November 1, 2024 • 22 mins
Have you ever felt like success affected your dating life?
Have you ever felt judged for your level of ambition?
Today, Jay addresses the insecurities some men may feel when partnered with highly driven women, shedding light on societal conditioning and personal growth. discusses how societal expectations traditionally placed men in provider roles, which can lead to an unease when faced with a partner who exemplifies drive and independence.
Jay also delves into recent studies, such as the "Clooney Effect," showing that most men actually value intelligence and confidence in their partners. By examining these narratives, Jay dispels myths that successful women are inherently intimidating to men. Instead, he encourages ambitious women not to diminish their goals but to seek partners who celebrate and complement their journey.
In this episode, you'll learn:
How to embrace your ambition without guilt
How to address insecurities in your relationship
How to balance mutual respect and personal ambition
How to seek partners who uplift, not compete
How to identify and avoid unhealthy relationship roles
True partnership means valuing each other's journey, working through insecurities together, and building a foundation where both people can grow freely and authentically.
With Love and Gratitude,
Jay Shetty
What We Discuss:
00:00 Intro
00:49 Are Men Less Attracted to Successful Women?
05:15 Men Have Had to Play the Protective Role
06:48 The Negative Dating Mindset You Should Stop Having
13:04 Have an Understanding of What Both are Pursuing
14:29 Are You Making Your Partner Feel Insecure?
18:29 What Makes You a Healthy Partner?
21:04 Respect Each Other’s Ambitions
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Some men are less attracted to successful women because they've
been told that they need to be more successful. So
as soon as they meet someone who shows qualities that
they don't have, motivation, discipline, drive, enthusiasm, they get worried,
they get concerned. It's a reminder of their own inadequacy.
(00:21):
It's an insecurity and let's recognize that there are some
men are less attracted to successful, driven women and they're
not the right person for you. The number one health
and wellness podcast set Jay SETI. Hey, everyone, welcome back
to On Purpose. It's your host, Jay Shetty, and I
(00:44):
am so grateful to be here with you right now.
Thank you so much for tuning in. And today's question
that we're reflecting on and asking is are men less
attracted to successful women? If your ambitionous and driven and dating,
this episode is for you. If you have a friend
who's single right now who's been thinking about this question,
(01:07):
this episode is for you. And if you're someone who's
maybe been in a relationship, maybe you're even divorced, this
episode could be for you. I think so many people
are thinking about this topic right now, not enough people
are speaking about it outwardly, and it's uncomfortable to actually
dive into it. Like, even when I was thinking about
making this the episode, I was somewhat scared about it
(01:31):
because I didn't want it to be misconstrued or misunderstood.
And so I want you to stay with me because
I'm definitely going to be explaining why I thought it
was important to ask this question. And the biggest reason
why I think it's important to ask this question is
this is how some of the women in my life
have been feeling. These are friends of mine who are
(01:53):
dating right now, are single right now, are looking for
love right now, They're looking for a meaningful connection, and
this kind of sation keeps coming up. Now, I'm guessing
you might have had this conversation with your friend, maybe
you've thought about it, maybe you've even quizzed some of
your male friends in your life about it. And the
reason why I chose it for this week's topic is
(02:14):
I was talking to he a friend this week and
she was saying she spoke to a couple of guys
in the last month, and she's young, she's ambitious, she's driven,
she's very kind, very thoughtful, and so it got me thinking.
She said she met a guy her age who after
going on a few dates, he was vulnerable enough to
(02:34):
say to her that he was intimidated by her drive
and would rather be with someone a little more chill.
He actually said that he felt threatened that he didn't
have that drive and may never have it, even though
she never expected it from him and never asked for it. Now,
(02:55):
first of all, kudos to that man who was able
to be that vulnerable. It takes a lot of courage
to be that vulnerable, to put yourself out there in
that way to admit that, and so I want to
show respect for that, first of all. And the second
thing I want to say is, maybe a lot of
you have heard something like this for a while. Maybe
you've had men say it to you, maybe you've found
(03:17):
out through a friend of a friend afterwards, maybe it's
a thought that crossed your mind. Now, that was one
guy that she spoke to. She then said that she
was at a dinner a couple of nights ago and
she overheard a conversation someone was having with a successful founder.
He was single and looking, and when asked what he wanted,
(03:39):
he said he wanted an ambitious homemaker. And she found
both of these interactions in close proximity to be a
bit deflating. So the young man that she was dating
was around the same age as her. He was saying
that she was too intimidating because of her drive. And
then she was overhearing this other conversation where this very
(04:00):
successful man was saying he wanted someone who was going
to be a homemaker and didn't have their own drive,
And so it left her with the question are men
less attracted to successful or maybe even just driven women
who want to create something? Now, I want to point
out that when we're looking at this, this for me
(04:23):
isn't about hating on men or hating on women or
trying to make either one look bad. I think this
conversation is about learning to understand why we are where
we are in what circumstances this is true or false,
real or not, and what do we do about it? Right?
I think a lot of conversations focus on like, oh, well,
(04:44):
all men are bad, and you know, women don't do
this and men do, and it's like, I don't want
to do that. What I want to do is have
a really healthy, thoughtful, intelligent conversation around what's going on here.
So the first thing we have to understand is that
some some men are less attracted to successful women and
(05:04):
they're not your man. And the reason why this is
a really important thing to talk about is that there
may be some men whose ego is affected by a
more driven successful women. Now let's talk about why that
is the case. I'm not saying it's a good thing,
and I'm not saying it's right, but why is that
the case. The case is because traditionally men have had
(05:25):
to play that protective, supporting role. They've been the one
who's had to go out and put food on the table.
They've been the primary breadwinner of the family. So a
lot of men are carrying around a pressure, an expectation
of them that society is placed on them, and then
(05:48):
they're projecting it into this relationship. So it's not necessarily
projected personally onto you. It's projected because that's how society
has convinced us that we need to be. And so
some men are less attracted to successful women because they've
been told that they need to be more successful. So
(06:09):
as soon as they meet someone who shows qualities that
they don't have, motivation, discipline, drive, enthusiasm, they get worried,
they get concerned, it's a reminder of their own inadequacy.
It's an insecurity and if a man goes as far
as admitting that to you, it's definitely not something to
(06:29):
demean or put down, and it's not something you have
to date either. I'm not saying, you know, you should
feel sorry for that person and date. Then. What I'm
saying is, let's look at why we're here, how we
got there, and let's recognize that there are some men
are less attracted to successful, driven women and they're not
the right person for you. Now, it's important to note
(06:51):
that the mindset men are less attracted to successful driven
women is actually an unhealthy mindset. When we repeat idea
like that, we're repeating a negative, unhelpful thought which leads
to our unhealthy mindset, which makes us feel that there
is no man for me that exists unless I diminish
(07:14):
my drive, unless I become less successful. And I would
honestly say that when I look around my friends who
are in happy relationships today, they all want it to
be with smart, thoughtful women. And I think there is
a difference between someone who's smart and smart and driven.
There is a difference. And I would say that a
(07:35):
lot of my friends enjoy being with driven, ambitious women,
and they're also driven ambitious men. What I want to
encourage you to do here is that mindset of maybe
this guy doesn't exist, Maybe I need to slow down,
Maybe I need to, you know, become different, maybe I
need to change. I don't think that's the case. And
there was a great article by Jenna Birch in Psychology Today,
(07:56):
and she talked about a study where after looking in
to the mating preferences of more than five thousand men
and women in a survey, an anthropologist named Helen Fisher
wrote that she saw something called the Clooney effect in America. Now,
this article was in twenty eighteen, and the research found that,
(08:17):
according to Fisher's numbers, men desire smart, strong, successful women,
and eighty seven percent of men said that they were
data women who was more intellectual than they were, who
is better educated, and who made considerably more money than
they did, while eighty six percent said they were in
search of a woman who is confident and self assured.
(08:40):
So it's just really important to point that out that
sometimes I think we developed these narratives based on our
few data points, and we all have confirmation bias where
we also have another friend who went through the same thing,
and now all of us are saying the same thing,
and guess what, it makes us reduce our poor even more.
We now go out look looking for who's going to
(09:01):
confirm that belief, right, That's what happens. We kind of
look to who confirms our belief. Let me give you
a really simple example about this. If you're thinking of
getting a specific car that you really like, you're now
looking for other people to confirm that belief and say,
oh my god, I really like that car too. So
we're constantly looking for people to confirm our beliefs. And
(09:22):
so we may surround ourselves with a group of people
who all say men are just not attracted to successful,
ambitious women, and we keep reaffirming that belief when the
study shows the opposite. And it's interesting. It's called the
Clooney effect, of course, because George Clooney with a male
who's extremely talented, smart, ambitious, thoughtful, And it's just an
(09:43):
interesting thing that we often see these rumors or doubts
we have spread faster than some of the statistics that
come out for it. Now, it is important to note
because I thought it would be interesting to look at
the facts of what's happening as well. And when I
was looking it up, it said that back in nineteen seventy,
only eleven percent of Americans twenty five or older had
(10:06):
bachelor's degrees. That number has gone up every decade to
roughly thirty eight percent in twenty twenty one, according to
the data from the Census Bureau's current Population Survey, and
the jump since twenty ten has been especially sharp. This
research said, and one of the big drivers has been
that more women are completing their four year degrees, and
(10:30):
in the last decade, women surpassed men in college completion.
So when you look at it from a college perspective,
and I appreciate that college isn't the only way to
show ambition or success. There are plenty of people who
are not going to college and doing exceptionally well, but
to use it as a marker, we're seeing that women
are completing degrees more than men. In twenty twenty one,
(10:53):
the Census found that the number of women with degrees
was about three points higher than the figure for men,
is thirty nine point one percent for women compared to
thirty six point six percent for men, and The reason
why that's so incredible is that back in nineteen seventy,
about eight percent of twenty five plus women had bachelor's degrees,
(11:15):
and that was six points below where American men were
at the time. So the insane rise of women being
educated and completing their degrees has had a huge impact
very recently, and it's something that I think a lot
of men are having to mentally catch up with. I
(11:35):
think that's the point, right, It's like there's been consensus
in society around roles. There's been a thought process around roles,
and all of those are being questioned rightly, so, all
of those are being looked at and reevaluated rightly. So,
but what's happening is that it's taking a while for
people to catch up with that, for people to understand that.
(11:56):
To give you an example as to how far behind
we are compared to where the age education is. In
twenty twenty two, female founded companies received two percent of
all venture capital investment. Let me just say that again.
In twenty twenty two, female founded companies received only two
percent of all venture capital VC investment. Female founded femtech
(12:20):
companies received twenty eight percent of venture capital funding compared
with thirty eight percent for male founded femtech companies. So
the reason I'm talking about this is for us to
realize how society is shifted maybe a narrative, maybe in
us asking the right questions, maybe in us having the
right thoughts, but it hasn't yet shifted mentally, emotionally, and
(12:46):
it hasn't yet shifted financially. And so when you look
at that, we have to realize that when you're out
there dating and you're finding some confirmation of the belief
that men are less attracted to successful women, you may
find it because there's all of these reasons as to
why it's been set up that way. One thing that
I think is really really important to note. I think
(13:09):
it's really important to be with someone who has the
right balance between you. Don't want someone who's threatened by you.
That doesn't lead to a healthy relationship. Maybe you saw
the movie fair Play last year on Netflix. If you haven't,
I recommend watching It showed what happens in a relationship
with confused roles and competition and insecurity and where that leads.
(13:34):
And I mean it shows a very dark version of
where that can lead to. But often those are the
emotions that people are feeling inside. But at the same time,
you don't want someone who just wants to bask in
your glory. Right, It's a really interesting balance that you're
looking for. You don't want someone who's like basking in
your glory and just you know, a groupie, And at
the same time, you don't want someone who's threatened by
(13:57):
it either. I think what we're all looking for is
someone who allows us to be our best self, who
appreciates us, who acknowledges it. But what that requires is
both people to have an understanding of what they're both pursuing.
In my book Eight Rules of Love, I have a
dedicated chapter to this, and if you haven't read the book,
you can grab a copy on Amazon or wherever you
(14:19):
get books. I have a whole chapter dedicated to how
to find your purpose and how to help your partner
find their purpose at the same time. And one of
the hardest parts about this is that when you start
pursuing something and if it's not working, and your partner's
pursuing their thing and it's working, the natural feelings we
(14:40):
have even towards someone we love is jealousy, envy, competition.
Now you may say you don't have it, and that's beautiful,
that's amazing if you don't have it. But I promise
you a lot of people do. They feel insecure, they
feel unsettled, and it comes all from us feeling like
we want to do something great with our life, but
maybe we don't have the tools, maybe we don't have
(15:02):
the motivation. And often what's really uncomfortable in that moment
is your partner's dissatisfaction with you. Your partner is saying
to you like, oh my god, why aren't you doing
it yet? Look what I did. Oh my gosh, you
need to get up off your backside. I achieved more
in a month than you have in your year. When
(15:22):
your partner looks down on you, we've got to make
sure that whatever gender we are, it's not really about
what role we play. It's about how we make the
other person feel. So we have to ask the question,
are we making the other person feel more insecure? Not
by our greatness, but by how we make them feel
(15:42):
about our greatness. You can be great, and you can
be brilliant, and you can either choose to inspire people
with that or you can choose to discourage people with that.
And if you have expectations, and you're telling people that
you're not happy with where they are or how much
they've achieved. And I had a friend admit this to
me a few months back, where she said she was
with a guy and she constantly reminded him how far
(16:05):
behind you was to her. That, of course, is not
an encouraging place to start from. And at the same time,
you can't be someone's parent, coaching them along the way,
cheerleading them the whole way. It's a really interesting balance.
But I will say this, often the way we support
our partner is different. You may support your partner in
their career, they may support you mentally and emotionally. We
(16:27):
may not support the person we love in the same
area they support us, and that's okay, That's totally fine.
For example, like Raddy came up to me when she
was asking me questions about her book, and as I'd
launched two books before she launched her first one, I
had a lot to share. So in that area, Raddi's
not helping me with my book. When it comes to
(16:48):
setting the right tones, setting the right mood in the home,
setting the right energy, I let Radi lead on that.
So we have to understand that leadership comes in many
different forms. Partner may lead financially, but you may lead emotionally.
Your partner may lead physically are you taking care of
the physical things in the home, But you may lead
(17:09):
mentally are you making decisions? So I think it's really
important to realize what leadership is and what you're looking for.
Sometimes people say to me, I want to be with
someone really ambitious and they are ambitious too, And I say, okay,
well do you know what that looks like, because that
isn't the person who's sitting front row at your event
hearing you on. If you want to be with someone ambitious,
chances are they going to be on the road too.
(17:31):
If you want to be with someone who's killing it
their career, chances are there's going to be a lot
of late nights. They're not always going to have loads
of time for you. And neither of those is better
or worse. But it's about being honest with what you
want and what that means you attract. I think that
it takes time for people to find their stability, and
when you're making someone feel insecure, no matter how much
(17:52):
you try lift them up, if they are not doing
the work to lift themselves up. There's only so much
you can do, and so as much as we can
play that role, we can't take the responsibility to be
the person that lifts someone up. We can be a supporter,
we can be a cheerleader, we can't do the work
for them, and I think sometimes some of us feel
(18:15):
that if we do the work for them, they'll suddenly
get it. But the truth is we can't, and so
we need to empower them. But we need to empower
ourselves as well, and that can be the hardest part
about all of this. One of the things I want
to say is that I found another interesting study, and
it said that in this study of one hundred and
(18:37):
five men, the researchers gave two scenarios. The first scenario,
they told men that a woman close by who they
never saw either outperformed or underperformed them on an intelligence test,
and the men said that they would like the person
who outperformed them on the test. In the second round,
(19:01):
men were told that they were about to meet a
woman who did better than them on the test, and
at that time men choose not to meet that woman.
So it's really interesting. Men said they were attracted to
a smarter woman. But then when they were told that
they were about to meet them, that was a much
more challenging scenario. That was a much more challenging thing
(19:23):
for them. And so if you're with someone, or if
you're dating someone and you see them and you like
them and they're not as ambitious and driven as you,
it's up for you to decide how important that is
for you. But the qualities that this person has and
what they bring to a relationship. Remember, career ambition isn't
all anyone brings to a relationship, male or female, whoever
they may be. There's so much more we bring to
(19:45):
a relationship, and career ambition doesn't define whether you have
a successful relationship or not, or an unsuccessful one. Right,
It's almost disconnected from the actual success part. I think
what I look for when I encourage people to look
for is what do you think is going to make
(20:06):
someone a successful partner? What do you think is going
to make people a healthy partner? If you focus on that,
chances are the rest will figure itself out. One of
the things that comes to mind is I'm talking about
this with all of you. You're trying to find someone
who's going to be a partner. And what a partner
means is you support them on some things, they support
(20:27):
you on others. What you don't want to be as
a parent, and what you don't want to be as
a child. You don't want to be the child of
the relationship where you're expecting someone else to parent you
and build you up all the time. And you don't
want to be the parent in a relationship where the
other person's a child. But a partnership means we're willing
to help each other, We're willing to support each other.
And I think it's important early on to figure out
(20:49):
whether the threatening and the intimidation is something. If you
keep feeling that, you also have to ask yourself, am
I attracting the right man? I working towards the right person?
Beyond beyond whether it's a male or a female as well.
I want to end on this last point, and it's this,
we should respect our partner's ambitions, they should respect ours,
(21:12):
and we should be excited to watch each other grow.
This requires such a high level of maturity because when
you actually say I want to watch you grow, that
means you're okay with however they grow. And most often
we want people to grow the way we want them
to grow. And so a successful relationship requires a flexibility
and adaptability and openness to who that person wants to become.
(21:35):
And that's very unsettling for most people. For most people,
we want certainty, we want clarity, we want ease, we
want comfort, and a real, healthy, long term relationship evolves
far more than that, and so I think it's important
to remember that, first of all, don't make career ambition
the only thing you look for in a relationship. Don't
(21:57):
make it your sole identity either. Look for traits that
make people a healthy partner, and ultimately recognize that growing together,
being tolerant of each other in some areas, as long
as it's not hurting you, is part of any healthy
relationship and building something special together. Thanks so much for
listening to this episode. I hope it helped you rethink
(22:18):
this idea, and I hope that it helps you have
healthier conversations with the people you know and love. Remember this,
I'm forever in your corner and I'm always rooting for you.
If you love this episode, you'll love my interview with
Dr Gabor Matte on understanding your trauma and how to
heal emotional wounds to start moving on from the past.
(22:40):
Everything in nature grows only where it's vulnerable. So a
tree doesn't grow, Oh, it's hard and thick, does it.
It goes where it's soft and green and vulnerable.
Some men are less attracted to successful women because they've
been told that they need to be more successful. So
as soon as they meet someone who shows qualities that
they don't have, motivation, discipline, drive, enthusiasm, they get worried,
they get concerned. It's a reminder of their own inadequacy.
(00:21):
It's an insecurity and let's recognize that there are some
men are less attracted to successful, driven women and they're
not the right person for you. The number one health
and wellness podcast set Jay SETI. Hey, everyone, welcome back
to On Purpose. It's your host, Jay Shetty, and I
(00:44):
am so grateful to be here with you right now.
Thank you so much for tuning in. And today's question
that we're reflecting on and asking is are men less
attracted to successful women? If your ambitionous and driven and dating,
this episode is for you. If you have a friend
who's single right now who's been thinking about this question,
(01:07):
this episode is for you. And if you're someone who's
maybe been in a relationship, maybe you're even divorced, this
episode could be for you. I think so many people
are thinking about this topic right now, not enough people
are speaking about it outwardly, and it's uncomfortable to actually
dive into it. Like, even when I was thinking about
making this the episode, I was somewhat scared about it
(01:31):
because I didn't want it to be misconstrued or misunderstood.
And so I want you to stay with me because
I'm definitely going to be explaining why I thought it
was important to ask this question. And the biggest reason
why I think it's important to ask this question is
this is how some of the women in my life
have been feeling. These are friends of mine who are
(01:53):
dating right now, are single right now, are looking for
love right now, They're looking for a meaningful connection, and
this kind of sation keeps coming up. Now, I'm guessing
you might have had this conversation with your friend, maybe
you've thought about it, maybe you've even quizzed some of
your male friends in your life about it. And the
reason why I chose it for this week's topic is
(02:14):
I was talking to he a friend this week and
she was saying she spoke to a couple of guys
in the last month, and she's young, she's ambitious, she's driven,
she's very kind, very thoughtful, and so it got me thinking.
She said she met a guy her age who after
going on a few dates, he was vulnerable enough to
(02:34):
say to her that he was intimidated by her drive
and would rather be with someone a little more chill.
He actually said that he felt threatened that he didn't
have that drive and may never have it, even though
she never expected it from him and never asked for it. Now,
(02:55):
first of all, kudos to that man who was able
to be that vulnerable. It takes a lot of courage
to be that vulnerable, to put yourself out there in
that way to admit that, and so I want to
show respect for that, first of all. And the second
thing I want to say is, maybe a lot of
you have heard something like this for a while. Maybe
you've had men say it to you, maybe you've found
(03:17):
out through a friend of a friend afterwards, maybe it's
a thought that crossed your mind. Now, that was one
guy that she spoke to. She then said that she
was at a dinner a couple of nights ago and
she overheard a conversation someone was having with a successful founder.
He was single and looking, and when asked what he wanted,
(03:39):
he said he wanted an ambitious homemaker. And she found
both of these interactions in close proximity to be a
bit deflating. So the young man that she was dating
was around the same age as her. He was saying
that she was too intimidating because of her drive. And
then she was overhearing this other conversation where this very
(04:00):
successful man was saying he wanted someone who was going
to be a homemaker and didn't have their own drive,
And so it left her with the question are men
less attracted to successful or maybe even just driven women
who want to create something? Now, I want to point
out that when we're looking at this, this for me
(04:23):
isn't about hating on men or hating on women or
trying to make either one look bad. I think this
conversation is about learning to understand why we are where
we are in what circumstances this is true or false,
real or not, and what do we do about it? Right?
I think a lot of conversations focus on like, oh, well,
(04:44):
all men are bad, and you know, women don't do
this and men do, and it's like, I don't want
to do that. What I want to do is have
a really healthy, thoughtful, intelligent conversation around what's going on here.
So the first thing we have to understand is that
some some men are less attracted to successful women and
(05:04):
they're not your man. And the reason why this is
a really important thing to talk about is that there
may be some men whose ego is affected by a
more driven successful women. Now let's talk about why that
is the case. I'm not saying it's a good thing,
and I'm not saying it's right, but why is that
the case. The case is because traditionally men have had
(05:25):
to play that protective, supporting role. They've been the one
who's had to go out and put food on the table.
They've been the primary breadwinner of the family. So a
lot of men are carrying around a pressure, an expectation
of them that society is placed on them, and then
(05:48):
they're projecting it into this relationship. So it's not necessarily
projected personally onto you. It's projected because that's how society
has convinced us that we need to be. And so
some men are less attracted to successful women because they've
been told that they need to be more successful. So
(06:09):
as soon as they meet someone who shows qualities that
they don't have, motivation, discipline, drive, enthusiasm, they get worried,
they get concerned, it's a reminder of their own inadequacy.
It's an insecurity and if a man goes as far
as admitting that to you, it's definitely not something to
(06:29):
demean or put down, and it's not something you have
to date either. I'm not saying, you know, you should
feel sorry for that person and date. Then. What I'm
saying is, let's look at why we're here, how we
got there, and let's recognize that there are some men
are less attracted to successful, driven women and they're not
the right person for you. Now, it's important to note
(06:51):
that the mindset men are less attracted to successful driven
women is actually an unhealthy mindset. When we repeat idea
like that, we're repeating a negative, unhelpful thought which leads
to our unhealthy mindset, which makes us feel that there
is no man for me that exists unless I diminish
(07:14):
my drive, unless I become less successful. And I would
honestly say that when I look around my friends who
are in happy relationships today, they all want it to
be with smart, thoughtful women. And I think there is
a difference between someone who's smart and smart and driven.
There is a difference. And I would say that a
(07:35):
lot of my friends enjoy being with driven, ambitious women,
and they're also driven ambitious men. What I want to
encourage you to do here is that mindset of maybe
this guy doesn't exist, Maybe I need to slow down,
Maybe I need to, you know, become different, maybe I
need to change. I don't think that's the case. And
there was a great article by Jenna Birch in Psychology Today,
(07:56):
and she talked about a study where after looking in
to the mating preferences of more than five thousand men
and women in a survey, an anthropologist named Helen Fisher
wrote that she saw something called the Clooney effect in America. Now,
this article was in twenty eighteen, and the research found that,
(08:17):
according to Fisher's numbers, men desire smart, strong, successful women,
and eighty seven percent of men said that they were
data women who was more intellectual than they were, who
is better educated, and who made considerably more money than
they did, while eighty six percent said they were in
search of a woman who is confident and self assured.
(08:40):
So it's just really important to point that out that
sometimes I think we developed these narratives based on our
few data points, and we all have confirmation bias where
we also have another friend who went through the same thing,
and now all of us are saying the same thing,
and guess what, it makes us reduce our poor even more.
We now go out look looking for who's going to
(09:01):
confirm that belief, right, That's what happens. We kind of
look to who confirms our belief. Let me give you
a really simple example about this. If you're thinking of
getting a specific car that you really like, you're now
looking for other people to confirm that belief and say,
oh my god, I really like that car too. So
we're constantly looking for people to confirm our beliefs. And
(09:22):
so we may surround ourselves with a group of people
who all say men are just not attracted to successful,
ambitious women, and we keep reaffirming that belief when the
study shows the opposite. And it's interesting. It's called the
Clooney effect, of course, because George Clooney with a male
who's extremely talented, smart, ambitious, thoughtful, And it's just an
(09:43):
interesting thing that we often see these rumors or doubts
we have spread faster than some of the statistics that
come out for it. Now, it is important to note
because I thought it would be interesting to look at
the facts of what's happening as well. And when I
was looking it up, it said that back in nineteen seventy,
only eleven percent of Americans twenty five or older had
(10:06):
bachelor's degrees. That number has gone up every decade to
roughly thirty eight percent in twenty twenty one, according to
the data from the Census Bureau's current Population Survey, and
the jump since twenty ten has been especially sharp. This
research said, and one of the big drivers has been
that more women are completing their four year degrees, and
(10:30):
in the last decade, women surpassed men in college completion.
So when you look at it from a college perspective,
and I appreciate that college isn't the only way to
show ambition or success. There are plenty of people who
are not going to college and doing exceptionally well, but
to use it as a marker, we're seeing that women
are completing degrees more than men. In twenty twenty one,
(10:53):
the Census found that the number of women with degrees
was about three points higher than the figure for men,
is thirty nine point one percent for women compared to
thirty six point six percent for men, and The reason
why that's so incredible is that back in nineteen seventy,
about eight percent of twenty five plus women had bachelor's degrees,
(11:15):
and that was six points below where American men were
at the time. So the insane rise of women being
educated and completing their degrees has had a huge impact
very recently, and it's something that I think a lot
of men are having to mentally catch up with. I
(11:35):
think that's the point, right, It's like there's been consensus
in society around roles. There's been a thought process around roles,
and all of those are being questioned rightly, so, all
of those are being looked at and reevaluated rightly. So,
but what's happening is that it's taking a while for
people to catch up with that, for people to understand that.
(11:56):
To give you an example as to how far behind
we are compared to where the age education is. In
twenty twenty two, female founded companies received two percent of
all venture capital investment. Let me just say that again.
In twenty twenty two, female founded companies received only two
percent of all venture capital VC investment. Female founded femtech
(12:20):
companies received twenty eight percent of venture capital funding compared
with thirty eight percent for male founded femtech companies. So
the reason I'm talking about this is for us to
realize how society is shifted maybe a narrative, maybe in
us asking the right questions, maybe in us having the
right thoughts, but it hasn't yet shifted mentally, emotionally, and
(12:46):
it hasn't yet shifted financially. And so when you look
at that, we have to realize that when you're out
there dating and you're finding some confirmation of the belief
that men are less attracted to successful women, you may
find it because there's all of these reasons as to
why it's been set up that way. One thing that
I think is really really important to note. I think
(13:09):
it's really important to be with someone who has the
right balance between you. Don't want someone who's threatened by you.
That doesn't lead to a healthy relationship. Maybe you saw
the movie fair Play last year on Netflix. If you haven't,
I recommend watching It showed what happens in a relationship
with confused roles and competition and insecurity and where that leads.
(13:34):
And I mean it shows a very dark version of
where that can lead to. But often those are the
emotions that people are feeling inside. But at the same time,
you don't want someone who just wants to bask in
your glory. Right, It's a really interesting balance that you're
looking for. You don't want someone who's like basking in
your glory and just you know, a groupie, And at
the same time, you don't want someone who's threatened by
(13:57):
it either. I think what we're all looking for is
someone who allows us to be our best self, who
appreciates us, who acknowledges it. But what that requires is
both people to have an understanding of what they're both pursuing.
In my book Eight Rules of Love, I have a
dedicated chapter to this, and if you haven't read the book,
you can grab a copy on Amazon or wherever you
(14:19):
get books. I have a whole chapter dedicated to how
to find your purpose and how to help your partner
find their purpose at the same time. And one of
the hardest parts about this is that when you start
pursuing something and if it's not working, and your partner's
pursuing their thing and it's working, the natural feelings we
(14:40):
have even towards someone we love is jealousy, envy, competition.
Now you may say you don't have it, and that's beautiful,
that's amazing if you don't have it. But I promise
you a lot of people do. They feel insecure, they
feel unsettled, and it comes all from us feeling like
we want to do something great with our life, but
maybe we don't have the tools, maybe we don't have
(15:02):
the motivation. And often what's really uncomfortable in that moment
is your partner's dissatisfaction with you. Your partner is saying
to you like, oh my god, why aren't you doing
it yet? Look what I did. Oh my gosh, you
need to get up off your backside. I achieved more
in a month than you have in your year. When
(15:22):
your partner looks down on you, we've got to make
sure that whatever gender we are, it's not really about
what role we play. It's about how we make the
other person feel. So we have to ask the question,
are we making the other person feel more insecure? Not
by our greatness, but by how we make them feel
(15:42):
about our greatness. You can be great, and you can
be brilliant, and you can either choose to inspire people
with that or you can choose to discourage people with that.
And if you have expectations, and you're telling people that
you're not happy with where they are or how much
they've achieved. And I had a friend admit this to
me a few months back, where she said she was
with a guy and she constantly reminded him how far
(16:05):
behind you was to her. That, of course, is not
an encouraging place to start from. And at the same time,
you can't be someone's parent, coaching them along the way,
cheerleading them the whole way. It's a really interesting balance.
But I will say this, often the way we support
our partner is different. You may support your partner in
their career, they may support you mentally and emotionally. We
(16:27):
may not support the person we love in the same
area they support us, and that's okay, That's totally fine.
For example, like Raddy came up to me when she
was asking me questions about her book, and as I'd
launched two books before she launched her first one, I
had a lot to share. So in that area, Raddi's
not helping me with my book. When it comes to
(16:48):
setting the right tones, setting the right mood in the home,
setting the right energy, I let Radi lead on that.
So we have to understand that leadership comes in many
different forms. Partner may lead financially, but you may lead emotionally.
Your partner may lead physically are you taking care of
the physical things in the home, But you may lead
(17:09):
mentally are you making decisions? So I think it's really
important to realize what leadership is and what you're looking for.
Sometimes people say to me, I want to be with
someone really ambitious and they are ambitious too, And I say, okay,
well do you know what that looks like, because that
isn't the person who's sitting front row at your event
hearing you on. If you want to be with someone ambitious,
chances are they going to be on the road too.
(17:31):
If you want to be with someone who's killing it
their career, chances are there's going to be a lot
of late nights. They're not always going to have loads
of time for you. And neither of those is better
or worse. But it's about being honest with what you
want and what that means you attract. I think that
it takes time for people to find their stability, and
when you're making someone feel insecure, no matter how much
(17:52):
you try lift them up, if they are not doing
the work to lift themselves up. There's only so much
you can do, and so as much as we can
play that role, we can't take the responsibility to be
the person that lifts someone up. We can be a supporter,
we can be a cheerleader, we can't do the work
for them, and I think sometimes some of us feel
(18:15):
that if we do the work for them, they'll suddenly
get it. But the truth is we can't, and so
we need to empower them. But we need to empower
ourselves as well, and that can be the hardest part
about all of this. One of the things I want
to say is that I found another interesting study, and
it said that in this study of one hundred and
(18:37):
five men, the researchers gave two scenarios. The first scenario,
they told men that a woman close by who they
never saw either outperformed or underperformed them on an intelligence test,
and the men said that they would like the person
who outperformed them on the test. In the second round,
(19:01):
men were told that they were about to meet a
woman who did better than them on the test, and
at that time men choose not to meet that woman.
So it's really interesting. Men said they were attracted to
a smarter woman. But then when they were told that
they were about to meet them, that was a much
more challenging scenario. That was a much more challenging thing
(19:23):
for them. And so if you're with someone, or if
you're dating someone and you see them and you like
them and they're not as ambitious and driven as you,
it's up for you to decide how important that is
for you. But the qualities that this person has and
what they bring to a relationship. Remember, career ambition isn't
all anyone brings to a relationship, male or female, whoever
they may be. There's so much more we bring to
(19:45):
a relationship, and career ambition doesn't define whether you have
a successful relationship or not, or an unsuccessful one. Right,
It's almost disconnected from the actual success part. I think
what I look for when I encourage people to look
for is what do you think is going to make
(20:06):
someone a successful partner? What do you think is going
to make people a healthy partner? If you focus on that,
chances are the rest will figure itself out. One of
the things that comes to mind is I'm talking about
this with all of you. You're trying to find someone
who's going to be a partner. And what a partner
means is you support them on some things, they support
(20:27):
you on others. What you don't want to be as
a parent, and what you don't want to be as
a child. You don't want to be the child of
the relationship where you're expecting someone else to parent you
and build you up all the time. And you don't
want to be the parent in a relationship where the
other person's a child. But a partnership means we're willing
to help each other, We're willing to support each other.
And I think it's important early on to figure out
(20:49):
whether the threatening and the intimidation is something. If you
keep feeling that, you also have to ask yourself, am
I attracting the right man? I working towards the right person?
Beyond beyond whether it's a male or a female as well.
I want to end on this last point, and it's this,
we should respect our partner's ambitions, they should respect ours,
(21:12):
and we should be excited to watch each other grow.
This requires such a high level of maturity because when
you actually say I want to watch you grow, that
means you're okay with however they grow. And most often
we want people to grow the way we want them
to grow. And so a successful relationship requires a flexibility
and adaptability and openness to who that person wants to become.
(21:35):
And that's very unsettling for most people. For most people,
we want certainty, we want clarity, we want ease, we
want comfort, and a real, healthy, long term relationship evolves
far more than that, and so I think it's important
to remember that, first of all, don't make career ambition
the only thing you look for in a relationship. Don't
(21:57):
make it your sole identity either. Look for traits that
make people a healthy partner, and ultimately recognize that growing together,
being tolerant of each other in some areas, as long
as it's not hurting you, is part of any healthy
relationship and building something special together. Thanks so much for
listening to this episode. I hope it helped you rethink
(22:18):
this idea, and I hope that it helps you have
healthier conversations with the people you know and love. Remember this,
I'm forever in your corner and I'm always rooting for you.
If you love this episode, you'll love my interview with
Dr Gabor Matte on understanding your trauma and how to
heal emotional wounds to start moving on from the past.
(22:40):
Everything in nature grows only where it's vulnerable. So a
tree doesn't grow, Oh, it's hard and thick, does it.
It goes where it's soft and green and vulnerable.
Host
Jay Shetty
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