
	And I can only have power over the worst and most subjugated aspects of themselves, which is a refooing if it's if it was an abusive relationship, right?
	Yeah.
	You know, I I I get that.
	I I don't want to have any power or control over anyone either.
	I find that No, but you want the you you you go after women who have power over you.
	Either they take that power, you g well, generally you give that power, right?
	Right.
	So that's the problem.
	That your parents' relationship was only a manifestation of power of escalation, of abuse, of aggression, of screaming, and your mother's relationship with you was power, you're going to fucking hell on Tuesday.
	Power.
	Not reason, not love, not exhortation, not plea, not appeal, power.
	And the horrible words that your father called your mother and him throwing things around once a month and so on, there's power, intimidation, escalation.
	How do you get your way?
	Well, you either surrender or you dominate.
	That's it.
	It's all you get.
	It's really hard to look in this mirror.
	So you don't want power over other people, but because of the culture and the family situation that you grew up in, if you're not going to rule, what's the only other alternative?
	To be ruled.
	To be ruled.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	Either dominance or submission.
	That's all you're going to get.
	Thank you.
	And so if your girlfriend is dominating you through the fear that she knows about, she knows about that fear, and she's more than happy to have it keep going because that way she gets her way.
	And then what happens?
	Well, uh, then what happens is you finally lose your temper.
	Enough of being pushed around.
	Now it's my turn to push.
	Now it's my turn to get my way.
	And instead of me folding for you, you fold for me.
	But once you set up that dynamic where you're the one who folds.
	You can't get other people to fold for you.
	You can't just rewrite that, and now you're in charge.
	Now you're the bossy one, now you're the dominant one.
	Doesn't work that way.
	Because the whole relationship had been set up on the opposite.
	Yeah.
	And you keep trying like things keep changing.
	Like, look at look at these relationships.
	You want a pattern?
	Okay, here's a pattern.
	Look at these relationships.
	Your parents get married as agnostics or atheists or whatever the hell they were, and then your mother goes, full, not just religious, but fundamentalist, right?
	Right.
	That's rewriting the whole relationship.
	You get married to a woman with the full and healthy expectation of a robust and married sex life, right?
	And she rewrites the whole contract and says, nope, nope, nope, right?
	And then you date a woman who doesn't want to get married.
	And you try to rewrite that contract at the end, and it all goes to hell.
	So look at all the rewriting of the contract that goes on in this in these relationships.
	You keep trying to change things from the inside.
	You keep taking these relationships and trying to rewrite them after you've already accepted them.
	And so sorry, and sorry, the last thing is that in your marriage with your ex-wife, she rewrites the relationship so you can't have sex, right?
	And then you both rewrite the relationship to turn it from monogamous into an open marriage.
	This constant rewriting of contracts is what you saw in your parents'marriage.
	you Thank you.
	I mean, your father also tried to re well, I guess successfully.
	I don't he didn't rewrite the contract, but he acted as if the contract was null and void.
	Because he married your mother, promising what?
	Monogamy.
	Monogamy.
	Yeah.
	Right.
	And then he fucked everything that moved with a hole and a breathing tube, right?
	Right.
	Didn't even care about it.
	Yeah, so so your father rewrote the contract unilaterally.
	Your mother rewrote the contract through religion, unilaterally.
	Your wife rewrote the contract, no sex, unilaterally.
	And then to appease her, I mean, she basically turned it into an open marriage.
	That wasn't something that was on your mind, was it?
	I'm sorry.
	Could you repeat that?
	Your ex-wife.
	Were you both I mean, did you want an open marriage?
	Did you bring that?
	No.
	No, you don't.
	So she rewrote that.
	She rewrote it to say she rewrote the marriage to say no sex.
	And then she rewrote the marriage again to say now it's an open marriage.
	So you keep getting into these relationships because this is what your parents' relationship is modeled on, where people make promises and then just do whatever the hell they want.
	Maybe we'll get married since your ex-girlfriend.
	No, we really we gotta decide this.
	Okay, I'm out.
	You're trying to rewrite the marriage contract.
	You're trying to rewrite the relationship from the inside after you're already invested.
	And I'm feeling choose people based on their virtues and stop trying to change people from within the relationship.
	Doesn't work.
	Yep.
	It doesn't.
	Did it work for your parents?
	Nope.
	Yeah, sure as hell hasn't worked for me either.
	It doesn't work with your wife.
	It doesn't work with your ex-girlfriend.
	It doesn't like.
	Here's the example.
	Why did you wait a month to tell your last girlfriend before this one that you were going through a divorce?
	Because I was scared she would dump me.
	Right.
	So you dated her under false pretenses.
	Which is why she dumped your sorry ass when you told her the truth.
	Yep.
	And you also dated your last girlfriend under false pretenses.
	I want to get married.
	I would like to get married.
	And if you don't want to get married and you're not certain about that, we ain't dating.
	You're like, well, it's okay.
	I'll date you if you don't really want to get married.
	Well just I'll just date you.
	Right?
	Because I'll change your mind later From the inside.
	I'll rewrite the contract.
	Don't worry about it.
	But you can't rewrite the contract.
	The moment you say to someone, I love you, we're together, we're boyfriend, we're girlfriend, you're saying I accept you for who you are.
	Right?
	Right.
	You can't rewrite the contract from within.
	Right?
	So what is it?
	If you take a job for a hundred thousand dollars, and then you say, after working there for a couple of months, I want half a million dollars a year, is that reasonable?
	Will that work?
	Hell no.
	No, of course not.
	If you go and volunteer at a soup kitchen, and then on your second night you say, I want 50 bucks an hour, is that gonna work?
	Nope.
	No.
	If you negotiate for a car, you say I gotta pay you 20,000 for the car.
	And then at the end you say, actually, it's only five grand.
	Haven't you just wasted everyone's time?
	Absolutely.
	Right?
	Aren't you just wasting everyone's time?
	I'm just floored by this because I'm such a rule follower in most other aspects of my life, you know.
	No, you are following a rule.
	The rule is I can negotiate this shit later.
	And it fails every time.
	You have a rule, it's just a bad one.
	And your rule is, I have to follow rules, but other people don't.
	Hmm.
	Yeah.
	Thank you.
	Man, what's up with that?
	What's up with what?
	What we've talked about a lot here, but what do you mean?
	Yeah.
	Yeah, I'm sorry.
	Um I'm just thinking to myself, like hearing you say that out loud, like that's obviously unjust.
	It's obviously what?
	Injust.
	What do you mean by that?
	Unjust.
	What do you mean by that?
	Yeah.
	Yeah, like I guess I'm I'm I'm frustrated with myself.
	And wondering.
	You're frustrated.
	Yeah, like I just gave I just gave you the fucking golden key to your life, and your first response is not relief or happiness, but irritation.
	I just explained your whole life to you, gave you a path forward that's not the same as the last 20 years.
	And you're like, that's irritating.
	Maybe this lack of gratitude is why you can't get love.
	And you made it about you.
	You could say, Steph, wow, that's really great.
	I'm not even paying you for this, and this is a great insight.
	I really really appreciate that.
	That's amazing.
	What a relief.
	Now I know what the problem is, which is exactly what you called me for.
	You called me for this, right?
	You're right.
	I did call you for this.
	And you're right.
	It is a good insight.
	And and you're right.
	It is interesting that I made it about myself in that moment.
	Well, you just made it into a negative experience, right?
	So, you know, I'm I'm bending my butt backwards trying to help you, right?
	And you are.
	Thank you.
	No, and listen, I appreciate it, and and I appreciate your thanks and all of that, but uh.
	If you've got you know chronic back issue for 20 years, and some guy comes along and says, Oh, just do this and you'll be fine, and you're like, that's really irritating.
	Yeah, sorry for that.
	No, no, it's it's it's nothing to apologize for.
	I'm just pointing it out.
	That why why should you why do you deserve love?
	Well, you don't deserve love if you lie to people.
	Right?
	And and if you try to rewrite the contract later on, that's a falsehood.
	Yeah.
	Did you see what I mean?
	Yeah, absolutely.
	Because you're saying this is a fine relationship when there's a huge condition in there.
	Thank you.
	Thank you.
	Right.
	And by me going along with it, waiting for it to change while Pat while Pat sith aggressively or however, even trying to change it from within.
	That's right.
	No, it's worse than that, brother.
	It's and that's good news That it's worse than that.
	I'll tell you why it's worse than that.
	It's worse than that because you lie.
	And I'm not calling you some big stinky liar.
	And it's good news that you lie.
	Because lying is the fundamental enemy of love.
	Right?
	Because you can't.
	You can't love and lie.
	Now, let me tell you what I mean.
	The last girl.
	Right?
	Scandinavian, right?
	Right.
	You were terrified, right?
	Of losing her, yes.
	For how long were you terrified?
	From the beginning.
	No, from when she told me that she never saw herself getting married, and I could see the seriousness with which she said that.
	Okay.
	And it was after a year of being together.
	That was a year after a year of being together.
	Okay, sorry, I missed that part.
	So at the beginning she said she might want to get married, and then you're in the beginning.
	Yes.
	So why the hell did you stick around for another 18 months?
	She told you, she told you the truth.
	I don't want to get married.
	Yep.
	And you stuck around for another 18 months.
	And then you demanded you get married.
	Bro.
	Yep.
	Come on.
	What are you doing?
	I felt like I couldn't do any better.
	Well then you just keep dating her and don't get married.
	The problem is that we're Catholic, right?
	So our relationship we can't have sex until we get married.
	Well, you had some kind of sex, right?
	We did, but it's not what I wanted.
	I wanted more.
	I get it.
	And I wanted a family.
	Okay.
	So then you could do better because with her, you can't have sex and you can't have kids.
	So what is the you couldn't do better?
	What does that mean?
	That's to be honest, feeling getting someone that looked as good as she did.
	And was as young as she was.
	No, it's not.
	Come on, just that's that's trash.
	I'm not saying you're trash.
	I'm just saying that perspective.
	Oh, I get that.
	That's total trash.
	She's hot.
	She's hot.
	I mean, come on, you've been into philosophy for ten years.
	And you're a Catholic to the point where you won't have premarital intercourse.
	So, but she's is that is that a shadow from the born addiction?
	She just what did she look like a porn star or something?
	And that's all you're attached to these days.
	It's a good point.
	It's a good question.
	Okay, well, that's something to mull over on your own.
	So she openly told you a year into the relationship, we ain't get I don't want to get married.
	Okay.
	But then you thought and and so hang on.
	So when you first got together with her, were you scared of losing her, or would you scared that she wasn't going to uh stick it out?
	Well, I wasn't scared at the beginning because I didn't know what would happen.
	I I was definitely Did you think she was out of your league, so to speak?
	At the beginning.
	Yeah, I did.
	Okay.
	So you were scared of losing her because when we date people out of her league, we feel anxious, right?
	That's right.
	Okay.
	So you were scared of losing her at the beginning.
	That's right.
	Okay.
	Now the reason I'm saying about the lying is were you honest with her and say and say, listen, your looks are the primary thing that I'm attracted to, and I'm terrified that you're way more attractive than I am, and that you're not going to stick around.
	And I I live in fear of you leaving me like every time.
	No, I never told her that.
	Right.
	So that's lying.
	Because you're your inner state you are keeping hidden as a shameful secret, so you can't be close.
	Do you see what I mean?
	Yeah, no, I do.
	I mean, do you know what it is to unpack your heart and be honest and connected with a woman.
	Gosh, I thought I did.
	Well, you knew that you were frightened of her leaving you when you also knew That you never told her.
	That you withheld and hid your most foundational state of mind with her.
	Well, and you know, I experienced it at the time as this this vague anxiety.
	Anxiety is something that I've dealt with my whole life.
	Okay, so then you should know what the hell's going on, because you've dealt with it your whole life, so you should know what's going on with your anxiety, right?
	And I think I've dealt with it in some sense like, oh, I'm anxious, that actually means I'm excited.
	And I push it down.
	Okay, and I don't mean you if you push down and deny your own feelings, you're responsible for that, especially again, because you've listened to me, Mr. You know, be honest and connected and tell the truth, blah blah blah, right?
	For ten years.
	Absolutely.
	Right.
	So so if you choose to push down your emotions and not figure them out, then things are gonna go haywire, right?
	Absolutely.
	You know, if you've got a toothache and you just take painkillers, your toothache doesn't get better, right?
	Right.
	Can be fatal.
	Right.
	So if I had in that moment, hey, I feel anxious.
	I don't know why, but that's how I feel.
	Well, you knew that okay, when did you figure out that you were terrified that she was out of your league and she was gonna dump you?
	Or she might.
	I've kind of struggled with Well, I that's not true.
	I was gonna say that all women are out of my league, but that's not true because there's some women that I like I'm not dating this person because I feel like I'm out of her league.
	The fat girls.
	Yeah, exactly.
	Right.
	Yeah.
	But I would walk up to her door, um, you know, to knock to, you know, because I'm here, right?
	To let me into her place, and I I'm just anxious.
	And I was probably when did you figure out that you were frightened of her leaving you?
	That she was out of your league or too good for you or whatever.
	Man, since day one.
	Okay, so what are you giving me all this runaround for?
	See, you gotta develop a habit of tell it the truth.
	Oh, you don't get love.
	You earn love through honesty.
	And it until you can be honest, you don't get love.
	I mean, you'll get lust, you'll get attachment, you'll get codependence, you're like whatever it is that people pass off as the false federal reserve coinage of pretend love.
	But to get love, you gotta be honest.
	And honesty would be I'm in this relationship.
	Okay, what's the most honest thing you could have said to this woman when she said, I am not certain about getting married at the beginning.
	I don't know if I want to get married, or like what's the most honest thing you could say?
	I don't know if it's gonna work between us, because I sure as hell do.
	That is not honest at all.
	Really?
	No.
	What do you mean I don't know?
	If you want a marriage and kids.
	And the woman doesn't want that.
	Is it gonna work No, it's not I don't know situation.
	Right.
	It just isn't gonna work.
	Yeah.
	We're not gonna date.
	Yeah.
	I'll see you later.
	Yeah, I'm I'm like I want to get married and I want to have kids, and if it's not with you, like, you know, you're great and love you to death, so to speak, but um no, I'm not uh just it doesn't accord with my values.
	Because you all you did was waste two and a half years in that way.
	Because if you'd said that at the beginning, you say, oh yes, but but then I won't get to date her.
	It's like, yeah, but you wouldn't be heartbroken now, right?
	Right.
	Because you're not fit to date.
	You're six months and you're still heartbroken.
	I'm not criticizing you for that by any means, right?
	Right.
	But you're heartbroken because you're scarred.
	You don't know why things keep not working out, which is what I'm working to try and get you to see.
	Yeah.
	Because you you don't tell the truth.
	Now, if you were younger, I'd say, you know, you're you you hide things or whatever, but because you're in your 40s and listen to me for ten years, you just lie.
	That's a lie.
	And and I'm not calling you some big stinky liar, and right, it's not like I'm 100% all the time, right?
	So I say this with you know compassion and sympathy and all of that kind of stuff, but I have to call a spade a spade, right?
	That you appreciate it.
	You lie and you want truth and you want love.
	Sorry, You lie and you want love and you can't get both.
	That's hard to hear, but I I resonate with that.
	You're right.
	I do lie.
	I do like you even lie.
	I mean, even when it came to your mother, right?
	You didn't want to talk negatively about your mother.
	Who cares what you want?
	You tell the fucking truth.
	Who cares how it feels?
	You just tell the I mean, do you think I had a blast talking about all the controversial shit I was talking about in the world?
	But it's not up to me.
	The truth is important, and we can't have morality without truth, and we can't love each other without the truth, and I'm sick and tired of everyone lying to each other about really important things.
	Yeah, and I really respected that about you.
	Well, thanks.
	And and so you admired me, and life is a form of admiration.
	And so if you want to be admired by a woman, you've got to tell the truth.
	Because if you if you feel she's out of your league and she's going to leave you, you feel like a fraud.
	You feel like someone who's stolen something and is being tracked down and is going to get caught.
	You can't relax, you can't enjoy yourself, you can't enjoy her company.
	It's just tense, stressful.
	Sorry, you were about to say, and I interrupted you, my apologies.
	No, that that actually accords with my experience.
	It's being stressed and it's being feeling stress and tense and it's subtle.
	It's very subtle.
	And I I had this sense that I'm conditioned to deal with those feelings in myself.
	So maybe I'm not as good what that means to deal with those feelings.
	Oh, I I had this low level of stress and anxiety in my life, maybe 95% of the time, sure.
	But I'm so used to it that way.
	Because you were raised by terrifying people.
	Your father was constantly taking a sledgehammer to the base of the family by fucking everything with half a pulse.
	Your mother was telling you we're going to be swallowed up by Satan's armpit a week Tuesday.
	You were raised with great terror.
	And I I sympathize with that, I really do.
	It's awful.
	Thank you.
	And you had violence and you saw terrible verbal abuse flying back and forth between your parents were from your father to your mother in particular, right?
	Right.
	It's awful.
	So, yeah, of course.
	Of course.
	And your parents uh did not tell the truth, it seems.
	I mean, your father slept around despite promising to be monogamous.
	Your mother went from not particularly religious to a fundamentalist, which is the rewrite of the marital contract, significantly, right?
	Right.
	And you said that they kept pretending to be wonderful parents when they were screaming, horrible, sometimes violent, and abusive, right?
	So that's a lie.
	Look how wonderful we are when they're not wonderful.
	That's a lie, right?
	Right.
	So you were raised by people who lied.
	And I think it's hard for you to imagine being in a relationship where you tell the truth.
	I'm I'm intimidated by your looks, I'm intimidated by your scientistness.
	I am um terrified you're gonna leave me, and I am I I'm I'm really gonna work hard to try and talk you into getting married.
	Even though you told me you don't want to get married, I'm here to get you to marry me.
	But that kind of honesty is terrifying.
	And the reason that honesty is terrifying is if you had been honest with your parents.
	Like when you were a kid, what's the most I'm not saying you should have, no, none of us really can with when we've got volatile and difficult parents.
	But when you were a kid, what was the most honest thing you could have said to your mother and father?
	You're not love.
	Right.
	You guys hate each other.
	Stop fighting, you absolute retards.
	Yeah.
	Stop screaming, stop yelling, stop being childish toddlers.
	Dad, stop being A hot dog in permanent search of a bun.
	Like stop being ridiculous, stop being embarrassing, stop being yelling, stop fighting, stop screaming, stop throwing things, stop being idiots.
	You're embarrassing.
	Now, if you'd said something like that to your parents, what would have happened?
	I'd get my ass whooped.
	Yeah.
	So truth equals death.
	Honesty equals destruction.
	So you gotta hide.
	You've got to be silent.
	Right?
	So I think in in in practical terms, I'm sure you have truth as an abstract value or an abstract virtue, but in practical absolute terms.
	I don't think you know how to be committed to telling the truth.
	In a relationship.
	And how could you, given your history and your lack of practical commitment to these virtues and values?
	Telling the truth is really hard.
	Yeah, you know, that resonates, and I've noticed it gets harder when I know someone longer.
	Well, sure, especially if you've had a habit of not telling them the truth, it's kind of hard to confess later, right?
	Right.
	But also if I'm just meeting someone on the bus, right?
	Or if I say I I just met someone and I know them for a week.
	Then okay, I can I can tell them the truth about whatever.
	Um but as I develop a relationship with that person I had this sense that I need them to like me all the time.
	And then telling the truth becomes more and more and more difficult.
	I don't know if that makes sense.
	So no, I get what you're saying, but it was interesting you said I need them to like me.
	And therefore I can't tell them the truth.
	Which is to say that what is honest about you is somehow shameful, and you've used the word shame probably half a dozen or more times over the course of this conversation, right?
	Right.
	So uh with regards to the porn addiction, you you felt you feel shame about it or you felt shame about it, right?
	Right.
	I did.
	Who was responsible for keeping you safe from pornography?
	My parents were.
	Yeah.
	Did they do that?
	No.
	No.
	They didn't.
	Who introduced you to pornography?
	Well, I was a computer kid, so I was I knew enough to get on a BBS back in the uh 14.4 modem days and you know.
	Okay, so someone online or you saw some pictures or whatever it was.
	Okay.
	So your parents failed to keep you safe.
	Yeah.
	Now, how could you not be a sex addict, which is what a pornography addict is, when your father was a sex addict.
	Right, because that's what he I mean.
	He got me pregnant.
	He's my father, so I'm gonna do what he did as a as a model.
	He's the model of yeah, you you know all of that, right?
	You've heard that before.
	So yeah, your father's uh seems like a sex addict if he just continually has sex and and with women and you know, lies about it, and right, so your father is um a sex addict.
	And uh I assume that your mother is to some degree a sex addict as well, which is you know, maybe your father was really good in bed and you know, the colored lights kept going round and round, and that worked for her.
	I wonder about that what what why she stuck around.
	Well, a lot of people.
	I mean, that that keeps a lot of people in in relationships.
	So again, I don't know.
	I don't know, right?
	But uh your mother clearly had some significant instabilities and and no sense of what was appropriate to talk about with children or not.
	You don't talk even if you believe in this end times crap, you don't talk about it with kids.
	And you certainly don't hang over like it's yeah, you know that that saying to a kid you're going to hell is worse than threatening to strangle them to death.
	Right.
	Because strangle them to death, your suffering is over.
	Hell, the suffering is eternal, right?
	It's it's worse than a death threat.
	Especially if it's not like you know 70 or 80 years down the road, but imminent, right?
	Right.
	Right.
	And it's for eternity.
	And it's for eternity.
	That's right.
	And you'll be separated from all the loved ones, or blah, blah.
	She's going to heaven, you're going to hell.
	I mean just torture.
	Well, and you know, if you're seven and under, it's not even theologically correct.
	Because you haven't it's the age of reason, you're not responsible for your sin, you'd you'd go to limbo, right?
	Right.
	So Yeah, go ahead.
	I want to talk to you about aggression, because when you pointed out that um the way I described the end of my relationship with my ex-girlfriend was aggressive.
	Um that really surprised surprised me to hear.
	And well, I've always hear it when it's played back, but go on.
	Yeah.
	Um I I've had a difficult as you know, right?
	Just hearing this for the past couple hours, my relationship with my anger isn't great.
	And at some point I became aware of that.
	Stop criticizing yourself.
	Man, which we're here to learn to understand, not to judge.
	Go ahead.
	Thank you.
	Um anyway, I I'm really into martial arts to to channel that.
	And I thought I'd solve that problem, right?
	Because I do jujitsu and shoot guns and isn't martial arts to some degree about conquering your fear.
	Yeah.
	Right.
	Absolutely.
	So conquering your fear means not hiding it, right?
	If you hide if you hide your fear from people around you, it's one.
	It's conquered.
	You because it's caused you to lie and falsify your existence.
	Right.
	So to be honest about your fears with the people around you is to not lose to your fear.
	Because if your fear becomes so great and you feel ashamed and you hide it, then you are lying and falsifying your experience to those around you, which means you are smaller than your fear.
	Your fear has won and conquered you.
	Because it has caused you to have a rift between you and others by lying and falsifying and hiding.
	Yeah.
	I see what you're saying.
	Because the fear is basically got me to erase myself.
	Well, you I mean, you lied.
	I lied.
	You lied.
	You lied by hiding your true feelings from someone you claimed to care about.
	Now, of course, if somebody says to you, should you hide your true feelings from people you care about, what would you say?
	Of course not.
	Absolutely not.
	Yeah, of course not.
	But you do.
	And then you say, gee, I wonder why I can't get love.
	Thank you.
	Thank you.
	It's a lot to take in.
	Well, not that much.
	Honestly, it's really not that much.
	Just tell the truth.
	It's not complicated.
	It's really not.
	I I don't want you to come out of this with like, oh my God, what a what a maze Steph is constructed for me to get out of.
	It's really, it's dead fucking simple.
	I'm telling you.
	It's dead simple.
	You feel something, you tell the truth.
	You tell the truth.
	You talk about it.
	Yeah.
	You're right.
	It is simple.
	I don't know why I feel this way.
	Maybe I maybe I'm I don't care about what people think of me.
	Well, everybody cares about what people think of them.
	It's not unique to you.
	That's because we're social animals.
	So that's not the answer.
	But the truth is more important.
	And the truth is more important than that.
	No, the truth is that you think that you are not lovable, which is why you lie and hide.
	You think you are not lovable, and that's why you lie and hide.
	What I'm saying to you is you're not lovable because you lie and hide.
	You know, the crazy thing is that everyone tells me that I'm lovable.
	Well, the I'm not telling you that.
	I'm saying you can be lovable, but you have to tell the truth.
	And I and I and I didn't mean to say that you're telling me that I'm not lovable.
	I just mean No, I'm telling you you're not lovable until you tell the truth.
	Fair.
	I mean, you're not.
	Yeah.
	Nobody is.
	I'm not.
	No, no, nobody is, right?
	Right.
	Because what's there to love if the person's lying to you.
	Just an illusion.
	Someone who's not there, someone who's the opposite, right?
	Right.
	And here's the thing too.
	People who are honest, my friend, always know that you're lying.
	Like there were these comedians back in the day who used to make up nonsense languages that sounded realistic, you know, like some Eastern European language or some, you know, a pretend Japanese, right?
	And it sounded like they were speaking Japanese or some, I don't know, Croatian or or some Eastern European language.
	But it was just nonsense syllables, right?
	And there was an Italian singer who in the 70s created a English sounding nonsense song.
	It sounded English, but of course, to English speakers, you know it does this just gibberish, right?
	Now people who tell the truth, people who speak the language of honesty, always know when you're lying.
	So the only people who will let you lie are people who are always also lying.
	So the problem is the problem is when you don't tell the truth, you are doomed to wander this godforsaken earth in the presence of people who lie.
	Fuck that.
	So your ex-girlfriend, a Scandinavian woman you put on a pedestal, the goddess of porn addiction or whatever we want to call her, right?
	So she lied to you.
	Right?
	So she she when when you said I want to get married and have children, she should have said what?
	I don't want that, so we're done.
	Yeah, it's just not this is not gonna work out.
	And it didn't, right?
	Right.
	And now everybody's hurt.
	And so she lied to you because she wanted to have a boyfriend.
	And you lied to her because she was hot, right?
	Right.
	Gee, I wonder why it didn't work out.
	Now, what you and the reason I'm hammering on this so hard, my friend, is because you are gonna meet some woman.
	Let's do this this little game.
	What's your favorite female name?
	Mary.
	Mary, okay.
	Good Catholic boy.
	Yeah.
	So you're gonna meet Mary.
	She's gonna come down on a cloud of cherubs and honesty, right?
	You're gonna meet Mary.
	And Mary's gonna be honest, right?
	Right.
	Now, the moment you start lying to Mary, even unconsciously, she's gonna know it, right?
	Right.
	And so you can't lie to Mary.
	So if you want to have a relationship with someone who's honest, you've got to start practicing telling the brutal truths to yourself first and foremost and to others as well.
	Thank you.
	Are you familiar with the book Radical Honesty?
	No.
	Okay.
	Well, it's it's along these lines, and I read it and I'm like, well, it sounds great in theory.
	Um terrifying in practice, and the gist of the of the book is is essentially what you're saying.
	It's you you you tell you tell the truth, no matter what.
	And well, I don't I don't the no matter what stuff.
	I I you know I I don't like the word radical.
	I mean, just be honest.
	Now, honesty is a relationship.
	So if someone is a if someone lies to me, I don't feel any particular obligation to tell them the truth.
	I mean, I won't have a relationship with them as a whole, but you know, if someone's lying to me, uh I don't feel any particular obligation to tell them the truth, so uh it's not to me it's not an absolute like gravity, honesty is a relationship.
	But when Mary comes along, she's gonna need you to tell the truth.
	Now to tell her the truth is to say, yes, I had a sex of 15 year marriage and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
	And now the fact that that happened is not gonna drive Mary away.
	Right?
	What is gonna drive Mary away is if there's two things.
	One, you lie about it, or two, you don't know why it happened.
	You blame the other person, you blame your parents, you blame your childhood, you blame whatever, right?
	Right.
	It never crossed my mind.
	That's an excuse.
	Of course it crossed your mind.
	That that that you might leave.
	Because if it if it if it never crossed your mind that you might leave, you would complain to your friends about it and get their feedback, and then they might say, Well, you've got to end the marriage because it's not really a marriage.
	So the fact that you hid it from your friends and your family meant that you were thinking about leaving, but you were frightened to leave, and that's why you hid it from people.
	Yep.
	Does that make sense?
	Yeah, absolutely.
	That's why you hit it.
	So Mary needs to know, A, that it happened, and B, you know why the hell it happened, so that it's not going to happen again.
	Right.
	And I'm better for it, and I'm stronger for it.
	Yeah, maybe.
	I mean, that's maybe.
	I mean, i I don't I'm not with everything that kills you makes you stronger.
	I mean, chemo doesn't kill you, but it doesn't make you stronger.
	So um so it's uh you know, I'm better for it.
	That's a kind of bravado.
	I don't know if you're better for it or not.
	It would be better if you've been raised well to begin with.
	Right?
	So you can survive these things and grow from them, but you know, whether you're better or not, that's a kind of everything that happens happens for the best, and I'm stronger and better.
	And like you can get you can get good things out of bad circumstances, but that doesn't make the bad circumstances good.
	So I don't I wouldn't I wouldn't go because you don't know for sure whether you know you're stronger and better for it.
	You sure as hell aren't at 42 because you're single and heartbroken.
	So it hasn't it hasn't made you better and stronger yet.
	So I I would be very careful about jumping to those conclusions because um that was your first instance of kind of lying about something in the even the imaginary conversation with Mary.
	No, I'm better and stronger because of it.
	You don't know that.
	And how?
	What what is the evidence that you're better and stronger for having had a sexless 15 year marriage and got your heart broken by the Scandinavian woman.
	That's a good point.
	So don't do that.
	Don't do this false bravado when I'm better and stronger and blah, blah, blah.
	At least like we're just talking about telling the truth, and you give an imaginary conversation with Mary.
	She's gonna look at that and she's gonna say, This guy's full of shit.
	And she's not gonna say it like in some condemnatory way.
	Like, oh, he's a terrible guy.
	It's just like, yeah, he's full of shit.
	Like he doesn't he he's just making things up to sound good or to sound better.
	He just saying stuff.
	He doesn't have a commitment to the truth.
	Like, why did you tell me no, I'm better and stronger because of it?
	Why did you say that?
	What was the impulse behind it?
	I felt some kind of need to balance out.
	The shame I feel that that that's not what I did again.
	That's manipulative.
	What's the most honest thing you can say in that moment.
	Here's what happened.
	What's the no?
	What's the most honest thing you can say when you feel the shame?
	I feel ashamed of this.
	There you go.
	That's it.
	Don't give me this bullshit, I'm stronger and better.
	Like that's not honest.
	That's manipulative.
	That's you trying to make the other person not see your shame by putting on this false bravado front.
	And and looks, I I'm I'm this is not a criticism in any way, shape, or form.
	I'm just pointing out the mechanics that somebody who's honest, like the moment you said that, I'm like, that's not true.
	And I so I'm telling you, like people who are really dedicated towards honesty, and again, please understand this doesn't mean I'm perfectly honest all the time, but it's something that I really work towards, right?
	So people who are really honest will know immediately when you're lying, and that was a lie.
	And again, I'm not calling you some big flawed liar.
	I'm just saying that that was a falsehood because you weren't being honest and saying, you know, I really feel kind of cast down, and I feel the need to pump myself up and compensate for the shame by saying, Oh, it's for the best, right?
	Or I'm stronger.
	Like so you've got to catch yourself.
	You know, sort of take that deep breath and just say, you know what, I really do feel ashamed at the moment.
	Yeah.
	So Mary, Mary will catch this stuff.
	And she'll point it out maybe once or twice, but if you don't start to catch yourself, she's just gonna have to move on.
	Because she's not gonna want to spend the rest of her life trying to wrestle you back into an honest perspective, if that makes sense.
	Right.
	And I wouldn't want to be in her shoes, so I totally get that.
	Yeah, yeah, for sure.
	And it's you know this is you shouldn't give up on love.
	But you gotta give up on falsifying things on false front on bravado on braggadocio on you just gotta be honest.
	If you feel ashamed say I feel ashamed.
	If you feel fear you say I feel fear.
	I mean I've got a whole book on this real time relationships.
	I don't know if you've read it or not but if you haven't it would be a good thing to to do I have read it and I will read it again.
	Yeah, read it again because you've got to really commit to just take that deep breath and unpack your heart.
	You know, earlier when you were saying things that I didn't understand, what did I say?
	I don't understand.
	I can't follow.
	When you said, oh, I'm better and stronger, I said, I don't think that's true.
	And so here's why and all of that, right?
	So, again, I'm not doing it any – and none of this is about moral.
	This is not about judgment.
	It's just if you want love, and I know that you do, you've got to – the price of love is honesty.
	It's hard because, of course, in your family, honesty was roundly punished.
	And your father was not only a sex addict, it sounds like, but he also sounds like a pathological liar because he lied to your mother about everything to do with his affairs, right?
	Right.
	You said your mother found this love letter, and he's like, nope, not real, doesn't exist.
	I mean, that's like – I don't even know what to say.
	That's like somebody standing in the rain telling you it's not raining.
	And that's why I don't talk to him because he lies to me.
	Yes, but now you have to confront his effect on you.
	Right.
	I hope that makes sense.
	So yeah it but if you I'm telling you if you commit to this honesty stuff your life will change completely well I really appreciate it.
	You are welcome and I just really want to reiterate I mean I'm I'm so sorry about your upbringing sounds really really tough and horrible and corrupt and and wrong and I'm really really sorry for that as a whole I I you know massive big bear hug sympathies brother to brother about about that and uh yeah it's not too late.
	I mean if you were 60 maybe but um you're just looking for a woman ten years younger and you can get that but the price is honesty.
	You you're honest and you'll drive the liars away and the truth tellers will hold you to their heart but there's no other way thank you.
	You're very willing will you keep me posted about how it's going absolutely absolutely thanks many thanks for doing what you do.
	Thanks for doing what you do man.
	I I it's it's it's a light man.
	It's a light I appreciate have a great night.

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