“How Do I Get Him to Try Harder?”

Transcript provided by YouTube. Slightly edited with AI.

Hey everyone! We have some exciting news: our retreat is coming up from September 9th to the 15th. If you want to spend six transformative days with me on the beach in Florida, this is the one and only time it’s happening this year. Don’t wait for the next opportunity—it might be a long time coming, and your progress can’t wait.

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Emotional Honesty

Now, shifting gears—how are you feeling today? I woke up feeling a bit off, and I think it’s important to acknowledge that. We need to eliminate the stigma around feeling down sometimes. Toxic positivity can be frustrating; it’s okay not to be happy all the time.

I believe this episode will help lift your spirits, and I’m excited about the topics we’ll cover today.

We’ve received an email from Theresa that really caught my attention. She’s been dating someone long-distance for nearly 12 months, but feels like she’s his lowest priority. Exclusivity isn’t her main concern; she just wants to feel valued and heard.

Theresa mentions that despite her partner’s efforts, she often feels like an obligation. When she brings up plans to meet, he responds with a list of his commitments, making her feel unimportant. This situation is challenging, and it sounds like she feels trapped in her choices.

It’s great to see that Theresa is working on setting boundaries at 55, a skill she seems to be developing for the first time. However, she deserves to feel cherished and sought after. It’s clear she’s navigating complex feelings around her relationship.

Many of us have been conditioned to suppress our needs, but it’s crucial to communicate them. Theresa, what you’re asking for—time, attention, and emotional support—is entirely reasonable in a relationship, especially a long-distance one.

Analyzing the Relationship

Let’s break down some red flags here. Feeling like a low priority and struggling to get your partner to communicate effectively are significant concerns. It’s essential to have clarity in any relationship. If he can’t prioritize making plans, it may indicate a lack of commitment.

A busy schedule is not an excuse for neglecting important connections. The key is prioritization. Many successful people manage to balance their commitments while making time for loved ones.

Ultimately, the question isn’t whether he’s busy, but whether he chooses to prioritize you. If he cannot show empathy or communicate his feelings, these are serious issues that shouldn’t be overlooked.

Theresa, you deserve a partner who meets your needs and values your presence in their life. It’s essential to recognize your worth and advocate for what you need. Remember, you are not impossible to please; your needs are valid, and it’s okay to expect them to be met in a healthy relationship.

These are your words, not mine. You said there is always something more important, something more pressing. You should listen to that. You should listen to the fact that you feel forced to either keep your mouth shut or disappear and play his game of silence.

The Silent Treatment

Now there’s a whole other aspect: the silent treatment he gives you. There isn’t even kindness in the way he deals with this; he just disappears and goes silent on you. This adds another layer to the situation.

I’m reluctant to say this because I don’t want to hurt Teresa’s feelings, but it sounds like he has a life he prioritizes, and whatever he gets from her in the form of attention, validation, or comfort is something he dips into when it pleases him. That’s the role that relationship serves for him.

I don’t know the guy, but it feels like if she voices a need for reassurance or anything, he is nowhere to be found. If she wants to see him and he’s busy, he doesn’t make time. Yet, he doesn’t let her go either, because there’s some convenience in having someone who cares about him and checks in, especially when he’s having a bad day.

The Long-Distance Dynamic

It’s likely that the long-distance aspect has allowed this to persist far longer than it would have if they were in the same city. He wouldn’t be able to hide behind the distance.

I mention this because I would hate for you, Teresa, to blame yourself and feel like you’re going crazy trying to understand why this person behaves the way they do. Whether or not they’re a good or bad person is irrelevant; sometimes, we feel treated like an option or a commodity rather than a priority. None of us should settle for that.

It can be helpful to imagine something else that might fall into this category, like video games. If someone enjoys video games, they can choose when to engage with them. They might work all week, ignoring the games, and then come Friday evening say, “Oh, I’ve got a couple of hours to play.” They enjoy it because it gives them satisfaction and reward.

But once they’re done, they put the game down and move on with their lives. That relationship works because the game asks nothing of them when they’re not playing.

You have to start looking at it like you’re his video game. You are there for his enjoyment, satisfaction, and entertainment. However, this doesn’t work because you have the wrong needs or because your needs are excessive or demanding. This doesn’t work because you simply have needs. For him, any needs you have are too many because you’re the video game; you’re not supposed to have needs.

That realization can be jarring. We’ll continue to unpack this, and I have a model I want to share that can help everyone moving forward.

Staying Connected

Hello again! We have no sponsors, just me, Matthew Hussey. Every Friday, I send out a private email to everyone on my mailing list called “The Three Relationships.” I spend significant time crafting it each week because I want it to be both entertaining and helpful.

Many of you have enjoyed my book, *Love Life*, and it’s wonderful to see how it resonates. If you’ve finished the book and are eager for more, I’m writing new material every week. You can sign up for this free email at thethree relationships.com.

Also, if you haven’t taken our free masterclass, *Dating with Results*, you should. It’s our most popular masterclass, with over a million people having watched it. It’s designed for anyone struggling to navigate modern dating, tired of situationships, or encountering flaky people.

If you’re serious about finding real, lasting love, *Dating with Results* is the foundation for a productive path in your love life. You can access it for free at datingwithresults.com.

The Three Variables in Relationships

In any relationship, there are three things that can change: your standards, their behavior, or the status of the relationship itself. Any of these three can change at any time.

Your standards are the behaviors you’re willing to accept. Their behavior relates to how they treat you, and the status of the relationship is about whether you choose to be with them or the degree to which you include them in your life.

If any one of those three can change, you have to decide which one will change. In Teresa’s situation, she has tried to raise her standards because his behavior isn’t working for her. However, he has made her afraid to voice her needs, leading her to feel like she’s an inconvenience.

When someone doesn’t want to change their behavior, they’ll often try to shame you for your standards. That’s exactly what he has done. Teresa has shown that she is unwilling to change the status of the relationship; she doesn’t want to let go of it, even though it doesn’t sound exclusive.

So which of the three has to change? If his behavior won’t change and she’s unwilling to change the relationship status, then her standards must change. One of the three has to be pliable.

Recognizing the Cycle

Teresa has started to understand the concept of standards, but she isn’t demanding more because if she did and his behavior didn’t change, the status of the relationship would have to change.

When someone realizes that your standards are malleable, their behavior will remain the same. If you break up with someone and they keep coming back, you realize you don’t need to change your behavior because they lack standards. They keep reaching out or staying in contact.

We must decide which variable to change. There may be areas of a relationship where behavior doesn’t change, but we don’t want to lose the relationship. In those cases, our standards may shift, allowing us to live harmoniously.

But in Teresa’s case, the areas of his behavior that he’s unwilling to change will cause her long-term misery.

So what should she do?

Facing the Hard Conversations

She must become willing to change the status of the relationship. That’s hard, especially when you’re attached and invested. Generating a big enough “why” to risk it all is crucial.

This is a giant question—one that may require deep reflection. What bigger things might we lose if we stay? The reality is that there are often much bigger losses in staying than what we think we gain.

Teresa might be afraid of letting go, but she needs to connect to the pain of staying instead.

Right now, she seems to be in survival mode, living day by day, trying to feel safe and closer to this person who doesn’t make her feel secure. A good day for her is one where she feels closer to him, but this mindset limits her ability to think about her situation.

This leads to a critical realization: trying to derive safety from something inherently unsafe is a game she will never win.

You are not crazy, Teresa. The anxiety and fear you’re feeling are appropriate in this context.

Finding True Safety

The solution involves shifting your sense of safety to something fundamentally secure. If you want to work on this deeply, we’ll address it in our retreat. We can help you transform your confidence and target a sense of security that actually feels safe.

If you’re interested, you can find the program details at mhretreat.com.

Thank you, Teresa, for your vulnerability. Your honesty is appreciated, and I hope this discussion has been helpful for you. You sound like a fun person, and I hope we meet at one of our events in Australia.

For our listeners, we have live events coming up in London, Los Angeles, and New York. If you’re a Love Life member, you can attend these intimate gatherings.

For those interested in becoming members, visit lovelifclub.com for access to events, masterclasses, and expert sessions.

Thank you, everyone, and remember to love life!

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This post was previously published on YouTube.

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