Is someone just describing all their excess as crazy or insane? But then on top of that, are they also just with you because they didn't like being alone? And this is the kind of stuff you notice through their language, like, Oh, I'm just so glad to not be with that person anymore. I'm so glad I don't have that in my life anymore. Rather than this is what I appreciate about you, this is what I really value about you. Notice how it's
a negative skew versus a positive skew. A negative skew of the past is not as good as a positive skew to the future. Hey, everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the number one health podcast in the world. Thanks to each and every one of you that come back every week to listen, learn, and grow. We've had some incredible, fascinating episodes recently, so many amazing conversations. I want to make sure that you don't miss out on them. This
week we had the one and only Big Sean. A couple of weeks ago we had the one and only Lauren London, two phenomenal episodes, and one of your favorite solo episodes was last week seven Ways to be Productive Even when you're tired, and from a few months ago, this one really stood out to all of you. Eight types of people you need in your life for twenty twenty two. That was January twenty eighth. Make sure you go back and take a listen if you miss those again.
I am so grateful for your time, so grateful for your ears, and so grateful for your energy and presence in this moment. I also want to give a big shout out to all of you who've been bumping into me in and around LA Or while I'm traveling and telling me that you listen to on Purpose. It means the world to me. I literally couldn't be happier when someone says to me, Jay, I listen to on Purpose. And I just want to give you a massive hug.
So even if I don't get to see you, if you're feeling that, I want to give you a big hug. I just wanted to know that, and I fully meander. I want to thank all of you you've been leaving amazing reviews for on Purpose. There are so many that I want to share with you. We now have over seventeen thousand, five hundred reviews. Our goal for this year is twenty thousands. So if you get a moment, please
please please leave us a review. Okay, so today's episode is all about red flags that you shouldn't ignore and our signs to take seriously. The reason I'm sharing this episode is I was sitting with a friend recently and she was telling me how she'd been with this guy for six months and all of a sudden he ghosted her. Another friend told me that she was engaged to be married to this guy and all of a sudden it
fell apart. And here's what's really really interesting. We always feel and we experience these things that they happen all of a sudden. When someone breaks up with you, doesn't it feel like I have no idea how that happened. When someone ends things, doesn't it feel like, wait, everything was perfect. When somethings fall apart, doesn't it feel like but that was going in the right direction. Rarely do we predict these moments. Rarely do we expect these moments.
But they seem to happen in that order time and time again, where we're always caught off God, we're always in a state of shock. Why is it that it always feels that way? That is why they say love is blind, because when we think we're in love, we become blind to the red flags. We become blind to the signs. And when someone breaks up with us or ends a relationship, that's when we start to become investigators and start noticing all the tiny details. But before that,
we ignored them. We didn't work through them, we didn't solve them, we didn't try to deeply understand them. So when I'm sharing these red flags with you today, I want you to see them more as a sign to stop and reflect. A red flag doesn't mean the end. A red flag means an opportunity to investigate, an opportunity to pause, take some time space and stillness to actually understand. And I say investigate first, and even before that, a red flag sparks inquiry. So in a relationship, when you
first meet someone, you just interested. Now, as time goes on, we have to become more inquisitive, not just interested, deeply understand. When we start to spot red flags or signs that worry us, we have to investigate, and of course, if things go too far, we may even have to interrogate.
So you notice the journey of understanding that ideally you go from being interested to being inquisitive and being intrigued, and your whole relationship is just inquiring about the other person, being interested in learning about them, which is how I feel with RADI. But if you see these signs, you see these red flags, you may have to take a moment. So I want to start off with a red flag. That's very interesting because it's often not perceived in that way.
But a red flag is when someone wants to fall in love too fast, they want to move in with you really quickly. They're talking about marriage, they're talking about a proposal, they're talking about whiskey your way. Now, this is pretty normal in our teens, when we're inexperienced, when we're immature, when we don't have the understanding of our emotions and the person were with. But when we do
this as adults. Even if you're listening to this and you say, well, our relationship worked out and we did all of those things, I would encourage you to still reevaluate whether you believe that that was healthy. I often say to rather that sometimes I feel we fell in love too quick and we got lucky, but we had to do the work anyway. And that's what relationships do, is that if you try and force something to be fast, a relationship will kick back and push back and ask
you to do that work anyway. And so that what happens when you try and skip work in a relationship, the relationship pushes you back to the level. So sometimes you're like, well, wait a minute, it was so good when we started. I felt like we were at a seven. Now we're at a three. It's because your relationship only actually got to a three. You experience some seven, and now you're being pushed back and asked to earn it.
It's almost like you had the cheat code in the beginning, you skipped a few levels of the game, and now the game saying wait, wait, wait, we caught your cheat code, and now you need to go back a few levels and earn this level of a relationship. So this term that's been used right now is love bombing. And it's interesting because the way therapists talk about it is that it's when someone makes you feel that you're dependent on them.
So you start thinking that if you don't keep up with your partner and if you pause, then there's something wrong with you. So if someone saying to you, but but how you feel it I feel it, Let's just do it. You feel the same thing I feel right. You want to do this too right, you want this too right, and it's almost like you're being forced or impressed stepan to live at a certain pace. I always encourage everyone to live at the pace of love. That means to live it a pace that you love yourself.
It means to live it a pace that you love life. That doesn't mean that there's no discomfort. It doesn't mean that you don't welcome challenges, but you're able to reframe your mind to approach them differently. But you don't want to fall in love too fast. You don't want to be pushed into moving in too fast. If someone's talking about weddings on the first day, that is something to investigate because you know as well as they do, you barely know each other. Marriage is a lifelong commitment. I'll
give an example. If you ever want to buy a house. You may fall in love with a house the moment you see it, but then you're meant to do certain checks. You do a mold test, you do a soil test, a test on the plumbing, the wiring, and then when you do the test, you realize whether it's a good investment or not. I'll give an example. Rather and I fell in love with a home a few years ago, and we rented it, and we went to visit it a few times before we rented it. But the first
day we went there, we both loved it. Second day we went there, we both loved it. So we're like, this must be the home. Let's rent it. We rented it. The first day we moved in, and we arrived, the clock struck nine, and all we heard were frogs croaking really, really loud. We didn't realize that the surroundings of this home were so damp that we had frogs in our back garden that were croaking away. Now, some people loved the sound of frogs. They want to sleep to the
sound of frogs. Not me and Rady. But we got used to that and we still loved the house. Now, let me tell you a bit more. This house was pretty old, and it had a lot of cracks. It had a lot of holes that we didn't know about. We just already had character. And every night I would wake up at least three times thinking someone was inside my house, because there'd be an animal through the floorboards.
There'd be an animal outside the window. Now, when you're asleep, you can't tell the difference between an animal and a human, so when you hear steps, you wake up an anxiety. I would hear animals in the floorboards every night, outside the window, knocking against the window throughout the day. One day we even had a snake slither through the home. So now you're wondering, January, how did you fall in love with this house? We both love nature, we both
loved being outdoors. But what I'm trying to say to you is that the more we live there, the more we learned about it. We realize the work it required, and we chose not to make that our long term home because of the work it required. But if you asked me that on the first day that I moved there, whether that could be my long term home, I would have said yes. And this is what we do in relationships. We go to a home and we go I love it. We find a person, we say I love them, They're amazing,
they're perfect, They're just what I've been looking for. And then as we spend more time with them, we start to discover the cracks, We start to discover the weeds, and then the question we have to ask ourselves is do I want to work with this? Do I want to invest in this? Do I want to develop this? If the answer is yes, that's your relationship and if it's not, and if it is, you have to live
with it. I remember we had contractors come out. We were thinking about buying this home, and I had contractors come out and walk me through what it would take to resurrect this property that we loved. And oh, my gosh, not just was it incredibly expensive, not just was it tiring, not just was it exhausting to think about what needed to be done, it would have taken years. And I tapped out. I said, I can't do this. I'm not patient enough, I don't have the time. That's not what
I want to focus on. I want to focus on on purpose. I want to focus on my purpose. I want to focus on my career. I want to focus on our relationship. I want to be able to go on vacations, and I don't want to get lost trying to do this. So this is that second principle from the idea of falling in love too fast. When we investigate, we really start to understand what this is going to require. And the red flag in a relationship is when we go, oh, I don't need to investigate. Oh no, no, we're good.
We're good. We don't need to ask questions. No, no, no, I don't need to know that about them. Oh no no, I'm not interested in their past. Oh no, no, I'm not interested in that about them. Were this feeling that everything's new and everything's fine. That's what we did in the house. We're like, oh, but it's beautiful. There's so much sunlight. Oh it's stunning. Right. And I'm not telling you to be negative or spot the mistakes. I'm asking you to be aware of what work this is going
to require if this is going to be real. The third thing that I want you to spot out as a sign is when someone talks about all their past relationships negatively or as their partner's fault. What does this mean? It means they have not learned from their partner. If someone only sees all their past relationships falling apart as a sign of their partner being insane, crazy, or weird, it means they have not been a reflective individual. I'm
not saying that their X wasn't crazy. I'm not even saying that their ex didn't cause problems in the relationship. But what I'm saying is can they reflect Do they have the capacity to discuss their past relationship in a way that shows what they've learned, how they've matured, and how they've grown Now. Often someone will say, look, I'm not ready to talk about it yet because I don't think I fully processed it. That's a healthier answer than oh my gosh, yeah he was crazy, she was insane.
They were so intense, because what's happening here is they're not going to know how to process the lessons from the past to aidial relationship. They're not going to know their mistakes. They may not have the capacity to understand that now. I started to realize this when I was applying for jobs as an employee, but also when I became an employer. I would often sit down with a respective employee and ask them the question what excites you about this job right now? What is it that is
interesting to you about this job right now? Or how I usually start a job interview, which is why is this job right for you right now? And why are you right for this job? And that's kind of the question you're asking in relationships, because relationships aren't just about two people, they're also about timing. And so the question you're really asking is why are we right for each other? And why are we right for each other right now? And so hiring someone is very similar to being in
a relationship with them. And it's fascinating to me because I'd say fifty percent of the time the answer was I don't like my current job. And that is a real telltale sign about someone's motivation. If someone's motivation to be with you is because they don't want to be where they are, chances are they're not making that decision based on real quality intention. If someone says to me, Jay, yeah, like the reason why this is right for me right now is I'm just bored at my current workplace. I'm
not getting anything out of it. Notice they could say, Jay, what I'm really excited about is the opportunities here. I'm excited for the ability to grow with you and grow with your team. Notice the difference. Now, I'm not saying it's a technique. I don't want someone to lie to me. I'm happy when people are honest with me. And actually, if someone's honest with me and tells me that their
workplace isn't great. I'll be like, I want to help you in a different way, like I want you to find a way out, but I need to know you want to be with me, not that you don't want to not be where you are. A healthy relationship is not existing because you don't want to be where you are. A healthy relationship exists because you're with me because you
want to be with me. And for so many people, their decision making is relieving stress rather then creating joy, right, their intention, their focus is decreasing the pressure in their life rather than increasing the passion in their life. And that's the question you want to see when someone's with you. Are they just decreasing pressure because you're easier, you're nicer, you're supposedly they're telling you you're not insane, And that's
a step further. So the third idea was this idea of someone just describing all their excess as crazy or insane or that they were the problem, so they don't have the capacity to reflect. But then on top of that, are they also just with you because they didn't like being alone? And this is the kind of stuff you notice through their language, like oh, I'm just so glad to not be with that person anymore. I'm so glad
I don't have that in my life anymore. Rather than this is what I appreciate about you, this is what I really value about you. Notice how it's a negative skew versus a positive skew. A negative skew of the past is not as good as a positive skew to the future. Just because you're with someone who thinks you're better than their X doesn't mean that you are right for them or that that is a good fit. Right. So the fifth reason is they're not great at managing conflict. Again,
none of these signs are break up with them. They're the worst. We don't have these skills, we're not trained in these skills. But if someone doesn't handle your first conflict right, you've got to make that a priority to build if you want to invest in that relationship. Now, I'd be honest and say, when me and Rady first got together, I don't think I manage conflict right, and I don't think she managed conflict right. I think we
both didn't understand. And what I want you to understand about conflict is everyone has a different way of dealing with conflict, and the easiest way is to figure out how that person deals with conflict and if it's healthy. Now, I'll give an example. Right these way of dealing with conflict is being quiet and thinking about it. My way of dealing with conflict is talking about it and having a conversation. They are polar opposites. Both are healthy for
both of us. Anger is not healthy. You feeling unsafe is not healthy. When Riley doesn't talk to me, yes, do I feel upset or did I used to feel up Say yes, but I didn't feel unsafe. I didn't feel threatened. I may feel a bit insecure, but not unsafe or threatened. And similarly, if I wanted to talk about it and she didn't, she didn't feel unsafe or
threatened by me. It just felt uncomfortable. So what I would encourage you to do is figure out your conflict style very early on and recognize that people have different ways of dealing with conflict and that's okay. But as long as you don't feel scared or unsafe or threatened. I want to share with you the biggest news of the year. How many of you want to meditate? I can see your heads nodding I can see you raising your hands. I can see you saying, yes, Jay, I
really want to learn to meditate. How many of you would like to learn to meditate with me? Every single day? Now? I already know what the answer is because I know how many messages DMS reviews notes that I get saying Jay, I'd love to meditate with you. Last year, we took meditation to Instagram and I meditated for around forty days live and twenty million of you tuned in. Now I am taking that same focus, that same presence to Calm.
I've partnered up with Calm to release a new series called The Daily Ja, where you can meditate with me every single day for seven minutes to make it a real habit. I would love for you to come and join me and take part in building a really powerful meditation practice. And guess what We're going to do it together? Head over right now Atcalm dot com Forward slash jay
to get forty percent of a premium membership. That's Calm dot com Forward slash j. A really interesting red flag is when someone is highly touchy feely physical with you without your permission and when you are trying to create distance. So I find that a lot of people are trying to hold hands too early, they're trying to kiss too early,
they're trying to get wherever they can too early. And if you just keep laughing it off and smiling it off because you're still attracted to them or you think they're the one, or whatever it is, you're basically setting a boundary that says you can keep pushing boundaries and I will laugh it off. And unfortunately, that can escalate
pretty bad. That can get much more serious, much more quicker, And you don't want to land in a position where something bigger happens in a few years, something bigger happens in a few years, and you're wondering, well, how did that happen, Why did that happen, and why is that going on? And where did that come from? And I'm not saying it's your fault at all. I'm not saying
that that's ever condoned. I'm saying that you can set the right standard earlier in the relationship, right, I'm saying you can definitely, definitely, definitely set the right standard at the beginning of the relationship. Another interesting red flag is they make you feel bad for people being attracted to you,
they make you feel bad for their jealousy. There was this funny TikTok that went viral a while ago, and it was when a man and a woman in this case, in this scenario, were walking to their apartment and you hear a girl's voice that says, oh, I like your T shirt. And he says, oh, thank you. And they get inside and his girlfriend says, oh, I like your T shirt? Thank you? Like who are you? Like? Who is you know? And it's like you're getting made to
feel bad for people liking you. You're getting made to feel bad because that person feels jealous. So they're telling you like, why are you talking to that person? Or why why did you say hello back? Why did you respond to them when they were hitting on you? Of course, if you've flirted back, sure, but if you're normal back
in a normal human interaction. I someone complimented you and you said thank you, and someone makes you feel bad for saying thank you when you weren't flirting and that you have to be honest with yourself about, then that's a really unhealthy trait because now you're setting yourself up for being mistrusted and having someone who's being insecure now, how do you deal with that? Again, you don't just break up with someone. How do you deal with that?
You sit down with them and say, hey, where's this insecurity coming from? And they'll probably say, I'm not insecure, I'm not jealous. So that's not the question you ask them, right the question You say, hey, how can I make you feel secure in this relationship? How can I give you the feeling that I want to be with you? What is it that you need from me? And if they say I don't want you to talk to anyone ever else again, or if someone compliments you, then you'd say, well,
what does that mean? Because where is that coming from? Now? What I find is this is where it gets uncomfortable. If we're not trained to be coaches or therapists, it's really hard to guide our partners through this conversation without a getting personal, without a getting emotional. And this is where the person in your life needs to be open to forms of therapy, needs to be open to forms of coaching, needs to be open to these ideas, because if they're not open to it, that gets really tricky.
And I think that's why when someone is fully dependent on you for their mental health, their well being their emotional state. That is a tall order, and I think early on in the relationship, it feels really good to be wanted to be someone guide and someone's coach and someone's at home therapist. But you've also good to resist that temptation. Sometimes it feels good to save someone and
you have to give up that savior mentality. You have to give up that desire to be wanted in that way because that's going to set the standard that this person just runs to you when they need you, right, that this person just runs to you when they need anyone. So really, you want to help that person set up the right structure for supports. You want to say, okay, look, I see that this is a recurring thing in your life. I think you need a trainer. I think you need
a therapist. I think we should help you find this. And they're more likely to listen to you if they see you surrounding yourself with coaches as well. See, people are not happy to take advice when they don't see you taking your own advice. And this is why giving advice is really good, because then you're to take it yourself. I really believe that the advice I give I'm going to try to take myself and it's not always easy, right, It's not always easy. I fail every day. I make
mistakes every day. But I'm trying. And as long as you're trying, people will be happy to see you try and they will also try. But if people don't see you trying, it's going to be really hard for them to consider how this fits in this one. I find really fascinating. When I read about Steve Jobs and his biography by Walter Isaacson, who we've also had on the podcast, I learned about something which is a term called RDF reality distortion field. It's when someone distorts reality to suit
their narrative. I when you say to someone, hey, you remember when this happened. I didn't appreciate you did this, and they go that never happened, and you say, no, it definitely happened. I mean I know two other people and they're like, that didn't happen, Like that's not true. They make you doubt what you just said. You may say, oh, I just heard you say you know your girlfriend's name.
I just said you say your boyfriend, your ex boyfriend's name, and they're like, no, I didn't there was a scene in Entourage years ago. If you're an Entourage fan. Rather he's a huge Entourage fan. She made me watch it. There was a scene in Entourage where I believe the name of the characters Eric Eric Murphy, and he's dating a girl and he remembers Sloan, who's the girl he wants forever, And she says to him, she goes, you just said your ex girlfriend's name while we were kissing,
And he's like, no, I didn't, No, I didn't. That's just in your head. You're just hearing things, right. That is a seed of reality distortion field. But what reality distortion field is that person keeps lying or keeps portraying or playing a role for so long that they actually believe that that is reality. That's what's fascinating about reality distortion field. It's not just that someone is a liar. It's that they've repeated that lie so much that they
believe it's the truth. So when they talk to you, they talk to you as if it's a matter of fact. They talk to you as if that is it. And so you have to look out for those seeds. Is if you're being pushed back on your reality and your experience, and you're not allowed to have that, if you're not allowed to have a difference of opinion, if you're not allowed to think differently. And by the way, this applies to you too, all of these apply to you. How
many of you are listening to this list? Going, Jay, I do this to people? Am I a red flag? And it's like, no, you're not a red flag? But we all do things like this, and that's what I'm saying. It's not about breaking up with someone, It's about being aware so we can build through. I really hope this episode has helped you today. I really hope you're going to pass it on to someone who's just started dating, maybe who's single, maybe he's just come out of a breakup.
It will help explain so much of what they're going through and experiencing in life. And I really really think it's going to benefit a lot of people, So please pass it on. Thank you so much for listening today. I'm going to read a few reviews and I'm going to say your names, so make sure you leave reviews
with your names. This one is from Karen Rizzl. Jay, You've really gotten me through a couple of tough years being seventy one and retired is challenging at times, but getting through scary health issues with my husband Ron along with COVID has been hard at times. So I've thrown myself into cooking healthy meals, listening to your podcast while I walk, and I'm spending as much time outside appreciating
nature and it's repeating wonders. Thanks for your constant encouragement. PS. Even with this health scare, my husband is listening to you two and has continued his Zoom classes on writing and critiquing. You've boosted us both, helping us to know that you have to keep pushing on. I love that. Thank you so much. This is from Jana. I'm a new listener, but I've enjoyed the conversation. Thank you for making us dive deeper into an issue and realizing our potential.
I enjoy listening to at least one a day. I find myself starting my day with one and reflecting throughout the day. Thank you for being you. Keep it off means so so much to me. And this is from Janice. This podcast made me think and start making decisions on what I really want. Jay, I'd learned so much from your experiences. Guests, and I am very grateful. Thank you for all those five star reviews. Make sure you leave one too, and I'll see you next time. Thanks everyone,