Why We Choose the Wrong Romantic Partners | Dr. Richard Schwartz & Dr. Andrew Huberman

00:00:00.000 | Why do people select people that are fundamentally bad for them?

00:00:08.280 | OK, so I did a book called You're the One You've Been Waiting For, and in it I talked

00:00:15.360 | about this whole issue.

00:00:17.240 | And so for a lot of people, you get hurt by your parent, and there are parts that want

00:00:27.160 | to protect you from your parent, but there are other parts who are desperate, who took

00:00:31.460 | on the worthlessness from being rejected by your parent, and are desperate for redemption.

00:00:36.800 | Do you follow this?

00:00:39.480 | And so as you leave and you're looking for a partner, that part from a subconscious place

00:00:48.980 | can influence your decision to find somebody who resembles that parent in their effort

00:00:54.620 | to be redeemed again.

00:00:56.760 | Is this anything like the repetition compulsion that we tend to repeat a pattern over and

00:01:03.720 | over again as an attempt to resolve, not just a manifestation of dysfunction?

00:01:09.840 | That's a version of what I'm talking about.

00:01:12.440 | And so you find somebody who does resemble that person, that parent, and unfortunately

00:01:17.560 | they do resemble that parent, and so they'll hurt you in the same way.

00:01:22.320 | And then your protectors go into one of four modes, they'll say, "I've got to change that

00:01:29.040 | person back into who they're supposed to be," so they'll try to change the person's behavior,

00:01:35.600 | or they'll say, "I've got to change myself so they'll be who they're supposed to be,"

00:01:41.520 | or they'll say, "Oh, this wasn't the Redeemer after all," and they'll go looking for the

00:01:46.420 | real Redeemer who's still out there.

00:01:49.680 | As always, inside.

00:01:50.680 | And, yeah, that's what I try to do, is to help them see that that Redeemer is inside

00:01:55.640 | of them, it's self.

00:01:58.160 | And if we can go to that exile who's got this thing for this parent-like person and help

00:02:04.840 | it connect to self and help it unburden, that whole repetition compulsion disappears, because

00:02:13.520 | now they can take care of themselves.

00:02:17.080 | They trust self to do it, they don't need that from some other person like that.

00:02:23.240 | And so when we're working with couples, and you always find some version of that in couples,

00:02:28.600 | if we can get each of them to become their own good attachment figure, good caretaker

00:02:34.800 | inside, that frees up the partner, because when this exile is leading the relationship,

00:02:43.360 | your partner feels a lot of sort of demands, or feels a lot like your partner has to take

00:02:49.740 | care of that young part of you, and can't, can't fully do it.

00:02:53.720 | So there's always this sense of, oh, a burden, you know what I'm saying?

00:02:59.720 | Yeah.

00:03:00.720 | Yeah.

00:03:01.720 | It's so interesting how romantic relationships are where these patterns get repeated.

00:03:05.840 | And at the same time, numerous examples in my life of healthy relationships is that usually

00:03:13.000 | the case because people have done the work before, or because they had a minimum of trauma

00:03:18.840 | in their upbringing?

00:03:19.840 | Both.

00:03:20.840 | Yeah.

00:03:21.840 | Yeah.

00:03:22.840 | What percentage of kids, adults as well, do you think had a minimum of trauma, are just

00:03:30.080 | because of the way they're wired, and the way this stuff is organized within them, that

00:03:34.240 | they naturally attach to a good partner and are pretty healthy?

00:03:39.560 | Is it like 25%, 30%?

00:03:42.280 | Is it--

00:03:43.280 | I really can't say because my sample is very skewed.

00:03:46.720 | I'm working with psychotherapy patients who always have a lot of trauma.

00:03:52.520 | So I really can't say.

00:03:54.480 | I mean, I'm very biased.

00:03:57.880 | Half of marriages in this country end in divorce.

00:04:02.880 | And presumably of the ones that don't, I'm guessing somewhere between a half and a quarter

00:04:11.080 | of those people are really unhappy.

00:04:17.640 | Sounds so pessimistic.

00:04:18.640 | But if you just look at the numbers, and I'm an optimist, I already acknowledge that I

00:04:22.400 | don't like to think about bad stuff.

00:04:25.120 | So yeah, I'm guessing that a lot of people repeat these patterns.

00:04:32.880 | But it seemed as if maybe 20, 30 years ago, because these ideas weren't discussed really.

00:04:40.840 | So many fewer people were in any kind of analysis or personal exploration work, that as a society,

00:04:50.160 | we defaulted to just sort of role execution.

00:04:55.160 | You're a father and a husband, so you do certain things.

00:04:58.120 | And you don't do certain things.

00:05:00.080 | You're a wife and a mother, so you do certain things, and you don't do certain-- and so

00:05:02.800 | on.

00:05:04.860 | And I think nowadays, there's a lot of discussion about is there a resurgence of organized religion

00:05:12.320 | because we've drifted so far from these kind of core structures?

00:05:16.080 | I mean, love your thoughts on that.

00:05:19.840 | And also what you think doing this kind of internal work on oneself without requiring

00:05:24.880 | any input or participation from another, what the value of that is.

00:05:29.360 | It sounds like there's tremendous value to just doing this work for oneself, maybe with

00:05:34.740 | someone trained in IFS.

00:05:36.420 | Yeah.

00:05:37.420 | I mean, like I was saying, there's a lot you can do with working with your protectors and

00:05:43.000 | helping them get to know self.

00:05:46.200 | We didn't do it, but had you asked that titanium teddy bear how old it thought you were and

00:05:56.040 | just really waited for the answer, most people will get a single digit.

00:06:01.920 | It still thinks you're very young, and it still thinks it has to protect you the way

00:06:06.720 | it did when you were very young.

00:06:09.300 | And just even updating it creates a huge amount of relief with these protectors.

00:06:16.080 | So there's a lot that can be done just by working with protectors, introducing them

00:06:20.280 | to self, helping them see they don't have to keep doing this all the time.

00:06:25.840 | Some protectors, it's very hard for them to totally drop their weapons until what they

00:06:30.620 | protect has been healed.

00:06:33.240 | So that's where the therapist comes in.

00:06:39.320 | There are coaches doing this work, for example.

00:06:42.960 | They'll work with some executive, and they'll do great, and then they'll get to an exile.

00:06:49.960 | And then they'll have the person see an IFS therapist for a couple of sessions to heal

00:06:54.520 | the exile and then come back, because coaches aren't trained as therapists.

00:07:01.960 | So yeah, there's still need for therapists, but you can do a lot on your own.

00:07:10.960 | [MUSIC PLAYING]

Why We Choose the Wrong Romantic Partners | Dr. Richard Schwartz & Dr. Andrew Huberman

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