 Well hello and welcome to our first holiday special live stream with my beloved who's and joining us for the first time and her name is I'm Marie and guess what I'm real she's real she's not the photograph that you see behind me in most of my videos I've actually invited my sweetheart my beloved to join us tonight to answer some of the questions that came in from the group which mostly centers around our relationship how we met some of the challenges we face in our relationship and I'm excited to have my beloved with me tonight how do you feel about doing this this is fun I've never done anything like this so I apologize in advance for any bloopers but hey we're gonna make the best of it well this is very impromptu this isn't scripted I literally other than asking that she get ready I didn't prepare her whatsoever so we're doing a test run to see how we work together this will be interesting for us and I'm very excited to have you all join us tonight so many of you have asked me about my relationship many of you've been following me for a very long time and you've known my journey and my journey from after my divorce and some of the dating or some of my relationship history so many of you have been very kind and very generous expressing how you felt about how I've shared my content with you all interesting enough my sweetheart has much of a journey not similar to mine but you have your own experiences of how you got to where you're at today and would you be willing to share with everyone our age difference because many people think you're 20 years younger than me so what's our age difference seriously yeah okay I'm a year older than she's a year older than me so I want everyone to know that I am not this guy that's you know basically dating younger woman I've got an older woman in my life and that just illustrates that not all men are seeking younger women so I hope most of you recognize that there are good men out there that are seeking a serious relationship so with that said I think I'd like to share kind of how we met with the group and the challenges we face because you know right off the bat well first off we were a long distance relationship and I say we're because we now live together yes that is true my question is are we gonna share the relationship how it evolved from my perspective or from your perspective so let's see it says the freeze I think there's something wrong with the camera so I hope it's working looks like we have people in here so that's good so let's start with we'll start with your perspective because you well first off I want to officially say she wrote me first on a dating site and that dating site was match.com so you initiated contact well he seems to think that that was our first contact but our first contact was actually one year prior to that and he didn't give me the time today so then a year later I wrote I wrote to him and he wrote back and basically thank you but no thank you you know you live in Chicago I live here and you know so when so I wrote back because I'm like you know what look I was raised in LA I have two kids in LA I have no problem moving to LA and you know I think you know we would get along and so he said wow that's a lot of stuff to unpack that was the first time I heard the word unpack and like what sort of unpack did you read it? Well I was actually really impressed with what you shared I was really impressed with how you articulated your point for me to consider someone long distance because you know I really didn't want to do long distance dating I talk about long distance dating with my community and I don't feel like it's a good move for most people so you you made an argument that at least made me want to consider her but I've been candid with you and you know this I really even when we first met he didn't like me wait what wait first off let's clarify this not when I first physically met you when we first spoke on the phone I didn't feel like we were a fit yeah well and then what did you do next? I called you a week later thinking oh my gosh that that last conversation went so well and what did I say I didn't like our last conversation like really like wow okay can we share why I didn't like it? Okay so I said to her I felt like you talked all about yourself and you didn't ask me any questions and what did you say after that? I said yeah I've heard that before and actually by her sharing that by her owning it it actually made me think you know what I want to get to know you a little bit more because you owned it and that was that was really important to me well and you know now when you think back when I didn't do a lot of dating I did a lot of meet and greets but I don't call those dates and I felt that I needed to tell everybody my story so they knew about me and and then go from there his perspective is different you know he wants to be asked questions I'm not somebody that yeah I don't like volunteering I like to I like to be invited in the conversation I don't like to over share although I do unpack things so we talked about that earlier so in that conversation we said let's be Facebook friends you know let's keep in touch you know if either one of us is ever in town let's connect with one another well and the other thing is that I didn't come to California often last year was a little bit different because I was in a car accident so it changed things a little bit for me but when I came out here in November and December I blew her off wait a minute let me rewind for a second so first she we met in May of 2021 via the dating app but she believes we met a year prior to that or at least connected with each other so for about eight or nine months we just kept in touch we called each other wasn't even romantic it was just like friendship you were liking posts on my Facebook page I was liking posts on your page so when she came to visit I wasn't in really a good mood I wasn't really in a good place when you came that first visit I had just had a brief encounter with a woman who totally messed me up so I wasn't in the mood I didn't blow you off intentionally well I know that now but at the time I'm like okay what I'm not somebody that is I don't want to say that I chase people I put myself out there I have no problem staying in touch and stuff but when you know he tells me oh yeah 1 30 would be a good time and then he says that but you have to come here I'm like I didn't run well I was working I had only I was working and I had a slot available and it didn't work out yeah well so then then the next time I came out of here it didn't work either so yeah so fast forward a few months after that I was coming out to Chicago to officiate a wedding for a dear friend of mine and I called you up and said hey do you want to meet up yeah before that oh yeah we did talk well that's right we did like in January he had contacted me and he said oh that's right forgot about this you know like oh so how's the dating world going and I'm like it's going I turned it off I turned it on I mean we all go through the same things of just getting overwhelmed with just the nonsense of it and and so we you know we talked a little bit about that and then but by the way and then I would I'd leave her messages if we don't meet anyone if you neither one of us meet someone in six months let's just meet fall in love and get married this was before I came out for the visit I would make little innuendos like that so what did you think of those little innuendos oh I thought yeah in your dreams oh so okay so now it's uh it's April I said I'm coming out to visit yeah so he said he was coming out to visit I cleared I thought I cleared my schedule wait didn't you offer yes I did I did I offered to pick him up at the airport because he was staying downtown where I was living it was very convenient to just you know pick him up at the airport however I didn't check that I had a hair appointment and we all know the hair appointments are very difficult to change at times so I you know I had to call him back and say hey I'm really sorry but my appointment is going to run into when your flight gets in and to drive back to the airport was not a good deal and it turned out that particular day there was a mad house on the freeway anyway and it took me an hour and a half from the airport to get to downtown but I did finally make it and we met at a restaurant yeah and it was really gorgeous restaurant overlooking the river just a really great choice by the way sweetheart and what happened when we first saw each other so when I first saw him you know it just I you know I feel like I've known him for so long so I give him a hug and a kiss and did you give me a french kiss I did not that's what you like to tell people I did not I don't do that in fact I usually just give a kiss on the cheek because Colombia I'm Colombia by the way Colombians that's just the norm you you greet somebody with a kiss on the cheek but he kind of turned his head so it was kind of like yeah you kiss me on the lips yeah so we sat at a high-top table we ordered a couple drinks and we proceeded to talk for the next six or seven hours we closed the place down we had a great time yeah great time and but I said you know I'm not really sure I want to do a long distance relationship remember that yeah and I was like okay right but I was kind of vacillated in back of my head because I thought oh my god she's this amazing woman or at least that's how I felt but I was really reluctant to do a long distance relationship so but what happened next was we we went our separate ways and we didn't know if we were going to see each other again but I call I texted you the next day and said um well he wanted me to go to this wedding with him yeah but I had to get there after after the the dinner and I'm like she was crashing the wedding I'm like nah that's not my style I don't crash wings no you had no you had oh that's right I did I did have permission to invite you so but what happened was I the next day I couldn't stop thinking about her I texted her and I said I really I really miss you I appreciate you will you be my date to the wedding I know you're crashing it but you know go outside your comfort zone and join me so I did and she shows up in this stunning red dress oh my god drop dead well you can tell she's dropped in gorgeous but she looks stunning and from that moment on I knew I knew I really wanted to get to know you and then I started to think you know it maybe long distance won't be so bad it'll be fun it'll be traveling you know he was going against everything he preaches yeah so um and at the same time though when and we had a great time and when I got back home we immediately arranged um well I was already coming to Los Angeles for my birthday uh to spend it with my two kids that live here because I have two kids in Chicago and two kids here and I feel like the ones here always get neglected so I try and come as much as I can and they're the ones that are not married so um my best friend planned this dinner at you know master's and stuff and so I already made the plans um you just extended a few after days to hand out hang out with me and initially it was um supposed to be just like a three dates kind of thing three days um we ended up spending three days unpacking our entire lives laying the cards on the table I mean we shared the good the bad the ugly because we thought you know what we actually were serious about this we said if this is something worth exploring then let's just like I said lay our cards on the table the good the bad the ugly and what I mean to say is we shared each of our marriages what we liked what we didn't like we shared our past relation or our significant relationship after our first marriage and then where the our dating experiences we even shared our personal development work you know you had done life spring I had done Hoffman and Insight and you had done the naked divorce and by the way that's a plug for go to the naked divorce dot com it's a great or at least I'm pitching for you it's a great um impression teller about it yeah we should um but a great way to heal after divorce so we felt like if we're going to explore this relationship then we would have to do this in the same city I mean so we began early conversations about um how are we going to take this distance from long distance to short distance and what and during that time we also arranged um a couple visits here which were extended visits I mean the first one was 12 days the next one was 18 days and they were only a two weeks apart each and even during the 18 day visit that included trip to Mexico for my birthday yes it did and my point in bringing this up is it's I've often said everyone knows I'm really big on spending a lot of time together I know if you live in the same city my belief is you should spend three or four days and nights a week together doing shared activities hobbies mutual interests you know so forth and so on she's heard my rhetoric over and over again but my point is you really don't get to know someone until you spend a lot of time with them so I'm not a big proponent of piecemealing the dating process I'm a big proponent of spending a lot of quality time together so those first three days initially it's we're going to go out to dinner and we're going to go bike riding and we're going to go this and then we decided no we're not going to do that we're just going to we're just going to sit around in pajamas and basically we literally you know got on the floor picnic on the floor and we just order food and just let's just unpack and you've learned what unpacking really was unpack was oh I gotta back up though yeah so um when we were talking on the phone uh before I came out for my birthday I had told my daughter about him and I said you know like he's a dating relationship coach and I don't know he's a little exhausting so that's all I said because like he's asking questions and questions and and so I thought I'm just not sure about this I don't know if I can handle this so when I told my daughter that I had a date with him after my birthday she's like oh the exhausting guy so let me ask you a question all the relationship gurus will tell you not to interrogate someone yeah okay don't make it an interview process everyone will tell you not to do that why was that worth doing for us because we had a small time frame well was it just small time frame well I look I didn't want to waste my time yeah I didn't want to waste my time on you but you know look at the camera tell them I didn't want to waste my time so I wanted to get as much accomplished in those three days before you know to see if I wanted to even go down that road yeah you know this is where I again I'm a big proponent of of don't waste your time with someone who's not a fit with you so when I say interrogate someone yes it may not be fun it may not be attractive at the same time I think when two people like each other it's actually good to dig in the nooks and crannies to see where you're actually similar with one another and what's interesting about you and I I love it how we literally are thinking the same thing at the same time we have our back stories are very similar to one another to some degree and we always seem on the same page so it didn't feel like an interrogation it felt like it was like a crash course into getting to know someone so anyway that's my two cents on that one but the other side of that is that I wasn't sure that I was that into him and he thought I was really into him that's right so that's why he thought I was like so into him and I like okay I really want to get to know this guy hey wait what's not to be into oh and then he was really offended because I had never seen any of his videos oh god I forgot about that she'd never seen any of my videos I wasn't offended I was he's like what you haven't looked and I'm like no I don't want to watch I don't want to watch your videos I want to see the real person and I didn't I thought that watching these videos I don't know how it would sway me so I thought no I'm not going to watch any of his videos oh and he did give me his book and I'm starting she still hasn't read it yet so after seven months so listen we've got some questions from the members of the group I'd like to you know toggle off a few of these to see how you felt so okay here's one from Renee she says what questions did you need answered before moving in well I needed to know that he wasn't a psycho well how can you not know that I'm not an amber herd or Johnny Depp um no we what questions like what was the like if you had to say what was well one thing you wanted answered not what question but what did you need to feel safe to make this decision well first of all I wasn't sure that I was that I was gonna move in with you I've never lived with somebody um I've been in long-term relationships and marriage and you know so like I didn't I didn't know that this was for me um so I started looking to see okay it's a lot easier because I you know as even though I have my kids there and grandchildren I do not have a job where I well you're retired yeah and I'm retired and so I thought okay I'm going to look to move there um that way I could spend more time with my kids here as well and then I realized how expensive California was but but those are different questions like what did you need to feel safe with me like why did you feel safe I spent three days with you how could I not well but a lot of people go travel long distance they spend a weekend in a bubble and they think they know someone so this wasn't I mean we didn't talk about stuff that you talk about when you're in a bubble we talked about like real life things like what you're looking for in a person um the type of I think we were almost like it was almost like prove me instead of prove me right prove me wrong does that make sense in other words instead of approaching it from a fantasy perspective we were like I want to know the nitty gritty that's how it felt I mean I don't like we had fun too don't get me wrong but I felt like what the the way we structured it it really allowed for our vulnerable authentic transparent selves to come out and one thing I want to say about Marie is that she's incredibly transparent and she's authentic if she basically says don't ask me a question to something you don't want to know the answer to because sometimes I do that and I appreciate that that she's in integrity always and while that's not easy to recognize in the beginning I think when somebody shares something with you that's uncomfortable that's something you may not like kind of like like I think you need new deodorant working yeah exactly she shared that with me I felt like that was a good starting block so okay so let's see what you know what before you go on it makes it sound like we decided to move in together after three days no no no we we took a couple it took another six weeks before we took that leave yeah we took our next visit and the visit after that and what happened was she just happened to go I'm looking at apartments there and she places to live or we're in a condo actually she found a place that was literally walking distance from where I did previously live and we checked it out we just fell in love with it and as many of many of you know from the videos that I shoot I think we have a great place to live yeah and it wasn't it so it's not like we said okay we're gonna do it now it's just you know it I didn't I was ready to leave Chicago anyway she wanted to beat the winter I wanted to leave before winter came but so it was either I was moving to Florida I was moving here so it just came down to okay this is what I had planned what do you think and and then we just decided okay let's do it all right let's see what other questions we have let's see since you were in a long distance relationship what are some of the questions oh that's we've already got that so before you decide to move in together what kind of conversations did you have was it more about the end game of possible permanent partnership or marriage or was it more just about being together also did you bring up living together did she so who brought up living together first um I don't know I really don't know I remember that I sent to this well I do it also said that you were looking at moving I think I think it was you were thinking about moving somewhere here first and you looked at the how expensive it was and then I probably said well why don't we just live together that may have been how it happened I don't know but it was really quick yeah I mean and and not that I'm recommending this for everyone at the same time though you know it occurs to me like you're okay really quickly how long did your parents know each other before they got married 12 days okay my parents the same way so it makes me wonder you know is it better to dive in and maybe fail than have it drag out for years which a lot of people do they have these long relate these you know not even relationships they're dating for years without any real destination and I'm not suggesting it's safe to do this because here's the thing look to some degree we're strangers with each other but at least you know I had a public persona you know that I never looked at yeah you never look but you knew I had a public persona look I get that there's a lot of people we don't know who they are that I'm a big proponent of vetting people it's why I teach this in my private coaching but at the end of the day I'm a big believer now it's better to dive into the deep end of the pool to see if it works versus dragging it out some people drag out relationships for years that it's kind of I don't want to say fail but they're going to end and I like that we dove in the deep end quickly well let's face it we're not 25 yeah exactly so to me we're not even 35 45 or 55 okay we'll leave it at that no but it just you know I thought to myself you know what the heck I talked I talked to my kids talked to my daughter and my daughter's like mom he seems like a nice guy go go do it I mean I laugh because it's I was so proper my whole life and here I'm doing something that my kids might view as not proper and and then they were all they were all supportive and it's like okay so we we revisit our journey just like we did with you all right now we oftentimes revisit our journey and some of the some of the little bumps along the way and there weren't really that many thankfully we tend to get along really well with each other whatever we joke with one another we have a saying that we say to one another because where we started and where we are today do you know what that is yes like for example you know we talk about when he blew me off when I was in town yeah not once twice and then you know then we go oh and here we are so it has been a true pleasure to enter your lives today to share a bit of our story we hope to be doing this more often we hope to be doing some youtube live stream certainly for our group here I am really grateful for this group midlife love mastery this is a great opportunity to talk about some of the challenges that we face at midlife and and you know we both had a significant we had a marriage we had a significant relationship after that and and I believe that prepared us for where we are today we both had a lot of not a lot of well I had a lot of dating app dating app experiences flybys coffee dates that sort of thing but ultimately what I do want to say is it's as I talk about frequently in my videos it's important important to do the individual work and what I mean by that personal development work that self-help that spiritual work so that you can be prepared to be in a relationship so you can have the relationship skills and the emotional maturity and ultimately I think what we both had in common was we knew we'd meet someone special we just knew it we didn't doubt it and I'm here to say to everyone when you have doubt it's going to carry forward when you come from a place of knowing and I do believe we both came from that place we were able to find each other and I always jokingly say thank you for finding me because you are by you are the most amazing person in my life and I'm very grateful for you all right everyone well I think this would be a great place to wrap up today so as I wrap up my typical videos I always give myself a big gigantic Jonathan bear hug but I'm going to give you a big gigantic Jonathan bear hug of appreciation thanks for joining us can I get one okay you can have one back thank you sweetheart hey everyone hugs are a great source of love and I want you to reach out to someone right now a pet a teddy bear a pillow and give either them a hug of love because hugs are a great source of love and I want to share our love with you on a regular basis and I hope we do come back for more we'll see all right thanks everyone have a great evening bye now bye now