 Love to hear first and foremost, you know, what drew you to relationship and sex therapy? I know it's pretty exciting to hear on the show and we've talked to a number of them over the years, but I'm always curious as to the back story of- I'm like, how the heck do you, someone at once asked me, how do you end up looking, you know, acting and seeming like L Woods, but you can talk about orgasms like the weather? And, you know, because I am sort of this girly girl, you know, crystal-y, whatever, but I wish I had like a really compelling transformational story, but honestly I would- most of my career has launched in every phase out of my own anger at the system and so I was raised in a family very rare for whatever reason was really comfortable with the topics, sometimes too comfortable, but it was never weird, it was never taboo. I could ask any question as long as I brushed my mother hair, she loved to have her hair brushed, I could ask her any question I wanted and she would answer. I was never shamed. I wasn't supposed to go out and do it willy-nilly, but my body was nothing to be ashamed of, sex was nothing to be ashamed of, so it was just natural to me and I didn't realize until much later that that was weird and then when I got to graduate and I was my parents' therapist for most of my life, I was one of those parent-ified child children and so I of course went to graduate school, I wanted to be a therapist, a couple's therapist and then I very quickly when I was doing my field placements and under supervision, all these couples were talking to me about their sexual issues and as you're supposed to do I would go to my supervisor and say okay you know she's not having orgasms or he's not interested in sex or he has erectile, whatever it was, and they would look at me like I was a pervert and be like what do you mean? What are you asking them? I was like I don't know it just kind of comes up and I realized that ended up being one of the topic of my doctoral dissertation, the variables that predicted for a clinician's willingness to talk about these issues and it pissed me off that my teachers, my professors, my supervisors were not comfortable with this, we're not teaching it and we're expecting anyone including themselves to be a couple's therapist that doesn't address sex. I mean that's ridiculous, so I got mad and I kind of cobbled together, I talked my way into a medical fellowship in sex therapy and I figured it out and got more training and cobbled together you know that specialty, but I'm first and foremost an expert on loving relationships. I can talk about orgasms like the weather. I was curious in that story was that environment that you grew up in, was that premeditated or is it just the way they sort of were in the way? It was not premeditated, in fact it was a little over sexualized. My dad, you know, my dad was a colon and rectal surgeon. I come from a very filter-less, boundary-less family, so everything is discussed and you can say anything, any way you want because you're family and it took me a long time, like my dad handed me a Cosmo article when I was 14 years old. I didn't even have a boyfriend yet on how to give oral sex, which you know is kind of traumatic looking like it's kind of freaky and like you know a little too much over sexualized like today if you saw that happen I would like be concerned about a 14-year-old getting that from their father, but it was just like it was just the way they were. They were naked all that, you know, it was just the way it was. It was the 70s also, so that helped. That helps, yes. But to bring it into modern times to have, to give that article out, they're just going to learn it much earlier from the internet anyway, in a very vulgar manner. Right, right. I mean listen, I benefited from the tips in that article greatly through the years, but yeah, that's, I teach sex. I love, I've been developing curriculums and teaching sex ed for my entire career and I'm actually working with a school in Los Angeles now, Oakwood School, which isn't too far from here, and I do their sex education program and mostly with fifth and sixth graders and I teach that, I mean not how to perform, but we talk about the clitorists and we talk about self-stimulation and we talk about, you know, the right context for sex and what a relationship that is also sexual should look like and I think this is the kind of stuff that just isn't, what sexual respect looks like, you know, and this just isn't really taught and then some of the parents for the most part are really receptive, but they sometimes get anxious and likely, you know, what do you mean my kid came home because I let them, I let them ask anonymous questions and in the end of every class I answer some and so on this one occasion, I had three anonymous questions on what is 69 and these were sixth graders and I'd already assured the parents that I wasn't going to be getting into like positions and techniques, that's not what this class was about, but because three of them had asked, I knew that it was now being discussed, they were gonna Google it, you know, they were gonna get a lot more information than I was about to tell them, so I said it is when, you know, because we'd already talked about the right context, they have to talk to their parents about what that is and all the other variables I said, but in the right context, it's when two people kiss each other's genitals, like I didn't discuss anything like that, but I told them the answer and the reason I did and I did get a little pushback from some of the more paranoid parents is because I knew they were gonna Google it and get right really what the parents didn't want them to see from from the technology that is all around us and I'm gonna guess that you've been doing this for quite a while, that being able to see the transition from when it was a bit more innocent of a topic to now this topic where they have all these preconceived notions of things that they have put together because of what they have seen on the internet and now it comes to you as questions or an attitude or an idea about sex. Yeah, anything from the, you know, big mouth cartoon that they watch, you know, to the things they're looking up on the internet, to the fact that, you know, I've had this, I have three boys, I've had this conversation with my boys many times, there's all of this research coming out and I'm seeing it clinically because they have such unfettered and no matter how many blocks you put up, they have such unfettered access to porn if they want it. And any type of porn. Any type of porn. Well, growing up for us, we were laughing about this, you know, it was vanilla, it was a magazine. It was the national, I mean, I remember National Geographic, I remember sneaking under my parents' bed to find the joy of sex. Remember that book and we looked at the picture. You know, yeah, it's very different now. And this unfettered access is harming us, not only in our youth, but in adulthood, having healthy relationships, especially sexual relationships. Well, yeah, and I used to say to them, okay, look, just so you know, porn is not, you know, it is not a place to get your sex education. It is not what turns a woman on. It is not how real women look like. What they look like is not what real men look like. But now I just had this because I have a line of sexual aids and devices and I do have some in a, you know, in my closet in this like, you know, container. And of course my kids will sometimes with their friends when they're being, you know, provocative will go in there. And so one of them came to me recently and said, I know you have this device for men. Can I have one? And I said, sure, but you have to use it. You can't use it with porn. You have to use it with fantasy. And he looked at me like, what is that? What in the heck is that? Like he had no clue. And I was like, well, I like, I literally, so, you know, if you see someone who you're really attracted to, or maybe somebody you like, like you imagine what you might like to do with them, or you imagine them naked, like you use your imagination. That's what it is. And like, and I explained to him because we now know neurologically that not doing that not only affects their ability to be intimate in their expectations and of what people look like or what sex is, but it starts to affect their ability to get aroused by something other. It creates a visual like cue that is required, a certain kind of visual cue, a synaptic connection that they then become dependent on in order to get aroused. That's certainly an angle I've never thought about. It's certainly growing up and needing to use imagination to the best of abilities. And as we used to say, file it away. Rather than, so for you to say, I'm just like, oh, my God, like, well, there's no filing away anymore. The next new thing is available to that's the other thing is at this point, you could go to every end of the earth and still not run out of pornography. There's so much out there and this endless new, new, new. And we were talking about this and dating to this paradox of choice that we're all confronted with online dating. This new market has exploded. And what we've heard from our audience this past month really is a lot of people are struggling in this arena. Sure. Some because they're taking it too seriously. Some because they can't figure out what's the right choice for them. Right. And there's such a huge choice. Like it's it's an overload of options. So there's no commitment. Let me just keep texting you while I'm texting 30 other people. And, you know, it'll be three months before I consider meeting with you because I got a, you know, and within a few weeks, I'm also going to sext you. And if you don't respond accordingly, then I'm gonna, you know, there's a mess. Yeah. Now with that, you know, for our single members of the audience, if they feel this paradox of choice, they're struggling to find the right person. What is your advice for them? Well, I think with love and I feel very strongly about this. And it's the same thing with anything else in you in life that you want. It's about moving into alignment with that which you desire. And I think one of the problems and the fundamental core underneath the paradox of choice that is not only around online dating, but everything everywhere is taking the time to get extremely clear on what you actually want. You know, not like the physical, I mean, fine, physical characteristics, whatever, but maybe one or two should be how much that person makes or how tall they are or what they look like. But what I really urge people to focus on before they even launch into any kind of dating, including online dating is, and I do this with couples too, how do you want to feel? If you have that person sitting next to you waking up with you every morning, spending the day with you, how do you feel five feelings that you want to feel in love, you know, appreciated, passionate, adventurous, playful, whatever those things are, those are your fundamental core longings. And anytime we're having a relationship with someone else, we're actually having a relationship with ourselves through that person. I mean, that's all love is really any relationship is. So you get really, really clear on how you want to feel in love. And that becomes your litmus test. And you marinate in those feelings all day every day, not even in dating. So if you want more playfulness, go and you know, go to the dog park every day, go and volunteer with a kid's playgroup, do something every day that makes you feel playful, or passionate, or honest, or whatever that is. And as you do that, it literally is attracting in people that are aligned with those feelings. And so it literally clears the plate, it clears the paradox of choice automatically. And then that becomes your litmus for dating as well. Is this someone who I'm because now I know what it's like to live in the soup of playfulness or whatever that thing is. So sitting across from this person, am I feeling that energy? Right? It's not it's no longer in your head. It's now in your system. Yeah. And this feeling of well, there's another better person just around the corner. You know, we talked about this too about how back in the day for us in dating with fewer options, you didn't write people off as fast as you do these days. And that was the other thing that we heard from our audience is like, you know, yeah, this person's great, but yeah, and the butts have now become so small. It's like, Well, how are you ever going to choose? Exactly. Well, you I'll tell you something really interesting. That's interesting. You mentioned that because I just I'm partnering now. I just started with them. There's this company. They were first a dating site called Faramore. I don't know if you've heard of them. But it's a really cool concept because it was a genealogist, this adorable young woman who's a PhD in genetics. And she and you know, we know the science I can get into it with you, but it's been out there for a while about a DNA match, right? Like if you you know, if you you can if you have two similar basically DNA to someone else in certain certain aspects of DNA, you're not going to have attraction, you're not going to have alignment. There's and so what they found is they would match people according, you know, a couple of social emotional factors, but according to their genetic compatibility. And what they found in particular for women but also for men is that they were giving these dates that they would normally write off a second, third and fourth date because of the genetic match. And when they did that, then they were like, wow, I really like this person. So when they had that impetus to give it to look past the hair color or whatever the stupid thing was, that they wrote off the person for, they actually fell in love. Right. They attached to greater meaning. Yeah, this genetic match. Yeah. And they they held on for longer. And so though swipe life as Johnny likes to call it. Swipe life. Yeah. I didn't love it. They're marketing. I have a girlfriend that literally lives in New York City and literally ran out of options. They said, we no longer have a match for you because she had swiped the wrong direction, you know, be cut for that. His shirt doesn't like his shirt in the picture, doesn't like his smile looks a little creepy, like stupid stuff or eject, reject, reject. To me, it's almost as if life is imitating art. And the art that we're imitating is the the narcissistic tendencies and self absorption of Seinfeld. And we're just like, like, no, no, I didn't like the next. Yeah. And of course, you know, and with that show, I mean, we didn't even have that this technology yet, right? They just had paradox of choice just from living in the city, being so self absorbed. Now the other frustration that our audience came to us with is this Me Too movement and how to date in this new movement in this new era and how to make consent sexy. So yeah, we started this month talking exactly about that consent, defining it, understanding it. And the big thing for me, the highlight was that it's ongoing, that it's something that's not just a checkbox. And we talked about this, a lot of us learned it in sex ed is like, you get the yes, okay, then everything's on the table. But no, not at all time, all the time. And I can see even if you've had sex with someone 20 times. And then I mean, not that if you're married or in a relationship, like every is it okay if I kiss you? You know, that would be interesting. But but if for some reason, you know, that person is unwilling and doesn't give their affirmative consent, even after having had sex with you, it's still considered assault or rape or whatever it's going to be. So it is really tricky. I mean, I sometimes joke that I like want to invent an app where like in the moment you're like, Sign here that you give your consent, because as a mom of boys, I often because they're good guys. But you know, yeah, it's concerning. So what what advice do you have for the guys right now that that we're talking to are feeling frozen, they're feeling that any advance could be seen in a negative light and now could have potential repercussions outside of just their social lives. Right. Well, I think it's first of all, being really clean with your intentions and with where like, obviously, be really careful about the workplace. Be really careful with people who have, you know, who you have any power over at work or anywhere else. And if you are, you know, a celebrity or someone who theoretically has emotional or social power over everyone, you have to be extra careful, right. But if you're average Joe, you want to keep those things in mind. And then you want to be really, really conscious and careful and clear. And I think this is the hardest thing. And also one of the things that I'm most excited about, because I think it's going to be so good once we get this, is that most of the stuff we're not comfortable talking about. We just kind of want to fall into sex in the dark, you know, and just kind of let it happen so we don't have to actually use the words and have the conversation, which is fundamental to having a good sexual relationship. So this is actually requiring that you get more verbal and that you actually have the conversation and that you go up to a woman. And I was just reading the statistic the other day on my show that 65% of women only want to be asked out face to face. They do not want a phone call. They do not want to definitely don't want to text. None of them want to text, but they want face to face. And so really practicing and getting in the habit of looking going up to a woman, putting on your big boy pants, like it's scary, you might be rejected, but going up to her and say, look, I find you really interesting, or I've been watching you, you're really beautiful. It's totally fine to say no. But I'm wondering if I can take you out or if I can, whatever. And what is so fascinating about that is no one is doing face to face. Everyone is going to the app. Everyone is texting it. So if you do it, not only do women want it, the stats show that women want it, but you stand out. You want to talk about paradox of choice? There is no other choice. You stand out. And really all men and all any of us want is to feel really seen and safe and delighted in and to be in alignment with those feelings we most want to feel in love. And if you move from that place into your dating life, it's much more successful. Yeah, we all want to feel wanted and we want to feel like your first choice. Yeah, these apps unfortunately make us feel like the 34th 97th. And it's like a business meeting like boom, boom, boom, you know, so this one I was telling you about that ran out of options in New York City, like literally in the first conversation. So are you gainfully employed or not? Because she'd been through enough that weren't, you know, like you just get and you're for that has her questions lined up. But you forget that this is the first time you're meeting this person. But to you, it's the 80th person you've met, right? But you have to treat each person like the first and like fresh clean the slate. You keep those things in mind. You're not stupid. But first and only person I'm meeting Johnny has an interesting strategy about that clean slate going into the first day especially online. Oh, well, I've been saying on the podcast. So you know, we were in this age with all this technology and there's so much information. And what I have noticed is everyone when they get the match, they do some texting, they get their social media, they swap info. No one's talking. No one's the face to face. Now you've set up a date and you have this person's info and then you just you start scrolling and you're learning only stuff about it. But you have no context for any of this stuff. And because of this, your mind is going to put together some sort of plan of how you're going to go into this conversation where you're going to want it to go because hey, look, if I can get her into this area, we have plenty to talk about. So now you have this plan, you have this agenda. And of course, the conversation is forced. It's everyone's uptight. There's no one. You can't discover. Exactly. And even for myself, when these apps first came out, I fell into that whole thing as well. It's tempting. And what I had noticed was a drastic change in how the conversations and the first dates had went when I had just went in. And it would be I would we would get the match, text back and forth a couple of times. Hey, let me shoot you a call and chat for a bit. If the chat was well, I was like, OK, well, let's meet up. That's more than a lot of women get, by the way. And one and one moment when I had done it after we had chatted, she goes, you know what? I thought it was so weird that you wanted to talk to me. And then I realized that's what real men do. And she goes, thank you very much for snapping me out of this. And she's like, yes, I would love to go on a date. So then, but when I had went on these dates without any information, just only the opportunity of the conversation we had and a couple of pictures that we had seen on the profile. Now my attention was rather on where I'm going to steer the conversation or what are we going to talk about? My conversation is paying attention and be present for the other person. High five. I love that. I agree with you 100%. I mean, I think the thing we were women run into in particular is they get scared. So they want to make sure they want to Google that person to make sure he works where he says or he isn't married or whatever. But and I'm fine with that. But I absolutely agree that the thing that is going to most predict for your success on with anyone is to go out soon. So I always say, do not text and have these back and forth for more than two weeks before you meet. We said a challenge of five messages back and forth. I'm with you. I'm with you. And when you meet them, like you're saying, if you haven't, if you can just be fully present me here now, look them in the eye, feel their energy, just treat it as like, Oh, goodie, I get to excavate. I get to get to know this person. I get to discover who they are. And just like I would anyone else. Well, by the results of that was comparatively where going in with all this information was it was tense. It was stressful. It was and we're out of we have an agenda. But going in paying attention being present and allowing the emotional bids to carry the conversation whoever it was going to go. It was very and it was a very fun date. And women can feel it. I feel the difference 100%. Absolutely. They were fun. There was there was there was no tension. It was just the conversations flow. They just went all over the place. And we were laughing. Even even if these conversations went to like the no, no territory of the old adage of don't talk about politics or religion in our first day. Because we were present and we were allowing the emotional bids to go where the conversation is conversations going to go. Even if we stumbled in that territory, we had very spirited fun conversations about those topics with without trying to force my reasoning or positions. It was just an open discussion. Right. And they were and it was wonderful. And it was. And so we've been on the for this whole month encouraging people not to go into these dates with these pre planned scripted ideas of where it's going to go and and develop skills in being present and focusing on emotional bids. And and and you're going to have to turn your phone off and please not only turn it off like away off the table. Yeah, that is a deal breaker. But you know, it's interesting because we were talking earlier about sort of this social emotional intelligence and how we're kind of evolving to this point where it's hard to look each other in the eye, much less be present with each other without distractions. I also find that in part because of that, but also because of other things, there are so many men and women, but if we're talking about men who just are so unbelievably anxious and so worried about rejection that it suits them to know, OK, I have a couple of, you know, discussion points in my back pocket, you know, and I know what I'm going to say and like it adds a sense of security. So I think one of the rate limiting factors in order to be in this beautiful space that you're talking about is in really getting clear that it is OK if you are rejected. It is. It does not mean that you aren't worthy of love. You can maybe sometimes get feedback and information from that experience that will help you learn how to maybe do something different the next time. But a lot of times it has nothing to do with you. You could be an amazing guy and the woman that you're with feels so bad about herself. She says she wants a nice guy. But every time she's with a nice guy, she thinks what the hell is wrong with you. If you're that intimate, you must be a loser and it has nothing to do with you. So the anxiety that you were discussing, what's interesting about that is, of course, everyone's going in the first day. And of course, everyone's a little bit nervous. You're meeting somebody for the first time. So all the social media feeds those insecurities by giving you all this information. Don't be tempted to do that. Now, but going in without that information, well, you're going to be a little bit more nervous going in. But I can tell you the joy that you will get out of the conversation and the connection you're going to make is afterwards you're going to feel so much more fulfilled from the date than you would have trying to bang the conversation in a certain direction and then leaving not feeling like there was a real connection like a robot and hoping that well, I hope she enjoyed it. It's like, well, if you didn't enjoy it, expect her to have enjoyed it. Oh, yeah, you know, I often have guys because I'll coach them through this process. And I talk to so many men work with them who struggle with this and I will have them go like, OK, your assignment is you're going to go to the grocery store or the coffee like low stakes practice. Talk to the barista as you're getting your coffee. Practise the eye contact, get to know them as if you've never looked at their because you haven't ever looked at their social media, right? You don't know anything about the make conversation. You know, maybe at first you're even if you're attracted to women, you're practicing with guys. And then you practice with the woman at the checkout counter or somewhere out, you know, and then you kind of get much more comfortable just having a conversation. I mean, these these are skills that you're either sharpening or they dull. Yeah, right? Like lawn tools in the shed, they dull if they're not used and our social skills aren't being used. A lot of us have jobs that involve computers, emails, texts. A lot of us are now balancing work from home where we don't even go into an office space and and have any human interaction. And oh, by the way, as we talked about, we get everything delivered to us as well. We never have to leave the house. So we're these opportunities for socialization are now out of the equation and these social skills dull. And then to Johnny's point, now we have high stakes, don't want to be rejected on a date. And we're expecting all of this to just magically come together. It doesn't work like that. So we have a great question here. First one from Raj, who's looking for tips on building a relationship with little free time. He says, I'm a single dad and I have the kids three nights a week. I also work two nights a week. So that leaves me two nights to go out and be social. I was able to have a one year relationship with the schedule. But one of the reasons it ended was my lack of free time. We'd love any advice, particularly on how to set the expectation in the beginning. Yeah, well, I mean, I think the most important thing if you're a parent and especially if you have your kids three days a week is that you only want to date people who, you know, at least in theory and from their own perspective are open to that and aligned with that. Right. And so that clears the way of a lot of women right off the bat. Obviously you want to set that expectation from the beginning and there will be many women like if you're dating a 20 year old who wants to go out partying every night, she's not going to be a good match for you. Right. You know, if you're dating a woman who's around your same age or maybe as a mother herself, then she totally gets it. And you have to be flexible. Right. So this person is probably I wouldn't rule these other women out, but you're probably going to do best with a woman who kind of can make her own hours because those two days that you aren't working when you work at night, you could have a daytime date. Right. So so you want to you want to kind of manifest I'm not saying to rule out someone with a nine to five job, but you want to really set an intention for attracting in a woman who's flexible, who has kids or likes kids or wants kids, who isn't looking to party all the time, who has a flexible schedule, ideally. And yes, you state those intentions from the beginning, you say, look, this is my schedule. It's pretty set. These are the times every week that I know I have free time. And the way that my life works right now is that that is where my dating and relationships occur. You know, are you going to be okay with that? Because I really like you and I want to keep dating you, but I want to make sure before my heart gets too far into this, that, you know, that's cool. And I want to add that a lot of times we say things, but our actions don't match them. And in these situations, when we meet someone new or excited about them, we may push the kids off on our spouse an extra day, day in and that fourth day in. And then all of a sudden we get upset three or four months down the line when we're like what I only have these two days for you now. Yes, because the expectation you may have said I only have these two days, but your actions that your actions have to match your words. So that's very important in this scenario. The other thing this is a broader commentary here that we get from a lot of our audience members who are, you know, their parents, they're back in the dating world and they don't know when to bring up the conversation about, Hey, I have a child first date. Absolutely. Yeah. Profile. And yes, yes, it was one of the best litmus tests I had when I was a single mother. Like I got rid of so many men out the bat who didn't want to date a single mother. Boom, done, or who didn't like kids. Boom, done. Absolutely. It's easy. And this idea of hiding it, waiting till the third day, sneaking in there later, it just upsets the other person. It's a waste of everyone's time. And it's not honoring who you are, what you want is back to knowing what you want. Right. Not just like getting that second and third date. What do you want? What you want in this case, among other things is someone who is wants to be a co parent, you know, someone who is on board with you being a parent. That is fundamental if you're a parent. Yeah, absolutely. So there's no getting around. So instead of pretending it's not there, hiding it for some later date, be open and honest about it. Yeah. Fabian asks us, once I'm talking to a woman, I'm really interested in I get really nervous and my mind actually goes blank. I'm even blind to signals that she's potentially sending. Even if that would normally be something that should help me calm down. Cutie patootie. A female friend even pointed out the clear signals from one woman I was getting. When I'm interested in someone or when I know she is in a relationship, I have absolutely when I'm not interested in someone or when I know she's in a relationship, I have absolutely no trouble speaking to it. Plus, I'm normally not afraid of new situations or unpleasant interactions. What can I do? So can I do you mind if I go a little deep? Yeah, go for the deal. So what this says to me, and this is very, very common, he has a really complicated relationship, most likely with his mom. Lots of criticism, lots of rejection growing up. So people like that can be very confident on the sports field or in the classroom. But when it comes to the deepest emotional connections, the most vulnerable emotional connections, the history is again and again that you're not enough. And the parent almost never wants to give that, you know, they think they're trying to shape you or kick your butt into doing something or whatever it is, or they have their own issues. But what happens with the child, because children are so fundamentally narcissistic, everything is because of them, right? So if mom, you know, isn't showing up for me or leaves me or criticizes me, it's because of me. If I were more of something or less of something, then I would be worthy of love. So this is a guy who fundamentally does not know how worthy of love he is. So the reason he freezes when he really likes someone is because now the stakes are really high, and he thinks he's going to be rejected. And so he goes back to being I can tell you when it started, I have this weird ability to tell when abuse starts, I can like feel it started when he was he became conscious of it when he was around six or seven. So for someone like this, I want him to be in some sort of coaching or therapy or process where he's really working on healing the damage to his self worth and that legacy that that he's kind of adopted. And as he does that work and does more practice, you know, in his case, I wouldn't say obviously he's fine with the lower stake situations, but maybe a girl that he thinks he may really like, but isn't 100% sure, right? Practice there for a while. And the more practice, like you said the sharpening of the lawn tool, you know, the better he's going to get. But it fundamentally you have to with all dating and quite frankly with anything in your relationship, you have to be willing to get your heart broken. I always say that you just have to be willing. You can't love. It's a part of the process. And it's part of the fun. I mean, it sucks when it happens. But every time it takes you wider and higher and freer and clearer. Exactly. It's for the right reasons. The rejection helps you move ahead. Laura, let me ask you this as to go along with that. And I love what you had to say there. And I could I could clearly understand how that could play role. What about what would it be looked and would it manifest itself in the same way with this person? If they've been for lack of a better word, wrapped in bubble wrap as a kid, where they've always that everything was they were protected all the time. Any obstacles in front of them were were taken out of. And so now they've learned in a work environment and a professional environment to take some lumps to to figure out some things. But once again, now that they're in in this romantic area, they're afraid to get hurt to afraid. Well, that can happen, especially you know, if you you're what you're talking about, obviously, is the development of that grit, right, and that tenacity and that resilience. And if you weren't allowed to build resilience, which, you know, let's face it, there are lots of helicopter parents out there, right? Yes, there is. So if you were unable to build that resilience, then upon your first rejection, you will you will be someone who doesn't try, you know, if at first you don't succeed, who doesn't try again. And so, yeah, in a case like this, I, you know, it could be that he tried once to make a connection with the woman he really liked was rejected. He's like, forget it, I'm not going to try that again. But the feeling I get from. So what I think in your case is more likely in a kid in a kid who was raised like that, is that he's going to be the FOMO guy. He's going to be not sticking with a relationship through the first hiccup. You know, he's going to be someone who is more of an infatuation junkie. I call them some, you know, because we move in relationships from infatuation to attachment, right? In the beginning of the relationship, you can't get enough of anything, right? And then three months to three years later, depending on how committed you get, you move into attachment. So for many, you know, I call them infatuation junkies because as soon as they move into attachment, they've fallen out of love. And now they're moving on to the next infatuation. So that's what I would imagine the bubble wrap kid would grow into. Gotcha. Yeah. And, and we've seen a lot of these clients end up feeling like they settled, right? Because they they don't have the skills and they haven't worked up the gumption to approach the people they're actually interested in. They find themselves in relationships that don't interest them that aren't attracted to them. They've settled. Exactly. And they feel to a degree lost because it's like, how did I end up here? Well, you didn't put in the work to actually get the results you wanted. Exactly. The risk is rejection. But the other side of that risk is everything that you want. Yes. And as Pink says, the heart doesn't break, it just spins. I like that. Yeah. Now we have a pretty common question here from Pete about keeping intimacy going in a long term relationship. And we've all heard of the famous honeymoon phase. Yes. I'm about six months into my long term relationship. And I love it. But I also know how love and intimacy shift as a relationship grows older. I'm anxious about the honeymoon phase of my relationship ending. Preemptive anxiety. Exactly. I hear a lot of friends and family joke about intimacy disappearing once you're in a long term committed relationship. What do intimate couples do to keep their romance in bed reasonably healthy and long lasting? So lots of thoughts on this. If we are talking about just keeping the physical connection going in a heterosexual relationship, keeping the desire high, what we're, you know, a lot of what I see, let's just talk about how the problem typically evolves is in what I call the sex romance stalemate. Because what what women don't understand about men and what men don't understand about women, if we're talking about heterosexual relationships is that men typically the women achieve a sense of emotional intimacy closeness through cuddling, spending time together, talking about their feelings, you know, holding hands, cuddling, sharing, right. And when that is in a long term relationship, and I looked at I did a national study on what the most sexually satisfied women have in common, and it's not the number of orgasms they're having or anything else. It is the closeness, the emotional closeness they feel with the person they're having sex with. That's the bigger biggest predictor not only for her enjoyment, but very, very important for her desire to be sexual. And what women don't understand about men is that most of them achieve that sense of emotional closeness through the physical act of sex. And the hand holding, spending time together, sharing is a result of a deep sexual connection. So what I see happen in that sex romance stalemate is that now she's tired or they have some kids or they're under stress, she's less interested in sex, withdraws a little bit. He not even aware of what's happening withdraws emotionally is less attentive is less romantic is less tuned in is less connected. And then she's that much less inspired and to have sex. So I think that's a really important thing that you can be aware of in a relationship. And, you know, the other thing everywhere I go, anytime I give a talk, I always get asked and this is this is inside this question to how do you spice it up? You know, and I always say, look, I can give you very, very easily written many books on the topic. No problem. 365 positions, role plays, toys, tools, whatever to do. And in a year to a year and a half, you'll be back asking for new, right? It's the same thing that we were talking about earlier, more, more, more, what's next, what's next, what's next, right? And part of that is because we aren't really centering and getting clear on what we really want. We know we want something. So like, what's the new thing that'll get me back to the infatuation? But what we aren't doing is taking advantage of the depth of the connection that the attachment phase affords you and recognizing that what you're really looking for when you're looking for spice is intensity, right? That's what's that's the want underneath spice. Okay, intensity sure can be created temporarily with a dopamine surge in your brain from doing something brand new. But, you know, it's only brand new once or twice, right? So real intensity comes from that soul to soul connection from the depth, from the willingness to take risks with each other from, you know, practicing some Tantra techniques, taking sex to the next level. It's not just a new kinky, spicy, porny thing to do, although those things are great and fun. That's not going to give you what you really want. And in your experience, this idea of the honeymoon phase, are there signs or signals of a relationship that is going to be struggling? Well, if you don't have a strong, if you're, if your connection is primarily physical and you don't have a strong emotional connection, if you don't have a good way to resolve conflict, if you don't have a good way to be clear on what you want and articulate it in a supportive way, you're not going to have a successful sexual relationship with a woman. You're just not. It all comes down to that communication. That's that is what we need. We need to feel and we need to feel like you're delighted in us. You know, and I think the biggest complaint that women tell me in their long-term relationships is that kissing has totally gone by the wayside, except as part of foreplay or when he wants to get something started. And there isn't enough emotional connection and there isn't enough presence back to what you were saying before enough presence in the relationship. Most couples don't talk more than 15 minutes a week about things other than the logistics of their lives. You know, they talk about the kids and work and trips and whatever, but they're not talking about anything else more than 15 minutes a week. So right there, there's a lack of emotional connection. If you just invest in 15 minutes four times a week with the technology off, some music on, looking at each other face to face and having a conversation about things other than the logistics of your life, that in and of itself will transform your relationship. Yeah, I know that over the last year, Amy and I in our relationship have instituted date nights weekly and it's on the calendar and we know that there are no devices, there's no conversation about that stuff and it creates this space for us to have those moments because when you're both busy and we don't even have kids, but I can't even imagine exactly, you know, all of that to schedule sex kids in the way. Can't wait, which I highly recommend. My calendar is wide open in that category. Our next question is an important one as well. And this came in from social media. And we want to explore this a little bit here. My partner no longer finds me attractive and it crushes my self-esteem. We've been dating for some time, but now I'm afraid that my partner will grow apart from me. What can I do? Is this a male or female? So this was anonymous. This is on our Instagram. And I guess the question that the one I really the main thing I want to know is how does this person know that their partner isn't attracted to them anymore? Right? Like what what's going on? Because I'm assuming that that belief comes from a lack of availability and interest in having sex. Yeah. Right. And so from there, we just jumped to you. Well, I must suck. You know, I must be hideous. I must be fat. My penis must be too small. Whatever those things are, your worst insecurities, right? Come bubbling to the surface. When in reality, she might be depressed or going through a hard time or feeling a real disconnection from you or just not really good at communication and things are going on that she's not articulating. So it's really dangerous to just assume that it's about you, right? Because that could have nothing to do with you. But unfortunately, that is a lot of our defaults. Of course, everything's about us. And that first signal is typically to internalize it. Absolutely. And it is, you know, the only way you're going to have a successful intimate life physically or emotionally is by really being vulnerable. You know, that's where we come to the heart bend thing and taking risks is really saying, you know, I'm a little scared and I'm feeling really sad because I miss our physical connection and I have a story that you're not attracted to me anymore. I don't know if that's true, but if it is true, let's talk about it. You know, maybe there's something I can do, maybe there's not, but let's be honest with each other. And if there's something else going on, let's talk about that too because I really miss you. Yeah, just creating the space for that conversation alone can help alleviate this. And I completely agree. I think that there's a high likelihood here that they're misreading the situation and by internalizing it, they're doing damage to their self-esteem needlessly, that a conversation could avoid. Right. And as we adopt those, I mean, I work so deeply. That was a huge part of what my last book about about the stories we tell ourselves and how important those are. And it also changes, you know, our our our thoughts and our beliefs create our feelings and our feelings create an energetic frequency that beyond words, the other person always feels. And so if you're walking around with a story that my partner is no longer attracted to me and therefore, I feel bad about myself, unwanted, unlovable, undesired, I am walking around with the energy of one who is undesirable. So it manifests itself. Exactly that. So these thoughts and beliefs and the stories that we share with ourselves are so important. How do we rewrite these stories? We've had members of our audience write in and say, I'm always in these same relationships. I'm always with the bad boy. I'm always with the the person who's not good for me. I'm always with the codependent person, the toxic person. How can we rewrite our stories? Well, when in situations like that, it's so important. I love that they're recognizing the pattern, right? That's the awareness is half the battle, right? So you're recognizing that there's a pattern and now you recognize that if there's a pattern, I'm the common denominator. And then usually, I mean, with all of those examples you just gave, all of those really everything is fundamentally connected to our own sense of self worth and our worthiness of love. And so really like we go back to what I said in the beginning that when we're having a relationship with someone else, we're really having a relationship with ourselves through that other person that really the path to clearing all of that is through the path to self love and accepting oneself. So that's part of it. But in terms of the stories we tell ourselves, it may not even be a pattern. It may just be an edge in your relationship, like a great relationship, but we always fight about this thing or we always struggle with that thing or whatever or in your dating life. You may not be a pattern, but you're just not having luck getting it past the third and fourth date or you start dating and then you break up. And it's getting really, really clear on what your stories and beliefs about you in love are. So if you're walking around with a story that all the good ones are taken or women are only after money or you know, I'm I don't earn enough to ever get anyone to really want me or I'm too short to find love. You know, you can be guaranteed that that's true. That result. Yeah, that's going to be the result. So there's a there's a process. You know, I it's sort of the best metaphor that I have found is if you imagine, you know, you're on a in a country house and a little bunny rabbit comes to the edge of the yard, you know, and you want that bunny to come over to the porch where you're rocking in the rocking chair, right? You have to coax that. You can't just say, hey, buddy, come here. You can't go and try to catch that you could, but you're not going to do well to catch the bunny. You put a little carrot very close to where it peeked out of the woods. The first day, the second day a little close, a little close, a little closer. And by the end, you've slowly worked up to and the same thing is true with our subconscious belief. So it's identifying what they are, and it's slowly being open to changing them. You can have all the positive speaker. I'm not going to think I'm too short anymore. I am beautiful. I'm good enough. I'm smart enough. People like me. It's not going to work because your subconscious is like going with your bad self. That's not true, right? So you have to say, OK, I feel like I'm too short to find love or that I'm not lovable. And I'm open to feeling differently. You know, I'm open to looking for ways in which I really am enough. And you slowly go through the process of changing those beliefs about yourself. And then you very quickly start to see how the world responds to you differently. And then it reinforces itself and the process starts to move in the other direction. Exactly. That looking outside of that belief in that story first to start to see some evidence. Yeah. If I were to say to you, like give you, I'm not going to make you sit here for 10 seconds. But if I were to say to you, and I often like to do this when I give talks, like, look, I'm going to give you 10 seconds to look around the room. And when we come back, I want you to tell me everything yellow that you saw in the room. And then when you come back, I say, OK, tell me everything red. You have no freaking idea because you were looking through the filter of looking for yellow. And it's the same thing in love and it's the same thing in looking for love. So if I am if I have a belief that I am too fat, too short, too thin, too poor, whatever that is, I am going to find evidence for that everywhere, everywhere. You certainly will. And of course, and the technology is going to add to all that evidence as well. I mean, certainly this is where we're seeing a lot of trouble with a lot of young people who have these stories that make some feel really bad. And then they have evidence to back the stories up through their own lens that they've colored to find those things. And then on top of that, communities on the internet who who that trolls that they can now identify with and feel good. There's other people like them and it may not be a healthy situation and they're all we're all too short together, right? We're all yeah. And just what happens on that is just resentment and anger until something bad happens and the community of the oppressed, right? Like, you know, they identify around their flaws rather around their strengths and that's never a good thing. You want to be around people who you identify with around the beautiful parts of yourself. Now, this is a question from a female listener who is dealing with a stoic significant other. How can I get my partner to open up? They've been resistant to opening up to me and I feel like our communication is suffering because of it. Well, you know, get him to open up. He's going to have to choose to open up. There are things you can do to make it safer. There are things you can do to even require it. But the only way you can require it is being ready to leave, right? So it has, you know, I always say that the pain, you know, the fear of leaving the situation has to be less than the pain that the situation causes, right? So there's that pivotal tipping point. And if this woman is at that tipping point, like right now, maybe she's just concerned, right? Or it's bothering her. But eventually she may get to the point if, you know, I'll talk about some other strategies, but if those strategies don't work, where, you know, she really and you're not going to be able to have a successful emotionally close and intimate, thus physically intimate relationship with someone who you can't talk to and who won't talk to you. So eventually she has to sort of not bluffing, but really mean, like, I can't sustain a relationship like this. I know this is really hard for you. And I know you probably have never had any training or awareness or even experience or having it modeled growing up, what it's like to be in a healthy communication. But I can't function in a relationship like this. So we need help and find a couple's therapist or a coach or a program like you guys who can, because these are skills that most of us don't learn, but are easily teachable. And so that's the good news. Now, from a strategic, if you don't get to that point, you know, you say, look, you can even invite him to do something like that. Or you say, look, I wanna just, let's just talk, like you choose a low-stakes situation that's still a little tough, but like, you're not gonna talk about the weather, but maybe you'll talk about, you know, where you wanna go on vacation. Where do you see yourself in five years? You know, things that aren't about deep emotions and pain, but are, you know, optimistic, but just get him talking. And then he gets the experience that, you know, he's gonna be received, he's not gonna be judged, that you're interested in what he has to say, that you're open to what he has to say, that you may even disagree, but you're still really interested in what he says. And then after he does it, I always joke with women that, you know, I don't mean to insult you, but men are a little bit like dogs in the way that you can train them. And so through positive feedback. So if after he has that conversation, oh my God, I love that so much. That was like so sexy to have you talk to me about like, oh my gosh, in the way that you said that thing about Greece. And like, you give him a lot of positive feedback. So then he's like, oh, that wasn't that hard and look how much she liked it. And I even got a little action as a result. You know, there's that now, there's that connection that it's not something that's scary and bad and dangerous, which is why guys don't do it, or women sometimes don't talk, that, you know, this actually might be okay. And then you slowly, so you're not gonna get out of the box be talking about your relationship issues or your sex life necessarily, but you can practice talking about these other things and work your way out. Yeah, that focus on positive emotions and topics that have a level of vulnerability, but aren't cutting to the core. Yes. And that reinforcement, I'll be honest, works both ways. It's great. It works with men and women. We're all in it. Positive reinforcement works across the board. And what is positive reinforcement may be different for both, but yes, always the carrot, never the stick. Absolutely. And to go along with that, I mean, when you're talking with other people, you're, there is a, there is a nonverbal discussion of how each person is gonna be treating each other, whether it's turning away to emotional bids, turning into emotional bids, using positive reinforcement, using negative reinforcement. All of these are sending signals that whether you like it or not, your subconscious brain is picking up. And you're putting puzzles together with this information and those behaviors are gonna be manifested from that. The other thing I wanna highlight, and we do video work in our boot camps with our clients where we actually film them interacting and what we find that's so shocking to a lot of us is we have this vision in our head of how we are perceived to the outside world and how we are behaving. And a lot of us don't realize the unconscious nonverbal signals we're sending to other people. When we're asking them to open up, we're looking down, we're closing our, crossing your arms. Exactly. We're pulling away in these moments when we're asking them to be really connected. So I would also turn the mirror back on this listener and say, okay, you want this person to be open. Are you being open and receptive in these moments? Yeah, are you someone who he can be open with? Right? Or are you providing cues to that? Are these nonverbals and verbal cues tinged with some judgment, tinged with maybe, I don't wanna hear what you have to say, but I do, right? And that is jarring for a lot of us because let's be honest, we don't look at ourselves on camera very often. We are living in our own movie and we're thinking things are appearing in ways that they often aren't. Yeah, and we attach to that. We take in 40 billion bits of information into our brains every millisecond, but we only consciously process 2,000 of them. So the rest is going into how do I feel? Oh, I feel a little scared. I'm not gonna speak up or whatever it is. That's all happening unconsciously and then it creates a decision, but it's happening. Now our last question for the day, CC here, slightly different tact. So CC has encountered a lot of guys in her life that are shy or introverted and she wants to be their friends and be encouraging. Would there be some other things to consider since I'm female trying to be encouraging to male friends? In other words, are the mindsets and examples that you guys have described in your show geared towards more males connecting with females or should there be some additional things to consider when I'm trying to make male friends? I guess what I'm asking is what are some things that I can do to encourage someone who's shy in their personality? I don't wanna be pushy and I wanna build friendships that are great. Why is she so focused on having friendships with introverted males? That to me is the golden question. Yes, what is that? What about shy, introverted guys and your need to break them out of their shell or fix them up? Yes, or fix them or be the mother Mary of what's that, I'm having a brain freeze. What was the woman who was sainted? Anyway. Mother Teresa. Mother Teresa, sorry, thank you. So, do you wanna be the mother Teresa for all the introverted guys? What is that, she's getting a hit or a jolt out of that. There's something in it for her that I think if you really want an answer to this question, that's the place you look like, okay. So underneath the question, what do I want? What is it that I'm trying to achieve here? This is her low stakes environment. Is what we're seeing here. She's defaulting to what she knows as low stakes. Oh, it's easier to be around the shy introvert because he's not going to reject me. He's not going to be over. And he's gonna be so grateful I'm sitting next to her. He's gonna love my company. So it's not about getting people to do something. It's about fixing your own behaviors the way you appear in the world and the way you communicate. It's not about manipulating and changing other people. Unless they wanna change and then you can, if you have something to offer, you can. But it's always starts with you. You know, you be the change you wanna see and then the other person matches you. Thank you so much for joining us today. Oh, it was so much fun. Your sessions were a lot of fun. Loved all of your input and you have a fantastic show and podcast as well that our audience can check out. Yeah, Uncovered Radio. So you can go to my website, which is DrLaraBurman.com. It's syndicated around the country, but if you can't, you know, if it's not in your town or if you don't know where it's playing, you can go to UncoveredRadio.com or even to my website and click on Uncovered Radio. The podcast is called Too Risqué for Radio because I often answer the questions I'm not allowed to answer live on the air. Gotcha. About sex. And I also just relaunched my website with a Seven Days to Better Sex free program. So you can go to DrLaraBurman.com and get that for free too, which will spice things up. I'm checking that out. Whether you're in a relationship or not. Fantastic. Thank you so much. Thank you. This is great being here.