What do you look for in a partner?
What do you think makes a relationship interesting?
Today, let's talk about the disparity between what people say they want in a partner — traits like kindness, empathy, and thoughtfulness — and what they often find themselves attracted to, which may be more superficial qualities like physical attractiveness.
Jay references research from the Pew Research Center to highlight that 35% of men value physical attractiveness most in women, while 33% of women value honesty and morality most in men. He discusses how societal pressures and media influence shape these preferences and often lead people to prioritize the wrong traits, which can result in unsatisfying relationships.
Additionally, Jay addresses the issues of men looking for nurturing qualities in women, sometimes in an unhealthy, maternal sense, and the pressure on men to achieve professional and financial success. He also touches on the societal expectations and challenges faced by successful women who feel they need to downplay their achievements to attract partners.
In this episode, you'll learn:
How to identify cover values in a partner
How to balance attraction and values
How to avoid common relationship pitfalls
How to build a connection based on values
How to foster a healthy relationship
By focusing on qualities like kindness, empathy, and honesty, we can build deeper, more meaningful connections. True compatibility goes beyond physical attraction and societal expectations, it's rooted in shared values and mutual respect.
With Love and Gratitude,
Jay Shetty
What We Discuss:
00:00 Intro
02:26 What Is More Important to Us in a Partner?
04:44 #1: Physical Attractiveness
05:16 #2: Honesty and Morality
08:37 #3: Empathy, Nurturing, Kindness
15:30 #4: Professional, Financial Success
18:49 #5: Intelligence
23:06 Looking for Love in the Wrong Places
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
There's a lot of talk about mindfulness these days, which
is fantastic. I mean, we all want to be more
present and self aware, more patient, less judgmental. We discuss
all these themes on the podcast, but it's hard to
actually be mindful in your day to day life. That's
where Calm comes in. I've been working with Calm for
a few years now with the goal of making mindfulness
(00:22):
fun and easy. Calm has all sorts of content to
help you build positive habits, shift yourself talk, reframe your
negative thoughts, and generally feel better in your daily life.
So many incredible options from the most knowledgeable experts in
the world, along with renowned meditation teachers. You can also
check out my seven minute daily series to help you
(00:43):
live more mindfully each and every day. Right now, listeners
of On Purpose get forty percent off a subscription to
Calmpremium at Calm dot com Forward slash j that's Calm
dot com Forward slash jay for forty percent off Calm
your Mind, Change Life. We say we want those things,
but when we experience in reality, a lot of people
(01:05):
will say, Oh, they're so kind, they're so sweet, but
they're boring, and then the other person who's not kind
and sweet, they're exhilarating. It's a really weird contrast in
how we say we want someone who's kind, we want
someone who's thoughtful, but then when we experience them reality,
it's not fun. There's no chemistry, there's no spark right,
and then we often go for the person who's not kind,
(01:28):
not nurturing, not empathetic. What I'm getting at here is.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
The number one health and wellness podcast set. Jay Shetty s.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Hey, everyone, welcome back to you On Purpose. I'm your host,
Jay Shetty. Thank you so much for turning up for yourself,
for turning up to the On Purpose show. I am
so grateful that you're here with me right now now.
If you're single and you're trying to figure out how
to find your person in this episode is for you.
(02:03):
If you're recently single and you're trying to figure out
what's going wrong, what mistakes are making This episode is
for you. And even if you're dating someone, even if
you're married, but you're trying to figure out how to
deepen your connection, how to understand more. Maybe you're even
questioning whether you're with the right person. This episode is
(02:25):
for you. I want to dive in to some really
interesting research today, and the research comes from the Pew
Research Center, and it talks about what men most value
in women and what women most value in men.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Now, I have to come clean with you.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
To start off with, last night, my wife, my brother
in law, and my sister in law made me watch
my first ever episode of Love Island. I think it's
season six of the USA. The of the show. I'd
never watched an episode before in my life. And again,
today's episode is not inspired by that by any means,
(03:09):
but it was just fascinating to me as to how,
after years and years of research, technological advancement and everything else,
and even just seeing what works and what doesn't work,
what we focus on about other people is so limited
and so limiting. And it led me to go down
this rabbit hole when I was thinking about this episode
(03:32):
today and researching for the episode and asking myself, what
is it that we say is most important to us
in a potential partner? But then how do we get
carried away with what we're attracted to? Right? Let me
say that again, what is the difference between what we
say is important to us in a partner? And then
(03:54):
how do we get carried away with what we get
attracted to. And I think what I was originally thinking
about was this idea that we almost know what's good
for us, but we want what's bad for us. Right,
we know what's good for us, but we'll ignore all
(04:16):
of that. If there's something attractive, if there's something shiny,
if there's something exciting, if there's something invigoring, we're willing
to give up all of our good common sense. Now
let's actually look at the research. This was what traits
or characteristics do you think people in our society are
(04:37):
most attracted to?
Speaker 2 (04:39):
So what do you think.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Men value most in women? Number one thing that came out?
What do you think it is? It was thirty five
percent said physical attractiveness is the most important thing they
value in a woman. I'm not surprised by that, and
I think think you hear that a lot, you see
(05:02):
that a lot. I think that has led to so
many challenges in our society where there's so much pressure
on appearance, there's so many enhancements of appearance, like it
all becomes about that.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Now.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
When women were asked what they most value in men,
what do you think that was? Thirty three percent said
honesty and morality. Now that's a really interesting one because
I think you end up watching videos on TikTok and
on social media and you see everyone talking about how
the height is the most important thing, the back balance
(05:37):
is the most important thing, which we'll get to in
a second. We're talking about who's paying on the first date.
It's really interesting what cultural conversations spiral online versus what
we say in a questionnaire, and I feel like there's
a disconnect there. I think what's really interesting to me
is you could go down this list and have someone
take a lot of it and then find them. Not
(06:00):
that you find them unattractive, but they don't take this
really artificial box like someone's height doesn't define the quality
of your relationship.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
It just doesn't, right.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
It's almost like saying I will drink a bottle of
water because it's taller than the other bottle, but they
both have the same amount of water in it. If
you have two bottles and they both have five hundred
millimeters of water in it, but one's taller, one shorter,
you choose the taller one. But it doesn't change your
experience of the water. It doesn't change your experience of drinking,
(06:37):
it doesn't change the quality of the water within. And
I think for so many of us who have been
burned in relationships, who constantly feel that we're going after
the wrong thing, how many of you can relate to
that where you keep saying, Jay, you know what, I
just keep picking the wrong person. I keep tripping myself up.
I know I keep making mistakes. It's because we're focusing
(06:59):
on the taller bottle of water.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
So I want to ask you, what is your tall
bottle of water? Right? What is that trip up for you? Right?
Speaker 1 (07:08):
What is that thing that keeps, like Mahamad Ali said,
the pebble in your shoe?
Speaker 2 (07:15):
Right?
Speaker 1 (07:15):
What is that that keeps giving you that discomfort, that
keeps tripping you up, that keeps making you make the
wrong decision because we say one thing, but then we
follow the other. I'm not saying that physical attractiveness is
not important. I think you should be attracted to your person.
But I think sometimes we create artificial, superficial, very limited
(07:36):
and limiting criteria that doesn't really allow us to find love.
And I think a lot of that criteria comes from
what we were trained in, conditioned to believe was attractive
when we were younger. Right when we were younger, we
saw certain things on the front cover of magazines, we
saw certain body types in movies and TV shows, we
(07:59):
saw certain colors of skin that were exposed to through media,
and we build up desires, We built up ideas and
visions of what a person should be. But I think
so often we're looking at criteria that doesn't impact the
quality of the experience, which is bizarre. There's so many
(08:23):
things in life where you would never assess it purely
based on a superficial metric that doesn't change the experience
of the product. Right now, number two of what men
most value in women, thirty percent said empathy, nurturing, kindness.
(08:48):
Now there's one thing I want to talk about because
I see this a lot. I see this with friends.
When a lot of men say nurturing, they often want
a mum in their partner. I'm just going to put
it out there. I had to say it because I
think so many individuals struggle with growing up, and I
(09:10):
think there's a lot of talk about women and daddy issues,
but there's not a lot of talk about men and
mummy issues. And it's this idea of I want someone
who is nurturing, but in a very maternal way, like
I want them to take care of me. I want
them to take care of the house. I want them
to do what my mom did. I want them to cook.
I want them to And it's not just the gender roles,
(09:31):
but there's this false expectation. And I think what's really
interesting about that is a lot of people being naturally nurturing,
naturally empathetic, naturally kind kind of see it as beautiful
because it's a way of being needed, it's a way
of being wanted, it's.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
A way of being useful.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
But I think we have to really look at that
in what we desire and what the other person is
willing to deliver on. And again I go back to it,
do we want a partner who's equal, excited and curious
or are we really looking for someone to take care
of us? Because if we're looking for someone to take
care of us, it ends up leading to the relationship
(10:09):
we don't want. We then say, oh, well they're not adventurous,
or well they're not interesting, or they're not passionate, and
it's like, well, yeah, because they're mothering or fathering you. Right,
if your partner is now your parent you're not going
to find them attractive. After a while, you're not going
to find them interesting. After a while, you're going to
find that they're annoying you, that they're on your case,
(10:31):
that they're holding you accountable. All the things that you
potentially are challenged by or resenting your parents, you now
project that onto your partner. So when we say things
like I want someone to be empathetic, nurturing, kind, let's
really look at what we mean by that. And I
actually think here's the thing. We say we want those things,
(10:53):
but when we experience in reality, a lot of people say, oh,
they're so kind, they're so sweet, boring, right, and then
the other person who's not kind and sweet, they're exhilarating.
It's a really weird contrast in how we say we
want someone who's kind, we want someone who's thoughtful, but
then when we experience them in reality, it's not fun.
(11:14):
There's no chemistry, there's no spark, right, and then we
often go for the person who's not kind, not nurturing,
not empathetic. What I'm getting at here is we know
we want people of high character and high value. We
want someone who has deep values. We want someone who
has values like honesty, kindness, morality, nurturing, both in men
(11:40):
and women. We've seen honesty and morality top one for women,
wanting in men, and empathy nurturing kindness number two in women.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
You've got all these.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Deep values that are right up then in what we want,
but we're so easily shifted away from our values. So
you ask me, Jay, why is that? Why is it
that I know what it's good for me, but I
choose what's bad for me? How many of you can
relate to that? Gee, I know what's right for me,
but why do I always choose what's wrong for me?
(12:10):
It's interesting, isn't It's a trick of the mind. The
mind has the ability to trick you. You know what's good
for you, but you'll still choose what's bad for you. You
know what's right for you, but you will choose what's
wrong for you. This happens because we become clouded. Our
(12:35):
vision becomes blurred, and ultimately love is blind. We get
blinded by the chemicals of the spark and of attraction
and of lust that literally blur our vision so that
we now no longer see the unfavorable elements of that individual.
(12:58):
This is true for the chemicals released during and after sex.
This is true for when we first feel that chemical
attraction to someone, we're actually emotionally vision impaired to notice
the things about someone that actually matter. And I've partnered
(13:19):
up with Match, which I'm really excited about as their
relationship advisor, because what I found is that dating apps
are not the problem the challenges of what we're focused
on and what we're looking at. If we don't understand
our values and we don't understand the other person's values
(13:39):
and they don't understand theirs and hours, it doesn't matter
how many other boxes we tick. If you're truly in
this for a successful relationship, if you're truly in this
for a real, deep partnership, I promise you the artificial,
superficial things are not going to be the ones that
make a difference.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Your values are.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Your knowledge, awareness, acceptance, and respect for someone's values are.
So I want you to head over to match dot com,
forward slash j if you want to match people through
value systems, through a deeper value connection. Again, I'm not
saying I want you to be attracted to the person.
I want you to think they're fun. I want you
(14:21):
to be excited, But I want us to pivot and
shift our mindset on for a moment, deprioritizing the things
that society, media, parents, and friends have told us to overvalue,
and shift more emphasis onto the things we've been made
to undervalue, like honesty, kindness, connection, empathy, these deep values
(14:49):
that are so critical to the success of a relationship. Right,
And we do this with everything right, There'll be debates
constantly between iPhone and Android users, people saying like, oh, well,
Android is more customizable, iPhones more the slickness, and again
we follow brand and it's true, right, like Android does
(15:12):
have and Samsung phones do have more functionality, but we
choose something that we think has a certain brand or whatever.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
It may be.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
And it's interesting how when you start doing that in love,
it has far bigger ramifications than with technology.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Number two of what women want in men, twenty three
percent said professional financial success. And I want to call
out this has caused a lot of stress and pressure
for a lot of friends, a lot of good men,
because I think we're again living in a society where
(15:50):
people are exposed to a world online of fast cars, jewelry.
You've got their high flying life and it can become
quite intimidating and quite challenging for people to think they
have to live up to that. And I know a
lot of good, hard working, honest men that are trying
(16:11):
their best, that are passionate about what they do, that
care about what they do, but they're being undervalued. And
I always like sharing this because to me, it makes
a huge difference. When I met Rady, materially, I didn't
have anything, and Raddi chose to be with me at
a time when I was still trying to pay off
(16:33):
my student debt and I didn't even have a job,
and I don't even thought she knew if I would
ever get anywhere externally to a certain level. But I
think the point was I had someone who believed in
me and saw that I wanted to grow. And I
(16:56):
think I want to point that out here. Which comes
third for women, which is nineteen percent ambition and leadership
women wanting in men, is that I truly believe that
ambition is something that is better to look for than
already achieved financial success. Someone who already has financial success
(17:19):
may want to pivot, They may even want to quit
their job to try something. By the way, someone else
who hasn't made it, Especially when you met someone young.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
They need to have time.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
And if that person feels pressure rather than believe, chances
are they'll buckle. Now, the other thing I'd like to
point out is whether you're a man or woman. These
are all themes that I think are across the board
for me. If you're looking for someone who's ambitious, you've
also got to understand from a value point of view,
what that trade is. So if you want someone ambitious,
(17:51):
chances are they won't be available all the time.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Right.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
You can't have someone ambitious and available. It doesn't work
that way. And I think a lot of us will
want someone who's ambitious, but then we'll say why they're
not available? Right, We'll say we want someone who's successful.
But then we're saying, well, why are they not, why
they're not messaging me, why they're not available this weekend,
(18:16):
why they're not up for hanging out, And it's like, well,
they're not living spontaneous, they're living structured. So we always
have to understand the value that we want in someone.
How does that value show up in reality. I think
we almost have these very one dimensional views of values, right,
Our one dimensional view of ambition is our someone who
has goals, someone who has dreams, but then we want
(18:37):
them to have dreams. But then we want them to
never work on their dreams because we want them to
be around. Right. It doesn't add up, and I think
we can have these very limited and limiting views of
what a true goal looks like. Now, the third thing
that men look for a woman, twenty two percent said intelligence.
And again, by the way, I am calling out all
(18:59):
sides of it because it's so interesting to me. I
have a lot of incredibly successful female friends who are
doing amazing entrepreneurs, building incredible companies, doing phenomenal stuff, and
they actually feel like their intelligence is intimidating. They feel
like their ambition is intimidating, and a lot of them
feel like they have to kind of lower themselves or
(19:22):
lower their standards, or make themselves feel less smart, less thoughtful, less,
you know, less accomplished in order to attract someone. Let
me say this, your partner who cares about you, who
values you, will admire your success. Now. I think there's
a difference also between admiring and being a fan, and
(19:46):
I think admiration is healthier than fandom. I think if
someone's a big fan of yours. It's hard to be
a partner, and sometimes we say, oh, my partner's my
number one fan. I want to be their number fan.
I mean, to be honest, I'd probably even say I'm
rather number one fan. And maybe I should take back
my statement now because I'm like, yeah, I am a
rather these number one fan. What am I talking about?
(20:07):
But I think the idea that there's an admiration for
what you do and there's a respect for what you do,
but you have to have that back for them whatever
they decide to be or whatever they decide to do.
And so if you are someone who feels like your
success intimidates people, or your success, you know, makes people
(20:28):
feel uncomfortable, chances are you're just speaking to the wrong
people because you shouldn't have to play down your success.
I know someone who constantly started to play down their
success whenever they were around someone to date them. They
complained about their life, they did all those things, and
then someone left them because they said they were too negative.
(20:50):
Now this person wasn't negative at all. So just imagine
that for a second. You're a positive, high functioning, high performer. Then,
in order to make yourself more relatable. You start talking
about your bad experiences and what's going wrong, and then
that person leaves you, not because you're intimidating, but because
(21:12):
they see you as uninteresting and complaining and negative. And
so I think you don't want to become someone you're not.
And there's this beautiful quote that I read from Arlin
was here the other day on Twitter, and it said
be yourself so that the people looking for you can
(21:34):
find you. And I think that's what that patience needs
to be. That I don't have to make myself smaller
in order to have a big experience of love.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
I don't have.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
To make myself less significant in order to find a
significant other. Let me say that again, you don't have
to make yourself less significant to find a significant other
because a significant other will recognize your significance and celebrate it.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
Now, I want to go down this list.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
For you so you know. So what women value most
in men? Nineteen percent said strength and toughness, eighteen percent
said hard work, good work ethic, eleven percent said physical attractiveness,
eleven percent said empathy, nurturing kindness, nine percent said loyalty, dependability,
eight percent said intelligence, five percent said being family oriented,
(22:35):
and five percent said politeness respectfulness. Notice how a relationship
is made up of loyalty, politeness, respectfulness, but those only
make up fourteen percent of respondents fourteen percent, versus strength
(22:56):
and toughness at nineteen percent. And by the way, I
think we all look at people like, how can how
can you think that? But but well, this trick is
played on all of us. We all fall for it.
And so I want us to be really careful when
you're next meeting someone. Don't write them off because they're
boring and they're polite and respectful. Because there's a part
(23:16):
of us that gets excitement, and it's the tension and
the stress that feels positive in the beginning when you're
playing guessing games and you're checking in, and I've talked
about this example before, this idea of this stress and excitement.
When someone's playing hard to get there's the excitement of
(23:37):
I got their number. The stress is what should I
message them? The excitement is, oh, I just messaged them.
The stress is when will they message back? The excitement
is I'm so excited we're going out on a date.
The stress is all they were hot and cold, and
that creates positive tension in the beginning, but really it's
not what we're looking for. It's exhausting. And what this
(24:00):
study says men are looking for in women, nine percent
said hard work, eight percent said professional financial success, seven
percent of loyalty dependent ability, seven percent of competence, ability,
six percent sat independence and self reliance, five percent of
strength and toughness, five percent of politeness, respectfulness, and five
(24:22):
percent said ability to multitask. What I'm realizing is we're
looking for love in all the wrong places. And usually
we think of wrong places as oh, am I in
the right bar Am I in the right restaurant? Am
I on the right app right? That kind of thing.
And what I'm saying is, actually we're looking for it
in the wrong places because we're looking at criteria that
(24:44):
doesn't define the quality of a relationship right. For example,
if you want to know whether a movie is good
or not, you look on Rotten Tomatoes or IMDb. If
you want to know whether a car insurance so something
is good, you'll ask a friend or family member what
they use. You go to the specific criteria to measure something,
(25:09):
but you wouldn't say, oh, I want to know if
a movie is good, I'm going to look at.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
The height of the actors and the cast. Right.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
Literally, you wouldn't do that because it doesn't impact the
quality of the movie. That is literally how ridiculous it
is to say, I'm going to look at this person's height. Now,
I keep picking on the hight thing because it was
big on that episode of Love Island yesterday.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
But and I'm not mad at that. I'm not.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Again, like, I get it, we're attracted to certain things.
But I want you to really understand the correlation between
what you're attracted to in a healthy relationship, Like that
element that criteria is not going to change the quality
of your relationship. It's not going to change the experience
of your relationship.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
Now, I really want you to go.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
Check out match dot com, forward slash Ja to understand
and your values, select your values, and be matched with
people based on your values, because I think that, like
I said, so many of us forget our values very quickly.
And I think that's because they've been talked about in
this very theoretical way. It's kind of like an idea
(26:18):
that we have. We've never seen them. We don't put
them at the center of connection. We kind of put
all the other stuff of like personality and attractiveness above
it when values are truly what it's about in a
long term relationship. And so I would love for you
to go and become more familiarized with values. I'd love
(26:38):
for you to check out my book Eight Rules of Love,
which focuses deeply on understanding someone values and them understanding
yours as being the core and central part of a
healthy relationship. And I want to thank you all again
for listening today, for connecting here.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I really hope this episode helps you.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
I hope it serves and supports you, and I can't
wait for you to listen to more episodes and on purpose,
share this with a friend, pass it along.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
Thank you so much for listening. I'm always in your
corner and I'm forever rooting for you.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Hey, everyone, if you love that conversation, go and check
out my episode with the world's leading therapist Lourie Gottlieb,
where she answers the biggest questions that people ask in
therapy when it comes to love, relationships, heartbreak, and dating.
If you're trying to figure out that space right now,
you won't want to miss this conversation.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
If it's a romantic relationship, hold hands. It's really hard
to argue it actually calms your nervous systems. Just hold
hands as you're having the conversation.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
It's so lovely.
There's a lot of talk about mindfulness these days, which
is fantastic. I mean, we all want to be more
present and self aware, more patient, less judgmental. We discuss
all these themes on the podcast, but it's hard to
actually be mindful in your day to day life. That's
where Calm comes in. I've been working with Calm for
a few years now with the goal of making mindfulness
(00:22):
fun and easy. Calm has all sorts of content to
help you build positive habits, shift yourself talk, reframe your
negative thoughts, and generally feel better in your daily life.
So many incredible options from the most knowledgeable experts in
the world, along with renowned meditation teachers. You can also
check out my seven minute daily series to help you
(00:43):
live more mindfully each and every day. Right now, listeners
of On Purpose get forty percent off a subscription to
Calmpremium at Calm dot com Forward slash j that's Calm
dot com Forward slash jay for forty percent off Calm
your Mind, Change Life. We say we want those things,
but when we experience in reality, a lot of people
(01:05):
will say, Oh, they're so kind, they're so sweet, but
they're boring, and then the other person who's not kind
and sweet, they're exhilarating. It's a really weird contrast in
how we say we want someone who's kind, we want
someone who's thoughtful, but then when we experience them reality,
it's not fun. There's no chemistry, there's no spark right,
and then we often go for the person who's not kind,
(01:28):
not nurturing, not empathetic. What I'm getting at here is.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
The number one health and wellness podcast set. Jay Shetty s.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Hey, everyone, welcome back to you On Purpose. I'm your host,
Jay Shetty. Thank you so much for turning up for yourself,
for turning up to the On Purpose show. I am
so grateful that you're here with me right now now.
If you're single and you're trying to figure out how
to find your person in this episode is for you.
(02:03):
If you're recently single and you're trying to figure out
what's going wrong, what mistakes are making This episode is
for you. And even if you're dating someone, even if
you're married, but you're trying to figure out how to
deepen your connection, how to understand more. Maybe you're even
questioning whether you're with the right person. This episode is
(02:25):
for you. I want to dive in to some really
interesting research today, and the research comes from the Pew
Research Center, and it talks about what men most value
in women and what women most value in men.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Now, I have to come clean with you.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
To start off with, last night, my wife, my brother
in law, and my sister in law made me watch
my first ever episode of Love Island. I think it's
season six of the USA. The of the show. I'd
never watched an episode before in my life. And again,
today's episode is not inspired by that by any means,
(03:09):
but it was just fascinating to me as to how,
after years and years of research, technological advancement and everything else,
and even just seeing what works and what doesn't work,
what we focus on about other people is so limited
and so limiting. And it led me to go down
this rabbit hole when I was thinking about this episode
(03:32):
today and researching for the episode and asking myself, what
is it that we say is most important to us
in a potential partner? But then how do we get
carried away with what we're attracted to? Right? Let me
say that again, what is the difference between what we
say is important to us in a partner? And then
(03:54):
how do we get carried away with what we get
attracted to. And I think what I was originally thinking
about was this idea that we almost know what's good
for us, but we want what's bad for us. Right,
we know what's good for us, but we'll ignore all
(04:16):
of that. If there's something attractive, if there's something shiny,
if there's something exciting, if there's something invigoring, we're willing
to give up all of our good common sense. Now
let's actually look at the research. This was what traits
or characteristics do you think people in our society are
(04:37):
most attracted to?
Speaker 2 (04:39):
So what do you think.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Men value most in women? Number one thing that came out?
What do you think it is? It was thirty five
percent said physical attractiveness is the most important thing they
value in a woman. I'm not surprised by that, and
I think think you hear that a lot, you see
(05:02):
that a lot. I think that has led to so
many challenges in our society where there's so much pressure
on appearance, there's so many enhancements of appearance, like it
all becomes about that.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Now.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
When women were asked what they most value in men,
what do you think that was? Thirty three percent said
honesty and morality. Now that's a really interesting one because
I think you end up watching videos on TikTok and
on social media and you see everyone talking about how
the height is the most important thing, the back balance
(05:37):
is the most important thing, which we'll get to in
a second. We're talking about who's paying on the first date.
It's really interesting what cultural conversations spiral online versus what
we say in a questionnaire, and I feel like there's
a disconnect there. I think what's really interesting to me
is you could go down this list and have someone
take a lot of it and then find them. Not
(06:00):
that you find them unattractive, but they don't take this
really artificial box like someone's height doesn't define the quality
of your relationship.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
It just doesn't, right.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
It's almost like saying I will drink a bottle of
water because it's taller than the other bottle, but they
both have the same amount of water in it. If
you have two bottles and they both have five hundred
millimeters of water in it, but one's taller, one shorter,
you choose the taller one. But it doesn't change your
experience of the water. It doesn't change your experience of drinking,
(06:37):
it doesn't change the quality of the water within. And
I think for so many of us who have been
burned in relationships, who constantly feel that we're going after
the wrong thing, how many of you can relate to
that where you keep saying, Jay, you know what, I
just keep picking the wrong person. I keep tripping myself up.
I know I keep making mistakes. It's because we're focusing
(06:59):
on the taller bottle of water.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
So I want to ask you, what is your tall
bottle of water? Right? What is that trip up for you? Right?
Speaker 1 (07:08):
What is that thing that keeps, like Mahamad Ali said,
the pebble in your shoe?
Speaker 2 (07:15):
Right?
Speaker 1 (07:15):
What is that that keeps giving you that discomfort, that
keeps tripping you up, that keeps making you make the
wrong decision because we say one thing, but then we
follow the other. I'm not saying that physical attractiveness is
not important. I think you should be attracted to your person.
But I think sometimes we create artificial, superficial, very limited
(07:36):
and limiting criteria that doesn't really allow us to find love.
And I think a lot of that criteria comes from
what we were trained in, conditioned to believe was attractive
when we were younger. Right when we were younger, we
saw certain things on the front cover of magazines, we
saw certain body types in movies and TV shows, we
(07:59):
saw certain colors of skin that were exposed to through media,
and we build up desires, We built up ideas and
visions of what a person should be. But I think
so often we're looking at criteria that doesn't impact the
quality of the experience, which is bizarre. There's so many
(08:23):
things in life where you would never assess it purely
based on a superficial metric that doesn't change the experience
of the product. Right now, number two of what men
most value in women, thirty percent said empathy, nurturing, kindness.
(08:48):
Now there's one thing I want to talk about because
I see this a lot. I see this with friends.
When a lot of men say nurturing, they often want
a mum in their partner. I'm just going to put
it out there. I had to say it because I
think so many individuals struggle with growing up, and I
(09:10):
think there's a lot of talk about women and daddy issues,
but there's not a lot of talk about men and
mummy issues. And it's this idea of I want someone
who is nurturing, but in a very maternal way, like
I want them to take care of me. I want
them to take care of the house. I want them
to do what my mom did. I want them to cook.
I want them to And it's not just the gender roles,
(09:31):
but there's this false expectation. And I think what's really
interesting about that is a lot of people being naturally nurturing,
naturally empathetic, naturally kind kind of see it as beautiful
because it's a way of being needed, it's a way
of being wanted, it's.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
A way of being useful.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
But I think we have to really look at that
in what we desire and what the other person is
willing to deliver on. And again I go back to it,
do we want a partner who's equal, excited and curious
or are we really looking for someone to take care
of us? Because if we're looking for someone to take
care of us, it ends up leading to the relationship
(10:09):
we don't want. We then say, oh, well they're not adventurous,
or well they're not interesting, or they're not passionate, and
it's like, well, yeah, because they're mothering or fathering you. Right,
if your partner is now your parent you're not going
to find them attractive. After a while, you're not going
to find them interesting. After a while, you're going to
find that they're annoying you, that they're on your case,
(10:31):
that they're holding you accountable. All the things that you
potentially are challenged by or resenting your parents, you now
project that onto your partner. So when we say things
like I want someone to be empathetic, nurturing, kind, let's
really look at what we mean by that. And I
actually think here's the thing. We say we want those things,
(10:53):
but when we experience in reality, a lot of people say, oh,
they're so kind, they're so sweet, boring, right, and then
the other person who's not kind and sweet, they're exhilarating.
It's a really weird contrast in how we say we
want someone who's kind, we want someone who's thoughtful, but
then when we experience them in reality, it's not fun.
(11:14):
There's no chemistry, there's no spark, right, and then we
often go for the person who's not kind, not nurturing,
not empathetic. What I'm getting at here is we know
we want people of high character and high value. We
want someone who has deep values. We want someone who
has values like honesty, kindness, morality, nurturing, both in men
(11:40):
and women. We've seen honesty and morality top one for women,
wanting in men, and empathy nurturing kindness number two in women.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
You've got all these.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Deep values that are right up then in what we want,
but we're so easily shifted away from our values. So
you ask me, Jay, why is that? Why is it
that I know what it's good for me, but I
choose what's bad for me? How many of you can
relate to that? Gee, I know what's right for me,
but why do I always choose what's wrong for me?
(12:10):
It's interesting, isn't It's a trick of the mind. The
mind has the ability to trick you. You know what's good
for you, but you'll still choose what's bad for you. You
know what's right for you, but you will choose what's
wrong for you. This happens because we become clouded. Our
(12:35):
vision becomes blurred, and ultimately love is blind. We get
blinded by the chemicals of the spark and of attraction
and of lust that literally blur our vision so that
we now no longer see the unfavorable elements of that individual.
(12:58):
This is true for the chemicals released during and after sex.
This is true for when we first feel that chemical
attraction to someone, we're actually emotionally vision impaired to notice
the things about someone that actually matter. And I've partnered
(13:19):
up with Match, which I'm really excited about as their
relationship advisor, because what I found is that dating apps
are not the problem the challenges of what we're focused
on and what we're looking at. If we don't understand
our values and we don't understand the other person's values
(13:39):
and they don't understand theirs and hours, it doesn't matter
how many other boxes we tick. If you're truly in
this for a successful relationship, if you're truly in this
for a real, deep partnership, I promise you the artificial,
superficial things are not going to be the ones that
make a difference.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Your values are.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Your knowledge, awareness, acceptance, and respect for someone's values are.
So I want you to head over to match dot com,
forward slash j if you want to match people through
value systems, through a deeper value connection. Again, I'm not
saying I want you to be attracted to the person.
I want you to think they're fun. I want you
(14:21):
to be excited, But I want us to pivot and
shift our mindset on for a moment, deprioritizing the things
that society, media, parents, and friends have told us to overvalue,
and shift more emphasis onto the things we've been made
to undervalue, like honesty, kindness, connection, empathy, these deep values
(14:49):
that are so critical to the success of a relationship. Right,
And we do this with everything right, There'll be debates
constantly between iPhone and Android users, people saying like, oh, well,
Android is more customizable, iPhones more the slickness, and again
we follow brand and it's true, right, like Android does
(15:12):
have and Samsung phones do have more functionality, but we
choose something that we think has a certain brand or whatever.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
It may be.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
And it's interesting how when you start doing that in love,
it has far bigger ramifications than with technology.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Number two of what women want in men, twenty three
percent said professional financial success. And I want to call
out this has caused a lot of stress and pressure
for a lot of friends, a lot of good men,
because I think we're again living in a society where
(15:50):
people are exposed to a world online of fast cars, jewelry.
You've got their high flying life and it can become
quite intimidating and quite challenging for people to think they
have to live up to that. And I know a
lot of good, hard working, honest men that are trying
(16:11):
their best, that are passionate about what they do, that
care about what they do, but they're being undervalued. And
I always like sharing this because to me, it makes
a huge difference. When I met Rady, materially, I didn't
have anything, and Raddi chose to be with me at
a time when I was still trying to pay off
(16:33):
my student debt and I didn't even have a job,
and I don't even thought she knew if I would
ever get anywhere externally to a certain level. But I
think the point was I had someone who believed in
me and saw that I wanted to grow. And I
(16:56):
think I want to point that out here. Which comes
third for women, which is nineteen percent ambition and leadership
women wanting in men, is that I truly believe that
ambition is something that is better to look for than
already achieved financial success. Someone who already has financial success
(17:19):
may want to pivot, They may even want to quit
their job to try something. By the way, someone else
who hasn't made it, Especially when you met someone young.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
They need to have time.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
And if that person feels pressure rather than believe, chances
are they'll buckle. Now, the other thing I'd like to
point out is whether you're a man or woman. These
are all themes that I think are across the board
for me. If you're looking for someone who's ambitious, you've
also got to understand from a value point of view,
what that trade is. So if you want someone ambitious,
(17:51):
chances are they won't be available all the time.
Speaker 2 (17:55):
Right.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
You can't have someone ambitious and available. It doesn't work
that way. And I think a lot of us will
want someone who's ambitious, but then we'll say why they're
not available? Right, We'll say we want someone who's successful.
But then we're saying, well, why are they not, why
they're not messaging me, why they're not available this weekend,
(18:16):
why they're not up for hanging out, And it's like, well,
they're not living spontaneous, they're living structured. So we always
have to understand the value that we want in someone.
How does that value show up in reality. I think
we almost have these very one dimensional views of values, right,
Our one dimensional view of ambition is our someone who
has goals, someone who has dreams, but then we want
(18:37):
them to have dreams. But then we want them to
never work on their dreams because we want them to
be around. Right. It doesn't add up, and I think
we can have these very limited and limiting views of
what a true goal looks like. Now, the third thing
that men look for a woman, twenty two percent said intelligence.
And again, by the way, I am calling out all
(18:59):
sides of it because it's so interesting to me. I
have a lot of incredibly successful female friends who are
doing amazing entrepreneurs, building incredible companies, doing phenomenal stuff, and
they actually feel like their intelligence is intimidating. They feel
like their ambition is intimidating, and a lot of them
feel like they have to kind of lower themselves or
(19:22):
lower their standards, or make themselves feel less smart, less thoughtful, less,
you know, less accomplished in order to attract someone. Let
me say this, your partner who cares about you, who
values you, will admire your success. Now. I think there's
a difference also between admiring and being a fan, and
(19:46):
I think admiration is healthier than fandom. I think if
someone's a big fan of yours. It's hard to be
a partner, and sometimes we say, oh, my partner's my
number one fan. I want to be their number fan.
I mean, to be honest, I'd probably even say I'm
rather number one fan. And maybe I should take back
my statement now because I'm like, yeah, I am a
rather these number one fan. What am I talking about?
(20:07):
But I think the idea that there's an admiration for
what you do and there's a respect for what you do,
but you have to have that back for them whatever
they decide to be or whatever they decide to do.
And so if you are someone who feels like your
success intimidates people, or your success, you know, makes people
(20:28):
feel uncomfortable, chances are you're just speaking to the wrong
people because you shouldn't have to play down your success.
I know someone who constantly started to play down their
success whenever they were around someone to date them. They
complained about their life, they did all those things, and
then someone left them because they said they were too negative.
(20:50):
Now this person wasn't negative at all. So just imagine
that for a second. You're a positive, high functioning, high performer. Then,
in order to make yourself more relatable. You start talking
about your bad experiences and what's going wrong, and then
that person leaves you, not because you're intimidating, but because
(21:12):
they see you as uninteresting and complaining and negative. And
so I think you don't want to become someone you're not.
And there's this beautiful quote that I read from Arlin
was here the other day on Twitter, and it said
be yourself so that the people looking for you can
(21:34):
find you. And I think that's what that patience needs
to be. That I don't have to make myself smaller
in order to have a big experience of love.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
I don't have.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
To make myself less significant in order to find a
significant other. Let me say that again, you don't have
to make yourself less significant to find a significant other
because a significant other will recognize your significance and celebrate it.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
Now, I want to go down this list.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
For you so you know. So what women value most
in men? Nineteen percent said strength and toughness, eighteen percent
said hard work, good work ethic, eleven percent said physical attractiveness,
eleven percent said empathy, nurturing kindness, nine percent said loyalty, dependability,
eight percent said intelligence, five percent said being family oriented,
(22:35):
and five percent said politeness respectfulness. Notice how a relationship
is made up of loyalty, politeness, respectfulness, but those only
make up fourteen percent of respondents fourteen percent, versus strength
(22:56):
and toughness at nineteen percent. And by the way, I
think we all look at people like, how can how
can you think that? But but well, this trick is
played on all of us. We all fall for it.
And so I want us to be really careful when
you're next meeting someone. Don't write them off because they're
boring and they're polite and respectful. Because there's a part
(23:16):
of us that gets excitement, and it's the tension and
the stress that feels positive in the beginning when you're
playing guessing games and you're checking in, and I've talked
about this example before, this idea of this stress and excitement.
When someone's playing hard to get there's the excitement of
(23:37):
I got their number. The stress is what should I
message them? The excitement is, oh, I just messaged them.
The stress is when will they message back? The excitement
is I'm so excited we're going out on a date.
The stress is all they were hot and cold, and
that creates positive tension in the beginning, but really it's
not what we're looking for. It's exhausting. And what this
(24:00):
study says men are looking for in women, nine percent
said hard work, eight percent said professional financial success, seven
percent of loyalty dependent ability, seven percent of competence, ability,
six percent sat independence and self reliance, five percent of
strength and toughness, five percent of politeness, respectfulness, and five
(24:22):
percent said ability to multitask. What I'm realizing is we're
looking for love in all the wrong places. And usually
we think of wrong places as oh, am I in
the right bar Am I in the right restaurant? Am
I on the right app right? That kind of thing.
And what I'm saying is, actually we're looking for it
in the wrong places because we're looking at criteria that
(24:44):
doesn't define the quality of a relationship right. For example,
if you want to know whether a movie is good
or not, you look on Rotten Tomatoes or IMDb. If
you want to know whether a car insurance so something
is good, you'll ask a friend or family member what
they use. You go to the specific criteria to measure something,
(25:09):
but you wouldn't say, oh, I want to know if
a movie is good, I'm going to look at.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
The height of the actors and the cast. Right.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
Literally, you wouldn't do that because it doesn't impact the
quality of the movie. That is literally how ridiculous it
is to say, I'm going to look at this person's height. Now,
I keep picking on the hight thing because it was
big on that episode of Love Island yesterday.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
But and I'm not mad at that. I'm not.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Again, like, I get it, we're attracted to certain things.
But I want you to really understand the correlation between
what you're attracted to in a healthy relationship, Like that
element that criteria is not going to change the quality
of your relationship. It's not going to change the experience
of your relationship.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
Now, I really want you to go.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
Check out match dot com, forward slash Ja to understand
and your values, select your values, and be matched with
people based on your values, because I think that, like
I said, so many of us forget our values very quickly.
And I think that's because they've been talked about in
this very theoretical way. It's kind of like an idea
(26:18):
that we have. We've never seen them. We don't put
them at the center of connection. We kind of put
all the other stuff of like personality and attractiveness above
it when values are truly what it's about in a
long term relationship. And so I would love for you
to go and become more familiarized with values. I'd love
(26:38):
for you to check out my book Eight Rules of Love,
which focuses deeply on understanding someone values and them understanding
yours as being the core and central part of a
healthy relationship. And I want to thank you all again
for listening today, for connecting here.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I really hope this episode helps you.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
I hope it serves and supports you, and I can't
wait for you to listen to more episodes and on purpose,
share this with a friend, pass it along.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
Thank you so much for listening. I'm always in your
corner and I'm forever rooting for you.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Hey, everyone, if you love that conversation, go and check
out my episode with the world's leading therapist Lourie Gottlieb,
where she answers the biggest questions that people ask in
therapy when it comes to love, relationships, heartbreak, and dating.
If you're trying to figure out that space right now,
you won't want to miss this conversation.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
If it's a romantic relationship, hold hands. It's really hard
to argue it actually calms your nervous systems. Just hold
hands as you're having the conversation.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
It's so lovely.
Host
Jay Shetty
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