[SPEAKER_03]: I'm Julie Kraftcheck, and I'm U.A.
[SPEAKER_03]: Xu.
[SPEAKER_03]: This is the psychology of relationships.
[SPEAKER_04]: Ever feel like you keep ending up with the same type of partner, even when it hasn't worked out before, what if it's time to reset your romantic GPS?
[SPEAKER_04]: So you can stop staring towards relationships that don't truly serve you.
[SPEAKER_04]: In this episode, we're joined by Mark Scholes,
[SPEAKER_04]: Psychotherapists and author of the book reset your romantic GPS to explore why people often gravitate towards familiar.
[SPEAKER_04]: But unforfilling, partner types.
[SPEAKER_04]: We unpack how attachment styles shape the partners we choose, why old relationship patterns tend to repeat themselves, and how awareness can help you make different healthier choices.
[SPEAKER_04]: Whether you're single, stuck in repeating cycles or evaluating your current relationship, this conversation offers tools to break old patterns and create connections that truly align with what you want and deserve.
[SPEAKER_04]: subscribe to the Psychology of Relationships on Apple Podcasts Spotify or wherever you listen, and if this episode helped you rethink your relationship patterns, leave a rating or review.
[SPEAKER_04]: This is the psychology of relationships and you're listening to an episode that just might change the way you show up for love.
[SPEAKER_04]: Enjoy!
[SPEAKER_03]: I have a hard time picking what to eat for breakfast.
[SPEAKER_03]: How am I qualified to pick my partner?
[SPEAKER_03]: I question myself all the time.
[SPEAKER_03]: Like, how do I know that my pickers even good?
[SPEAKER_03]: And I'm sure that's a question on everyone's mind.
[SPEAKER_03]: So that's what we have you with us Mark because you're going to shed some light on this topic.
[SPEAKER_03]: Welcome Mark.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hi.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for having me.
[SPEAKER_03]: Let's start with that.
[SPEAKER_03]: We talked about the picker.
[SPEAKER_03]: People say that all the time.
[SPEAKER_03]: My picker is off.
[SPEAKER_03]: I pick the wrong people.
[SPEAKER_03]: Is that an actual thing?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it is an actual thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, the truth is we learn about our relationships very early in life.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a kind of language we acquire, how to be attached to others, particularly our caretakers.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that kind of language, depending on the security of those attachment figures or the
[SPEAKER_01]: kind of laid down a kind of GPS in our psyches.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's the language we learn around connection.
[SPEAKER_01]: The more we're aware of that language, the more choice we have to move our decisions from a reflex to a choice.
[SPEAKER_04]: So why do we pick the wrong people then?
[SPEAKER_04]: Like why is it that our picker is off if that is how people feel?
[SPEAKER_01]: We're not really picking the wrong people.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're picking what we know.
[SPEAKER_01]: And really often we kind of pick the similar kinds of people who originally for lack of a better word failed us in a tunement.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we often pick somebody in the hopes of trying to master or fix that kind of early trauma or that early disconnection.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know that sounds like an oversimplification, but there's a lot of truth that goes into that.
[SPEAKER_03]: You say over a simplification, I actually think that was a very complicated statement.
[SPEAKER_03]: Can you break that down for us?
[SPEAKER_03]: How is this related to trauma?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so let me just very briefly say what a secure attachment is early in our lives.
[SPEAKER_01]: As an infant and early young child, our parents have a certain amount of attunement or caretakers to our needs.
[SPEAKER_01]: from eye contact, soothing physiological needs to responses with curiosity and discomfort, and when those needs are met on a kind of good enough consistent level, we internalize a sense that not only are our needs okay, but that the world is responsive to them.
[SPEAKER_01]: And what gets internalized is this buoyant life jacket, there's an anticipation over time that I'm good enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: people seem to want to respond to me, and anxiety is ultimately going to be suathed.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's a really wonderful thing to internalize.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you can go through life, life has tons of obstacles, and challenges, but you go through it with the sense of anticipation that I'm going to be okay, ultimately.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, on the reverse side with an insecure attachment, you have an environment where your needs are very inconsistently met or they're neglected and one is left to sort of comfort themselves and very strange thing happens here, very important thing happens that instead of the caretakers being attuned in empathic to the infant and child, the child has to become preoccupied and attuned to the parents.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they internalize something like this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Obviously, my needs are not so okay because they're not being responded to.
[SPEAKER_01]: So there must be something wrong with those needs.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I better figure out in the other what they need in order to feel available or more available.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that insecure attachment now, the security of the person of the infant lies outside of them.
[SPEAKER_01]: They don't internalize a sense of safety.
[SPEAKER_01]: They internalize a sense of preoccupation with the other because their security exists outside of them.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's a very different configuration to go through life with because we all crave and need security.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's one of our main motivations.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if it lies outside of us, instead of being in our own bodies and figuring out what we're feeling, we have to kind of be more preoccupied with the other and figure out what they're feeling.
[SPEAKER_01]: That becomes the language.
[SPEAKER_01]: So we're not going to be drawn to people with an insecure attachment.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're not going to be drawn to people who are tuned to your needs because that would be
[SPEAKER_01]: unfamiliar that would almost be like feeling homeless you're going to really be drawn to somebody who's less attuned who you can try to figure out because that's the language you learned how to be connected and we are most familiar with our first language then we have to learn a new language and that's what sort of psychotherapy in the book that I wrote is really about.
[SPEAKER_04]: So it does it all come down to attachment theory because we've talked about attachment theory a lot and I definitely have mixed feelings on it to be perfectly honest.
[SPEAKER_04]: I feel like in some ways I totally hear you that like early ways that we connected, impact how we show up as adults, absolutely.
[SPEAKER_04]: But I often think that that's kind of like the solution or kind of the explanation for everything where it feels like it's a little generalized sometimes.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like is that the only thing that's kind of coming into who we pick or their other aspects also?
[SPEAKER_01]: I think it becomes an issue when who we're picking has a kind of repetitive quality.
[SPEAKER_01]: It influences all of us how we feel about ourselves, what are language in us?
[SPEAKER_01]: Of course, it's variable, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes it's extreme, but it's often somewhere in between.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it really isn't an issue unless we find ourselves kind of picking the same kind.
[SPEAKER_01]: of person.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm a person who move from a more insecure attachment to a more secure attachment.
[SPEAKER_01]: I spent in my 20s and 30s kind of being drawn to a similar kind of person.
[SPEAKER_01]: Perfectly not good person, but people who sort of were more on the depressive kind of a little bit more emotionally needy spectrum, which is perfectly fine, if I didn't have an issue with that.
[SPEAKER_01]: but I would often feel suffocated and I would feel resentful of having to be more of a caretaker, much like my early childhood, what I learned from my mother.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it was a problem only because of that I was drawn to the same kind of person each time.
[SPEAKER_01]: And as I became aware of that and worked hard on that, I began to find people who had more variety than that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look, relationships are hard, but they're harder when you're really picking somebody who's really
[SPEAKER_03]: But that takes a lot of work to know that.
[SPEAKER_01]: It does.
[SPEAKER_01]: It takes a lot to know it, but there's a lot of information out there.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you know, becoming aware of what our first language is is not that difficult.
[SPEAKER_01]: The difficulty is doing the opposite or moving in the other direction of what feels familiar.
[SPEAKER_01]: I like to call it the discomfort of an healthy choice.
[SPEAKER_01]: So for instance, chemistry can often come from a feeling of, oh, I finally, I'm going to, this is it.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is the person that I'm going to redo sort of my past with and is going to make me whole.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know exactly how to be with this person.
[SPEAKER_01]: A lack of chemistry can be with somebody who shows up, who responds consistently, whose character is really good, but you don't feel that
[SPEAKER_01]: think that you think you're supposed to feel, you have to allow yourself to see what a relationship is like or a connection is like without something that feels familiar and that can be difficult for people.
[SPEAKER_03]: I think that's a conversation we've had a lot on this podcast.
[SPEAKER_03]: when someone's doing all the right things, so many daters chalk it up to no chemistry.
[SPEAKER_03]: There was no spark, we're just not compatible, but they're doing all the right things, but we also have to decipher if that's really the case, there's no chemistry or it's just something you're not used to seeing, it makes you uncomfortable.
[SPEAKER_03]: For someone who is just getting into this kind of work, how are they able to separate when someone's not good for them, versus when someone is actually good for them,
[SPEAKER_01]: That's a very good question and for instance, this can either be friends or patients of mine.
[SPEAKER_01]: The person you can often detect this when a person is dating and they're much more focused on the person who is inconsistently responding to them than the person who's consistently responding to them.
[SPEAKER_01]: You have to sort of step back and notice, is this good for me?
[SPEAKER_01]: Although it feels like it's got to kind of spark, how come it has a spark?
[SPEAKER_01]: To be able to self-reflect is one of the most important things to do, and you can do that with people, you can do that with food, you can do that with exercise, you can notice what your relationship is to any craving.
[SPEAKER_01]: And instead of just kind of going into a state where you follow it blindly, you begin to sort of notice, oh, I'm having a craving.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, this person that hasn't gotten back to me is taking up most of my time.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have friends, I have a job, all these things in my life, but this inconsistent responsiveness is a thing that I'm most paying attention to.
[SPEAKER_01]: That is a clue what one can practice is trying to walk in the other direction of that and seeing what happens.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's not binary.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's messy and you fail sometimes and you succeed other times.
[SPEAKER_04]: So for the person, because we definitely hear that story a lot, like going after these people that give us arms of attention or they're just not showing up in the way that you say you want, but yet you're spending all your time kind of pining over this person that's kind of giving you a half-assed relationship.
[SPEAKER_04]: What is it from the past that would draw you to this?
[SPEAKER_04]: What are some of the past signs or reasons why you're actually attracted to this?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, first of all, as I said, it's literally a language of connecting that you learn.
[SPEAKER_01]: That is what a connection feels like.
[SPEAKER_01]: It feels like something you're longing for.
[SPEAKER_01]: It feels like something you're trying to achieve.
[SPEAKER_01]: It doesn't feel like, oh, I'm gonna be kind of adhesive and have a draw to the other.
[SPEAKER_01]: The other's not gonna naturally just wanna be connected with me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm gonna feel anxious or insecure about that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Another component to that is that you haven't mourned what you never got and you're sort of still trying to undo what was done.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, mourning is like a real important experience and you have to be able to sort of notice that there's feelings of loss, existential anxiety in taking the strong step into being the person who says no to something that feels familiar
[SPEAKER_01]: And you know you have to be able to tolerate a certain amount of anxiety and when you are able to do that a very strange thing happens you begin to like yourself a little bit more because you know you've done something that's for your own good and when you're able to do that kind of consistently you actually tolerate people who aren't good to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Bless and you actually feel like you sort of deserve people who are there for you because you've been there for yourself But it's very hard to be there for yourself when as a young person your experience was there wasn't somebody for me Like I think it's when we talk about a touch with Mary and like you know upbringing on one side It's like should we just play our parents for everything?
[SPEAKER_04]: I guess that what it comes down to.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like I feel like there is always this like someone failed in this upbringing, but like what are some signs like getting that our parents are just human?
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like what are some things that they maybe did not realizing the impacts that caused it impact later on?
[SPEAKER_01]: Parents are people too who have their own childhoods, and they have their own strengths or weaknesses in empathy.
[SPEAKER_01]: They have their own responsiveness to dependency.
[SPEAKER_01]: They have their own levels of anxiety.
[SPEAKER_01]: Some parents tolerate anxiety very well.
[SPEAKER_01]: Others only want their kids to be okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: and to make sure they're okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so we all have our own wounds from childhoods.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's not really blaming parents, although there are some parents who, obviously, were overtly destructive, but it's kind of tolerating disappointment, understanding disappointment, but then instead of being entrapped by that disappointment, it's learning about yourself and repairing yourself.
[SPEAKER_01]: Our childhoods do imprint us with our language, but we have other people in our lives besides our parents, we have teachers, we have friends that could have provided different kinds of experiences, those all make a big difference.
[SPEAKER_03]: I want to piggyback on Julie's comment as well because I feel like by dating the people who weren't right for me, I was able to learn how to communicate my needs.
[SPEAKER_03]: By dating the person who didn't text me back when I wanted it, I learned to communicate that as I would like for you to text me back in a normal amount of time.
[SPEAKER_03]: If I were to date people who were actually good for me, I'm not sure if I would have learned these skills.
[SPEAKER_03]: So, would you say that maybe in dating we have to go through some of this first?
[SPEAKER_03]: Have your picker be off first in order to learn the necessary skills for relationships?
[SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_01]: Nobody teaches us really.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's no education in dating.
[SPEAKER_01]: No.
[SPEAKER_01]: The point you're making is is really so important to learn what your needs are, to learn how to express them, and to learn who responds to them and who doesn't.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, it seems like there's just so many variables to be.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like, I'm thinking of like, friends of mine that have been in very healthy relationships for early years, like maybe they met their person in college didn't really go through all this.
[SPEAKER_04]: Some of them that are coming to mind are people that came from divorced households where their parents weren't around that much.
[SPEAKER_04]: So I guess I don't try to rectify.
[SPEAKER_04]: Of course, I don't know how their parents interacted with them on a day-to-day.
[SPEAKER_04]: Maybe there was a lot of secure attachment that was happening.
[SPEAKER_04]: It seems like there's no rhyme or reason, but like, what would you say that that?
[SPEAKER_04]: Like, is there actually some universal signs?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, I definitely know three or four of those.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can't beat the system.
[SPEAKER_01]: Being in this profession I mean, this goes beyond dating.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're going to have issues.
[SPEAKER_01]: The issues I they're going to come out at some point in the marriage and you can work through them certainly or they're going to come out when you have kids.
[SPEAKER_01]: However, there are people who have less problematic relationships than others.
[SPEAKER_01]: But everybody runs into their walls.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, there's 51% divorce rate.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, that's 50%.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's half.
[SPEAKER_03]: But we run into this question as well from our listeners is,
[SPEAKER_03]: of what point do you give up on a relationship and just say, this person's just not, yeah, good for me, we're not compatible or do I keep putting in the effort to try?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, if two people are making an effort, you usually have something that's gonna work.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you're really grow and you're really not compatible and you're able to both realize that, that's another story, but if you have two people making an effort, two people willing to look at themselves.
[SPEAKER_01]: Love is,
[SPEAKER_01]: not loving a person the way that comes naturally to you, love is loving the person the way the person needs to be loved.
[SPEAKER_01]: So love is work and love is effort.
[SPEAKER_01]: When that honeymoon phase passes and hopefully when you have two people working hard, you have something really that you don't want to lose.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, that's what I wanted to ask you is like, when is it a bad situation versus, you know, just a rough patch or people aren't perfect, it gives it truly just when two people are working at it or is there any other signs?
[SPEAKER_01]: With somebody you know is contemptuous of you, puts you down or is overly critical, that's a bad sign, that's an environment that you don't want to be spending the rest of your life.
[SPEAKER_01]: If two people work at hearing each other, it doesn't mean they can meet the other's needs.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean,
[SPEAKER_01]: That's something that's excellent if someone can meet your needs, but it's not a given, but if somebody can hear what you're saying and understands and makes an effort to try to be better for you or to meet those needs, then you have a relationship that's worthwhile.
[SPEAKER_01]: And certainly relationships get tested.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I married 25 years.
[SPEAKER_01]: I got married at 36.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had plenty of failed relationships.
[SPEAKER_01]: My being a major part of those failures.
[SPEAKER_01]: You sort of know and sort of learn, okay, we're going through something where we're not feeling as close and usually those periods change and you are close again, and that's the excellent part of having a long term relationship is being able to sort of, you know, both be in it together and go through those kind of periods together knowing that you have a partner.
[SPEAKER_04]: So while we're talking about you, okay, I say you said that you struggled with this.
[SPEAKER_04]: You were picking people that weren't right for you.
[SPEAKER_04]: And you got out of it and then you bet your wife.
[SPEAKER_04]: There might be other stuff going on in between.
[SPEAKER_04]: But I guess like, how did you start to choose differently?
[SPEAKER_04]: And then also when a rough patch came with your wife, how did you know like it wasn't because you chose wrong?
[SPEAKER_04]: It's just that it was a rough patch and that's normal.
[SPEAKER_01]: First of all, I was ready to be with somebody who's disposition was a little bit different, not a depressive, but somebody who's emotional and needs were less.
[SPEAKER_01]: That was unfamiliar to me, but I was willing to kind of, you know, stand in that space.
[SPEAKER_01]: And there were plenty of times where we fight, we fight less.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're solid, a plus fighters, my wife and I.
[SPEAKER_01]: and the fact that she's a good fighter actually is helpful to me because she doesn't wound easily so I don't have to sort of be more preoccupied with her because she's tough.
[SPEAKER_01]: For me, what allows me to do that is it doesn't touch on my old patterns of feeling that I have to be super protective.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're feeling that I have to be more of a fixer.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those kinds of feelings for me left me feeling kind of more suffocated, not able to express my own anger or my own feelings if it would be.
[SPEAKER_01]: I thought it would be hurtful.
[SPEAKER_01]: That didn't exist in this particular relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: It didn't touch on the things that made me feel that I had to get out of something.
[SPEAKER_01]: Moving forward was much easier for me under those conditions.
[SPEAKER_03]: had you been married before?
[SPEAKER_01]: I had not been married before now.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had been engaged before.
[SPEAKER_04]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_04]: So what do you think it was from like your childhood that was drawing you two people like this?
[SPEAKER_04]: And then yeah, I guess like that's the first question.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you know, I had a wonderful charismatic, a very depressed moody mother.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had a very
[SPEAKER_01]: a two-ended empathic disposition when I was born.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was counseling her at four and five years old, and that seemed very normal to me.
[SPEAKER_01]: Unfortunately, it had other repercussions as well, but that really was what it felt like for me.
[SPEAKER_01]: to be close to somebody.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not all my friends, but for an intimate partnership, that's what it felt like.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so expressing my own needs felt like, first of all, that that wasn't gonna be okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: I sort of anticipated that the person wasn't going to be responsive to them.
[SPEAKER_01]: That was my own style.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I learned it in early age.
[SPEAKER_01]: It made me a very good therapist.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I was a psychology major and I learned how to be very attuned and empathic with other people, but it didn't help my personal life
[SPEAKER_04]: I guess by question though for you it's like how do you know when it's your own thing like in your case right stating your needs more versus it's the other person that's just not a good fit for you like how do you make that distinction.
[SPEAKER_01]: How did I know?
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I was probably not the perfect person to give an example because I had been in therapy.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was training to be a therapist.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was reading, and you know, and I noticed that these patterns were similar.
[SPEAKER_01]: I wanted a longer sustaining relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: I sort of realized at some point, I'm gonna have to move towards what's less familiar and more uncomfortable.
[SPEAKER_01]: And see what that's like.
[SPEAKER_01]: And one of the sign-failed episodes, George Costanza, he does everything the opposite to see if things would change.
[SPEAKER_01]: And instead of ordering his tuna sandwich on whole wheat toast, he orders chicken salad on rye.
[SPEAKER_01]: And all of a sudden, everything starts going well for him.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's sort of the same thing in some ways.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's noticing and becoming aware,
[SPEAKER_01]: and then making choices that might be unfamiliar and uncomfortable, but you know or healthy.
[SPEAKER_03]: So when I'm hearing you say and to answer Julie's question, it sounds like you can't really separate as a me or as a them.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's like both.
[SPEAKER_03]: By you wanting to be with this type of person, there is something in you that you need to work through.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_03]: And then by that person being the person who they are, that's just innately who they are.
[SPEAKER_03]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_03]: We often talk about childhood trauma.
[SPEAKER_03]: I don't think Julie, you and I have ever explored this deeply, just between the two of us, because I've been so curious what is it from my childhood that's contributing to my current relationships.
[SPEAKER_03]: And when you said first language mark, I think that.
[SPEAKER_03]: rang truer for me than saying trauma because trauma just sounds yeah awful yeah it sounds abusive yeah i don't think it's yeah i was never abuse as a child i can remember but the first language i learned from my parents is that words of affirmation are something that you earn that they don't just freely give out so the people i dated as an adult were not very good with words of affirmation and if they were to tell me something
[SPEAKER_03]: along the lines of your beautiful, I'm proud of you, I'm so glad we're together.
[SPEAKER_03]: I would freak out, I feel like, oh my god, I haven't heard something like that.
[SPEAKER_03]: I don't know if I earned it or not.
[SPEAKER_01]: You haven't earned it, right?
[SPEAKER_03]: And the people who gave me words of affirmation from the very beginning, I was so scared.
[SPEAKER_03]: I didn't think they were authentic.
[SPEAKER_03]: I didn't think they were being honest to me.
[SPEAKER_03]: And so I run away.
[SPEAKER_03]: I say, don't want to be with someone who's being inauthentic with me.
[SPEAKER_03]: So that's the first language that I can really pinpoint from my childhood.
[SPEAKER_03]: What about you, Julie?
[SPEAKER_03]: Have you thought about this much?
[SPEAKER_04]: You know, I feel like I have it to be honest.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like I think idea think about it more of where it's come from.
[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, there's definitely aspects of my childhood.
[SPEAKER_04]: But I think some of it too was, it wasn't just like my upbringing with
[SPEAKER_04]: parents, but it was just like my entire dating life growing up.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like I remember in high school and elementary school or middle school, maybe that's a better than elementary.
[SPEAKER_04]: Like I was never like focused on relationships.
[SPEAKER_04]: That wasn't something that like I never viewed myself as like the girl that got the guy.
[SPEAKER_04]: So I think it was always like something that had to like go for and like fight for.
[SPEAKER_04]: So maybe I tried to like win with people more than if like I'd felt that naturally at the beginning.
[SPEAKER_04]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's like hard to fully make those ties, I think.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's interesting.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that is.
[SPEAKER_01]: To the point that you're making, I don't like that we're trauma either.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's plenty of trauma, but it's really a language.
[SPEAKER_01]: It can be based on different kinds of attunement or misattunement, but it doesn't have to be outright trauma.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's just a kind of a way we learn to connect and to attach.
[SPEAKER_04]: I guess what like what is still like hard for me to grasp is that there's just so many things that like need to line up at a relationship right like how do you know like which ones are the things that really aren't serving you versus let's say I don't know your example right you were saying that like people that
[SPEAKER_04]: had a lot of emotional needs for instance.
[SPEAKER_04]: How do you know that that's like the one thing that really just does not work for you versus understanding that like, no, it's perfect.
[SPEAKER_04]: There's always going to be something like, how do you make that distinction?
[SPEAKER_01]: For me, I made a set that I'm fine with sort of being dependent or having emotional needs, just want to say, is okay with me.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's when
[SPEAKER_01]: a person is sort of more looking for just a lot of validation and doesn't really necessarily trust the relationships so much and needs a lot of attention on themselves that I sort of have a averse of reaction to in relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: How do you know, if you have two people who are trying to make something work, that is a perfectly great sign.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you're with someone and your experience is preoccupation and disappointment,
[SPEAKER_01]: and frustration.
[SPEAKER_01]: Forget about whether someone's late to a movie or, you know, their habits, it should not be deal breakers.
[SPEAKER_01]: But if you're feeling disrespected or you're not feeling listened to or you're not feeling supported and those are feelings that you're continuing to move towards and to have the strength to be able to notice why you're putting up with it and how to pull yourself out of it.
[SPEAKER_03]: It takes a lot of courage and awareness to do that for yourself.
[SPEAKER_03]: What if you see that for a close friend who is just picking the wrong people and constantly putting him or herself in the same disappointing position?
[SPEAKER_03]: How do you help out this friend?
[SPEAKER_01]: you try to say something.
[SPEAKER_01]: Unfortunately, these kinds of situations can be very frustrating for friends.
[SPEAKER_01]: If it's the 90th relationship, that's the same.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Friends begin to feel frustrated and begin to say, well, okay, there's nothing I can do.
[SPEAKER_01]: Often friends, they play the second fiddle, and they can often not have as much contact with the person because they're so obsessed in the relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: So friendships are often tested.
[SPEAKER_01]: But close friendships, you just have to sort of, you know, say how you feel, tell them that you're there for them.
[SPEAKER_01]: Recommend, you know, you've been doing good therapist if they want to see a therapist, recommend a book, but it's like anything else a person has to make that choice themselves.
[SPEAKER_04]: So we've talked a lot about how do you stop fighting the wrong people?
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_04]: But how do you know like the right qualities, right?
[SPEAKER_04]: Like how do you know when you found the right person?
[SPEAKER_01]: So I mean, I coined a phrase that I like, although it was not popular, which is character over chemistry.
[SPEAKER_01]: Personally, I think it takes about six months to find out who you're dating.
[SPEAKER_01]: Unfortunately, you can also grow close to somebody in six months.
[SPEAKER_01]: So there is a dilemma in about six months, you begin to kind of appreciate somebody's character.
[SPEAKER_01]: You see things in them.
[SPEAKER_01]: How do they treat people in a restaurant?
[SPEAKER_01]: How do they treat their parents?
[SPEAKER_01]: How do they treat their friends?
[SPEAKER_01]: What kind of decisions do you see them making?
[SPEAKER_01]: Character is something that I think is gotta be valued more.
[SPEAKER_01]: in dating and valued more than chemistry.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know you need some chemistry, but one doesn't need so much chemistry if they see in the other something that they admire and care about.
[SPEAKER_04]: So I feel like one of the things I've heard before, I'm curious on your take on this, is that we choose partners because we're trying to heal our own wounds.
[SPEAKER_04]: And what I'm hearing for you earlier though is sometimes that's just our own wounds aren't really who we actually need to be with because it's just the way we know love and we know relationships.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_04]: What is your take on that and like how do you understand the difference between this part of just not a good fit for you versus like this is stuff you need to work throw.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I think the apple doesn't fall far from the tree often.
[SPEAKER_01]: Relationships are the best place for us to work out our stuff.
[SPEAKER_01]: The best opportunity with the right person.
[SPEAKER_01]: Our partners become
[SPEAKER_01]: People from our past relationships bring up unformulated experiences and sort of dissociated experiences, longings, all sorts of things.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when you have a kind of a good enough partner, it's somebody who you can work through those things with.
[SPEAKER_01]: No one's going to make you fully whole, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: You have to own your own self and your strengths and weaknesses.
[SPEAKER_01]: I often hear people after a breakup say, maybe there's something I could have done.
[SPEAKER_01]: If I had just done the right thing, if I had gotten it right, then the love would be coming.
[SPEAKER_01]: I can't stop thinking about them.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know they weren't really good for me, but I just need them to understand.
[SPEAKER_01]: I need one more chance.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that is a resistance to mourning.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like this isn't working.
[SPEAKER_01]: You have to be able to tolerate, to mourn something, the ability to mourn and to move on is something one wants to learn how to do.
[SPEAKER_01]: And to be able to say yes to things that are good and to be able to leave, you know, person with a secure attachment can leave a relationship that's not good for them.
[SPEAKER_01]: A person with a more insecure attachment has a very hard time leaving, even if the person is not good for them.
[SPEAKER_03]: Mark specifically for you, looking back and hindsight, 40 years ago when you were dating, what are some things that you would have done differently?
[SPEAKER_01]: I would have dated people for less periods of time.
[SPEAKER_01]: Uh-huh.
[SPEAKER_01]: Instead of I was sort of more of a serial monogamous, like three or four year long term relationships, but I think I was in them for much too long.
[SPEAKER_01]: I would have talked to my mother and I would have tried to have her go to therapy instead of me be her therapist.
[SPEAKER_01]: I would have dated and explored different kinds of people that brought out different parts of me to learn from the dating, to learn what's really good for me that I like, that I don't like to be with people outside, what was familiar to me.
[SPEAKER_04]: We did an interesting episode a while ago about it was with a doctor that talked about positive intelligence and one of his things that he talked about is like how we sabotage our own relationships.
[SPEAKER_04]: And what attracts you to someone ends up being the thing that bothers you the most about them.
[SPEAKER_04]: So like for instance, you have someone that you think is like chill, laid back and that's like what gravitates you to them.
[SPEAKER_04]: But later on, it annoys you that they can never make a decision, they never want to initiate anything.
[SPEAKER_04]: How do you decide that like, they're not making plans enough for you to say like this person isn't good for me?
[SPEAKER_01]: Some people know early on what they like and what they don't.
[SPEAKER_01]: But some people, it could be that there are anxious around people who are more independent.
[SPEAKER_01]: and who have their own point of view.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they might be frightened to be with somebody who doesn't need them to be in control and to be the one making plans.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they're attracted to somebody who's chill and allows the other to make all the plans.
[SPEAKER_01]: But six months into it or year into it, they're feeling resentful and bored.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, they chose to be with this person.
[SPEAKER_01]: What they didn't take into account
[SPEAKER_01]: And the person now likes them and loves them.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now they're thinking, well, I have other parts of myself that are being neglected here.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'd rather be with somebody who has opinions, has a point of view, who likes things that I might not like to contribute to my life.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the challenge of this kind of thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's something called, it's an achievement in psychoanalysis called the depressive position.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the depressive position is the ability to live with the good and the bad.
[SPEAKER_01]: that somebody is not bringing you everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: Again, there are things that bother us about our partners.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, we're two people.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're going to have things that bother each other.
[SPEAKER_01]: Nobody makes one hole.
[SPEAKER_01]: But a person has to be able to live in that depressive position.
[SPEAKER_01]: You have to know that my partner is not supposed to make me whole.
[SPEAKER_01]: And the other is supposed to know that my partner is not supposed to make me whole.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are a lot of people out in the world.
[SPEAKER_01]: who are looking for someone to make them whole.
[SPEAKER_01]: Since nobody can do that, you begin the minute you realize this person's just a person, and it's just a human being who I'm with, and they're not going to make all of my wishes come true.
[SPEAKER_01]: There are people who then begin to pull away from that reality, and that person's really not ready to be in a relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: You have to have matured to a place,
[SPEAKER_01]: where you know the person you're with, you love them, but you have to be able to live with yourself.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's an unfortunate name, though, depressive position.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not sure if I like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: It comes from early infant research in which the infant learns that the person who's feeding them is the same person who is sometimes not available.
[SPEAKER_01]: They have to tolerate
[SPEAKER_01]: that it's not all good or all bad.
[SPEAKER_01]: They learn to tolerate that in between that the person who I'm dependent on is good enough, but I don't have control over.
[SPEAKER_03]: We don't want anybody thinking that this is the same thing as settling.
[SPEAKER_03]: I can already hear some of our listeners.
[SPEAKER_03]: like, okay, my future is just to settle for good enough.
[SPEAKER_03]: It doesn't sound that exciting or hopeful and I do think a lot of people in relationships are when they're dating.
[SPEAKER_03]: They're dating someone good enough.
[SPEAKER_03]: They think could there be someone better, right?
[SPEAKER_03]: You know, better compatibility out there and I just wasting my time with this person.
[SPEAKER_03]: But what I'm hearing you say is if you spend more energy and effort working on making this relationship work because both people are open to it,
[SPEAKER_03]: that effort to also know that you will be disappointed from time to time and that is okay.
[SPEAKER_03]: In the next relationship, you're also going to find areas of disappointment.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, exactly.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, look, it's good to be compatible, but if you're able to express your needs and the other person is able to hear you and work on things and the other person can do the same, what you have is you take the risk of being known and you have a deepening connection with that person.
[SPEAKER_01]: That deepening connection is much better than good enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't mean that you should settle for something that's good enough.
[SPEAKER_01]: You should settle for something where you have a partner,
[SPEAKER_01]: who has your back and who's there for you and who stands behind you with your own good and bad with the things that are good about you and the things that are not so good about you.
[SPEAKER_04]: So what advice would you have for someone right now that feels like they kind of like have a type that they keep gravitating to that they know is not right for them.
[SPEAKER_04]: How do they get out of their own way?
[SPEAKER_01]: They could pick up a for $15 a copy of my book how to change your GPS.
[SPEAKER_01]: They can Google any kinds of attachment theories or they can talk to friends.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, mental health has become a topic that's totally okay to talk about.
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't have to go very far too.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like your podcast, I'm sure, talks about this kind of stuff.
[SPEAKER_01]: The reason I am interested in this topic and the reason I work with patients and wrote this book is to introduce people to this idea so that they can learn about themselves and begin to make
[SPEAKER_01]: choices not just to have reflexes and so I would encourage people to do five minutes of mindful meditation to begin to sit with themselves to begin to take time just to go inward try to figure out does this make me happy yes It might be familiar, but does it make me feel safe and does it make me feel secure those are two things that are necessary in order to blossom
[SPEAKER_04]: Well, I mean, this conversation has been so insightful.
[SPEAKER_04]: I think my biggest takeaway in general is understanding yourself like we talked about this many of times, but like understanding where you come from, how you were loved, I love the initial language that you had with love and how people
[SPEAKER_04]: showed you love.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's so important to understanding yourself and I think from there, you can know your needs and then realize if the person that you're with is meeting them or not and if you find yourself in this pattern of feeling like it's the wrong people.
[SPEAKER_04]: I mean, I think ultimately the choice does come down to you and I like this George Costanza,
[SPEAKER_04]: analogy is like, can you try different things?
[SPEAKER_04]: You know, see what else could work like date like a signage.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's a direction.
[SPEAKER_04]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm just learning that you only know what you know.
[SPEAKER_03]: So that means we shouldn't be too hard on ourselves for having the wrong picker because we're only picking based on what we know from the past.
[SPEAKER_05]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_03]: But every decision we make in dating
[SPEAKER_03]: So we're learning from our picking choices that at least we're progressing forward, right, in our love lives.
[SPEAKER_03]: I like this level set of, is this person good for me?
[SPEAKER_03]: Does this person make me feel safe?
[SPEAKER_03]: And does this relationship make me feel secure?
[SPEAKER_03]: These are very good questions to ask.
[SPEAKER_03]: And we always say dating is like one big social experiment.
[SPEAKER_03]: How can we really say the person we've picked is the right person?
[SPEAKER_03]: We won't know till we're on our deathbed looking back and saying, yep, pick the right person.
[SPEAKER_03]: I know people who've been in 20, 30-year-long relationship that the end go, that was fun while lasted, but you know, I'm ready for the next person.
[SPEAKER_03]: So we don't have to focus too much on the picker.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's really on how we make an effort in a relationship to make a work and learn from those relationships.
[SPEAKER_03]: And connecting the dots of where we learned these patterns of behavior, I think it's also something that I've been really focused on, it's like, why am I doing this and why am I feeling this way?
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that the points you're making are absolutely nail it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you know, if you do feel safe and secure, chances are you're going to take risks with that person and reveal yourself more chances are you got yourself something that at the end of your life, you say this was really good.
[SPEAKER_01]: This was a good partner.
[SPEAKER_04]: Well thank you Mark.
[SPEAKER_04]: I know you kind of shared a bit about your book, but where can people find it if they want to read more?
[SPEAKER_01]: It's on Amazon and you just go to reset your romantic GPS where you put my name in.
[SPEAKER_01]: It'll come up there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for that.
[SPEAKER_03]: If people want to find out more about you, where can they go?
[SPEAKER_01]: They can go to marksholes.lcsw.com.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have an Instagram romantic GPS.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm happy to get back to people and guide them.
[SPEAKER_01]: If anyone is looking for therapy, you know, for therapists, I'm happy to be contacted.
[SPEAKER_03]: Great.
[SPEAKER_03]: Thank you, Mark, for your time.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, guys.
[SPEAKER_01]: You got me talking about myself a lot.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think you're...
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_03]: We are very nosy.
[SPEAKER_03]: I don't know what makes my choice, Mark.
[SPEAKER_03]: Sure.
[SPEAKER_03]: Well, we are so grateful for your time today.
[SPEAKER_03]: And if you haven't done so yet, subscribe to the psychology of relationships today.
[SPEAKER_03]: So you don't miss an episode.