 So a couple of months ago, you might recall me saying this in another video. For example, I was on the Lilly Singh show about three weeks ago. In February, when that video comes out, I am going to have to issue an apology video. I knew that the second I got off stage, I made some sweeping remarks about men in Toronto that is just not on brand for me. And it's so against what I actually fundamentally believe about the mindset you should have about people in general that I knew I messed up. But I know I'm going to have to come back and really explain and apologize to that. So stay tuned for that. And the episode that I was in of a little late with Lilly Singh actually aired last week and to my delight, that part that I knew that I was wrong for and that I wanted to address was edited out. And I'm not going to lie. For a while I was like, great, I don't have to say anything. But I had been reflecting because we shot the taping of that episode back in the fall. And I've been reflecting since the fall about that comment. And I feel like even though I don't have to get dragged for what I said, I can still drag myself because I've had a lot of great epiphanies in thinking about why I said what I said. So both Lilly and I are from the city of Toronto. And she was asking me about my experiences in Toronto to which I retold this story. So I get home and he's not there. But his laptop is, it's kind of like left out. But I think to myself, I'm not going to check it. I'm not going to do that. So I go into the kitchen, I start washing dishes, cleaning up. And then I'm like, I'm definitely going to go on the laptop. I'm just like, let's just keep it 100. And like some divine intervention, I just guess the password in like two tries. The computer lights up. And you know how with Max, your text messages sync to your computer. His message chat was like already up. And I'm watching this guy live sexed with another woman. So I decide to join the conversation. So I type, Hey, this is Shan. He is staying at my place right now. I'm just curious what the nature of your relationship, although it seems pretty clear here and send. And then I just watch chat bubble disappear, chat bubble disappear. Then I hear footsteps in the hallway. I lived in an apartment at the time. My door burst open. He's drenched in sweat. And he was like, we've got to talk. And I was like, Oh no, we didn't, I am talking. And I've said what I had to say. And all that's left to say at this point is like, get the out. I then went on to make a comment to Lily that more or less men are trash, but in specificity that men in Toronto are trash and that there's so many more awesome, capable, cool women than there are men who live in that city. And it was one of those things that as soon as I got off stage, I thought gross, like, have you not learned? Have you not grown? Do you have nothing to show for the work that you've put in to the point where you still feel comfortable in a public platform, making gross, slanderous statements about a group of people that not only is not true, it's not even remotely fair. So in thinking about, because I for a very long time did hold on to that statement. And I know a lot of us do hold on to those statements about whatever city that we live in, believing that one particular group of people are all bad or all terrible people. And I did hold on to the statement that a lot of men in Toronto are bad romantic partners and more or less bad people. But then I thought about all of the amazing men from the city of Toronto who have made a massive impact on my life watching that clip. And I felt really ashamed. I also thought that leaving a city to talk slanderously about it is just so tacky, especially since I haven't been a single person in Toronto in probably like seven plus years. So that type of cross the blanket, ignorant, misinformed, just silly ass comment was wrong. But furthermore, I used as an excuse to think about why it was that I consistently had negative relationships in Toronto. And a lot of those boiled down to myself. As you guys know, I'm a really big proponent of taking responsibility because when you can control your output and you are aware that your output could be better, that's when you have some control over the outcome. When everybody else is bad and stupid and ignorant in an asshole, then you're just a victim. Life is just happening to you. So whenever possible, I tried to look for ways that I was in the driver's seat or the architect of my own misery. Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of people, myself included, who have been victimized and could not have done anything different or better and should not be forced to reflect on how they are to blame for whatever bad thing happened to them. But in the circumstance of my love life, I do and can absorb a lot of the blame. So there's three particular areas that I want to discuss that I think really led to me having a negative love life while I lived in the city of Toronto that has nothing to do with the people who live and have lived in the city of Toronto. The very first thing is, in many ways, I was addicted to drama. I actually experience this now being in a healthy relationship. I don't know, it's like a nostalgia for the times that your love life was exciting or dramatic. I actually had an ex who used to have me saved in his phone as boo drama. When you're in a dramatic relationship, you have things to talk about. When you are calling your girlfriends or talking to your mom or talking to anybody else, you have got this ongoing crisis that always needs management, that always has updates. You are your own reality TV show. You are your own soap opera. And when you're specially going to that drama with like a well-known high-profile person, it just keeps your name in the mix, not in a positive way, but nonetheless it's still a form of attention. And I find now that in my relationship, it's very rare that I get to, other than on this channel, it's very rare that I get to actually talk to people about my experience being loved and loving Jared because it's kind of boring. You know, in the previous video that we just put out, someone was like, this is a really soppy boring video. I look at you and I'm like, I like that motherfucker. Yeah. I really like you. I think like, like is actually more powerful than love because everyone could fall in love. You have to choose who you like. Yes. So fuck love. I love you Jared. I love you too. And I'm like, I think we have a really soppy boring relationship. But when you are going through the shits with somebody, man, people want to hear about it. People are tuning in. People are clicking and not just online, just in life in general. So I do think a large part of me back then sought out attention and value through negativity. The second major downfall of my young adult romantic life was my attachment style. The way that I formed connections with people, the expectations that I had out of love were completely unrealistic and in all honesty, pretty unhealthy. What's fascinating about attachment style is that I consider myself and have considered myself to be extremely securely attached. And it probably wasn't until I'm telling you, I kid you not, maybe two weeks ago that I thought to myself, not really. Like you're not really all that securely attached that you actually think that you are. I think that I understand what secure attachment is. And when I have a low investment with people, I'm really good at portraying qualities of secure attachment. But I was actually raised by a very anxiously attached mom who enjoyed an anxious attachment out of me. My mom really enjoyed like a dependent love and a very like all encompassing love. And that's what she also expected out of us. And I see her expect out of my dad, for example. And my dad, however, on the flip side is a very avoidantly attached person. He grew up being let down by a lot of people. So I see this to this day that he tries to minimize the importance of relationships in his life. And my dad's conflict resolution style is too often just clam up and say he doesn't care as much as this is like kind of a joke that my dad makes. But my dad often says like, you know, that he wishes he didn't have kids. He doesn't mean that I know. But I think that that's kind of a part of his anxious attachment style. And so coming from this household with these very polar opposite ways of connecting, I think I absorbed both in my mind that meant that I evened out to a perfect score. But in actuality, if I reflect backwards, if I was in romantic bonds with people, I would have a very clingy sort of overzealous love. I look for somebody to be everything that I want my like perfect person who's always in sync with me like these unrealistic expectations of what partnership is supposed to look like. But if I didn't get that same enthusiasm returned to me from people, I would become very avoidant and cold like my dad. So I made a video that's called the needy narcissist in the past. I really spoke to this, but in truth, if in plain terms, it's the person who is anxious and then avoidant as every percussion of their anxiousness not being soothed. And if I reflect on my relationship to that time, I did that a lot. Like I would over invest in people and give the world to them. And if I felt like they didn't walk with me, I would completely shut down, turn the cheek and not speak to them. And that's a very difficult pattern for anybody to really connect with and understand. And more importantly to feel understood in. And that leads me to the third thing that I think that I did massively wrong. And that is I focused a lot on how I wanted to be loved and really invested zero energy in learning what it meant to love other people. A lot of people do this. I think that because we, you know, we go very quickly from like a parenting sort of nurturing love to a partnership love. And there's no bridge in between. So when you are a child and you've got a parent or a caregiver of any kind, if you have a good caregiver, like your needs are the most important thing. You don't ever really think like, how do I make sure they're good? How do I make their day a little bit better? How do I understand them? How do I be a support system to them? Like, no, like that's not important. And when we go into partnerships, oftentimes we still keep this train of thought, like the right person is supposed to focus 100% on me and supposed to meet my needs. And as long as I'm working on myself, I'm doing my job. That's no, the job of a partnership is about mutuality. It's about understanding. It's about curiosity too. I use this quote a lot now is that an exceptional lover is a tourist, not a tour guide. And in my early years, I can see how I was tour guiding every relationship. I was like, this is what we're going to do. This is how we should love. This is how you need to love me. Here's where we should go. And just not giving enough space for that person's needs to be just as important as my own. Now don't get me wrong. I think what the big asterisk says on all of this is it's not like I was with exceptional partners who were all of these things. I wasn't choosing people who had an aversion to drama. I wasn't choosing people who were securely attached necessarily or people who were passionate about learning how to love others. So in addition to the fact that I'm choosing immature partners for the wrong criteria, I am also not the right criteria myself. And as a result, no matter what city I was in, I was probably going to have those identical results. Now, a audio book that I actually just finished listening to is The Course of Love by Elaine DeBotton. And for anybody who is feeling like you are seeing a repetition of toxic love or toxic relationships happening in your life, before you jump to the conclusion of all X are trash or everyone in X city is bad, maybe open yourself up to listening to content like that, obviously to a massive reason that I was inspired to put together the game of desire is because I needed that book. I did not know how to connect with others. I did not know how to be reflective and truly insightful and critical of myself in a helpful way. There's a very big difference between being critical and constructive. Like you can look at yourself and think all the worst things, but if you don't understand how to take that information and transfer it to make you a better person, then it's useless, right? It's just the same as like over flattery. They serve no actual purpose. So because I recognized that I was having such a hard time making romantic connections and just connections in general period, I mean, I am a very disagreeable person. And so the game of desire was the fruit of all the research that I did to make myself a better lover, a better connector and a better flirt. And I put all that information together and I taught it to other people in a way that I wish that I learned myself at a much younger age. That's it. That's what I've been thinking about for the past few months. And I just wanted to share that with you guys. Also, can I just emphasize that if you do want to check out any of those two audio books, this is not a sponsored video. This is just a call out to the fact that in a crazy world, I somehow have been able to partner with a company that can benefit me and I can give you what I have made for free. Meaning I wrote a book. It got turned into an audio book. I read that audio book. It's on this platform and this platform said, Hey, if you get people to sign up, we're going to support you and your content, they'll get your audio book for free. You win. We win. They win. Everyone wins and nobody pays. When does that happen? I'm not sure. So if you have yet to take advantage of the audible offer, please do so. If not to get my audio book, then to get another amazing audio book on love and relationships to see how that can help you change your output and thus your outcome in the intimacy space. Thank you for listening. Bye.