#23 How To Manifest Your DREAM Partner! + Should You Know Your Partner's 'BODY COUNT'?

Mark and Teal explore the experience Mark had becoming a single mum online, the complexities of the 'body count' question, and the art of manifesting one's ideal partner through vision. We share personal experiences, insights from dating apps, and the importance of having a clear vision in relationships and HOW to make that vision your reality!

Takeaways

Becoming a single mom can lead to unexpected positive experiences in dating.
The dating landscape is evolving, and single moms are finding love.
The performance of dating apps can vary, but genuine connections are possible.
There are good quality men available for women in all situations.
The body count conversation can be sensitive and varies between individuals.
Health status is more important than the number of past partners.
Having a vision for what you want in a partner is crucial for success.
Engaging in open conversations can lead to deeper connections.
Manifesting a partner requires clarity and intention. Visioning is crucial for attracting the right partner.
Clarity in desires leads to better relationship outcomes.
Emotional connection is more important than superficial traits.
Identifying past relationship patterns helps in creating a better vision.
The heart can guide us more effectively than the mind.
Every relationship teaches us something valuable.
It's essential to differentiate between chemistry and compatibility.
Asking the right questions reveals deeper insights.
Building a vision involves understanding how traits make us feel.
Integrating different coaching approaches can enhance personal growth.

Chapters
0:00 Introduction
1:19 Mark Became Single A Mum (online)!
7:11 Should You Know A Man's 'BODY COUNT'
14:14 How To Manifest Your Dream Partner!
19:08 Differentiating Healthy Visions from Trauma Traps
22:57 Building a Vision: Practical Steps for Clarity
30:27 How To Filter For Relationship/Conflict Skills In A Partner
34:37 Want 1-1 Help? Book A Call!

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction
• 1:19 Mark Became Single A Mum (online)!
• 7:11 Should You Ask Or Know A Man's 'BODY COUNT'
• 14:14 How To Manifest Your Dream Partner
• 19:08 Differentiating Healthy Visions from Trauma Traps
• 22:57 Building a Vision: Practical Steps for Clarity
• 30:27 How To Filter For Relationship/Conflict Skills In A Partner
• 34:37 Want 1-1 Help? Book A Call!

Transcript

[Speaker 1]
The results of becoming a single mom online. Should you ask or even know your partner's body count and how to manifest your dream partner? We'll see you right after this.

G'day and welcome to The Tinder Project, the podcast where a straight Aussie man attempts to survive 365 days dating online as an American woman. I'm your host, Mark Rosenfeld, Australia's Dating Coach for Women. I'm here with my sidekick, self-love coach, Teal Elizabeth.

And together, we have one mission to make meeting good men fun and easy for you. Let's give it a bell.

[Speaker 2]
Hi, Mark.

[Speaker 1]
How are you this morning? It's so strange seeing you on a Friday.

[Speaker 2]
Our listeners will never know. I really, I really have been starting to enjoy our weekly chats. It's like our little friend get togethers every week.

[Speaker 1]
It's our little catch up every week, Teal. We had a bit of a scare before you came online. There was a slight doggie incident with some chocolate, but all is good.

We're OK.

[Speaker 2]
I feel so bad. I'm just like throwing all my life life challenges at you. I'm like, I'm sick.

My baby this. My baby threw up on me. Now my dog ate chocolate and got rushed to the hospital.

You're just such a sweetheart. You're just always accommodating and showing what chivalry really gets to be like.

[Speaker 1]
Everything is OK, guys. Teal is good. Her dog is good.

The baby is fine. So no need to worry. Teal, it's great to have you back.

We've got some interesting topics today. I've become a single mom over the last month or so. And the results have been quite interesting.

Would you like to know what they are?

[Speaker 2]
I would. I think.

[Speaker 1]
What is it like becoming a single mom? I've run one profile. You won't see this really in regular life because most people are typically going to take a break in dating between not being a mom, being a mom.

But I did not do that. I went straight in. Now, I did make one other change, which is I paused the profile on Hinge and moved it over to Bumble.

Typically, Hinge has outperformed Bumble for most of this challenge. So I was a little hesitant that I thought, well, are we going to be able to tell if Bumble performs worse? This is a Bumble problem.

Is it a single mom problem? But I'm going to go ahead and share the screen with the final results for the month. So I just need to make sure I open the right window here, Teal.

Click the right button. And here it is. Can you see my screen, Teal?

[Speaker 2]
Mm hmm.

[Speaker 1]
OK, so if you're listening, I've got the August, September and October results on here. Keep in mind, August was a fairly standard month. Just like July, September, we stopped opening conversations.

In October, we stopped using emojis moving into November. And then November, December has been single mom. So the results are at the end of the at the end of the screen and the second from the right column for those listening.

August was 13 dates. September was 12. October was 12.

And that's my little drum roll. 11 phone dates in November, December as a mom. Wow.

[Speaker 2]
So I'm going to say truly there is not that much difference if you are just single and on the market with no attachments to anything or any of these other things. None of this is making that big of a difference.

[Speaker 1]
It's it's not making a huge difference. I was quite surprised. It was a bit of a slow start to the month, but it often is.

Every new app, the start is slow. I was really impressed overall, actually. And the conversations felt a bit more intentional.

We had some really good guys and it was interesting, too, because keep in mind as well, if I share the screen for a moment here, keep in mind, we are positioning this as the mom of a one year old. A one year old. So this is not my child is five, my child is 10.

This is a one year old. So this is if there was ever going to be a time where you might suffer a bit of judgment or you might perceive that you're going to suffer some judgment, this would be it. It's like my child is my child is one and I'm a single mom.

But I haven't seen that much of it now. I'm sure there's a little bit less swiping and possibly some some fewer matches that we received, but we still received over two and a half thousand. So not really having any lack of issues with numbers there.

But the guys, I've just been so impressed. And instead of talking about hobbies and interests, often when the guys ask, how are you going? What's happening on your weekend, your day or something?

The honest answer for a lot of single moms as well. I basically hung out with my kid today, you know, especially mom of a young child. And I wasn't shy about saying that.

He says, how's your weekend? I say, actually, it felt amazing. I got to spend time with my daughter, took her to the park, and then we went to see grandma, had lots of fun.

So a lot of it was not like, oh, I'm doing anything big, big, amazing stuff. It was just sharing the feelings. It was just answering the questions well with a good energy.

And the guys were just solid. They a couple of them asked very polite questions like, oh, it's lovely that you have that great connection with your daughter. It's so nice to see.

You know, maybe even like, what's her favorite hobby or something? They would ask an occasional question, not intrusively, but just kind of politely. And it was just really good to you.

Yeah, there's almost no no difference in the overall performance. So a fraction less. And we did have to go through a few more profiles.

Just looking at the numbers again, we viewed a few more profiles. So the previous month we viewed between 60 and 100. This month we viewed 130.

So there was a bit more of a churn rate. A few more guys, I suppose the conversations didn't have the legs. Um, one number that did change was in the previous months.

We've been getting about 30 conversations to get to that 12 phone calls this month. It took 50. But to be honest, I think a lot of that is just Bumble because guys on Bumble, they, uh, they want you to message first, of course, being Bumble.

And if the guy doesn't log on within 24 hours, that conversation disappears. So of those 50 conversations, I probably lost 20 just in the fact that the guy wasn't online within 24 hours to respond to me or didn't reply within 24 hours. So while there was a bit more swiping, I kind of just put that down to being on Bumble instead of Hinge and overall, mom's the word.

It's really good.

[Speaker 2]
This gives me so much hope for all our ladies out there in the dating world, just showing that there are really genuine good guys out there. And I think that's been a consistent theme of our conversations since the beginning. It doesn't matter what kind of woman you are, older, younger, with a child, without a child, there are really good quality men out there and you just got to know where to find them and how to talk to them.

[Speaker 1]
I'll bring a few of the conversations next week because there was something a little more, I don't know if the word substantial, not that they weren't before, but some of these where the guy was like, I've asked her a single question about the daughter or maybe was just, you know, aware of the babysitter situation. He goes, Oh, like, can we talk? Like, do you have a daughter?

Have you got some free time? There was just some guys who were extra considerate. And I thought that was really cool.

It really gave me a lot of hope, Teal. And yeah, there's some great people out there.

[Speaker 2]
Yay. I'm so glad to hear this.

[Speaker 1]
Way to go. I'm very much positive. I will say that we're trying a different strategy this month.

So I'm going to reveal what that is to you soon. Still a single mum, still on Bumble, but a different style and it's not working anywhere near as well. So I'll explain what that style is and how I changed up the tactic, uh, in a couple of episodes time.

[Speaker 2]
Ooh, excited. Cliffhanger.

[Speaker 1]
So that one is a bit different. Um, let's get onto our next topic, Teal, which is an interesting question. Uh, which I didn't know it was a question.

So until I saw it trending online as a question, should you ask or know your partner's body count? And by body count, we of course mean the number of people your partner has slept with or been with sexually. What do you think, Teal?

[Speaker 2]
That is a, that was a charged question.

[Speaker 1]
That was quite a hiccup. I enjoyed that, Teal. Thanks.

Your hiccups are cute. I love you, Teal.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you.

[Speaker 1]
They're very like feminine little hiccups you've got going there.

[Speaker 2]
So good job. You know, this one is such a tricky one because like, if I ask myself being single and not in a partnership, would I want to know my partner's body count? Yes.

I would like to know that just, it's just, it's just nice to understand what we're working with, you know, potential diseases that they could be carrying all that kind of stuff. It's just nice to know the background that you're, you're working with kind of like test driving a car before you buy it. However, when I got into my relationship, my partner did not want to know, and I'm curious too, if it's a difference between men and women, if maybe women don't care as much about knowing about men's, but if men very much have this ideal of not wanting to think of their woman as being tarnished, so to speak, and would rather just pretend that they are this, you know, beautiful, pure angel that only they get to touch. So I, I, I'm going to err on the side of not sharing it, but not from a place of, um, trying to hide anything about yourself, but more from a place of keeping this illusion that we don't need to know about the past.

It's more about moving forward and what we're creating in the future.

[Speaker 1]
Interesting. I had no idea what you'd answer to this. That's yeah.

I was really very curious about it. Okay. Um, I'm a hard no on this.

I'm an absolute devout. No, I have zero interest in that. I think it would be a ridiculous question if Sam ever asked me.

I wouldn't even know the answer, even if she did. And I wouldn't want to know hers for a number of reasons. Like, I don't see any benefit with it.

I don't see what it gains. Uh, what are you going to make a judgment of me on my relationship skills based on that? And if I want to know health status, just get a test.

Like it doesn't matter if it's one or a thousand, the health status will show up on the test. Um, and yeah, I think overall, like, I don't know, it's just this weird thing that you make a meaning from. If it's super low, you get judged for an experience.

If it's super high, you're judged for a different reason. And I just, I think it's the dumbest, stupidest, um, overrated thing. I would never want to be asked and I would never ask.

And that's my final say too.

[Speaker 2]
Wow. Okay. So you're very similar to my partner then and how you feel about this?

[Speaker 1]
Cause he feels very similar. I have zero interest in that conversation either direction.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah, he feels very similar in that. And I don't know, for me, it just doesn't bother me that much. Like I'm, I'm genuinely curious just for the sake of being curious, but I do agree with you.

There's no real win that comes from it.

[Speaker 1]
I have a, I have a follow up question on this, which.

[Speaker 2]
Don't you ask me what my number is.

[Speaker 1]
I'm not going to ask you that, but maybe this, you don't have to answer this to you. We can, we'll cut it out if I make you uncomfortable. Uh, but I'm curious, do you remember all of your one night stands?

Assuming, I know you had at least one cause you've shared one on the podcast and you're blushing, so you don't need to, she's, she's blushing a lot. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding.

Okay. You're so blushing too. Wow.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah, I know. I'm like, well, it's been a long time.

[Speaker 1]
Do you remember all of them? And I'm happy to answer this question as well. Do you remember?

[Speaker 2]
It's kind of fishing though, because let's just say, and this isn't the case that I've slept with like hundreds of men, then obviously I'd have to say no, because there's no way you're going to remember a hundred different people. But if you've only had one, one night stand, then of course you're going to be like, yes, I remember that.

[Speaker 1]
I mean, that's true. That's a fair point. So if you feel that the answer gives away too much, then don't answer.

[Speaker 2]
I would say probably most of them. Yes.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. I like, I wouldn't know mine. And I'd like, that's just being honest.

It's not that high, but I, that was what really made me realize like, ah, it's kind of meaningless because I don't remember like some of them and that's where you go, huh? It was, it seemed like great at the time, but I literally don't remember. And I think that's how, you know, that, eh, what's kind of the point of that?

[Speaker 2]
Well, I have a little black book where I kept track of all the names. So I could go back and I could jog my memory and I could remember each one of them, but do you still possess such a book?

[Speaker 1]
I do. Do you?

[Speaker 2]
Oh, you probably burned it before.

[Speaker 1]
Teal has a book. Spencer, are you listening? Find the book.

[Speaker 2]
God, this podcast gets the weirdest stuff out of me.

[Speaker 1]
Um, that's cool. Do you know what? I kind of wish I'd kept a book, Teal.

I think you, I didn't want to forget these people. I didn't. No, I really wish that I'd kept a book if I'm being completely honest.

[Speaker 2]
Yeah. I, it wasn't just for people I slept with. There was people that I had really meaningful connections with.

I've kept names of all those people.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. I could remember all of those for sure. Like anyone that was mean, even if it was a short relationship, um, for sure.

But I do wish, you know what? If you're listening and you're young, any of our young listeners, Teal has a book. It looks like she's proud that she has.

I don't have a book. I wish I did. So the net result here is get a book.

[Speaker 2]
Well, it's more like a page.

[Speaker 1]
It's a novel. There's a lot written in it.

[Speaker 2]
Uh, I think it's important though. I do think it's important. Okay.

This is totally a BTMI, but I remember being like in high school and telling my parents that I wanted to have a one night stand and I'm like, why? Looking back, I'm like, why would I tell my parents that? I have no idea.

But it just, at the time I just, I had such a fear of missing out on life experiences that I wanted to experience everything. And one of the things on my bucket list was having a one night stand because I wanted to know what that was like to just have pure, meaningless sex. And it's like, okay, yeah.

Like you said, it's like, it's interesting, but it's so much better when you have that devoted partner that you can really just get to know.

[Speaker 1]
I think it's cool that you were able to say that with your parents. My parents would have been too conservative, even as a man.

[Speaker 2]
Oh, they were, they were, they were probably freaked out by it. I made them very uncomfortable.

[Speaker 1]
I mean, I still think the fact that you could say it is, is really impressive. I think that's cool. Cause even if they were freaked out by it, you obviously had enough confidence or you were a complete and total rebel and like to the point where you just gave zero fucks, but I don't, I don't know.

I think you had, I don't know a ton about your history, but I think that, I just think that's really cool that you're right. You felt comfortable enough to say that even though it made them clearly uncomfortable.

[Speaker 2]
Thank you. I think I just had no filter and was not imagining how they're probably receiving that. I don't know if I'd want to hear that from my daughter down the road.

Yeah, mommy. My new year's resolution is to have a one night stand.

[Speaker 1]
All right, we should get on to the main topic of the day, which is how to manifest your dream partner, Teal. Now you had some crazy client successes this week. I think you had two engagements and two women who met amazing men, possible dream future long-term partners.

How you were talking to me before we came on about how important the vision was with this. Tell the listeners a little bit about setting out a vision because I do this with my clients as well. Tell us a little bit about how you do it and why it was so important for these particular women to have a vision.

[Speaker 2]
Yes, yes. I just love, love, love creating visions in general. I love the world of law of attraction and manifesting and all of that kind of stuff.

So visioning in general is a huge part of attracting in and co-creating the kind of life that we want to have. And it goes into our partnerships as well. But I think where a lot of times visions fall short is focusing on the wrong aspects.

And the way that I take my clients through their visions, yeah, I just want to reemphasize that because it was so, it just gave me chills. They literally said to me, Teal, everything that I wrote on our vision that we worked on together, I now see in this person in real life in front of me. And that's two engagements and two people meeting the love of their life and feeling like I literally manifested this person.

And to me, that's just like, I live for those kinds of moments. Like it's, it's not ever about the engagement, but it's about literally creating magic out of thin air is what it feels like. And so we have a lot more control than we even give ourselves credit for in how we put those visions out and the way that we choose to think, think about our visions.

And I think a lot of times we get, you know, when I hear, when I ask women or initially, what do you want in a man? What do you want in a partner? They either rattle off a list of, you know, superficial qualities, or they have no idea.

They have a general sense idea of what they want, but they don't, they know what they don't want based on the experiences they've had, but they don't know what they do want. And so the first place that I always take them is like, let's take all the things that didn't work and find what is the inverse of that and be able to really shift into creating what you do want. Because I would say, if you don't have a clear GPS coordinate of where you're going, you're just going to be spinning around in circles.

And that's literally what I see women doing so much. And the universe will just keep delivering the same kinds of men to them because they're staying stuck in this uncertainty of what they're actually wanting. And I've found even in my own life in the last year or two, the more specific and the more clear I am in articulating, not just what I want, but how I want to feel in that experience.

It's just like, it's able to flow to my life so much faster and with so much more ease where I don't have to be overthinking it. I can literally just experience it into existence, which is just so, it is, it's the world of magic. It's the world of energy.

So the biggest thing for me, and I'd love to know how you approach it as well. The biggest thing for me to taking my clients through it is not just the paper trades, but really experiencing how I want to feel, how I want this dream man to make me feel and really connecting into more of the heart poetry of it. And when we connect into the poetry of it, I want to feel the warmth when he holds me.

I want to feel safe when he looks in my eyes, like I can tell him anything, you know, I want to feel like I can just be light and giggly and expansive, um, and have never have to worry about, you know, saying something that's going to make him upset. Or if he does get upset that we're going to be able to feel supported and respected in working through our differences. You know, that kind of vision is a very different way of looking at a relationship.

Then the tall, dark and handsome makes me laugh, has a good job, takes me on fun trips, pays for my dinners kind of vision. And when we can articulate it from that kind of energy of, Ooh, I, my body feels safe. My heart feels light and open.

I feel valued. I feel seen. Then when we actually go out into the world, it's like we have this laser focus and we just cut out anything that doesn't feel that energy vibration.

And that's how women are able to now, it's like parting the red seas. When you go out dating, it's like, you can see all these men, you can see all their potentials, but you're not getting swept up in the flashiness of all of that because you're really looking for the deeper energy that they're conveying in how they're interacting with you. And that's when the heart knows immediately, ha, that's my person.

I've just met the love of my life because they feel it on a visceral level than in a trying to second guess it. Is he, is he not? Is he, should he, should he not?

Um, on a mental level. Yeah. Is that similar to how you approach it as well?

[Speaker 1]
I like that a lot. Similar. I bring in other aspects as well, but I really like the way you described that kind of the experiential vision.

I'm curious as well. How do you ensure that your clients differentiate from, I guess what you might kind of say is like a Hollywood vision of infatuation, you know, it's going to be perfect. I'm going to be swept off my feet by a Prince charming.

It's going to feel so magical. And you know, how do you differentiate a client who is maybe giving a vision that basically describes really high chemistry and really intense desire that we all so often feel with a new person? How do you differentiate that?

Cause that can feel very magical, but often it's a trauma trap. So how do you differentiate something like that versus, uh, I guess you'd say a good feeling vision that is not a trauma trap.

[Speaker 2]
That's a great question. Yeah. I think that goes into what I was saying before about like really pulling from what hasn't worked in past relationships and finding the inverse.

So if you found that your past partner, you know, did not prioritize you in your relationship, then you know, the inverse of that is I want someone who makes me a part of their life and prioritizes me in their life, you know, and that's one of your values or my past partner could not have emotionally mature, deep conversations. It's like, okay, then I know that's a huge value for me that I want for this relationship. And then what does that feel like to have that emotionally deep conversation?

Um, and I think that when we can take the things that haven't worked, that highlights the values that you're actually really looking for so that you're not just getting caught up in the chemistry and having those values is what gives that vision substance so that it's not just, I want to just make me feel loved and excited and happy and all, like you said.

[Speaker 1]
And do you bring in, what if past partners have positive traits that you want to attract again? Do you bring that in?

[Speaker 2]
Absolutely. Yeah. And that's what I really love to say is, you know, every person you meet is like a lily pad man.

You're just jumping from one lily pad man to the next until you meet the one that sticks around.

[Speaker 1]
And what's he called?

[Speaker 2]
King lily pad? Prince charming, right?

[Speaker 1]
Prince charming on king lily pad, but he's not a frog. So don't go that far.

[Speaker 2]
The other ones weren't even frogs. They were just the lily pad.

[Speaker 1]
Just the lily, there's no frogs at all involved in this metaphor.

[Speaker 2]
But each one of them is a really important stepping stones to leapfrog to the Prince Charming. And each one gets to give you that next step of stability or traits that you want to take with you into your Prince Charming vision.

[Speaker 1]
I like that a lot. I really like that a lot. The feelings based version.

I always have clients look at a few different areas. One of them is sort of around that. I also get them to look at how are our conflicts going, some of the relationship skill pieces.

I am a little bit more objective. We use a traffic light system where we sort of say, well, how's this person sitting in the different areas? Are they a green light?

So far, so good is green. Yellow would be unknown. You know, orange is, oh, I'm not sure about that.

And obviously a red light would be, oh, I've seen it, seen kind of a red red flag here. So having the traffic lights kind of each week for each guy helps us go, all right, we'll compare and contrast number one. So we can kind of see, well, maybe you thought this guy was good, but then you go, oh, this guy, this is good.

This guy's, you know, this guy's like a 10 in relationship skills. This guy's maybe like a seven. And it also allows you to see changes over time.

So you might see lights that go from orange to green, but you might also see lights that go from green in week one or two to actually now I've seen this guy in different circumstances. It's becoming a red in say week eight. And so you see kind of the directional trends, but it is a little bit more heady.

So I really like that you're bringing in that idea of, okay, yeah, what's, what's the felt sensation here and what's my experience of this? Because I can see that being a really good guide in the, in the, um, on the path towards, towards that North star. So, yeah, and what can ladies do if, if they're listening, other than obviously booking a call with you Tia, what else can ladies do if they want to start building out their vision and just start thinking about this stuff?

Maybe they're in that position earlier where you said, I just don't know. What can I start doing?

[Speaker 2]
So yeah, well, I think first listing out, like I said, all the things that you've experienced up until now, whether they've been good traits or bad traits and asking yourself, what things do you want to pull into that vision of the things that worked or the things that didn't work, that you want to inverse and then create into something new and then asking after every single one of those traits, how does that trait make me feel?

What would it feel like to experience that trait? If the trait is, I want to feel prioritized, what does prior feeling prioritized feel like? It feels like not needing to worry about when they're going to call to book time with you to spend time with you, right?

It's just knowing that they want to feel safe, that they're, they want to involve you in their life, that you don't have to feel like you're pushing the relationship forward because they're already initiating those moments of feeling like you're building into their life. What would that actually feel like in your nervous system, right? Or if, like I was saying, the emotional communication piece, what would it feel like to actually be able to drop in with a man who is able to have raw, deep emotional conversations where you don't have to pry it out of them, but he just offers it.

It's literally what my client was saying today. She's like, I just can't believe this. Like he's offering me the chance to be able to share how he feels and he feels comfortable with me to share it.

And he wants to share it with me. She's like, I've never experienced this before. How does that feel?

She's like, just so good. Cause I don't have to be in the driver's seat and I don't have to push things or pry him open or be in my head trying to control this. I get to just be here and be loving and be me.

I'm like, yes. And that's what she had written in her vision. I just, I don't want to have to try.

I just want to be me. So I think really asking that deeper question of how did these different traits that you want, how would experiencing that feel? And again, like I said, that's when the heart starts to really be the one that's scanning versus the brain.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah.

[Speaker 2]
And when the heart is scanning, it can really pick things up on a lot faster and more potent frequency than the brain questioning and overthinking things.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. I like that a lot because sometimes some of those paper traits, while they are important, you do want someone who has a job. Um, yeah, it can be, it can be hard to know without stopping and actually becoming aware of it.

What are you making that mean? So if someone says, oh, I want a guy over six foot. Well, what does that really mean to you?

Usually it means I'm feeling attracted. I'm feeling safe. And when you stop and question, you actually think, well, I'm sure if we got all the population of guys out there who are 5'10 or even 5'8, I'm sure there are at least some in there with whom you could feel attraction and safe.

They may not be common, but they are there. So that idea of, well, we're taking, it's kind of going a layer or two deeper and it's not just, what is the paper thing? Does he do that thing?

But it's like, do I get the feeling that I'm actually seeking from finding that paper thing?

[Speaker 2]
Yes. Yes. However, I love what you've added into about these red light, green light, you know, because I'm actually, I'm chatting with one of my girlfriends.

She's like, you have to use this on the podcast. You have to tell about this experience because this is so ridiculous. She almost has the opposite experience where she feels so emotionally seen and valued and adored by this guy, but he's just not meeting those paper trait qualities.

And he's not actually able to fully be her Prince charming in the ways that she would feel proud to bring home to dad. And I think that that does play a role as well. You know, it's, it's not all just about how he makes you feel, even though that is a really big part of it.

But there are some kids that like, yeah, he's kind of a yellow flag in this, you know, it's like, Ooh, he doesn't have a very good relationship with his mom. Okay. That's kind of a concern.

That could be a red flag. And yeah, his house is kind of a mess and he's not very clean. Like that is kind of a red flag and these things are important too.

[Speaker 1]
Yeah. And it's interesting because those traits that you're mentioning, they're not a good relationship with his mom. Messy house, that type of stuff.

We also have the same thing in reverse of what does that mean? And if we go to a stereotype, well, it doesn't have a good relationship with his mom could mean mommy issues or trauma, which are very reasonable concern to have. And what was the other one you said?

Doesn't keep his house clean. So poor internal boundaries is what you might assume that that would equate to. And, and these are interesting because these are what, these are ones I put in the relationship or conflict skill category.

And those are the ones that are hard to kind of spot early on, especially if someone is a little more forward, very into you, they're high, you know, they're doing all the things. Compatibility, which is, you know, do we live in the same place? Do we have the same religion?

Do we want the same number of kids? Do we have the same values on health and wealth and money and sex? That type of stuff you can often ask about and people will tell you the truth.

But relationship skills and conflict skills, you can't really ask about those things because someone who can't do them will either lie intentionally or more likely, they just won't be aware of how much they suck at those skills. And so they'll lie by accident. So for example, if someone has a poor relationship with anger, but they're not aware of it, you can't really ask them, do you have a good relationship with anger?

Cause they're just going to go, yeah, yeah, look good relationship with anger. Yeah, really, really. Absolutely.

You have to read between the lines. And so what Teal's referring to here, I was chatting with a client about this earlier, one of the big things you can look for is impulsiveness because impulsiveness is really a representation of a disconnect between body and head. It's like the body is grabbing the wheel of a car and wrenching it off in a direction that the head is not in alignment with.

And unfortunately, when the body and the head are out of alignment, you can't trust the person, you can only trust the impulses and the impulses are there to protect the person, they don't care about you. So you end up becoming the, on the, on the wrong end of their trauma and that's how it gets spread to you. So to bring this back Teal to where you said, well, he doesn't have a good relationship with his mom.

Now, again, we shouldn't generalize. There's plenty of people with shitty families who do a lot of work in healing. But if we take the stereotype and the generalization, if someone has a shitty relationship with the opposite gender parent, often it will absolutely, if they haven't done the work, reflect on their intimate relationships.

So you can be feeling very good and very calm and very safe, but you need to read between the lines of like, all right, this is fine now. But when I ask certain questions like, oh, how do you go? It could even be like, how's your relationship with your mom, setting boundaries with your mom?

How do you feel that, uh, how do holidays get to look like? Yeah. How do holidays look with your mom when, when you get angry with your mom?