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December 23, 2022 45 mins

In this special edition of RTT – renowned experts who have helped millions have healthier relationships reveal highly sought-after advice you need to hear. Dating coach Matthew Hussey, author Stephan Labossiere, podcast host Lewis Howes and relationship advisor DeVon Franklin are joined by a very special woman with decades of wisdom to share: Sheree Zampino. If you want to change your love life, don’t miss this engaging conversation.

 

 

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, fam I'm Jada Pinkett Smith and this is the
Red Tabletop podcast all your favorite episodes from the Facebook
Watch show in Audio produced by Westbrook Audio and I
Heart Radio. Please don't forget to rate and review on
Apple podcasts. Single Dating, Divorced, Married on this special edition
of Red Table Talk or expert Men who have made

(00:23):
it their life's work to help people have healthy relationships.
They've coached millions of people navigating the complicated world of love.
I'm Matthew Hussey. I've been coaching for fifteen years, helping
women in their love lives build the confidence they need
to make really good decisions. My nameless stuff on Level. Sierre,
also known as Stefan speaks um a sort of fire

(00:44):
relationship coach, an author of ten books, and I'm all
about helping people experience healthier and happier relationships. I'm Lewis
House and that was a former pro athlete, written a
bunch of books, got a top podcast, had many failed relationships,
and now in a beautiful one. I'm Divine Franklin. I'm
here as a relationship advisor and author. I'm committed to
just uplifting as many people as I can. Plus a

(01:06):
special woman with relationship wisdom to share. The man I've
been looking for my whole life is me for the
first time, they're joining forces to reveal their findings and experiences.
Grab a notebook were retaken note, we've got a pen
and paper. You don't want to miss this. Some women

(01:26):
are just looking to have sex and that's the real deal. God,
I wish I had this information. And the table, this
is a table. This is so re tell us how
dating has been for you. I have a meme that
really captures it because it was so exciting in my

(01:47):
younger years and now it's kind of like, what, Yeah,
it's not the same, but it's it's good because I'm
in a healthier space, in a season of intention. So
because of that, the pool has gotten smaller, and that's
a good thing. It is. That's a good thing because
you don't waste a lot of time with goings and

(02:08):
situations that you know aren't even right before I would
have entertained that. So it's about self love first, because
if you don't, I'm serious, I can't give it if
I don't have it. I can't give it if I
don't have it, you know, Whoever, my partner will be
I have to bring my best meat to the table.
And I didn't realize how far off track I got

(02:31):
and the lack of self love, and I came to
a place where I'm like the man I've been looking for.
My whole life is me. When we look to other
people to give us something that we're void of, we
set them up to fail. That's what we do, and

(02:52):
we set ourselves up to be very disappointed. To me,
the saddest thing, the thing that drives me in all
of this when people say, why you whatever you want
to call me a dating coach or whatever, why are
you that thing? I think they think that I'm going
to say, because finding love is the most important thing
in life. Actually, to me, it's not that that's the
most important thing in life. Is that if you make

(03:13):
bad decisions in that area, then the wrong love can
corrupt everything in your life. You can run out of
the clock on your time, you can run out the
clock on your energy, you become bitter, and even the
good thing. You can have a job you love, you
can have a family you love, it will poison your
energy and all of those things. If you're unhappy here

(03:36):
what you said, sure, he is really important to me
because you've got to a point and that allows you
then to be very discriminating when it comes to who
do I need in my life and who do I
not When I see couples who stay together no matter what,
you start teaching kids this other message that the ultimate

(03:57):
failure is being alone. The ultimate failure is to leave something.
We don't teach enough, the idea that having no thing
is better than having the wrong thing when it comes
to our love life. Dn't know you didn't know. Yeah,

(04:17):
this is a but we gotta share, y'all. So we
have a whole wall of single women joining us with
burning questions about the complicated world of relationships. Some of
them have even taken their search for a partner to
the next level, appearing on popular dating shows and hoping
to find love. So let's say hello to all the

(04:40):
single ladies. First up is Teresa, who said she's notoriously
bad at dating. She even tried to find a partner
using her zodiac sign on the Amazon series Cosmic Love.
Hi guys, Hey Teresa. I consider sexual chemistry a big

(05:03):
priority when I am dating someone, but it hasn't been
serving me well. So I've been wondering if maybe I
need to slow things down and try the opposite, even
though it is such a huge priority for me. Oh yeah,
that's real, great question. I'm gonna let you take that.
Here's the thing, a lot of guys start off in
a relationship around sexual chemistry first and instead, that's the

(05:27):
mistake I made for many years, is not creating the
foundation of spiritual connection and really getting clear on what
are my values and do your values match up? What
is my vision for a life for a relationship and
does your vision matchup? Do we have shared aligned lifestyles?
And I think a lot of us, myself included, it
was all about this sexual attraction, Like you look good.

(05:47):
I want to experience what that might feeling talking to me,
I'm talking to what's going on? But I think I
think sexual attraction is a good thing if there's a
spiritual connection tied to it. But I think you need
that spiritual connection before we sexually bond. And then let

(06:10):
me ask you a question, how long do you think
it takes a dude to come to that realization? Oh man,
that took me to thirty eight years because I repeat
the pattern thinking a new person is going to give
me a different outcome. I wasn't realizing where my wounds were.
Once I started the heal, I realized that I was
the common denominator of every relationship that didn't work because

(06:33):
when I was fully honest, which most women from my
personal experience, weren't able to handle the truth of my values,
my vision, what I want, what I believe in in
a relationship, and so would scare them. And then I
would coward and I would say, well, actually, you know,
I'll agree with you here, I'll agree a little bit
with you here, I'll give it. I'll abandoned my I'll

(06:54):
abandoned myself to make you happy because I don't want
to rock the boat, you know, I don't want to
shake this big table. And I think lacking that courage
created conflict deeper in the relationship, as opposed to being
fully honest, upfront and kind of pushing away people that
aren't in alignment so I could be my honest self

(07:15):
and not the image of the best self. I believe
love is commitment to your well being. So if I
say I love you, then that means I have to
be committed to your well being. If you say you
love me, that means my well being is important to you.
That means it's got to show up in how we act,
right Because let's say I love you, it's words are
cheat I mean, listen, I love you cost nothing. It's

(07:37):
in the air, it's out and not just my emotional
well being, my spiritual being, my well being to me,
it's about that because then we can actually feel like
this person really does want my best interest at all.
It's not just romantic Absolutely, no relationship can thrive off
of independence on either side. It's all about interdependence. We
have to lean on each other, we have to do
for each other. That has to be there. So that's

(07:58):
what we're trying to figure out here, how to have
that energetic interdependence between the ship. I think you have
to look at it like some people are looking for
an experience and other people are looking for a real
relationship and experience. Chemistry, sexual attraction, it's all an experience.
What you're talking about, Devon is a standard standard for

(08:22):
how I choose to love, and that requires discipline. So
in a way, what you're really looking for is for
a person a with knowledge. How do you get to
the point where you value connection spiritually compatibility, giving love
more than just chemistry, and you can say, okay, well,
there's the guy that struggles to get there because he

(08:42):
never has the thing that Lewis you had. You're a
good looking guy with options, right, it's successful. You're very attractive,
so you got to experience that and go it didn't work.
A lot of men never really get to play it
out and say it didn't work, so it's like stuck,
and so their whole life they're trying to date the
cheerleader because they they're eight and still imagining what it

(09:06):
would be like, so they never got there. Then there's
the guy that gets there and has access and does
all those things and realizes it doesn't work. But realizing
something doesn't work doesn't stop you replaying the same addiction
over and over in your life. You have to then
have the discipline to say, Okay, I like pizza, but
I can't eat pizza every day. That can't be my life.

(09:29):
You don't stop eating pizza because pizza stops being delicious.
You stop eating pizza because you value the way you
feel when you live better. And so for a guy
who stops just chasing the gratification, it's not that there's
not still that urge. It's just that something more nutritional

(09:51):
became the thing value. One thing that I've discovered is
that we're not all wired the same. There's a lot
of men they value committed relationship. Then you have the
other guy who wants to be with a bunch of
different women. You have to just be mindful of. Okay,
what kind of man do I want to get with?
Like if you surveyed most men, most men are just
happy with I got food on my table, a roof

(10:13):
over my head, my kneeds are being met. I'm fine.
Then there's other men who want more in life. They
go after more. They show that same attribute in their
business and their career. That kind of man takes a
longer time to develop when it comes to settle down
one woman, I'm good here. The other guy, he's fine,
you'll never care for another woman. But I think the

(10:34):
unfortunate problem is that man who's very driven tends to
exude a lot of mask and energy. Women tend to
be more drawn to that. Well, you know that's very primal, right,
you know, Like how men are? You know, it's like
it's problem when you see a fine woman who's got
a nice body, So as a woman when you see

(10:59):
a driven in who's out, you know, conquering the world
and let's go, and you're like, damn, he's gonna kill
that Lion's got the village. But women have to understand
what comes with that, right. It's like, hey, you're dealing
with a lion, you know, versus versus stepping up to

(11:20):
that line and expecting that line to act like a
kitty cat, you know what I mean. But if you
want that driven, masculine, ambitious energy, you better be prepared
for what comes with it. And I think a lot
of times we as women have to have more understanding
where you know, a lot of times we get connected
to that oh my goodness, he can provide. He's dynamic,

(11:44):
and it's like all right, but just know it's a
lot that's gonna come with that boo. It's gonna be
It's gonna be a journey, you know what I mean.
And so I think it's really important for women to
understand these different kind of characteristics of the of the
male kingdom. You know, the point you're making is critical

(12:04):
for this reason. Don't marry a lion and then want
them to be a kitty cat. But that thing that
attracts is then the thing that you can detest and
a commits relationship because it's like you love the idea
that you know, I'm out there and conquering the world,
But then that means I'm not gonna be home right
Like that means I have another calling and a thing

(12:26):
and a passion. And so I think it's very critical
with understanding who it is you're going for and appreciating
who they are and not saying, well, they're a lying now,
but once I get them, I got plans. Yeah, what
you see is what you get. There's a cute that
says women Mary hoping the man will change, men marry

(12:49):
hoping the woman will never change. So it comes down
to what do you value. If you're a woman and
you value most excitement and my adrenaline, always being up
and always feeling like I'm like being kept on my toes,
then you're going to choose a very different guy than
if you're a woman who values peace. We're gonna go
to another question. Deept didn't find her happily ever after

(13:12):
on the Netflix dating show Love is Blind. I deserve
somebody who knows for sure. So I'm choosing myself and
I'm going to say no, my question. I think you
said it best you choose yourself, and that's exactly what
I did at the altar. But we're taught relationships don't

(13:33):
work unless there's a little bit of compromise. My question
is how do you find the balance between compromise and
choosing yourself? That's really, really real. Here's the thing. I
feel like I've made a lot of mistakes and relationships
in the past, and I learned a lot. And in
the current relationship i'm in right now with Martha, my girlfriend,
I said, in the beginning, listen, I'm not gonna go
there sexually with you until I want to commit to you,

(13:56):
which never happened previously, right it was sexual chemistry. And
then we'll commit now without having the conversations to see
if you need to compromise for something. And then I said,
the only way I'm willing to get into a new
relationship is if my partner is willing to do therapy
with me from the starting, so we both need to

(14:16):
be on the healing journey together. I don't really think
it is compromised. It's more healthy alignment of do I
agree with this, and you give that and not waiting
until there's an argument, waiting until there's a breakdown, and
it's been an incredibly peaceful journey doesn't mean there's not conflict,
but the conflict is minimized because we're both in it

(14:37):
together and not one person is doing the world. Values
are aligned, so she's not compromising something because we agreed
before the commitment and neither are you now exactly exactly.
I like that idea of healthy alignment versus compromise because
that's a trigger word, compromise. I don't want to compromise
who I am for the rest of my life. That

(14:58):
seems like a trap. And I think we have to
be careful because a lot of people confuse compromises with sacrifice,
and to me, compromises a mutually beneficial agreement. We may
have given a little bit of something, but we can
sustain this. What I'm seeing a lot of relationships is
you're saying, Okay, I like to go out dancing. He doesn't.
My compromises. I'll accept not going out dancing, But the

(15:19):
problem is you're not happy and you can't sustain not
having that in your life. And now even if you
try to, you're gonna start to have an attitude with
now exactly now, intimacy is gonna start to get a
hit because he doesn't give you what you need. If
you are giving up something that's going to take away
your ability to pour into your partner, don't do it.
It has to be at a level where okay, we

(15:41):
can still show up one percent for each other. But yes,
I don't mind moving a little bit on this issue,
and you move a little bit here so we can
meet in the middle. For people that are listening to this,
if you can imagine how much time that takes, you
know what I mean, how much time that takes to
get to that space, how much understanding that you have

(16:02):
to have of the other person. It takes time. This
is not stuff that happens overnight. And if you think
about how we just jump into relationships and jump in
the bed and yeah, and we want to like we
want this. We had this idea of what relating is
supposed to be. God, I wish I had this information
years ago. Deep te, did that answer your question for you? Yeah?

(16:25):
It does, thank you. Oh, I'm so glad. So you
might recognize Michelle Young from the Bachelorette. What's your question, Michelle?
So I came into reality TV, falling in love and
the public eye, and it didn't work out. It was
best that it didn't work out. But now that I'm

(16:46):
healing and going on that journey, how do I move
on and find a way to date now that I
am in the public eye. I want a relationship where
somebody doesn't know who I am. In the day of
so social media, in the day of dating apps, you know,
going to the club. I don't want to meet my
forever person at the club. That's not where I'm going

(17:07):
to meet them. So how do I do that? Where
do I search for somebody organically where they don't know
who I am. Your platform is going to be your
biggest weakness if you're not careful, and it's going to
pose as your biggest strength because it will look like
the place where you can get all of this attention,
and everyone goes, look how many options you have, Look
how many people are in your d m s. This
is crazy. You can have your pick, but the problem

(17:29):
is every single one of them picked you for a
bad reason. The hard part for you is talking to
someone who has no idea who you are, which makes
it much more likely you'll get rejected. But if you
can sustain the rejections in places where people don't care
who you are, then you actually might find someone who

(17:50):
starts to care about who you are for all the
right reasons. This is why I think it's really important
to meet people in different contexts other than the ones
that you might be meeting them in. You kind of
have to start looking in some polls of people that
actually don't care about any of that to begin with, Right,
that's interesting. Yeah, you know, I've gone through a you know,
very public divorce, and so most people I come in

(18:11):
contact with, most women I come in, they know more
about me than I know about them, and so that's
some strange dynamic. But what I would say to you
is part of the way to find it. Don't look
for it, like I just don't. It's going to happen me.
I know you deal with this. People know who you are, yeah,

(18:31):
um or not, but at some point you know it
comes up. Yeah, you definitely want to meet people organically,
Like I don't do the dating sites, been there done,
They just don't work for me. They don't work for me.
But I met somebody at home depot and that crazy.
I don't know where it's gonna go. But I'm saying

(18:53):
it was just an organic thing and and just to
talk and spend time. And um. Then yesterday it' funny
because we talked and I old him, I said, I
don't know if you know, because you don't know. You
don't know what people know. He didn't know, and you
look for the reaction. He never broke character, so to speak.
He kind of stayed true to to who he was.
He was not impressed. If you're impressed, that's an issue.

(19:17):
If you are just if you're a friend to buy it,
that's an issue. It didn't sway him. It didn't sway
him at all. So read why doesn't this dating sites
work for you? Though? I prefer to have somebody say, hey, girl, listen,
I got a friend, because there's a paper trail somebody,
can you know, vouch for this person? Scare me? There's

(19:38):
too much work I have to do. Got it? You know?
Because you can present any anything you want to present,
You can pretend to be somebody. It's just too much, Yes,
it just it has not worked. So how did you
meet someone at home? Defense out they're looking for some tile,
just needed some tile and was just there at the

(19:59):
same time, say please started conversation. Because I'm a woman,
I'm old fashioned in a lot of ways. I'm not
going to go up to I'm not going to pursue
a man. I'm not going to do that. He's going
to have to pursue show interest first, and once he does,
I'll give it back. What you say is very very common.
I'm a woman. I don't want to make the first move.
If you say you're old fashioned and that's why you're

(20:19):
not making the first move, then you don't know what
old fashioned was. Old fashioned was walking past a guy
inadvertently dropping the handkerchief, and then and then you kept walking,
and he saw an extraordinary opportunity to be a man,
and he picked it up. And he'd walk over and
he'd say, madam, you dropped this, and she'd say did I?

(20:40):
And they now have a conversation that he thought was
his idea, but it wasn't. It was hers. She chose him.
That's not comfortable for me. I didn't know how to
do that. I'm very friendly. You can flip your pretty
hair and be like people don't know this because I'm
an extroverted in revert. But there's a little shyness there

(21:02):
no no, no, no, no, no, there's shyness, but there's
a hint of you know, the moment you didn't miss
a beat when Louis looked at you and said something
sexual and there was immediate playfulness there. I can I'll
give it back, right, But that's engaged. But that's it,
that's what he's saying. It's so interesting to hear it

(21:22):
from a male perspective, in the idea of what we
see as going after a guy, and he's like, no,
it's so civil. Just your feminine essence, your feminine energy
is the handkerchief. You know, men live for them, maybe
right if they think it's a no, they're not coming
anywhere near you because it's so hard. This is what

(21:43):
is I think sad for a lot of guys, this
idea out there that if a guy likes you, he
comes over to you, and it's just not true for men,
they just don't. And they don't because it's hard, because
it's hard to go over to someone in home depot
and not seem like a creepy. It's a hard thing
to do, even for a nice guy. So just that

(22:05):
little green light that says I I am available, for
you to talk to me is something that can radically
change the game. Maybe I'm just a super super nerd,
but I love the what are you reading. I've come
up to a lot of guys and been like, oh,
told story, that's fire. And now we're talking, and now
we're in this whole conversation about authors and books that

(22:26):
that we love, and now I'm like learning more about him.
We're not really talking about being romantic. We're talking about
something different but that, but that feeling can sort of
trickle in as we're talking about something. It's like it's
like it's a way to meet somebody. This person may
very well say, you know what, You're not my type. Okay, great,
but at least I shot my shot because that confidence

(22:46):
of this is what I want and I'm going to
position my life to get what I want. I think
it's critical, but I think we were specifically taught men
should approach us. Yeah, we were taught that men like
to hunt. That's what you hear all the time. No, no, no, no,
man hunt. The thing that people don't understand about the
men like to hunt. Yes, men have this innate desire
to conquer, face challenges, and we get a high off
of that, but once emotions are involved, throw that out

(23:09):
the window. No, man who's been a lovaful woman said,
I hope she makes me chase her once we're now
so invested. We don't want this to be difficult. We're
hoping she reciprocates, not makes it more challenging. What you'll
notice is easier for men to chase lust than it
is to chase love, because when you love someone and
they're not receptive to you, it hurts. When you're just

(23:31):
lusting after the woman, all you're focused on is what
you want to get from her, which is why you'll
see some women have men who were never serious about you,
but will chase you for years on end because they're
just locked into I want this exactly, that's it. That's
where the men are. Hunters kicks in, but once he's
emotionally into you, he doesn't want all this resistance. That

(23:52):
hurts too much. I do think that there are men
who don't want to be aggressed upon in that way.
How your actions will be perceived will be based on
how much they had interested in you. So a lot
of women will say, well, men don't want to be
approach this way. No, he probably was never interested. He
didn't want to be approached by you at all. You
could have been subtle, you could have been strong. He
didn't want it exactly. It didn't matter. But most men

(24:12):
are so happy to have a woman show him that
she wants him, she has interests. He's going to be
receptive to that if he has interests as well. Okay.
It's like when women say I don't want to ask
certain questions because it might scare him away. You only
scare away a man who's not serious. All right. I
also understand this. I think always just be true to
who you are, because if making that first move scares

(24:34):
him off or cause you to lose value, he ain't
for you. Simple. Something important in the framing of all
of this is understanding that your power can't continuously come
from playing hard to get. It's a problem if it does.
The power has to become Okay, you got my curiosity,
and my curiosity is me going out with you tonight.
My attraction grows if the next week of communication after

(24:56):
this date is good, and then you get a little
more of me. If two weeks from now the communication
gets bad, you suddenly, oh I'm questioning you again, and
then someone says, oh, oh wow, she if I don't
give her consistent energy, if I don't give her consistent communication,
I've become a question mark. It's not the cat and

(25:19):
mouse is hard to get. The challenges your standard that
I'm not willing to allow someone into my life unless
they can give me that standard, and then owning that
standard and living up to it. Not I have a
fake standard that says you have to treat me right,
and then the moment they start to drift, I go
come back because now what you taught someone is the

(25:40):
exact opposite that the moment they pull back, they get
more of you, not less. Ladies, does that raise your
hand if that makes sense? Yes, indeed, thank you for
that one. The standard is the declaration of how you
feel about yourself, and you can't commise it quickly. That
radiates everywhere, right, Absolutely, Some women are just looking to

(26:04):
have sex, and that's the real deal. An experience an experienceship.
Are you trying to find someone to be your life
partner or do you want just an experience? Exactly? That's
such an important point you're making. But you have to
be real with yourself because here's what I see A
lot I had a woman the other day and she said,
me and this guy both have really busy schedules. We've

(26:26):
been on three dates, we've been going seeing each other
for a month and a half. How do you progress
things when your schedule is so intense? And I realized,
are you really saying your schedule is so intense that
you don't want to like give more energy to this,
And she went, well, I mean I could. I went, so,
here's what's happened. You have appropriated his excuse, and in

(26:49):
order to save face and not be vulnerable, you're making
it the royal way. You're saying we're just so busy.
It's a bit like saying some dating someone where you
want something serious, but that person and says, you know,
I'm just a really chill person. I just like to
see where things mean. I don't want to put a later.
I'm just like And then when your friend asks you, so,
how's it going with that person? You go, well, you know,

(27:10):
we're just like chilling and having a good time and
we're just not And you go, oh, you're this person's
ventriloquising you. This isn't you. You've done this so that
you don't have to be vulnerable. You have to be
brave enough to create what you want and then know
if the busy guy with the intense schedule, which by
the way, you have an intense schedule too, and you're
willing to prioritize a relationship, that's where you are. If

(27:33):
he's got busy schedule and he doesn't want to do that,
then then that's okay. But know that now instead of
pretending it's we have this expense, that's real top right there,
because I do think that royal wet it happens a lot.
So we have Violet. She's a comedian who made a

(27:53):
name for herself with her Instagram alter ego Daddy Issues.
She was crowned the memean by Vanity Fair and hosts
a popular podcast about dating, What Did You Want to
ask the guys? First, Ione to say thank you for
all of your inside of a researching feminine energy and
masking and energy, and I think we have those energies

(28:15):
in both male and females these days. Yes, sometimes I
feel like I bring out a lot of mask and
energy in general. But I have noticed when i'm more
my feminine energy, things come to me and I don't
have to run after it. And my question is do
men notice when women have mask and energy or feminine energy? Oh?

(28:36):
Hell yeah. My research shows that men tend to be
more drawn to women with feminine energy. So do you
guys have any pointers on that? I want to said,
Can I jump in with something, which is I think
a different perspective on all of this, because I think
language can be very very Yeah, because language takes us

(28:59):
down the rabbit holes that we don't actually need to
go down. I don't think masculine a feminine. Honestly, the
terms themselves don't interest me very much. What interests me
is that we're all many things. As there's a starting point.
Maybe we have a dominant size. Fine, but you know

(29:19):
what's boring is when we date someone who's one thing.
Anyone who's one thing becomes boring. I consider myself to
be a masculine person, and there's times where I love
my fiance to take care of me, and it's really
enjoyable for me to cut up under her arm and
be like, I'm just going to be this now, and

(29:42):
she enjoys the fact that I'm different things at different times.
I enjoy the fact that she's different things at different times.
There are times where it's really nice where I can
step in and kind of be stereotypically manly, and she's
smart enough to know that he needs this right now.
But there's also other times where it's like, we're taking
the trash cans out and she doesn't go, they can

(30:04):
you take the trash cans out? She doesn't do that,
she said, she grabs the heaviest trash can and she's like,
I'm going to get involved. And it's called that she's
like that because I go, oh, I have a real teammate.
We tend to Over time, we become addicted to whatever
we get the most validation for. Right if we're funny,
we keep being funny, and then eventually, on a date
we go we come up with the problem, why does

(30:24):
no one ever want to sleep with me because you're
just funny? And then someone else got validation young for
being sexy, and they played that weapon over and over
and over and over again, and they come to me, Matt,
why does everyone just want to sleep with me because
you're just sexy? Look at your Instagram profile. It's sexy, sexy, sexy, sexy, sexy, sexy, sexy.
There's nothing else in there. There's a concept of unique parents,

(30:48):
unique pairings, or when you find two things that are
both attractive but you don't normally find in the same person.
In the same person. If you can go deep with
me on a date and have a great conversation and
then five minutes later you can say something sexy, yeah,
I'm like, oh, you're going to be addictive because you've
got both. You know, we spend so much time going

(31:10):
which thing should I be to me? The answer is
you're gonna be both, because both is what actually is
very attractive. It's not hard to find someone who's feminine
all the time. It's not hard to find somebody's masculine
all the time. By the way, women don't want a
man who's masculine every second of the day because it
becomes boring. It's just alpha alpha alpha, alpha alpha. Why

(31:30):
is it so attractive when the alpha guy cries unique,
so unique parents? That is the thing. Yes, it is
lovely to watch an alpha man, and it's lovely to
watch a sexy woman be a boss. Yes, if you
are a woman who desires a masculine man and you
tend to walk around with your mask and energy, you're

(31:52):
gonna attract men who are more passive, more feminine, the
type of men you're not really into. You can talk
to a lot of successful women. If not that men
don't want them, it's the type of men that want
them they don't want to return. Question, yes, ladies, how
many of you would rather have men that can really
express more their feminine I would say no. I like

(32:21):
a lot of men are being coddled as children, and
now when they grow up, they're looking for a partner
who's their mother, all right, and now they're putting the
burdens on the woman because they can't stay on their
own two feet. So just be real about what the
energy dynamic needs to be in your relationship. Fantastic point.
If you take a woman who is independent friends for herself,

(32:43):
is quite capable. One of these things that traditionally we
might associate with the masculine, and we say, why is
there a lot of masculine men on't going for that woman?
I would say it's nothing to do with any of
those things. It's because one of the most attractive things
about a relationship is I feel like I still I

(33:03):
can do something. I feel like I can still serve you.
What's confusing today is that you have a lot of
women who are doing amazing things, earning money, taking away
all men's normal weapons, and men don't know how to
handle that because we're not used to it. I was
raised by a mother who said, don't you let her

(33:25):
carry that bag? How dare you If I came home
from a date and told my mom that I let
her pay half, my mom would be furious. I was
brought up to think that my value was being able
to take care of someone, was being able to pick
up the heavy bag, was being able to pay for
the check. Now I'm living in a paradigm where I

(33:48):
have to find a different way of providing value, and
that means my self worth as a man actually has
to grow because guess what, I can't throw money at
the problem and be important anymore. I actually have to
be important by being a person of character, by being
a person whose personality is enough without me doing all

(34:08):
of these things. And women have to do a better
job by the way of educating men on the fact
that those things are sexy. And if they do that,
I do believe men will have an easier time being
with successful women because they will go oh, I still
feel just as manly I still feel just as sexy.
We have to know how to play off each other.
If I don't know my role in my masculine energy

(34:30):
and you and you're feminine, we will have moments where
we're both being masculine. That's when the head start to
but or we'll have moments where we're both being feminine,
and that's going to be a problem. So if me
as a woman, if I don't know how to navigate
that energy, inevitably, I'm gonna knock heads up against an

(34:50):
energy with my masculine. And let me tell you something,
I don't care how much masculine a woman has in
her body. It ain't even gonna of when a man
brings up his you know, it's like that's a whole thing.

(35:11):
I think my perspective of this is, um, there are
times in my relationships where I've cried and been like
hold me. And then there are times where I'm like,
do this because you don't know how to do that
right And then when you like, and there are times
probably like okay, tell me what to do like, but
you have that interchange and just knowing how to dance
with the energy. And I think the person who knows

(35:32):
you best is going to be able to play that
with you and be a dynamic team and enjoy it. Yeah.
You and Dad used to tell me a story trees
don't grow without wind. You have to be able to
be flexible. You have to be able to move with
the way the wind blows. You can't just always be
I'm like this all the time, like, no, the wind
is blowing this way. Let me go like this, like

(35:52):
you You're gonna break under the pressures of life, under
the crazy ways that life throws you if you're always inflexible.
And I think that's the part for me that even
in being having been married, you know, I had to
learn that balance. I was dealing, you know, with an incredible, dynamic,
powerful woman and finding the balance of like, Okay, I'm

(36:15):
going to be more feminine in this moment, I am
going to be more masculine. And we were able to
dance and find that was really really important. Yeah, we're
gonna go to cats. Millions followed her relationship journey on
social media, through pregnancy, a wedding, and now divorce. We
just wanted to address some of the rumors about Oh

(36:36):
Michael are being separated. Unfortunately they are true. We are separating,
and we just wanted to be transparent with you guys,
because you guys have been with us from the beginning
of this whole journey. Cat has a question about healing
after her most recent breakup. So what question do you have,
miss Cats? So I'm a single mom, The question is

(36:57):
how do you not fail again? I don't want to
fail again, and I feel so much more pressure with her.
That's a heavy word failed because I remember Will had
said that this was his greatest failure. Oh yeah, I
had an issue with that because I didn't understand how
we could do what we do as a blended family

(37:18):
and do it as well as we do and as
loving as we do and have an amazing son, and
it's looked at as a failure. Yeah, it did what
it was supposed to do, So that was successful, and
that had to end so that something else could begin.
So I think you got to be careful with putting

(37:39):
those words because that's a heavy, heavy, heavy word. You know.
I think that what we consider success in relationships has
to be redefined. I've had some big lessons on that one.
Relationships come into your life, and you know, I was
digging on this this morning. We think we know why
we're in relationships, m okay, you know, and what the

(38:01):
journey is supposed to look like, and sometimes we have
to just see what is trying to be revealed, what
the healing is. It's like, oh, I wanted my marriage
this way or I wanted, you know, my family that way.
So how we define success, how we define why we're
in relationships and the purpose of relationships is like I

(38:26):
think sometimes we get stuck on what they are supposed
to mean to us. And I really have had to
get with that, you know what I mean. I've had
to get with that. I think that's a wonderfully made point.
I think that anytime something goes horribly wrong in our
lives and we lose something so important, it's a chance

(38:50):
to access a level of ourselves that we never would
have been able to access. It seems like she's just
in a space of trying to evaluate and think about
what happened and he and heal, which Devon, you know,
is so important before you start jumping up and thinking
about another relationship, which is good to that point. And

(39:10):
you know, cat, let me tell you when you on
the other side of a marriage that did not work
the way you thought, yeah, it changes everything, and so
I just want to acknowledge Cat's pain. It's painful, you know,
I just brought a piece of property, first piece of
property in the contract. Devon Franklin, an unmarried man. I
might have well broken down because I never saw this

(39:32):
moment when we said I do. There was never a
moment when we were thinking I don'tn't so to live
in the I don't. You don't know what it's like
until you do. So Cat is living in a moment
that psychologically never even accounted for. So on some level,
you know, yeah, in a moment when you're trying to
heal and you're trying to you know, deal with your stuff,

(39:53):
the ideas and the and the theories, you're like, forget that.
I'm hurt. Yo, I did everything that was the used
to be done, and it's still got me here. So
I would say to you, Cat, like it's okay to
feel how you feel. I just applaud your courage to
just admit, like, Yo, this is what I'm going through.
The one thing I had to do navigating this is
just be easy with myself. So Cat, I would just

(40:16):
encourage you be easy with you, you know, love you,
you know, care for yourself and give yourself grace because
you're gonna feel a whole lot of ways and a
whole lot of days. And it's okay, it's all right.
It's all right because love is hard and it's painful
in relationships don't work. So catt for whatever that's worth.
I share your pain, and you know, just applaud your process.

(40:36):
I want to add to cat because how can you
trust you're gonna succeed? How can you trust that you
won't fail again? Every woman, I've sat down with divorces
after relationship and I asked them, at any point your
spirit of intuition tell you this wasn't the man for you.
The answer is yes. But I'm a huge believer in
woman's intuition. Y'all can know in the first conversation this

(40:56):
isn't it, But you rationalize reasons to put past that
and give the guy a chance, and then yes, that
can turn into months, years, whatever relationship that never should
have started. It isn't to beat yourself up about it
and feel bad about it, but it's to help you
going forward. Your intuition knows. I haven't found a woman's

(41:17):
intuition to be wrong. That hasn't been my experience. So
I just encouraged to really tap into that. And in
order for you to do that, you have to make
sure you heal from what you've experienced, but not just
from this past relationship, from everything in your past, because
a lot of people make the mistake of just healing
from that recent breakup, that recent disappointment, and they haven't

(41:37):
uncovered the route or what even got you in that situation.
To begins, I want to add that real quick. I've
got a photo of my childhoodself on my phone, so
I've been doing that for the last two years because
we have to go back to the earliest childhood memories
and heal the wounds of the past. So now I'm
that young version of me that was banded or hurt

(41:58):
or abused and developing a healthy relationship that way. Cat,
I hope you've got some of your questions answered and
we are wishing you the best with you in that
beautiful Angel, You Angel. We have a question from Sierra

(42:18):
Miller from the hit Bravo series Some House. Hey, Sierra,
what's your question? Okay, so one, I've learned so much already,
so to keep it short and simple, I come from
to divorce, parents child of divorce, and as I'm dating,
I typically date with the intention of I do eventually

(42:38):
want to be married one day. I want to have babies,
and I want to break the generational patterns. How do
you decipher like a real red flag versus something that
could be worked on. I feel like sometime meet guys,
they might mimic my dad and a sense and you
know who wasn't always the most present. There are some

(43:01):
things that are red flags. There are some things that
are amber lights. I actually am a little distasteful of
the current culture we have, and I'm part of it
because these video titles do well on YouTube. You know,
five red flags to worry about, blah blah. You get
to the point where you go, oh my god, so
many things are a red flag. I shouldn't even be
allowed to date any more red flags. You get to

(43:25):
a point where you go, okay, not everything can be
a red flag. Some things are amber lights, and an
amberlite is an invitation to a conversation. Every great relationship
gets better with conversation, not worse. If you have the
conversation and someone attacks you. If you have the conversation
and now they go cold for two weeks if you
have the conversation and someone starts using your insecurities against you,

(43:48):
and everyone can have a bad reflexive reaction because the
fact is none of us like to be criticized and
called out, so we're all entitled to a little bit
of defensiveness. But it goes back to that well being
things like if you really want my well being, you're
gonna be like, Okay, you're hurt. Exactly exactly does the
conversation make things better? If it doesn't, red flag if
it does, Okay, let's keep going. Yeah, and not to

(44:10):
just the conversation, but whether you see any change in actions,
you know what I mean, any actions versus just words,
because everybody can talk. Yeah, I'm just saying. And I
would also say it's okay to have the intention of
wanting your marriage to work out when you get married,
but I would try to alleviate yourself from the stress
and the pressure of the generations and people that had

(44:33):
nothing to do with you that came before you, because
then that could be a weight on your marriage and
you might not make the best decisions for yourself because
you're trying to protect an ideal versus like that was
mom and dad, that's not my story and write your
own story and feel comfortable with that. Does that answer
your question for you? Yes, definitely. Thank you, appreciate you
so welcome. Thank you. This has been awesome and we

(44:57):
need to do a part two. And thank you all
you beautiful women for being here with us, our beautiful wall.
This was a good discussion. Don't dope. That was dope.
This was dope. This was so awesome. Wait we needed
by three more hours, Oh my goodness. Yes, Part two.

(45:37):
To join the red table Talk family and become a
part of the conversation, follow us at facebook dot com
slash red table Talk. Thanks for listening to this episode
of Red Table Talk podcast, produced by Facebook Watch, Westbrook Audio,
and I Heart Radio.
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