← The Diary Of A CEO

Paul C. Brunson: Most Replayed Moment: Why Does Commitment Feel So Scary? How to Build a Strong, Lasting Relationship

Episode 2025-10-242025-10-24English

Guests: Paul C. Brunson

Most Replayed Moment: Why Does Commitment Feel So Scary? How to Build a Strong, Lasting Relationship
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Contents3 chapters§01Transcript — part 1§02Transcript — part 2§03Transcript — part 3

§01Transcript — part 1

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00:32Thinking about the history of relationships, I often wonder how many of the rules of relationships that we've been handed by society are now invalid, or maybe were never valid.

00:42So, you know, we have these sort of constructs of like marriage and monogamy and even like heterosexuality, all these things that have been passed to us through religion and through history.

00:52I was looking at some stats about marriage and it says that in 2019, marriage rates for opposite sex couples fell to their lowest on record since 1862.

01:01That's in the UK.

01:02And in the US, marriage rates have been declining since the early 1970s.

01:08I'm not married, but I spend a lot of time thinking about whether I should be or not.

01:13I actually had a conversation recently with my partner where I said, do you want to get married?

01:16And it was abundantly clear that she does want to get married.

01:19But then I asked why.

01:21And really, it seems like it was really just more for the wedding than...

01:26Than for some kind of legal contract that we sign with the government.

01:30So I'm really wondering, based on everything we know about history and the trade-offs of marriage, should I be getting married?

01:40Yes, because your partner wants to.

01:42Is that reason enough?

01:44But here, all right, so I think the institution of marriage, what you're going to see, this is my prediction, is that because...

01:57Nuclear families.

01:58What do you mean by nuclear family?

01:59So having two, well, it's interesting.

02:02There's different perspectives now on nuclear family, but I look at it as you have two partners and children, and that creates the nuclear family.

02:14That becomes an economic unit.

02:17Which drives a society.

02:20And as that has disappeared, there's been less of a base to drive society, per many researchers.

02:29So as a result, what I believe is going to happen, as we see right now in Singapore, as we see right now in China, as we see right now in Japan, you're going to see government

02:39heavily involved in incentivizing marriage.

02:44And marriage is already incentivized right now in terms of, you know, tax benefits, being able to, you know, leave assets to your partner, leave assets to family members.

02:58So

02:58As a result of the decrease,

03:00of marriage and decrease of nuclear families, you will see government step up even more to incentivize.

03:07So you're going to see all types of benefits being thrown at people to get married, you know, especially as you not only see marriage rates decline, but as you also see birth rates.

03:20Declining as they are.

03:23Now, your question around what should you do is that this is a question around values.

03:33And this is a question that I believe is very important to have early on.

03:37Now, I was saying, you know, when you meet someone,

03:40You should lay out exactly what you want.

03:42This is a very important question to have early, early on.

03:46Now, in terms of where you are with your partner, I would say that if she is for, if she's pro this, and you are indifferent,

03:59It feels like you're indifferent, not anti, but indifferent.

04:02Yeah, I think I'm somewhat agnostic to it.

04:07However, I can call out a bunch of downsides to getting married.

04:11Really?

04:12Like?

04:13Well, again, I don't know because I'm not married, so all the married people are like screaming at me right now.

04:17I know this because they DM me.

04:18They've been DMing me for many, many years since I started the Diary of a CEO because in some of those early episodes, I was really like, I was really quite against it.

04:25But over time, I've kind of developed my thinking here.

04:27I just wonder, I can't understand the first...

04:30principles as to why having a like government or religious contract with somebody is going to increase the probability of success in the union of love

04:42um there's obviously the issue with the prenup situation i actually don't have this concern with my my partner so i think she's

04:49I think you've met her, haven't you?

04:50You've met her, yeah.

04:51Yeah.

04:52From a distance.

04:52Yes, from a distance.

04:53Yeah, I don't have a concern that she's going to try and bankrupt me or that I might try and bankrupt her.

04:59So that's not really a concern.

05:02The whole charade of like doing a massive wedding, I think is a little bit weird.

05:06I think, why can't we just have,

05:08lots of events over the next 50 years where we bring our friends and family versus like one.

05:13I've also watched a couple of my friends at the moment who are getting married.

05:16The like two years of pain and heartache and like cancelling date nights so that they can afford this one wedding day.

05:23Yeah.

05:23Feels like highly illogical to me.

05:25I've got one particular friend who...

05:27He's having to cancel so much of their everyday joy to save up for this one big event, which is stressing them both out.

05:33And I don't think they're going to have...

05:35Well, I don't think he's going to have a great time at the wedding anyway, because he seems so stressed by it all.

05:38I just...

05:39I sometimes hear that people can't get out of their marriage without having to file a divorce thing with the...

05:47Through lawyers and going to court and battling it out in court.

05:51I just think you should be free to leave if you want to leave.

05:55I don't know.

05:55I just think this is a terrible analogy and completely unrelated, but.

06:00Like in football, many of the problems we see with my favourite club, Manchester United at the moment, is we've got people on five-year contracts who we just can't get rid of.

06:11And they want to go, we want them to go, but because we signed these long contracts with them, it's incredibly difficult.

06:16And now these players are being thrown in the back room and they're not playing football and we're just completely ignoring them because we can't get out the contract.

06:23Yes.

06:24So I don't know, I just think...

06:25Yeah, I hear you.

06:26I hear you.

06:26All right.

06:26Can we talk about this?

06:27Yes.

06:28All right.

06:29There are many secular marriages, so you don't have to do anything religious related.

06:37And it sounds like a big difficulty that you have, could be the number one, is the wedding.

06:45Because, but the wedding to me, the premise of it is a public declaration of your love.

06:52And to your point, it could be as small as you want.

06:54It could be as big as you want.

06:56You could have as many as you want, right?

06:58That public declaration could happen 50 times over 50 years.

07:01It is up to you.

07:02So that is you and your partner navigating that space.

07:07With regard to getting out of it, this is the single biggest change that we need in marriages.

07:15Marriages, in my opinion, should be much harder to get into.

07:19You shouldn't be able, like literally, you and your partner could go to Vegas, drive up.

07:25So a drive through, you could have an Elvis Presley impersonator marry you.

07:30You pay $25 and you're married.

07:34It's ridiculous.

07:36I think that there needs to be hurdles in place.

07:41There needs to be some type of vetting, some type of premarital coaching, counseling.

07:47So everyone is aware of the commitment that is about to be made.

07:52And you have the tools, you have skills around conflict management, et cetera.

07:56It needs to be hard.

07:59But then, if you want out, you should be able to get out in an hour.

08:03It should be easy.

08:05Drive up, Elvis Presley says, it's over, $25.

08:09Free.

08:09Yeah.

08:10Yeah, free, right?

08:11That's the way it should be, but it is the reverse.

08:16Now, you're right.

08:18Marriage is hard to get out of.

08:19That's changing.

08:20There's now the introduction, especially in the UK, of the no fault, right?

08:24But that still takes, it still could take six months or so.

08:27There still is a lot of haggle.

08:28So I agree with you there is that it should be much easier to get out.

08:34But ultimately...

08:35What marriage is, is marriage is a declaration of commitment done in a formal way.

08:43Can you not do that without the marriage?

08:46Like, can you not do a declaration of commitment without having to go to like a church or whatever else and sign documents and stuff?

08:53I don't know.

08:54Is it not possible?

08:55It is.

08:56It is.

08:57It is.

08:58So.

08:58I think I just have commitment issues.

09:00That's probably what it is.

09:01Yeah.

09:01I think that's at the core of it.

09:02Because you know what's so interesting to me is that you're already going to, well, how do I get out of this?

09:07Yeah.

09:08Right?

09:09And it almost feels as if there is a fear of committing to someone for the rest of your life.

09:18Yeah.

09:18Because that's a massive– I mean, think about this.

09:22You're going to commit to someone for the rest of your life, for the rest of your days.

09:26And what we feel, because I've been there, because when I...

09:29When I get anxiety, as you say, I'm like, fucking hell, the rest of my life.

09:32The rest of your life.

09:35But think about this.

09:36The anxiety is the fear of what has not even come yet.

09:42So that means that you can now interrogate your thoughts.

09:47Okay, you have fear over what?

09:51What's the fear?

09:53But isn't it just a terrible idea to commit to someone till death do you part?

09:58Because, like, imagine if I said to you, you've got to pick a job and then you've got to do it forever.

10:03Yes.

10:04The amount of procrastination that would occur because of the significance of that decision.

10:09Would basically stop you picking any job at all because you'd be like, I've got to pick one and do it forever.

10:14You'd become a perfectionist.

10:16You'd be looking for perfection in every single job.

10:19And maybe this is in part the issue is that because we see marriage as being such a final thing, that we really have to make sure the pick is...

10:29Perfect.

10:29It's perfect.

10:30I agree.

10:30This is one of the myths, right?

10:32This whole notion of till death do us part, which really was handed to us in religion.

10:38If you look through Christianity, Hinduism, even a lot of the modern day Islamic marriage ceremonies, there's some formation of you will be with this partner for the rest of your life.

10:50And I think what that does is it actually sets us up for a lower level of satisfaction.

10:56It sets us up for complacency.

10:57Oh, this is all we get.

11:00Instead.

11:00They can't leave me.

11:01They can't leave me, so therefore I don't have to try as hard.

11:04I don't even have to talk to them now.

11:05Yeah.

11:06I don't have to go to the gym.

11:07No.

11:07I can just sit here.

11:09So that is a myth, though, because we know where divorce rates are, separation rates are.

11:15We know that there are– you can get a divorce.

11:19So you can get out.

11:20She can get out.

11:21We have to put that to the side.

11:23But the key is–

11:25to think about when I was like interrogate the fears is, well, what's the upside?

11:30What's the upside of having a partner for life?

11:34What would you say?

11:35Upsides.

11:37I mean, I could also name the upsides, I think.

11:39So there's a certain sense of stability and focus that comes when you know that.

11:45Home is kind of locked down.

11:47So as an entrepreneur in particular, I'd advise anybody that's going to pursue a big, grueling, tumultuous, uncertain challenge like building a business to have a partner at home.

11:56And I know Sir Alex Ferguson was big on this when he was selecting players for Manchester United.

12:00He would often inquire about whether they were in a relationship because if they had a stable home life, then they would be much more focused on the training ground.

12:07And I see that with myself.

12:08You need a stable base.

12:10If you're single, I think as an entrepreneur, it can become an immense distraction.

12:14An immense distraction because on one hand you're trying to build something over here and you're trying to build something over here.

12:19I think marriage is useful as well because when you know that it's hard to get out of, it means that

12:27exiting isn't the path of least resistance, which means that you probably will go to therapy first and you probably will see if you can fix it and figure it out versus just throwing it away.

12:37Yes.

12:37So it becomes less disposable.

§02Transcript — part 2

12:39Yes.

12:39Which means that you're more likely to fight to fix the thing.

12:43And...

12:46What are the other upsides?

12:49I mean, the stats, right?

12:50So the stats around health and wealth all suggest that if you're in a good, productive, healthy relationship, you're going to earn more money.

12:57I think it's 4% more a year in a productive marriage.

13:02Both partners net earn 4% more a year.

13:05And according to Robert Waldinger, who came on the show, you're going to live longer.

13:09So I get it.

13:10And you'll be healthier.

13:11You're going to be healthier, yeah, yeah.

13:13You'll have less disease.

13:14Good one, Stephen.

13:15I know.

13:16Do you know what it is?

13:17I'm not trying to throw the marriage out.

13:19I'm wondering if there's an alternative.

13:21Do you know what it is?

13:22Part of me as well, if you look at the way I've lived my life, I've always...

13:25Tried to test the system.

13:26So school, like not going to school, dropping out of university,

13:30Being an entrepreneur, there's always been a bit of a fuck you in me to the system.

13:34And a real pause in questioning what I'm being handed as the right answer to interrogate whether it's still valid now.

13:40Okay.

13:41So like many of the answers I was given, you go to university, then you go get a job, and then you hand out your CV, all of these things.

13:47Proved in my life to just be BS.

13:48There was a better way.

13:49So when I'm approached with a conventional system like marriage, immediately I go, hmm, let's interrogate this thing.

13:56And I would say, I'm with you.

13:59Throw the system out.

14:01Think about just one thing, and you said this, and there's research behind this.

14:04It's the investment model, right, theory.

14:07So the more you invest in the preparation of your partnership, in the actual partnership, the more that you're investing time, all resources, the higher satisfaction you have.

14:22That's fact, right?

14:23That's research.

14:25That's in essence what you're saying.

14:27Right?

14:27So that's the way that I would approach it is how can I invest as much as I can in this partnership with this person that I love?

14:37What is it that predicts a successful marriage, in your view?

14:42Well, once again, what is success?

14:44Is it, to me...

14:46Success is high satisfaction.

14:48High satisfaction has a strong correlation around well-being.

14:54Dr.

14:55Carol Riff, I think, is the OG of well-being.

14:58She doesn't get enough credit.

15:00created a model called the six dimensions of psychological well-being.

15:04And in essence, if we are working to increase each one of these dimensions, so for example, one is having a vision of your life.

15:14Like what is that vision that you have for life?

15:16And the question though is, do you feel like you are actively in pursuit of that vision?

15:21If you don't feel like you know what your vision is or you're not in pursuit of it, you're going to have lower well-being, right?

15:27So the higher well-being that you have individually.

15:32The higher satisfaction you have in your relationship,

15:36the more successful your relationship is.

15:38Are there like fundamental qualities that I should be looking for in a good partner?

15:44Oh, yeah.

15:45I mean, there's a million.

15:46But the core, the core that I like to write about is, and I'll actually, I'll even synthesize it.

15:54You want to have a partner.

15:56Who is aware of their well-being and who is focused on their well-being.

16:01This is incredibly important because one of the most profound bits of research that I feel like I include in the book is that most of us believe that having alignment

16:16in the values of our partner is the most successful or is the number one determinant of having a successful partnership.

16:26We think it's about values.

16:27We're told it's about values.

16:28We're fed values.

16:30By the way, goes back to, you know where that goes back to?

16:34Religion.

16:35You know how?

16:37Have you heard of you need to be equally yoked?

16:39No.

16:40Oh, you haven't heard this?

16:41No, no, no.

16:41You're not reading your Bibles, Neil.

16:42No, I'm not.

16:43Don't expose me.

16:45All right.

16:48The Bible talks about you have to have a partner.

16:52You have to find a partner who's equally yoked.

16:55What does that really mean?

16:56Equally yoked comes from oxen, right?

17:00So two, you have one ox here, one ox here.

17:02They're tethered together.

17:03They're plowing the land.

17:05If they're walking lockstep, they can plow the land.

17:08If you have one going off this way, one going off this way, you can't plow the land.

17:10You can't produce.

17:12So the Bible says you need to have a partner who is equally yoked.

17:16Pastors then interpreted that over the years to be what?

17:20values.

17:21You need to have a partner who shares your values, has the same religion, has the same accent.

17:26This is how we became regimented in class.

17:29This happened century after century after century, right?

17:34We get to today, you ask anyone on the street,

17:37We grabbed 10 people, 9 out of 10 would say, and we said, how important are values?

17:42Nine out of ten would say values is everything.

17:45What?

17:47Values change.

17:48They change.

17:49I value things much differently today than I did 10 years ago.

17:52Our values change.

17:54They're not constant.

17:54We need to throw away values.

17:56Are they important?

17:57Yes.

17:58Are they the most important?

18:00No.

18:01So therefore, let's de-emphasize the focusing on finding someone who matches all of our values.

18:07Instead, well-being, key.

18:10Are they focused on their well-being?

18:11That's one.

18:12Two, yeah, values is important.

18:14But you know what's equally, if not more?

18:17is, you know what, how open-minded are they?

18:21How much do they lean in?

18:22How curious are they?

18:24And then the third is how resilient are they?

18:27Because having a relationship with anyone means tough times.

18:32So are they able to bounce back?

18:34Or when things get tough, do they just lay on their back?

18:37So if you have a partner who's resilient, you have a partner who's open-minded, you have a partner who's focused and nurturing their well-being, you have a great partner.

18:46What about ambition?

18:47Does that matter?

18:48I think ambition is a value set.

18:52Okay.

18:54Okay.

18:56Yeah, I just wonder, because a lot of people would say that they want that in a partner, but just by, I mean, like running the mental numbers, not everybody can be ambitious.

19:05And people that aren't necessarily hugely ambitious also find love and keep love.

19:09But when you ask someone what they're looking for, they'll tend to have a preference towards someone who's ambitious or goal-orientated.

19:15One of the things we talked about kind of in between the lines was how society has changed.

19:20And one of the ongoing conversations in dating at the moment is around how women are struggling to find compatible men.

19:27Because women are more educated.

19:29I think there's more...

19:30all women graduating with college degrees now.

19:32The top 10% of men seem to be having all of the sex, according to some studies that I read, a lot of the sex.

19:37And then there's this bottom 50% of men that are somewhat disenfranchised because they're not getting the attention.

19:44They're probably turning to things like pornography.

19:46Women are dating up and to the right, I'm told.

19:49Women, I did read a study that said the majority of women are still looking for a man who's earning more than them.

19:55But in a world of equality, which we all agree is a good thing, where women are more educated now, there isn't enough men up and to the right anymore.

20:03So there's this sort of disparity between, you know, what women are looking for, but actually what's available in the market, potentially.

20:13These are all facts.

20:15However, we have to interrogate this data, but more so I think we have to interrogate the narrative that's being handed to us.

20:27So I feel like the narrative that's being handed to us today is that, you know what, the top 20% of men or 10% of men, they're good, but the bottom 80%, you suck.

20:41That couldn't be further from the truth.

20:44And I think we have to acknowledge, and this is where, you know, two things could be true.

20:49One, we live in a patriarchal society, absolutely.

20:53Absolutely.

20:56But do we need to extend more grace to our men?

21:01Absolutely, we do.

21:03Are men lonelier than they ever have been?

21:06Absolutely.

21:07Are men confused?

21:09Absolutely, right?

21:11Are men being misled?

21:13Absolutely.

21:15Let's extend more grace to our men.

21:19What does that mean?

21:19That means being aware that we do live in a loneliness epidemic, being aware that less than 27% of men have a friend that they can feel

21:29is a confidant, that 0% of them now feel like they have someone who they can go to at 3 a.m.

21:35In the morning.

21:36It's being aware of these things.

21:38It is saying, you know what?

21:41I can appreciate other traits and characteristics outside of how much you earn or how tall you are, right?

21:51These are– it's important to be able to understand.

21:53And you just asked me.

21:54You said, what are the most– I said nothing about–

21:57how much money someone makes, nothing about how tall they are, right?

22:01But at the same time, what we have to understand is the narrative that is handed to about women is that all women are looking for the six foot plus CEO, right?

22:13Who's making over a hundred thousand pounds or dollars a year.

22:17And that is also not the case.

22:19This study here says, despite advancements in gender equality, research indicates that

22:24Better educated women still tend to prefer husbands who earn more than they do.

22:29That's from the Institute for Family Studies.

22:30An analysis of online dating behaviors across 24 countries found that women are more selective than men, showing a marked preference for men.

22:38With higher incomes and education levels, which again proves this up and to the right thing.

22:43But there's just not enough men up and to the right, so there's going to be a lot of women that are somewhat dissatisfied according to this.

22:48All right, so the challenge, if I'm really interrogating this, is one is it's talking about highly educated women.

22:54So we know that highly educated women...

22:59Are on average dating hypergamously, right?

23:02Which is what you're talking about, up.

23:04So someone who's dating someone who has the same or higher level of education, the same or higher level of financial resources.

23:12And why is that?

23:13Because that's the script that society handed to women to say, the only way you can survive is by finding a man who can deliver this to you.

23:23Right?

23:24And I think we have to accept where it came from.

23:27It was this terrible society of, you know what, you're not going to be safe unless you find a man who could provide.

23:35But you fast forward to today.

23:38A large percentage of highly educated women are dating this way.

23:42But that's not all women.

23:44The other part is, yes, are women beginning to out-earn men and out-educate men?

23:50Absolutely.

23:51In certain cities.

23:53Not.

23:55Everywhere of the world, men on average still earn more income.

24:00So if you look at the narrative that's handed to us, you could say, well, you know what?

24:06Men on average still earn more.

24:09But my point is this.

24:10My point is that I think we all need to reevaluate.

24:13What it is that we want.

§03Transcript — part 3

24:15No longer do we need to have a partner for most of us, or should I say, this is me speaking out of privilege, for many of us in the West.

24:25No longer do we need to have a partner for pragmatic reasons.

24:31If you think about Maslow's hierarchy of needs,

24:34And you just divided it into three categories.

24:37You would say the bottom kind of rung is all of our psychological and physical needs, food, shelter, right?

24:47Then that kind of middle rung is belonging and connection.

24:51And the top rung is self-evolved.

24:54Self, you know, we want to be, you know, well, self-evolved, living our best self, contributing the most that we ever could to this world.

25:03Marriage and partnership and selecting a partner was largely based on that lower rung all the way through to the 1960s.

25:11That's like yesterday, if you think about how long we've lived.

25:13But isn't that evolution as well?

25:15Because you see the same thing in the animal kingdom with like the orangutan, which has like 98% the same DNA as us.

25:20They still select for survival.

25:23factors.

25:25So I think what's interesting when you look at different mammals and the evolutionary biology

25:34is that there's lots of similarities, but then there's also lots of traits that are different.

25:41So it's one of those where we have to appreciate this as Homo sapiens.

25:46We are unique, and we live in a structure that we have largely created ourselves.

25:53We're debating about the institution of marriage.

25:55I mean, marriage didn't exist for the vast majority of our existence.

26:00But this golden rule thing, you told me about this.

26:02Yeah.

26:02And you told me that it's cross-cultural.

26:04Yes.

26:05So...

26:06It is.

26:07And this golden rule thing, please explain it for people.

26:10But for me, that is evidence that there's still an evolutionary component to selection for men and women.

26:15And I was reading this study that said women, almost 50% of women prefer to date only men that are taller than themselves, while only 13% of men prefer to date only women that are shorter than themselves.

26:27And another study revealed that women are most satisfied when their partner is approximately eight inches taller, whereas men are most satisfied with a height difference of about eight centimeters taller than their partner.

26:38So women clearly have a preference here, a significant amount of them, to dating a man that is bigger than they are.

26:44Yes.

26:45All right.

26:46Yes.

26:46This is so good.

26:47All right.

26:47A couple of things here.

26:49Do we have these preferences?

26:51Absolutely.

26:52So a lot of this handed us.

26:54Through evolutionary and our biology?

26:57Absolutely.

26:59Is most of it handed to us through socialization?

27:04Definitely.

27:06Do we change as we increase our well-being?

27:11Yes.

27:11So here's my point.

27:12If you were to go back and say, Zendaya, look, you go back.

27:1710 years, say Zendaya, look, would you prefer to date a man that is taller than you?

27:23I would say there's a good chance she would say, I would prefer it, yes.

27:30Has that been her result?

27:32No.

27:34Does she appear to be incredibly happy and satisfied?

27:38Yes.

27:39Right?

27:39With Tom Holland?

27:40That's from my outside looking in?

27:43Yes.

27:44Why could that have been the case?

27:46Because she grew up being handed a script.

27:48She grew up the Disneyfication of relationships.

27:52She saw the prince and how large the prince always was in comparison to the princess.

27:56She saw that the prince was able to pick up the princess.

27:59Like, she saw all of these things.

28:00She believed all of these things.

28:02And then as she became more mature, as she realized that she doesn't need anyone's validation, as she understood the things and the traits that she loved, she was like, this Tom Holland guy is hot.

28:16Yeah, but that is an exception, not the rule.

28:19Because also Tom Holland's got 30 million in the bank.

28:24But this does happen.

28:25You hear short kids.

28:26It happens, but it's the exception, isn't it?

28:27It's not the rule.

28:28It is.

28:28And you know why?

28:29Also, that's the exception.

28:30And I agree.

28:31I'm with you.

28:31It's the exception.

28:32Because most of us have poor well-being.

28:37Most of us have low self-esteem.

28:40Most of us do.

28:41I would argue most adults have low self-esteem, mid to low self-esteem.

28:45And what does that mean?

28:46It means that...

28:47We need the validation of others, right?

28:52And this is the reason why I always say it goes back to us.

28:56Do you really think this is the answer to this?

28:58Do you not believe that there's a big evolutionary component to attraction selection preferences?

29:04Like, because...

29:07I'm struggling to believe that society is the only reason why we pick certain people.

29:14And I do, part of me wonders and slightly worries that we've almost accidentally, inadvertently designed society in such a way where...

29:25What we're looking for no longer exists necessarily.

29:28So we have to confront this new reality that, in fact, we're going to have to adjust some of our preferences if we are going to be happy and find what we're looking for.

29:36Yes.

29:37I do believe that a large percentage of the decisions that we make have been handed to us genetically.

29:44So I'm with that.

29:47And I think the research suggests that.

29:50So if you have, for example,

29:54You know, I was talking to Dr.

29:56Tara Swart and talking about, you know, a woman in the club, if she's ovulating or not ovulating, just based on that, men are going to be attracted or not attracted.

30:05Or you think about scent, right?

30:07Really what we're trying to do with scent, the reason why we're turned off with scent is that it's genetic.

30:13It's that if we end up mating with someone who has too close of a genetic mirror to ours, the child won't be as strong.

30:23So we need diversification in our genetics.

30:27And we don't realize this, but we can determine that through our scent by being turned off.

30:33It's a whole sniff test.

30:36Do genetics play a role?

30:37Absolutely.

30:39Golden mean.

30:39We talked about golden mean, where in essence, this is women on average loving to see wide shoulders and a thinner waist.

30:48And men on average loving to see smaller hips, smaller waist, wider hips.

30:55Now,

30:56Can people debate these concepts?

30:58Absolutely.

31:00Do they stand up?

31:02I mean, are there evolutionary reasons for these?

31:07Yes, because it speaks to being fertile for women or it speaks to being strong to protect, right, for a man.

31:16All of this does play a role.

31:18And sometimes we don't realize how much of a role evolution plays.

31:24has played in why and how we make decisions, which is why it's also important, though, to understand how the society that we have created as human beings also plays a role.

31:38How we were handed, you need to have a partner who's the same class as you.

31:44You need to, when you find your partner, that's the person that completes you.

31:49When you find a partner, that's till death do you part.

31:52Those pieces were handed to us.

31:54So there's no wonder why we're confused.

31:56We have all this evolutionary decision-making happening that we're not even aware of.

32:03And then on this side, we have society telling us this is the person that we should have and this is the reason why.

32:09And I go back to why awareness is key.

32:13And understanding how and why we are gives us a power.

32:20It gives us autonomy over our decisions so that when you are making that decision on your partner, you can ask yourself, you know,

32:31Yeah, I would love to have a partner who's over six feet, but how important is that really to me?

32:37Why do I think I feel this way?

32:41And once you begin to have those debates with yourself, that puts you on the path to making a decision that you're going to be more satisfied with in the long haul.

32:51I think that's the key.

32:52And I think...

32:54awareness comes from confronting both realities, which is on one hand, there are some evolutionary things that are going to make me have a bias towards a certain type of person that has certain attributes, even if those attributes are actually

33:05not going to lead to a long-term healthy relationship, like fuckboys.

33:09Like charisma and bravado and confidence is like somewhat attractive, but it might not be a great husband.

33:16And then on the other hand, there is tons of things society has handed me through magazines and media that have portrayed an image of what beauty looks like that are also just bullshit.

33:24I think understanding both is the key to that sort of autonomy.

33:29Being able to say, actually, I understand where that's coming from in me, but I will make a rational prefrontal cortex decision to select something else.

33:37Some evidence of this, the evolutionary basis of attraction, comes in this idea that people who have symmetrical faces are more beautiful and more attractive across cultures.

33:46Is that true?

33:47Yes.

33:48So there are many scientists that will say, absolutely.

33:51But here's one thing I know.

33:53Definitively about attraction is attraction to someone else is largely based on your self-esteem.

34:04And this is what I mean, is that the lower your self-esteem, the more dependent you are on the validation of the public.

34:13So therefore, you will want to have a partner who is considered to be

34:19attractive.

34:24Is it?

34:25Or if the script is wearing this type of trainer, is it?

34:32If that's what society is saying, then if you have low self-esteem, you want a partner to look like that because you need the validation of the partner.

34:40However.

34:41Whenever you see, this is what I say, whenever you see someone who's walking around with a partner and you think, how did those two get together, right?

34:52Chances are there's an element, and remember, I'm not talking about one is super high income or one has super high status.

34:59I'm just talking about you look at a couple and you say, they look odd, right?

35:05One of them could be traditionally attractive.

35:07One of them might not.

35:09Normally what's happened is that you have someone with high self-esteem who has no need for the public's validation of their partner at all.

35:21What you just listened to was a most replayed moment from a previous episode.

35:25If you want to listen to that full episode, I've linked it down below.

35:29Check the description.

35:30Thank you.

— A LITTLE MORE TO THINK ABOUT. —