22 Years of Dating Advice Summarized in 11 Minutes

0:00From 2008 to 2013, I was a professional dating and relationships coach. I happen to write one of the best-selling dating advice books ever written, [music] and oh, that's right. I've been married for 10 years, very happily. Here's everything I know about dating advice summarized in the next 10 minutes. Number one, if it's not a yes, then it is a no. So much time and energy is wasted in ambiguity and uncertainty. We spend so much of our energy trying to convince somebody who doesn't like us to like us, or trying to convince ourselves to like somebody that we don't actually like. The truth is is that our time and energy is better spent

0:34trying to find somebody that you both feel yes about each other, rather than trying to convince yourself or them to feel yes in the first place. In my opinion, in 2026, dating is largely a time management issue. And yes or no is one of the most useful tools to manage that time. Number two, when you hide your personality, you are inviting high-maintenance relationships into your life. When you pretend to be somebody else, sure, you might get a little bit more attraction, a little bit more of a spark on the first or second date, but you're setting yourself up for failure in the long run, because you're

1:07essentially attracting somebody to things that don't actually exist. And so down the road, when they discover that those things don't exist, you're going to have to start managing expectations and doing a lot of damage control. People are attracted to our strengths, but they connect to our weaknesses. It's actually our vulnerabilities that drive most of the intimacy in a relationship and most of the chemistry. So the more you hide yourself, the more superficial the relationship becomes. Number three, intimacy is directly proportional to how much each person is willing to allow themselves to be hurt. The more you protect yourself, the more you hide yourself, the more superficial the

1:42relationship becomes, the more you just end up with this blah thing going on. You're kind of into each other, but it's more just like you have nothing better going on, and that's the gray zone that like no good relationship emerges. Counterintuitively, the more vulnerable you're willing to be with people, the more surface area you give them to connect with you. Also, the more surface

2:03area you give them to reject you. There's a proportionality between your ability to connect intimately with others and your ability to be rejected by them as well. My tip, get good at tolerating the rejection. Number four, your dating life is a reflection of your lifestyle. Improve your lifestyle, improve your dating prospects. If you keep dating the wrong person over and over again, it's probably because you're looking in the wrong places and hanging out in the wrong areas. The best way to improve your dating prospects is to improve the life in which you're meeting those prospects. Number five, what you

2:35tolerate is what continues. Unconsciously, you teach people how to treat you. So, if you tolerate a certain amount of disrespect, then you will invite that disrespect into your relationships and it'll become a defining feature of the relationships. In this way, our relationships tend to be a reflection of the relationship with ourselves. If I don't feel like I deserve to be respected, then that is going to be reflected in the relationships that I allow into my life and the way that people treat me in those relationships. Number six, attraction cannot be negotiated. You cannot argue, impress, or trick somebody

3:08into wanting you if they don't want you. The moment you're building a case for yourself is the moment that you've lost the case. The more you try to coax attraction into somebody, the more unattractive you become. Number seven, a good relationship should periodically make you feel uncomfortable. Early on, when you meet somebody that you really like, everything's going to feel great, everything's exciting, everything's going to be going really well, it's going to feel easy, it's going to be a yes. But, the real test of whether the relationship is going to make it or not is the first fight. If you can fight well, it means you can go far. And by

3:41fight well, I mean, can you maintain respect in the face of conflict? Can you communicate well without taking personal jabs at each other? And can you repair well and forgive well after the fight. Number eight, the happier you are alone, the better your relationships with others will become. Every healthy relationship is between two people who have healthy relationships with themselves. Every toxic relationship is between two people who have toxic relationships with themselves and are using the other person to compensate for their own shortcomings. So, here's another tip, go to therapy. Speaking of which, this video is brought to you by BetterHelp. So, true story, I had a

4:18period in my 20s where I blew up every relationship with every girl I dated. And after three or four disastrous breakups in a row, it was pretty unavoidable. I was the problem. So, I did what any rational person would do. I went to therapy and some of those sessions were some of the most useful

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5:12therapy. Number nine, chemistry will get you into a relationship, but compatibility will keep you there. Early on, everything is about feelings, how you feel around each other, the romance, the sparks, the sex, all the fun and excitement. That's great, don't get me wrong, but it's not an accurate indicator of how long the relationship is going to last. Ultimately, the indication of how long the relationship is going to last is all of the boring resume stuff. Do you share values with each other? Are your world views aligned? Do you have similar goals to one another? Do you relate to each other? Do you have shared interests or

5:48hobbies? People tend to overrate romance and our culture has misled us about the utility of romance. Romance just opens the door to intimacy. It just lubricates the intimacy. Makes it a little bit easier. Removes the friction of the intimacy, if you know what I mean. But it doesn't guarantee the intimacy is going to last. You have to do the work to guarantee the intimacy is going to

6:14last. The lube does not last forever. [laughter] Number 10, keeping your options open is its own form of a trap. In this day and age, there's a real paradox of choice around dating and that anybody you choose to commit to or spend your time with, you are essentially turning down hundreds if not thousands of other potential options. But maintaining that optionality is itself a trap. And the trap can keep you addicted to the excitement of always meeting somebody new while allowing you to avoid the difficult vulnerability required to

6:46actually commit to somebody. Number 11, it is impossible for somebody who destroys your mental health to be the love of your life. Intensity is not the same thing as intimacy. Drama is not the same thing as depth. And love is not enough. [music] Number 12, neediness kills attraction. I define neediness in my book as prioritizing other people's thoughts and opinions of you over your own thoughts and opinions of you. The way this manifests is clinginess, bragging, playing games, manipulation, power

7:23struggles, all sorts of things. Basically, everything that makes a relationship and dating suck is rooted in a sense of neediness. It's in It's in needing to control other people's opinions and perceptions of you rather than being confident in your opinions and perceptions of yourself. Number 13, the quality of of love depends on the quality of your attention. Love is not a feeling that you have about somebody, it is attention that you pay them and it is

7:47action that you put out towards them. John Gottman, who's the preeminent researcher around love and relationships, found that the couples who stay together over a long period of time, it's not the couples who fight the least, it's the couples who respond to each other's bids for attention and affection. If too many bids for attention and affection go unacknowledged or ignored, then the couple drifts apart. Number 14, everybody wants a great relationship,

8:11but nobody wants to be a great partner. It's because being a great partner is hard. It requires sitting with a lot of uncomfortable emotions. It requires showing up for things that like you're not actually really excited to show up for. It requires being supportive in situations that are, you know, really hard to be supportive. It means learning how to communicate your own thoughts and feelings well. It means being able to sit with your own insecurities and open up to somebody who could hurt you really terribly. But ultimately, if you want a certain kind of relationship, you have to become the type of person who has that relationship. Number 15, the

8:48best relationships are between two people who need [snorts] nothing but want to give everything. Ultimately, you should always feel self-sufficient as a human being. That even if everything went wrong and your relationship ended, you would ultimately be okay and still live a good life. A relationship requires two healthy individuals and therefore, to be a healthy individual, you need to feel as though you don't need the relationship to survive. That said, you should want to give everything to your relationship simply because your relationship is one of the most satisfying and meaningful things in your life. It's one of the most profound things you can continue to invest your

9:22attention and time into. Number 16, the most powerful form of love is giving somebody the permission to be who they already are. Many of us fall in love with somebody's potential, but we miss the person who's right in front of us. Make sure you're in love with the person right in front of you. Number 17, a great partner makes everything else in life easier. Bad

9:44partner makes everything else harder. Your career, your health, your money decisions, your sanity. All of these things get run through the prism of your intimate relationship. And if your partner is additive to your life, they will be additive to all these other areas. They will make you better in all these other areas. And if they're a drain, then they're going to be a drain on all these other areas. Warren Buffett was once asked what the most important investment each person makes in their life, and he answered who you choose to

10:15marry. Number 18, you attract people at the level of your self-worth, not at the level of your desire. You don't necessarily get the relationships that you want, you get the relationships that you deserve. If you want to be with better people, you need to be better yourself. There's no hack, there's no script, there's no workaround, there's no trick to convince somebody who has their together more than you do to want to be with you. If you want to be with somebody great, you need to be somebody great. Number 19, love is not finding the perfect person, it's choosing to see what's good and

10:49beautiful in an imperfect one. That's a cute one to end on. Aw, guys. Aw, the feels, feels. god, guys, that's so sweet. How sweet. Oh my god. Aw, cut.