Hey there this is clay with www.ModernLove.Life and this is the relationship inner game experience.
Now, today we're going to be talking about something that I think a lot of people instinctively
know is not something that you should be doing in a relationship which is keeping score in
a relationship, and we're going to be talking about how people can sometimes keep score
and why keeping score is not important and why it's actually detrimental to a relationship
or to dating.
Okay, so first of all, keeping score can take a whole lot of different forms, right?
It could be keeping score over who is initiating text conversations.
Are you doing most of the initiating?
Is the other person doing most of the initiating?
Does it matter for some reason?
who's calling, who's paying for the date?
Who is asking the other person out on the date if you're in a relationship, who is doing
the dishes at the end of dinner?
Who's cooking, who's doing the chores?
All of these sorts of things.
These are very common ways that people keep score in relationships.
And I want to just point out a little interesting thing, which is that nobody ever keeps score
and suddenly realizes, oh, look at that, you know, I actually never initiate contact with
the other person.
Looks like it looks like they win right now.
Nobody ever does that.
If you're gonna keep score, you always somehow do it in a way where you come out the winner.
And I think that this is interesting because it really brings us to one of the main points
which we'll get to in a little bit when it comes to the topic of keeping score.
But first of all, I want to talk a little bit more about this, this whole issue of a
dynamic and all of that.
So first of all, keeping score is not important in a relationship, although it might seem
as if this is really critical information, you know, does it mean that he cares if I'm
doing all of the initiating, does it mean that, that, that she's using me if I'm like
doing all the chores around the house or whatever it is.
Right.
And although it seems like this is really useful information that you should know that
you should keep your finger on the pulse of whatever the thing is that you're keeping
score over, it's really irrelevant because when it comes to a successful relationship,
when it comes to dating, when it comes to getting into a relationship, the most important
thing that you can focus on is the quality of the emotional connection between you and
the other person.
Anything else is really just a distraction.
Okay?
It's not, it's not gonna make anything better if you focus on anything else, okay?
It's not going to make anything better if you focus on, you know, some sort of arbitrary
thing, like whether or not they're initiating contact with you, whether or not it's taking
them five minutes to text you back or 30 minutes to text you back, or half a day to text you
back or anything like that.
These are not important things.
These are just distractions from what is important, which is the quality of the emotional connection
that you are having with the other person.
Okay?
Now, secondly, keeping score is detrimental to relationships.
We know this on an instinctive level in some way, you know, people always say, oh, don't
keep score all of that stuff, but why is it, why is keeping score not a good thing for
relationships?
And the reason is, is because there, there's a certain dynamic at play between two people,
right?
So you have one person over here, you have another person over here and together they
create this third thing called the dynamic between the two of them, right?
That's why relationships between certain people can be great, they can feel comfortable, they
can feel welcoming, you know, you probably have some people like that in your life where
you can go to them, you can talk to them and you just instantly feel welcomed and comfortable
and relaxed around that person.
On the other hand, you also have relationships with other people that are tense or awkward
or strange, either because of just how the person is bringing themselves to you or how
you bring yourself to them.
Or it could just be due to the circumstances between how the two of you are relating to
one another.
You know, you might be having an argument or a disagreement or something like that that's
causing the two of you to have this sort of strained dynamic between the two of you.
And that's that third component.
It's the dynamic when we are keeping score over who is initiating, who is not initiating
all of these sorts of things.
What we're doing is we are feeding something into that dynamic.
We are feeding a sort of energy into that dynamic and you may not realize it, but when
you're keeping score, you're actually scanning what the other person is doing and you're
looking for ways that they are failing.
You're looking for ways that they are not living up to some sort of ideal or expectation,
right?
Like, oh well if he really loved me, he would be initiating contact with me.
Oh, if she really loved me, then she would at least, you know, offered to pay for the
date once in a while.
Or you know, things like this.
And the thing with keeping score is that if, for example, you know, he started initiating
contact with you all the time, suddenly it's not as if this whole keeping score thing would
go away.
It's not as if you'd just be like, oh great, now he's initiating contact with me all the
time.
Life is perfect.
No, you would find something else that you would keep score over.
That's just how it energetically comes across.
Right?
So you would notice things like, oh well, you know, he never cleans up after himself.
He's always late.
He has an uncomfortably high number of female friends that he spends a lot of time with
texting or calling or spending time with them or something like that.
And you would find something else to keep score over.
And so what you need to realize is that this is something where as long as you're coming
to the interaction, to the relationship, to the dynamic with this way of being, you're
going to constantly be scanning him, looking for things to keep score over.
Okay?
What you have to understand is that you're feeding this energy into the dynamic, into
this.
The third thing that represents the quality of the emotional connection between you and
him, you're feeding this into that dynamic, this sort of anxiety, this sort of insecurity,
the sort of seeking reassurance.
This sort of, you know, constantly looking for validation and so if that continues to
build in the dynamic, he's going to feel the effects of that.
He's going to feel the effects of that with maybe that's like, Oh hey, I'm never enough,
so why should I bother trying?
Or a no matter what I do, it's never going to be good enough.
Or maybe even something like, hey, it seems like this person is putting a lot of demands
on me.
Is this something that I really wanted in a relationship?
Maybe it's not, in which case, okay, bye.
See Ya, I'll go date somebody else.
Right?
And so you have to understand that this keeping score is not beneficial to you.
It's not as if it's given you any valuable information that's letting you know, hey,
this relationship is gonna work.
It's not going to work or anything like that.
In fact, it's just a distraction from what is actually most meaningful.
And most important in you having a great high quality relationship, which is the emotional
connection, the emotional connection is what you should be focusing on.
You should not be looking for signs of like, oh, hey, he's initiating contact.
He's not initiating.
Contact is taking him two hours to respond to a text.
It's not taking two hours to respond to a text there.
They're asking me out on a date.
They're not asking me out on a date.
All of these sorts of things you shouldn't be focusing on that you should be, instead
of focusing on whether you are actually having a good time connecting with one another when
you are together, when there is contact made, whether that's by you or by him or her, or
whether you're having a good time on a date, whether that date was initiated by you or
whether it was initiated by him or her or any number of these other things.
Okay?
Focus on whether the connection between the two of you is improving or or not improving.
Okay?
And that is what you should be paying attention to.
Not all of these tiny little insignificant, symptoms and little extraneous things that
don't matter.
Okay.
Focus on the connection.
That is the most important thing.
So at that being said, let's go over and see what sort of questions we have this week from
the students that are enrolled in our classes over at www.ModernLove.Life.
Okay.
Our first question is from Goodman, Goodman writes in and says, dear Clay and Mika, I
am still planning to break ANC in July.
It is really not because of damage control mode thinking or fear of my ex.
Moving on, I think I might want to push myself out of the comfort zone of ANC to the dangerous
zone.
You know, I have been on ANC for almost six months.
It's not about time, but more about how you feel not outcome focused and get advanced
relational skills down and solid.
Otherwise I might end up staying in ANC for nine months or even a year.
How can I be mindful that my reaching out to my ex is not relationship focused, but
start to build up a positive energy in her email in January.
She said the only way for her to know if I have moved on is to know that I am dating.
That was the third time she used that as a reason that she couldn't see me.
I get it when Mika said that I needed to bring the vibe that welcomes her in the past I told
her that I was okay for us to be friends and I didn't feel like dating at all.
Don't worry.
I was okay with whoever she is dating.
When she told me about the rebound guy.
Now after nearly six months of ANC, I'm hoping that she would not again use me not dating
as a reason to not meet up with me.
What can I do if she asked me about dating?
Trust me.
She absolutely.
Again, will ask me that.
Okay, so this is really a two part question here.
The first part is how can I make sure that when I reach out and contact my ex that I
am not relationship focused, but instead connection focused.
Okay.
And this really comes from what your mindset is about your ex and your relationship with
her and your connection with her.
Okay?
So if this is part of some sort of story that you're playing out in your mind, like, okay,
I'm going to contact her, we're going to get back together.
We're going to have this great relationship.
We're gonna.
I Dunno.
Maybe you get married or move in together, or something like that.
Then then you are more relationship focused.
You're more attached to the outcome.
You're more attached to getting back together with her.
Okay.
Now keep in mind you have been in active no contact for, I believe you said approximately
six months, which means that you probably don't know a whole lot about her, where she's
at emotionally, what's going on in her life and all of that stuff.
And so if you were connection focused, you would instead simply just be curious about,
hey, how is she doing?
What's new in her life?
What are the things that she is dealing with right now in her life?
What are the good things that are going on in her life?
What are the bad things that she's struggling with in her life that is more of the connection
focused way of thinking about things.
Whereas relationship focused, you don't really care so much about what the other person is
going through as long as it leads to an outcome of us getting back together of us being in
a relationship of her breaking up with her rebound partner of you know, something like
that without you even bothering to understand where she is at right now.
Because keep in mind, if you have been in anc for more or less six months, then you
know you are only really relating to her as the woman that she was six months ago as the
person that she was six months ago.
And keep in mind that that person no longer exists.
That person's life has rolled on for the past six months and she has gone through some things.
She has experienced some things that life has not been static.
That life has not stayed the same.
So to continue to relate to her as somebody who was the same person that she was six months
ago or possibly even longer ago, is to not really understand that there's that connection
component between the two of you that is most important.
And instead it's to realize that what you're focusing on is trying to get to an outcome,
trying to use her as a means to an end, trying to use her as a means to an end for you to
get into a relationship or as you to get a girlfriend or for you to get back together
with your ex because I don't know that means something about you or something like that.
And so what I would encourage you to do is to let go of any kind of outcome or relationship
focused thinking and to instead focus on simply just being curious about who this woman is,
what have the past six months like been, like for her again, what is she dealing with right
now?
What she's struggling with, what is she excited about?
What is going on in her life?
And simply let go of the status of being in a relationship, the status of having it look
a certain way, the status of having her laugh when you tell a joke, the status of her being
open and receptive to you, the status of her wanting to get back together with you, the
status of her wanting to leave her rebound partner for you or something like that.
And instead simply just be curious about who she is as a person and what she's going through
right now.
Then about your second question, which was what to do if she asks me if I am dating.
Okay.
Now, remember, if you are connection focused, you're going to have the ability to feel into
the moment and to know what her main concern is.
Okay.
Is Her main concern that you're still love sick and hung up on her and unable to move
on and that you're just pining to be with her or something like that?
Or is her concern, you know, something else like, do you have some sort of hidden agenda?
are you like not being genuine?
When you say that you just want to catch up or you know what's going on on her end, so
you want to be able to be tuned into the present moment to know exactly what's going on for
her and be able to respond accordingly.
But if you are a relationship focused, right, you're going to see this question as like
an opportunity for you to get to the next step for you to move one step closer towards
your agenda, towards your goal, towards the outcome that you want for yourself, towards
the getting back together towards the, her being your girlfriend again towards the youtube
being in a relationship again.
Okay.
And if you see every question that she asks you, whether it's this question or other questions
as some sort of, you know, like game show quiz where if you can answer enough questions
correctly, you'll get to the, the final bonus round of being in a relationship again.
Then that is being relationship focused.
Okay.
And you want to understand like what we were talking about before is that connection focused
is probably going to be the better way of approaching this sort of situation.
And if you are connection focused, you can simply just answer the question honestly.
Are you dating somebody else right now?
Either yes or no.
You can feel into the moment and say, well, what is it that you really want to know?
It seems like you're concerned about something.
You can ask her a question like, oh, are you?
Do you think that I might have a hidden agenda?
Is that while you want to know the answer to this question or you can do whatever it
is and I'm not telling you these kinds of things so that you can write them down and
put them in your back pocket is like canned responses that you can use or anything but
more so that you can actually feel into the moment and ask her what's going on.
To get clarity on what her concerns are.
To do what you can do to feel into the present moment and to start to wrap your mind around
what her experiences, what is going on with the dynamic between the two of you and what
you can do to actually improve the quality of the connection that the two of you are
actually experiencing.
Okay?
So, that's what I would really recommend that you do because again, on one hand in your
first question, you're saying, what can I do to be connection focused instead of relationship
focused?
And then your second question, you're saying, okay, now that I'm relationship focused, how
can I continue on this path of being relationship focused?
And so what I'm saying is don't worry about that at all and instead be on the connection
focused path because that is going to be much more likely to help you to create the kind
of relationship that you actually want.
Because relationships come from the quality of the emotional connection.
Connection does not come from being in a relationship, but having a high quality emotional connection
will naturally and organically result in a relationship.
Okay?
So I hope this helps you out.
And please keep us updated on how things go moving forward and feel free to check in with
us next week.
Our next question is from F, f writes in and says, my question for this week is in terms
of emotional acceptance, when she tells me that she didn't contact me after a month of
no contact because she wants to get back together, but because she wants to know how I am doing
and what I have been up to, I get that this is the content, but where's the context coming
from?
What would be the emotional place that she is acting from?
She seems to be keen on being friends at the moment with no expectations and no labels
either.
My response was to tell her that I'm totally okay with that.
A little scared about this and to be honest, a little bit scared about putting trust in
the process.
So when she is saying that she just wants to catch up and to see how you're doing rather
than trying to get back together with you.
There are a couple of different possibilities that are going on.
Number one, she could be connection focused like what we just went over with Goodman,
but number two is that she also might be simply wanting to test the waters without seeming
overly invested, right?
She doesn't want to seem like she's desperate or clingy or needy or something like that.
So she might simply be contacting you and saying like, oh, hey, what's going on?
How are things been?
How have things been going for you for the past, you know, however long it's been, and
she doesn't want to come right out and say, Hey, I want to get back together with you.
Hey, I miss you, or whatever.
Right?
Because oftentimes people approach dating and relationships as if it's some sort of
exercise in looking good in looking cool in sort of a grandizing your own ego.
Right?
And there's nothing wrong with, you know, trying to look good and trying to be cool
trying to aggrandized your own ego, but we have to differentiate the two because having
a great relationship is one thing and looking good, looking cool.
Having a strong ego is another thing.
And if you want to have one thing, that's okay, but it doesn't necessarily mean that
you can do both at the same time.
Right.
She, she probably doesn't want to come across as looking desperate, looking needy, looking
bad in any sort of way.
Right.
She doesn't want to come across in a bad way.
And so what she's doing is she's just kind of testing the waters to see how you respond.
And what I would do in this particular situation, which, which I imagine is probably what's
happening.
Again, I don't know your ex, I don't know exactly what your dynamic and relationship
between each other is, but what I'm imagining is that she is probably just testing the water
to see where you're at emotionally.
Right?
It's just kind of like a check in.
She doesn't want to seem overly invested.
She doesn't want to seem anything like that.
So she just trying to, you know, play it.
Cool.
So Yo, hey, what's going on?
It's been a while.
How are you doing?
You know, something like that, right?
When maybe in the back of her mind, she wants to ask you a million questions and maybe in
the back of your mind do you want to ask her a million questions too?
And so the thing isn't to necessarily play cool, composed, unaffected, detached, and
all of that stuff either because then you're just two people pretending to be something
that you're not pretending to be detached and emotionally unaffected by one another
and that that's not really a very rewarding experience.
But at the same time you also don't want to overinvest either and say, Oh, you know, I'm
madly in love with you.
I've been so surprised it took you this long to reach out to me.
I've been, I've been counting the days you know, endlessly until this moment.
And I just, you know, thank the heaven so much that you finally reached out to me because
again, that throws the whole social dynamic lopsided because you're way over, invested
in.
She know it's really hard to tell what her level of investment is at this point.
But she's making it seem, at least that she is a relatively low investment on her end.
Okay.
So what you want to do is you want to express vulnerability, but express vulnerability in
a positive way.
Okay.
So again, we had a podcast episode on this a couple of weeks ago on the difference between
good and bad vulnerability.
You might want to check that out if you have missed that episode, but basically you want
to take ownership for your feelings, for your emotions rather than projecting them onto
her and using her as a means to an end to get to some sort of outcome that much like
we were talking about with Goodman.
So, so overall, you know, if this was going on through a text exchange where, you know,
she texted you and I was like, hey, how have you been?
And you texted her back with, oh, I've been good.
And she's responded with, I think that we should just be friends and you're, you respond
with, that's totally okay with me.
Then you know, that's, that's okay.
There's nothing wrong with that.
It's just kind of words going back and forth.
There's not really a whole lot of emotional connection going on there.
There's not really a whole lot of emotional, revealing vulnerability, honesty, transparency,
all of that stuff.
and that's okay though, because sometimes you need a little bit of just words going
back and forth to kind of warm people up to the idea of actually having a meaningful conversation,
a meaningful interaction with one another.
Sometimes you just need a little bit of small talk about weather or you know, whatever it
might be, but you don't want to linger there.
Oftentimes people will linger there and they don't understand why things aren't developing.
They, they end up getting caught in what we call the polite trap where they're just, you
know, going back and forth about kind of trivial meaningless things and wondering why the other
person doesn't want to actually go out on a date with them or why the other person doesn't
feel connected with them.
It's because they're just talking about sports and weather and TV shows and work and stuff
like that.
They're not talking about actual emotions or feelings.
And so what you want to do is you want to use the advanced relational skills, pull it
down to the emotional level, use things like the magic questions and so on and so forth
to actually pull the conversation down to the emotional level and focus on the quality
of the connection there so you can actually start to build up a high quality emotional
connection with her in the process.
And what this'll do is it'll start to lay a foundation for obviously an increased emotional
connection, but a foundation for being able to do more things such as meeting up in person
such as you know, spending more time together such as possibly even getting back together
at some point.
Okay.
But this all comes from the emotional connection.
So again, if this is some sort of, you know, polite trap, sort of text exchange where it's,
how are you, I'm good, how are you?
I am fine.
Also, what is new?
Not Much, how are you?
Things are okay.
Things were like that, and you just not really going anywhere.
Then you're going to have to be a little bit more vulnerable.
You're going to have to share a little bit more about what's going on with you, put a
little bit of skin in the game and really invite her to open up and share more on her
end about the process as well too, because you can't expect other people to open up first.
You can't expect other people to be vulnerable first.
I'm sure sometimes they can, but oftentimes if we're able to go there, then that can invite
them and help them to feel more comfortable to follow us there because they know that
we are committed to the interaction and if they know that we are committed to the interaction,
then they will often commit to the interaction too, but if we don't commit to the interaction
will just end up in this polite trap kind of way.
Talking about, you know, meaningless things like sports, weather, traffic and so on and
so forth.
So I hope this helps you out and please keep us updated on how things go moving forward.
From here, our next question is from Pino.
Pino writes in and says, hi Clay.
My husband broke up with me at the end of last year saying he was no longer interested
in having a romantic relationship and just wanting to be friends.
We've been through what seemed like a mutual ANC.
Then a couple of months of good communication.
Then he went into a strong pull back for over a month and we recently met up again for the
first time during this whole period we have been fight free, which is a lot given how
2017 went, but he's brought up wanting to get started on the divorce every so often
with varying reasons such as wanting a fresh start and I like and respect you and think
that you're an attractive person and I want us to be confidence, but I don't want to be
married to you because I just don't feel attracted to you in that way.
That and the fact that he is changed jobs three times and moved cities twice in the
months since our separation makes me feel pretty sure that he is writing the dragon
in many areas of his life, including our relationship.
My question is, when somebody is writing the dragon and there are these weird inconsistencies
in communication, should we ever bring it up with them knowing the general pattern of
things to expect due to the ESP is such a big help that I am able to feel into the situation
and process them accordingly, but when patently rude things are done, like not replying to
texts, discussing the logistics of preplanned meetings, but are then followed by seemingly
normal conversations the next day, I feel a bit weird not addressing it the way I would
with any other friend.
It's not the waffling of writing the dragon itself that I feel effected by as much as
unsure about whether it's all right to leave my ex wondering about why as far as he's concerned,
I'm being accommodating to the point of collapsing.
For me, empathy helps explain the weird behavior and I let these things go.
But do you think it would come across as inauthentic to somebody who might not necessarily want
to think positively about you at the moment?
Okay.
So your, your question here, which you asked in the middle here was when somebody is at
riding the dragon and there are inconsistencies in communication.
Should we ever bring it up with them?
Okay.
So if there are inconsistencies in the communication that make it difficult for you to actually
communicate with them and for you to actually move forward and to actually plan things then,
you know.
Yeah, that is something that you can bring up with them, right?
Because obviously if you can't plan things and if you can't rely on them to follow through
with things that you're discussing such as meeting up or perhaps talking on the phone
or at a particular time, you know, you're agreeing to catch up over the phone at 6:00
tonight or something like that and they won't respond to you about, you know, hey, I need
to move it back to 7:00.
Something came up or something.
Then, you know.
Yeah, that's something that you need to address with them and you don't need to do it in some
sort of righteous way that makes you right and them wrong or anything like that.
Just simply say something along the lines of, hey, it's really difficult for me to schedule
things.
If I don't hear back from you, can you please let me know if this particular time or this
particular place or whatever works for you, that way that you can actually get clear on
what's going on with them.
You can let them know what your concern is, right?
Because if you just keep quiet, obviously that's collapsing and that is not you voicing
a real concern that's on your end and if you speak up and in a way that makes them wrong
and that's kind of posturing and that causes of course them to not feel connected to you.
but, but if you're simply just explaining like, hey, this, this doesn't work because
it's not workable, right?
We can need to be able to actually plan these things in a way that makes sense then, then
that's just being vulnerable.
Right?
That's just you owning what it is for your experience.
Right.
I'm on the other hand though.
I also have noticed that that many people will look at communication and they'll say
things like, oh, you know, I do 100 percent of the initiating.
What's up with that?
And they'll be keeping score over these sorts of things and the issue with keeping score
over, you know, for example, who's initiating or who's doing, you know, and other circumstances,
who's doing chores around the house?
Who's doing this or who's doing that.
The thing is, is that it comes from a place of looking for ways that you are doing more
than the other person.
Okay.
And if you're constantly looking for how am I putting in more work, more effort, more
more sweat and tears into this and the other person, you will always find a way to prove
that to be true.
For example, if you were keeping score over, let's just say who's initiating contact more
than, you know, it's not as if he suddenly started initiating contact 100 percent of
the time or 50 percent of the time or whatever.
That suddenly your life would be smooth and problem free.
No, you would probably find something else that he's not doing enough of.
Maybe he's not taking enough interest in your life and what's going on with you.
Maybe he's not paying for enough dates.
Maybe he's not asking enough questions about you.
Maybe he's not doing this or that or whatever, and you would simply find something else to
notice that he is not pulling his fair share of, in which case you need to either look
at yourself and why you are insecure about who is putting in an equal amount of effort
and who is not putting in an equal amount of effort while you're concerned about the
thought that you might be putting in more than him.
Or you might say, okay, well maybe he.
He just isn't putting in as much as I am and maybe this just isn't something that I want
to be a part of.
And you can just say, okay, well if that's how he is, I have to accept him 100 percent
as the person that he is right now.
And if that's not something that I want to deal with.
If that's not the kind of person that I want to be in a relationship with and I need to
let go of that so that I have the space in my life to welcome in somebody who is willing
to pull their fair share.
Right?
Not all of this is in your head.
You know, sometimes people are kind of just looking for a free ride.
Sometimes people are just looking to take advantage of people in one way or another.
And that's definitely not something that I am advocating in any way whatsoever.
Then you actually had a second question, at the end here, which is basically, do you believe
that showing empathy for somebody might come across as inauthenticity if that person is
not used to thinking about you positively in the moment and you know, yeah, it, it can,
you know, they might think that you're putting on some sort of act.
You're doing some sort of gimmick.
You're, you're doing some sort of trick or something like that in order to win them over
in order to make them think something positive about you.
And this is normal, whenever anybody has some sort of change in behavior about how we're
accustomed to seeing them now, in order to break up with you, he had to create an image
of you in his mind where he has to see you as like, oh well things are never going to
get better between us.
She's this way.
She'll, she'll never have empathy for me.
Are relationships never going to get any better and so on and so forth.
So he had to really cement that into his mind to the point where he actually felt comfortable
breaking up with you.
What you want to do as you start to change your behavior and change that perception that
he has a view, is to realize that it's gonna take time.
It's going to take time for him to start to trust you.
It's going to take time for to start to trust that the, that the empathetic version of you
is actually who you genuinely are now.
Right?
Because he doesn't know if this is a trick.
He doesn't know if this is just a gimmick or some sort of mind game of some sort.
To try and win him back or whatever he doesn't know, and so it's going to take him a little
while to start to trust you again, so you're going to have to keep going with this.
Hopefully this is genuine empathy and it's not just a gimmick or a trick or anything
like that, and so you're going to have to keep going with this and eventually he'll
start to trust that to empathetic you is actually just who you are now.
He'll start to say, oh, maybe I was wrong and Pino actually does have empathy.
Maybe she actually can see things from my point of view and again, for each person,
this will be different depending on, you know, the, the way they perceive things, the way
that they trust, the way that their past has been in all of that.
So there's no specific timeline about how long it'll take him to trust you, but through
consistency, he'll start to really erase the version of you that he had to create in order
to break up with you.
And he'll start to reconsider that as you continuously and consistently bring that empathy
to your interactions.
Okay, so I hope this helps you out Pino, and please keep us updated on how things go moving
forward from here.
Our next question is from Gaveol, Gaveol, writes in and says, hi Clay.
Two months ago, L decided that me and him should stop communicating.
He didn't tell me why exactly he came to this conclusion.
He just notified me that he has a new girlfriend and thinks we had better stop texting like
we did.
I pretty much understand that it could have been because he wants to take his relationship
seriously and put contact with an ex or because he didn't like interacting with me.
I don't see anything in our past conversations that point to something like agenda.
However, it is possible that an ex can just assume over time that you have an ulterior
motive because you're texting them despite the lack of investment on their side.
I want to reconnect with him in a few more months.
However, I only have a nothing more than assumptions regarding what made him to push me away rather
than the real reason I thought to ask him directly.
What made him feel bad about talking with me?
However, probably he wouldn't answer such a direct question.
On the other hand, a friend here suggested to tell him why it will be good for him to
interact with me.
That sounds good in theory, but I guess it's a form of convincing somebody and convincing
somebody in most cases, rarely works again and watched your videos about rebound relationships
and yet didn't find anything regarding an ex who is on a rebound and doesn't want to
communicate with you.
That's why I have to ask you a question.
If an ex is in a rebound relationship and refuses to talk to you, how can you reveal
their true reason and communicate to them?
You can keep in touch with one another.
Thanks.
When it comes to knowing their true reason for not wanting to communicate with you there,
there's a couple things to keep in mind.
Number one, unless you have any reason to believe otherwise, it's probably a good idea
to just take them at their word.
Okay.
Anything else is just speculation and it's just your brain filling in the blanks and
it's just it.
You know, it can lead you down, bs machine roads of thought where you're just, you know,
catastrophe, thinking, having worse case scenario predictions and so on and so forth.
And that is never a great idea, especially when there's no evidence.
So if there's no evidence, then I would just go with what he says he says to, he says here
he has a new girlfriend and he thinks it'd be best if we stopped texting.
Okay.
So what you know about this leads us to our second thing, which is what you know about
him, his personality, who he is, what his emotions are like, how he generally responds
to things and all of that.
If you were him and you sent as him, you sent a message to Gaveol all and you said, hi,
I have a new girlfriend and I think it's better if we stop texting one another the way that
we do.
What do you think?
Knowing his motives, his emotions and all of that stuff, what do you think would be
going on there?
Do you think that you would want to try giving the new relationship a fair shake?
Do you think that it's just some sort of thing that you might say to try and throw somebody
off?
Like what do you think?
Knowing what you know about him, you have to really feel into this.
Okay.
And so based off of that, that is what I would really do.
And then you know, of course you can take action and start to do things from the Internet.
Can of course give you more feedback which can help you start to form a better picture
about what's really going on, which can tell you really what's what, what the real story
is here, but until you actually have information, you don't just want to go filling in the blanks.
The only information that you actually have is what he told you and your knowledge of
him and his personality and how he generally responds to things and so on and so forth.
So if you put those two together, what do you think might be going on behind the scenes?
Okay.
And then when it comes to how you can keep in touch with one another, well, what you
want to do is you have to do that first part that we talked about and understand what you
think might be going on behind the scenes.
So for example, maybe he is in a new relationship with somebody else and he wants to give that
relationship a fair shake and he thinks that if he's in touch with his ex, that his new
girlfriend might get jealous that his new girlfriend might give him a hard time.
It could just screw up the new relationship in some way.
Right?
And so what you might want to do is you might want to say, okay, well he's afraid that we're
going to be in some sort of romantic relationship with one another.
He's afraid he's going to fall for me.
He's afraid that his new girlfriend is going to pick up the phone and see that I sent him
a text message and get really jealous and insecure or something like that.
So what could you do to, really comfort that emotional concern his.
And maybe that is to simply just say, hey, you know, I, I'm, I'm not trying to get back
together, I don't have a hidden agenda.
All I want to do is just stay in touch as friends, something like that, right?
That could potentially ease that particular concern that could potentially sued that kind
of anxiety he might be feeling okay.
And so what you have to do is you have to feel into the situation and understand where
he's coming from, understand what is likely to be his concern.
And then you have to directly address that in a way that hopefully will soothe that concern.
And, and you know, if he responds back and says, oh, that's nice, but I still don't think
we should be in touch for this reason or that reason, or whatever, then that you're gathering
more information and you can use that to say, oh, okay, I get it.
He's actually concerned about this.
Not that or something like that.
But it'll help us to, to kind of put together a full picture about what's going on.
So you want to really just understand him, understand, because.
Because again, you know him better than I know him, you know him better than probably
most people out there because you were in a relationship with him, so you can go ahead
and feel into what he must be going through and you can, you can kind of meet him where
that might be emotionally and you can start to soothe any anxieties that you think he
might be experiencing.
You can, uh, kind of let him know that it's safe to contact you to be in touch with you
in any way that you think would be best to do that based off of your level of empathy
about where he's at.
Okay.
So Gaveol, I hope this helps you out with your question and please keep us updated on
how things go moving forward from here.
Okay.
Our next one, next question is from Vixen.
Vixon writes in and says, hi clay.
My Ex has having a graduation party because he just graduated from Undergrad.
I was not invited and found out from mutual friends.
I was with him at a party when some of his friends brought it up and it was really awkward.
But I didn't say anything given the situation, it's bothering me and I've tried bringing
it up in, passing over text with him and he just dodges the question, how can I bring
it up to him in a way that won't be blaming him or anything like that.
It is something that is really on me and I feel like I'll regret not talking to him about
it or at least trying.
Even if he doesn't answer, should I call and leave a message or text him.
He hasn't been very good about phone calls in the past.
I'm just hurt that he wouldn't talk to me about it when I asked and also heard that
I had to hear about it from other friends when I was under the impression that we were
on good terms because he has been answering my messages more frequently since the party,
but still didn't respond when I asked him if he wanted to meet up when I was in his
area.
Thanks.
Vixen.
Okay.
So once again we have to go back to empathy here.
We have to put ourselves in ex's point of view.
Okay.
How would you feel if you were having a graduation party and, you did not invite a, again, you
as your ex and you did not invite Vixen.
Okay.
How would you feel, especially if Vixen later found out when she was spending time with
your friends and it just kind of came out accidentally in conversation.
How would you feel?
Would you feel embarrassed?
Would you feel maybe a little bit angry?
Would you feel maybe a little bit dodgy about it?
I mean like how would you feel then you have to really understand where he's coming from
and then you can address that, you know, so maybe if, again, knowing him, knowing what
his personality is, like knowing what his emotions are, like if you think that he probably
feels guilty about it or embarrassed, then maybe you could just say, Hey, I know that
you might feel a little bit embarrassed about this and he might feel a little bit bad about,
you know, me finding out about that.
But I just want you to know there's no hard feelings and I just wanted to, to clear the
air with you.
If this is something that we can talk about, something along those lines would be a good
thing to bring up, but again, you have to put yourself in his position.
You have to see the world from his point of view so that you can have a beginning of understanding
how he sees things so you have a beginning of understanding what his emotional world
might be like so you can start to meet him there.
Because if you, you know, dance around this.
If you take the direct route, if you just, you know, confront him in some way.
If you hint about things or something like that, but you're not talking to his actual
emotional state, he is probably not going to, open up very much about that in a way
that is going to allow the two of you to actually connect and allow the two of you to actually
have a real conversation about this.
So what is important is that you stay focused on the emotional connection.
Put yourself in his position, feel out where his emotions are, what's going on with him
emotionally that has created this situation.
And then meet him in that emotional place and then as you have this conversation with
him, it's important that you don't get lost in the details.
Well, you said this, I was a, there was a text message where you and I don't know, but
instead say, okay, what is actually the emotion going on beneath the surface here and how
can I address that?
Okay?
Don't get lost in the content.
Stay focused on the emotional context beneath that.
Okay, Vixen.
So I hope this helps you out and please keep us updated on how things go moving forward
from here.
Okay, so those have been our questions for this week.
Once again, if you'd like to get more help, advice and strategies with your relationship,
what you can do is you can head over to www.ModernLove.Life, or you can go down below this video and click
on the link and that'll take you over to relationship inner game.com where you can fill out a quick,
painless little survey.
That just kind of tells me a little bit more about where you're at, what kind of goals
you have when it comes to dating and relationships, and a little bit more of the specifics about
what's going on with you and then once I know a little bit more about that, I can start
you advice, tips and strategies to help you start making progress in getting there.
Again, that is down below this video, but if you have like this video, please feel free
to give us a thumbs up.
Go ahead and subscribe to the channel so that you can get updates when we upload and publish
new episodes of their relationship inner game experience, and also leave a comment down
below letting me know what you think about this video and what sorts of videos you'd
like to see me make in the future.
Anyway.
Once again, this has been Clay with www.ModernLove.Life and I hope that this has helped you improve
your relationship inner game.
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