Don't Commit to a Partner Before Asking These 6 Questions - Matthew Hussey

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Matthew Hussey presents a framework for evaluating relationship health through six critical self-reflection questions, drawing inspiration from discussions found on Reddit and his own personal experiences with heartbreak. The first five inquiries challenge listeners to assess whether they feel fulfilled rather than merely less lonely, if they can be their unapologetic selves without modification, and if they are in love with their partner's current reality versus an idealized version of them. A particularly poignant question asks if one would want a future child to date someone like the partner or raise that child knowing only the parent's habits and values. Hussey expands on this by suggesting another vital consideration: imagining a scenario where you have passed away, leaving your child solely in the care of their other parent; asking whether that prospect brings relief or worry is essential for understanding if one truly supports their partner as a guardian figure. The discussion delves deeply into the psychological traps that keep people in unhealthy relationships, specifically addressing the concept of "inheritance" from long-term toxic partnerships and the sunk cost fallacy. Hussey explains how individuals often feel they have lost themselves by folding into shapes to please others, leading them to fear leaving because their current self feels diminished compared to who they were before entering the relationship. This dynamic is exacerbated by loss aversion, where people believe that exiting a situation means losing value or being unable to undo past mistakes made for the sake of redemption. He illustrates this with an analogy involving lobsters and riptides, noting how instincts trained in survival—like swimming straight back against a current when it's too strong—are often counterproductive; similarly, relationship instincts may scream "stay" even when intuition warns that one is being dragged into danger or treated poorly. Hussey distinguishes clearly between instinct and intuition to help listeners navigate these internal conflicts. While instincts are immediate survival responses that can be misleading in complex social situations—such as boxing trainers advising against blinking at the right moment despite natural reflexes—intuition serves as a deeper voice indicating fundamental incompatibilities or mistreatment. He argues that people often make their partners into either angels on pedestals or demons with excessive power, which distorts reality and prevents healing. Instead of viewing an ex-partner as uniquely powerful enough to have revealed something specific about oneself, he suggests recognizing them merely as one of many potential catalysts who ignited issues already present within the individual. This perspective shifts the focus from blaming external forces to addressing internal patterns that need correction today. The narrative is punctuated by a personal anecdote where Hussey describes having a dream during his worst heartbreak about reconciling with an ex, only for the nightmare of their previous toxic dynamics to resume immediately upon reunion in the dream's logic. This experience marked a profound shift for him, as he realized that even amidst severe pain and self-doubt regarding his worth, there was a sense of relief simply at not having to endure specific anxieties anymore. He emphasizes that while therapists may initially focus on soothing acute emotional wounds rather than questioning why someone stayed so long, eventually the conversation must turn to what actually occurred in the relationship to ignore intuition. Ultimately, Hussey concludes that addressing these revealed flaws immediately is a blessing; it allows individuals to stop personalizing past pain and instead use those revelations as stepping stones toward finding healthy love, proving they are not further behind but rather forewarned about their own needs moving forward.

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I found on Reddit five questions to ask yourself if you're unsure about your relationship. >> Okay. >> Number one, if someone told you you're a lot like your partner, would this be a compliment to you? Number two, are you truly fulfilled or just less lonely? Number three, are you able to be unapologetically yourself or do you feel the need to show up differently to please your partner? >> It's a good one. Number four, are you in love with who your partner is right now as a whole? Or are you only in love with their good side, their potential, or the idea of them? And number five, would you want your future or imagined child to date somebody like your partner? >> These are good questions. Those are good questions. I think as well, would you here I think this is a good one. If you and your partner had a child and then you died and your child was going to be raised by them and only them with all of their habits, values, behaviors, would would that worry you or would you feel like that was a problem or would you be super happy with it? >> Wow. Yeah. Like are you basically hoping that your future parenting you're going to act as a gatekeeper or as a magnifier? It's like well you know I'll be there so I'll be able to protect them from the parent or I'm happy to get the [ __ ] out of the way because they're much better than I am. They're a much better person than I am. There was another one that uh I read this year that I thought was so [ __ ] interesting, which was question to ask yourself if you're unsure about your relationship. If you could wake up tomorrow morning and the relationship was over without you having to say it to them, would you feel relief or would you feel wistfulness? H I always remember having a dream about someone that I was at the time really heartbroken over. [gasps] And it was like the moment I realized something had truly shifted in me that meant I was better. And in because in the dream we got like we got back together >> and then within five minutes of getting back together in the dream the same things that made my life hell [laughter] in the relationship were happening again. >> Yeah. >> And I suddenly in the dream thought what have I done? Like I've made a terrible mistake here. Why did I why did I go back? Why am I back in this situation? And I woke up and I realized the nightmare was was being back. The nightmare wasn't, >> you know, having, you know, been heartbroken. And that that was a very it was a very prof I'm not big on dreams, don't get me wrong, but I'm that was a very profound moment for me to realize like, oh, I'm I'm finally like my brain has switched and I but I do even remember even in the midst of the worst heartbreak of my life, I do remember a sense of relief. And I don't I I I don't want to say for one second I wasn't in the worst pain because I was in terrible pain and I was questioning myself. I was questioning my worth. I was like in a dark place. But I still remember feeling a sense of relief when I thought I don't have to continue to feel the way that I did >> because I was so anxious. I was like a version of me that I really didn't not just didn't like, but that I didn't, you know, it it was a version of me that was like the worst possible version of me in many ways. >> And I felt this sense of relief that no matter what, even if this is the worst heartbreak ever, I don't have to I no longer have to feel that anxiety. M >> I'm now deeply deeply heartbroken in its place, but I don't have to feel that anxiety. >> Definitely one of the pains I think that people feel the sort of odd kind of inheritance of a relationship that went on too long when you knew that you should have left is the sentence and the worst thing of all is I lost myself. Mhm. >> You know, because the relationship is now over, but there is this weird inheritance that future single you has gotten from the relationship which is this weird parasite or or you know uh pattern that was a part of that. And unfortunately because of how long you have tried to fold yourself into a shape to make this person happy, you have left. But the shape that you're in has remained in part. And I think that the knowledge of that, the knowledge that well, I don't think that I am the person that I was when I got into this relationship anymore, a person who I preferred to the person that I am now, is another motivation for not leaving. Because you say, "Well, I'm not even me." Because that's more sunk cost fallacy. That's more loss aversion, right? And you go, "Well, when I get out of this, I can't even do the things that I did to get myself into this." So, like, my value, maybe my stock is decreased, but worst of all, my stock is decreased because of something that that person did to me. So, I'm going to get them to redeem me. [laughter] I always remember I don't even know I don't know Jordan Peterson's work very well but I always remember hearing something or reading something about the lobsters. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> And the what was what is it? A defeated lobster sort of gets it's like affected afterwards. I had a that gave me like this invasive thought >> that like yeah this like what if and I am the lobster >> that now is like you know there's some I I now walk away as this permanently sort of >> scarred thing. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Little red crustation. The the the [laughter] weird thing is I think people people have this fear that leaving is going to make them lonely. But in relationships where most of your time is spent questioning whether or not this is the right relationship, you're already alone. You're already alone in this relationship. And leaving is the first step to stopping that. >> And and that will bring on the the you know all of those feelings will come to a kind of crescendo at that point. And you know there'll be heartbreak to go through and all of that. And you know any any good coach or therapist when someone is going through the most acute heartbreak is not going to start by saying why did you let that go on for so long. [laughter] They're going to they're going to start by >> just treating the the wound like let's let's we have to get you back to a you know a feeling of safety again of you know getting lessening this acute uh pain that you're feeling. But at a certain point the question will come somewhere down the line. What happened there? like what was now that we're in a better place, what actually happened in that situation? You know, what was going on that made you ignore your intuition? Um, by the way, not instincts. Instincts and intuition are different. >> How do you distinguish those? >> Your intuition might be telling you something's not right. like some this isn't I shouldn't be treated like this or I should be in a relationship that's not this hard or whatever your intuition can tell you that your instincts as my boxing trainer used to say will get you killed >> cuz your instinct might be I feel unsafe try harder I you know I I I'm not getting love try harder do more stay in it instincts are what tell you when you get sucked out by a rip tide in the ocean to swim straight back to shore and the riptide's stronger than you so you die. The the your instincts won't tell you swim take a longer p you already feel like you're going to die. Take a longer swim back. Swim sideways parallel to the ocean or to the shoreline and then swim around once you're out of the tide. Your instincts won't tell you that. Your instinct instincts in boxing don't tell you to slip. Your instincts in boxing tell you to blink right at the time where you need to have your eyes. So it's in a relationship we all most of us at least have some bad instincts that have been trained and those instincts get us into a lot of trouble and they and actually it's not your instincts aren't necessarily you listening to yourself or that deeper voice. your instincts are actually often what get in the way of that deeper voice and stop you protecting yourself. >> So I to to add some compassion and some comfort to to that idea that you know we get into this thing and then I'm afraid to leave because I don't want to be the version of me that is like realizes I've now lost myself and I'm like feel like I'm starting from further behind and all of that. I think in many ways we shouldn't focus on the person that has become the object of all of this anxiety and cortisol and you know fight or flight. we should instead see them as a kind of like a revealer of something like there's some something was already there in me and that could have been ignited by 10 different people like this and if it wasn't going to be ignited by this person there's a very good chance it was going to be ignited by somebody else and in a way it might be a blessing that it got ignited by this person this year than someone 10 years from now. Because if this draws my attention to some like it's not our I want to be very clear about something. I'm not saying it's our fault when someone treats us poorly, but when we ignore certain behaviors, when we continue to put ourselves in the firing line, it's worth it's it's in some ways powerful to know, okay, that revealed that that showed me that I now it's not that I'm further behind. It's that I got it became revealed exactly where I am. And now that I know that, that's beautiful. I know forearm forewarned is forearmmed. I now know that that's going something happened to me there instead of personalizing it which actually makes this person too powerful. I shouldn't make this person that powerful. They're not that powerful. In our love lives, we have a tendency to to make people into angels and and demons. >> You know, they're either the angel on the pedestal that can do no wrong, and that's false. or they're the demon that has like got so much power over us because of, you know, the way they've hurt us and what they've become and that gives them way too much power as well. I think instead it's like, no, let me take both of you off that pedestal and and give you a lot less respect and instead realize that all all you were was the person that I met along the way that revealed something that was already there in me. And you're not so powerful that only you could have revealed that. There's a thousand people that could have revealed that about me. I But what I do now get to do is address that. And me addressing that today might be the thing that actually allows me to find healthy love. A quick aside, you've probably heard about PAS, the forever chemicals that are in your non-stick pans and food packaging and drinking water and probably your testicles. Studies say they might be linked to hormone disruption, infertility, and even cancer. In fact, 97% of Americans have detectable levels of PAS in their blood right now and probably their testicles. Good news. Function just introduced PAS testing as an add-on for members. On top of the over 100 biomarkers that they already track twice a year, hormones, heart levels, nutrient levels, they now look at the microplastics in your testicles. 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