 Let's face it. No two relationships are alike. And if you're dating long distance, it probably puts a big time monkey wrench in trying to create a relationship. So I want to lean into this conversation of, you know, how to make a long distance relationship work. Now, most of you who follow my work know that I'm not a big fan of long distance dating. I'm not a big fan of long distance relationships. Which is kind of ironic because now I am in a long distance relationship. So that kind of throws a monkey wrench in all of my content in the past. And I thought it'd be important to talk about this at a greater length to just give some backdrop as to why I felt they are problematic. And also some of the ways to actually build a healthy long distance relationship when you're long distance dating. So, God, I mean, the laundry list is long of why I think they're problematic in many cases, especially because of these devices. We have created opportunities to meet with people whom we wouldn't otherwise meet in our daily lives, which is great, especially for those that live in your same city. You know, it's great because literally I live in a condo complex that has 600 people and I don't know most of the people that live here. So great that we have these devices to maybe connect with someone. It becomes more challenging when you've connected with someone where there's distance involved for a variety of different reasons. One is just the logistics of meeting for the first time to just determine if you have chemistry with one another. That's certainly problematic. And then the logistics of how would you form a relationship with someone that's long distance that actually could lead to something more serious. Now, I believe that a lot of people enter into long distance dating scenarios because they're lonely. I think in some cases that loneliness causes them to actually connect via telephone and actually begin a relationship that's more based on bonding with their traumas than actually forming a healthy happy relationship. I think this happens significantly. In addition, some people connect or one of the two people connect long distance where they're operating from a place of desperation. That's what I said, it's place of desperation. I see this more often with women that believe that they can completely change their lives to accommodate someone else's distance. Now, I say that's desperate because think of the amount of headache it takes to shift one's life, especially if there's a significant distance, how much effort it takes to shift one's life to accommodate someone else. And I think women tend to do more of the accommodating than men. So I think women operate from a belief that once they've got a guy that might be interested that they'll bend over backwards, they'll pretzel for the guy. And oftentimes the guy doesn't have to do much to make this relationship work. So, and I've witnessed women, by the way, I've witnessed women who have engaged in long distance communication with someone who lives in another country. And they believe that by they're coming from a European country as an example and they come to the United States, which oftentimes creates a scenario which I'm about to share with you that ends up being short-lived. So a lot of times long distance dating is short-lived. Now, why does this happen? Because in many cases there's incessant communication with one another and there's a connection that's built. And during that time, a lot of times there's sexual conversations that occur. And during these sexual conversations, when two people end up, because this has happened, when they meet, they oftentimes have sex, literally moments after they've met or a short period of time thereafter, especially if there's been sexual conversations. So it really, it benefits the guy in some cases. And in many cases, women are doing the traveling to the man more often than not under the guys that, you know, this will be PG rated, but it always ends up with sex. And then once that man is at that sexual desire field, oftentimes the chemists, the chemicals have been released from his body and that conquest has occurred because you know men are hunters. So what are we conquesting oftentimes sex? And then men will disappear. So I'm not a bit, those are some of the reasons why I'm not a big fan of this. In addition, I've never felt that men really bond via the telephone. I don't believe men bond via the telephone. There's a saying that men fall in love through sex and women give sex hoping for love. So we bond more from a physical perspective. It's doing social activities, hobbies, mutual interest, spending time with family and friends, traveling together. That's where we can bond more closely than versus the telephone. And you're in a long distance dating scenario relationship scenario. You're more dependent on telephone communication, FaceTime and text messaging. And I just don't believe men bond that way. Certainly unhealthy men temporarily bond that way. Controlling men never bond that way. And emotionally mature men feel a sense of connection, but they desire a physical relationship that's face to face. So I find myself in the long distance dynamic. Now, I'll be candid with you, even though we had met a year prior on a dating site before our actual physical first meeting. And during that conversation, it wasn't a great conversation we had on the phone, but we decided to remain connected. We remained friends. We joined our Facebook pages with one another and I think Instagram. So we stayed connected. And we would communicate every now and again, how's dating going? How's your life going? We got on the phone a number of times. And during the course of a year, I'd say we communicated via phone six, seven, maybe eight, nine times. I just don't remember the specific number and included some text messages, you know, Merry Christmas, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Easter, that sort of thing. So when we eventually, and what happened was when we decided to meet, it was just merely two friends meeting with one another. Because I happened to be traveling to the city she lives in, which happens to be Chicago. And it was again, under the guise of just two friends meeting, I really had no idea we would have such a strong connection when we met. We had an incredible first evening together. And because I was there traveling through to officiate a wedding. In fact, I just got a picture of it. I just want to share everyone with you. I got a picture of the just got it today. There's me officiating a wedding, Max and Megan. I'm very honored to have officiated your wedding. I just posted that on Instagram. You can go to the description below to Instagram to find that picture. And so I invited her to join me at the wedding. I checked in with both of them and they agreed. And we had such a fantastic at the wedding that we really hit it off when we said, okay, are we going to explore this? So when I got home, we had a conversation. We immediately made a plan for her to come out and visit me. And that took about two weeks, give or take two and a half weeks before our last face to face time together. Now during that time, we talked on the phone a number of times we were connecting with one another. And we were kind of feeling each other out. We spent a lot of time talking about our past relationships. We wanted to unpack our past to see who we are today. And then we really explored, what are we genuinely seeking in a relationship? And we practiced what I call radical honesty, radical honesty was real open communication, open communication. We just laid our cards on the table when we were both talking on the phone and then face to face. And then during this conversation, we're like, okay, are we really going to explore a long term relationship? Is this something we want to explore? Because we're at a point in our lives where we're like shit or get off the pot. Let's get this shit going. Let's decide if this is a good fit. So we planned a second visit, which was originally going to be three weeks later, but we moved it up two weeks later. And we really said during these, and we had a number of multiple hour conversations in between. Why are we doing this? I was like, first is really good open communication, really laying our cards on the table. And then second, why are we doing this? Is this really got long term merit to it? Listen, if we were dating, if our dynamic was close, she lived close by, I think we would have had a different outcome. It may have just taken longer, but because of the distance, we said, look, we've got to figure out how we're going to take this distance and bring it closer together. So it was really important to say, why are we doing this and what is the long term goal? What is the long term goal? And what is our plan for this, which I'll talk about in a moment? So one of the other things that because we were apart on some days, it was important that we check in with each other to keep that validation going, keeping that energy going, because it's very difficult when you're apart. And in addition, we had the tough conversations. We had the real tough conversations. We talked about money. We talked about sex. We talked about the real more difficult conversations. For example, if you haven't read the book, Eight Dates by Drs. John and Julie Gottman, I highly recommend checking this out. This is the deep conversations to have. And we did that. And it's really important to have those tough conversations because if you're going to do long distance, listen, it's problematic. And like I said in the beginning of this recording, a lot of it is therapy based or it's just satisfying an itch base in the beginning. And because we were physically intimate with each other, we recited my dating vows to one another, which I'll share with you right now. And it's listed in the description below. But in the dating vows, it says, I agree to explore the process of getting to know you with the intent to declare something serious in the next three to six months. I agree to be monogamous sexually while we're having regular sex together. I agree not to actively seek or date or meet others while we're in this process of dating, including taking down our profiles. Interestingly enough, I deleted all my file. I mean, even though I hid all my apps and hid my profile, I actually physically deleted everything today because I'm like, what's the point of having it on my phone anymore? Number four, we agree to speak up if this isn't working for either one of us versus pulling back ghosting or disappearing. And lastly, I agree to invest regular time in the process of getting to know you, which looks like and this is what we talked about. What would it look like if we're going to do this from a long term perspective? I share this with you because look at what's the fucking point of dragging. Listen, it's dragging out a long distance relationship is can be incredibly painful, especially if your love language is physical touch. And if you're not familiar, where's the book? Oh, I don't have it handy. Oh, the Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman. I highly recommend checking this out. By the way, there's a link below to all the books I recommend. One of my love languages is physical touch. I need to connect with someone on a physical level to feel a sense of connectivity. I think most people physical touches in their top three. So ultimately, we had the hard conversations and we have a plan. And we've decided to take this distance and change it. Now, she grew up in Los Angeles where I live. She has many fans. She has many friends. Her dearest friend lives here. So we decided that she would move here at some point and that's going to happen fairly quickly. If you don't have a plan, it's going to be very difficult to make this work because a lot of people are just winging it. They're winging it. They're winging it in the dating process. They're getting some benefits of companionship, connection and sex without any real commitment. And if you don't have a real commitment with one another, the dating vows look, you're going to turn away a lot of people. A lot of guys, a lot of women are going to be turned off about this. But having intentional conversations and having a real plan and being committed to this, I think one of the real problems today, I'll talk about this in a moment, is that people aren't getting married as much as they used to. They're not. And the divorce rate is ridiculously high. And I think because of that, it has become incredibly problematic because I think the institution of marriage had a benefit, had a value. And I think a lot of people have discounted that or have dismissed it because the one core fundamental, especially for those in my parents' generation where there's a picture of them here today, is once they made a commitment to one another, you had to figure it out. Failure was not an option. It turns out my girlfriend, her parents met and married within, I believe it was three weeks and they were married almost 60 years before her father passed away. Failure was not an option. And yet the reason why I think the divorce rate is so high and why marriage is so low these days, or the people choosing to get married, I actually believe it's the proliferation of divorce attorneys. I believe making it easy to divorce, and by the way, a lot of people say it isn't easy to divorce. It is absolutely easy to divorce. It can be incredibly painful to divorce. There's no doubt about it. But to get a divorce is rather easy. And it's kind of fucked for the children that go through this because the reality is today, commitment, it's blasé. It's really blasé. Commitment is blasé these days. So you no wonder it's a clusterfuck out there in the dating realm because you know what, people don't have to make, they can make little or no commitment. Even my dating vow isn't even that strong of a commitment. It's just a promise that most people are flaky because human beings are rather fucking dysfunctional. And no wonder it's a mess out there in the dating realm. So if you're going to engage in a long-distance dynamic, you're really putting a lot of your heart at risk because it's already dysfunctional out there. If you're not familiar with my two charts about emotional maturity, I'm going to share this with you, emotional maturity and relationship skills. By the way, this is not a fact. It's an opinion. But I believe roughly 20% of the population has clinical issues. And while 20% might be emotionally healthy with their skills, we have a dysfunctional dynamic out there. And then to put distance in that is only going to make it more problematic unless two people are absolutely intentional. They practice radical honesty, laying their cards on the table. They've learned good, healthy communication skills. If you haven't read the book, I hear you, the surprisingly simple skills to extraordinary relationships. I highly recommend reading this so you can develop the skills to actually engage in a long-distance relationship. And most people are bad at it. So again, it's problematic if you live in the same city. Imagine how more problematic. Now what's interesting in our relationship, I think it gives you the opportunity to accelerate. If it's a real connection, I think for it to be successful, you need a real connection. You need to have that physical attraction, real connection. I'm talking about connection with one another. You need to have that physical attraction as well. But you also have to be intentional. In addition, you have to really be introspective. We have human beings that are completely unconscious to their childhood wounds and traumas and adult traumas. And no wonder it's problematic out there. This is why I highly recommend reading the book, The Hoffman Process, The Hoffman Process. So you can do a deep dive into healing your childhood wounds and traumas. Because the problem is, most of the times, distance is already problematic. But when you have emotionally fucked up people trying to connect with one another, it's going to be problematic on steroids. Because at least when you live in the same city, you can ferret this shit out much sooner. So why do I think my relationship is going to work? Look at strong connection right from the get-go, including the attraction piece. Intentional in the process. And lastly, we are very aware of our childhood wounds and traumas and our adult traumas. And we're introspective in this case. And if you want a long-distance relationship work, if you don't have those three elements, it's going to be problematic. And the last but not least piece, and this is what men need to be able to go the distance and long-distance relationships. They just have to like you. You know what? There's a picture of my girlfriend right there. There's her and I, Mastro's restaurant. I like her. I just like her as a person. I just light up thinking about her because she's a cool chick. She's chill. She's just got a great, pleasant personality. She's agreeable. She's not controlling. She's not combative. She's just very chill. I love that about her. It makes me smile because I like this person. Ultimately, if you want the guy to be able to go the distance, he's got to like you because I want you to know something. Long-distance is spending a lot of time on the telephone and guys don't bond that way. They bond face-to-face with you. And that's the kind of relationships I want to encourage you have. So if you need some help and support on that, check out the link to schedule a call with me. I'll teach you how to ask the right questions, how to determine if the two of you are right for one another. That's my skill. That's my expertise. Check out the link in the description for maybe joining my group, maybe following me on Instagram. If you want support, that's my area of expertise. I can help you with that. Listen, I hope you found value in this video. We're going to take questions in a moment, but do me a favor, hit that like button, share this video, subscribe to my channel, hit the bell. My goal is to open human beings up to the understanding that we are a dysfunctional society, emotionally speaking. So stop praying for fairy dust to fix things and take charge of your life. And if you haven't read the book, Ladies, Why Men Love Bitches, please read this. Stop giving your power away to men. Bitch stands for babe in total control of yourself. Yes. Because when you're empowered, you have a greater chance of having a relationship success. Is this sinking in? Is this resonating with you? Please let me know. By the way, my book, don't forget. What the self love anyway, a journey of personal development, self open spiritual work. All right. So I think it's time to take questions. We're just going to do a short Q&A today. If you have a question, write the word question and then post the question there after or purchase a super sticker, super chat. There's a little dollar sign there. And all of the monies go to a scholarship fund in the name of my son, Conor Asley, to donate to causes like the Hoffman process, insight seminar. There's a picture of Conor right there. There's a picture of him right there. One of my favorites. These are all brand new mixed style pictures. By the way, this is my son who passed away. So I'd be honored if you'd give us a little bit of money so we can donate to these causes. And if you're watching the replay, there's a super thanks button as well. All right, folks. I think it's time for questions. So let's see what we've got today. And that says girlfriend. Wow. I think I missed a few steps here. So happy for you. Yes. This has been going on almost three months now. All right. Let's go swim in. You have a question for me. Post the word question or purchase a super sticker. Oh, here we go. Monica. Question. I've been dating a guy for three months. We are both super busy. We meet up once or twice a week. I asked for one phone call per week. It's been hard for us to fit. So I keep pushing it. Is it, is it no big deal? You know what? Again, are you two having sex together? If you're, by the way, if his penis gets to go inside your vagina ladies, you have every right to ask for certain things to help you build trust in the relationship. Now the problem is when you don't see each other regularly, it's going to be difficult to build trust. How do you build trust? Emotional connection. Economic agreement. Social activities, hobbies, mutual interest, spending time with family and friends, traveling together, teamwork, building skills, and you're both your personal and professional life. Intimacy, both physical and emotional intimacy. It's going to be difficult to build trust. And it's even more problematic if you only get to speak on the phone once a week. So it's going to be problematic. If you don't have time for a relationship, obviously you have time for sex. You have time to actually spend on the phone to build trust and to do this stuff. That's how it's going to happen. It's very, men don't bond on the telephone. You got to do shit together if you want to have any chance for success. That's my two cents in it anyway. All right. Thanks so much for that question. I appreciate it. Question. What is your recommendation of how consistently to get together in person for a long distance relationship once or twice a month? I got to tell you something. So our distance is 2,400 miles. The plane ride ticket is 600 bucks. And I like to fly first class. So that's 1,400 for me. I actually purchased a coach ticket. Hey, I'm a little bit spoiled. Okay. I think it's very difficult to see each other only once or twice a month. It depends on how much time you gather. And if you're only spending a weekend together, now in my case, the first visit was four days. The next visit was 12 days, 24 seven together. And she flies out next week and we're going to spend almost three weeks together, including a trip to Cancun for my birthday on August 1st. So we're going to the secrets resort. I won't tell you which one. So, you know, I think it's very, unless you're spending a significant amount of time together, it's very difficult to make it work. I'm not saying they can't work, but you've got to have a plan. You have to be intentional. Otherwise you're getting a lot of, it's a bubble relationship. You're spending a lot of time in a bubble, but you're not really building the deeper roots to trust. So I think you got to figure out a plan of how you're going to take that distance and shorten it. Otherwise I wouldn't invest in someone unless you have a plan. I didn't consider this person, except I only considered it because she said she was wanting to move here anyway, to be with her daughter, to be with her friends. I mean, she has family, she has two children here. So if you don't have a plan, you're betting, you're, you're, you're betting on the come. And that's really hard to do. I'm not saying it doesn't work. I'm just saying it's hard to do. That's my two cents anyway. All right. Brenda says question. What should I do with men who are all, who are all in after a few conversations? I seem super, I seem super dysfunctional to me, but should I give these guys a chance? You know, men get enthusiastic because we're driven by our penis. So it's not uncommon to experience what's known as lust or limerence, lust or limerence. That's a very common experience for men. Now I've experienced that. I experienced it with my girlfriend, but I also was tempered with my emotional maturity. So, you know, it's hard to say, again, I believe 80% of the population is fucked up, pretty fucked up. So, you know, you've got a greater chance of that going on with this guy. I mean, when I say fucked up, I mean, we got issues that they're not being addressed, okay? So, let me come back to your question. But you know what? I'm all about giving a person a chance because you just never know. But do you know the mechanics to a healthy, happy relationship? Do you know the fundamentals to a healthy, happy relationship? If you don't know the answer to that, it's going to be problematic because I guarantee you, most men are winging it, winging it, winging it. They have no fucking clue. And then you give your power away to, you ladies give your power away to men because you want to be claimed by a guy and all you have to do is sit in your feminine energy and just hope that magic fairy dust will make shit work. Read these books I talk. Read the book here. Read this book. Even though you may not be talking marriage, read the seven principles for making a marriage work. This gives you insight into the mechanics to a healthy, happy relationship. That's when you're going to have a greater chance for success rather than winging it. That's my two cents. Thank you for listening. Wow. All right. We've got a lot of questions here. All right. Let's go swimming. Just keep swimming. Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum. Pharaoh says, Jonathan, enjoy your holiday in Mexico. Thank you so much. Oh, Trina, I just received your self-love book in the mail today. I can't wait to dive in. Thank you so much. I'm honored. All right. Let's keep... I don't have any questions. Let's see. Carrie says, I'm curious. I have a really good girlfriend. I have known her for years. We have a lot in common, support each other. She knows my struggles with this guy. Recently, she is flirting with him. That's pretty shitty. Not a good friend. That kind of fucking sucks. Sorry. I'm sorry you're experiencing that. Beat the shit out of her. I'm sorry. That's just bullshit. Your friends should not be flirting with somebody you're in a relationship with. Question. I'm a woman with no kids, and I can't seem to find a guy with no kids. Is there still hope for me? You know, I'm sorry. I don't like questions like this because there's a million men or more in the United States. Probably five million men who are relatively age-appropriate that don't have children or just date a 22-year-old like my son. 26-year-old like my son. Yes, there are men with no children. But there is a higher percentage of that. And you may have to change your thoughts here. You might want to change your thoughts or maybe date someone who has children. That's okay too. But you got to lean into that for yourself. But there are plenty of men that have no children at your age bracket. I can promise you that. All right. Let's see. Question. If I feel chemistry with a guy, does he also feel it? You could absolutely have chemistry with someone and they could absolutely not have chemistry with you. That is absolutely positive. Men have had chemistry with women and the women put them in the friend zone. So that is absolutely possible. All right. Let's keep swimming. What's up? Well, it looks like we have no questions. You know, we're going to do a short live tonight. It's Friday night. I'm going to go hang out with some friends. I'll give one more chance for a question. Otherwise, we're going to wrap up tonight. I just want everyone to know that, listen, long distance relationships have potential. But it's much like the broken clock. It's right twice a day. Most often than not, it's very much a very complicated type of relationship because of the distance. And in addition, because human beings are rather emotionally dysfunctional. So if you're going to engage in it, let me just remind you, open communication via the telephone. Really being intentional. Why are we doing this? Number four, making sure you are mindful about giving each other regular attention towards one another. Discuss the tough stuff like money and other things. And lastly, what's our plan to taking the distance and bringing it together? It's just a little, oh, by the way, we had Coco write in a question. I'll take this as the last one. Where do you see yourself in 10 years time? Where do I see myself? I'm going to wrap up with this question. So, here's my girlfriend. I see us married. I see us maybe living abroad, maybe being ex, you know, living in Costa Rica or Colombia, where she is from, maybe somewhere like that. Maybe Bali, maybe Thailand. Who knows? I see us traveling the world. She's a big time world traveler. I want to explore the depths of my profession. I want to be able to do this for another decade. I love being able to help people. I hope I'm still young enough to be relevant to people in the next decade. I hope we get to travel the world. I hope we really help each other in our personal lives. I hope we uncover the nooks and crannies of who we are at a deeper level. I hope to have great sex still up until, you know, 10 years or more. I really do hope that. And I said marriage. Yeah. I want to be married to someone. I'm in love with this person. So why wouldn't I want to consider that? It just saddens me. And I want to be fully committed because I want to be in that kind of relationship where we're in it through thick and thin. Because ultimately, you know, look at my mom passed away four years ago and they were, my mom and dad were together 66 years. You know, it's tough on my dad right now, but he had a good run. You know, they had a good run, I should say. I want to have a good run in the last, I mean, I'm in chapter three of a five chapter book, you know, provided nothing serious happens unlike what happened with my son. So I want to make chapter four and five, the best chapters of my life. So I want to, I want to taste life like you, you're biting into an orange and letting it just drip all over your face. That's what I encourage people. And I believe that personal development, self-help and spiritual work. This is why I wrote my book to empower your life. By the way, there's a link below to get it to empower your life in such a way that you want to live life to the fullest because guess what? I see a lot of people in meandering relationships and I always ask them, get busy living or get busy dying. Listen, for those of us in midlife, the days in front of us are shorter than the days behind us. It is time to make every single moment count. And you learn this after you lose a child like I did. So everyone, I encourage you to make every moment count and don't engage in relationships that are meandering or go nowhere. Be empowered in your life. Take charge of your relationship, Destiny. Don't leave it up to someone else. You take charge. And that's my invitation for everyone. And I hope my content resonates with you. If it does, please post a comment below. I'd like to hear your thoughts. All right. I think this will be a good place to wrap up my video. I'm going to wrap up as I always do. First off, give myself a big, gigantic John Thunberg of self-love. I'm going to reach into the camera and give you a hug of love if that's okay. I'm going to ask you to turn to someone, a pet, a teddy bear pillow, and give them a hug of love. Because hugs are a great source of love. And let's face it, we can all use more love in our lives. I want to thank Coco and Melissa and Anya and Carrie and Helen and Risley and Brenda and Natalie and Melissa and Vero and Kelly and probably Sal and CeCe and Adina. And everyone, thank you so much. Big, gigantic hugs from me. Have a wonderful, wonderful, fabulous weekend. Be well. Thanks. Bye-bye now.