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These are some of the first words that I've spoken today. Like, I haven't really talked yet today, and you can hear it. Okay. My vocal cords sound shriveled up, and they are. But luckily for me, there's something kind of sexy about it. Like, I kind of have morning voice right now. Like, it's a little raspy. Good morning, baby. Good morning. You know what I mean? Like, you just got the tingles from that. Anyway, soon my cords will be warmed up, but for now, you get sexy, tingly morning voice from me. So you're welcome. Anyway, welcome back to Advice Session, a series here on anything goes where you send in your current dilemmas or anything that you want advice on, and I give you my unprofessional advice. And today's topic is standards. Our standards are complicated, right? Because they're constantly fluctuating. Sometimes our standards are too high, sometimes they're too low, and when we're lucky, sometimes they fall somewhere in between. Not too high, not too low. Just right. Goldilocks standards. But as much as we all strive to have Goldilocks standards, which is, I think, a term I just came up with. Did I just come up with that? Goldilocks standards. Has anyone ever said that? Okay, nominate me for a Nobel Peace Prize. That's actually incredible. That's beautiful. Wow. Very excited and inspired. Thank you. Moving on. It's very challenging to maintain balance with our standards, to find that state of Goldilocks standards, because there are a bunch of variables in our lives that that directly impact our standards. And those variables are constantly changing, evolving, fluctuating. And as a result, our standards are all over the place. You know, I know for me, I constantly have to keep my standards in check. I constantly have to check up on them because they do have a tendency to go awry. And for me, when my standards become imbalanced, it tends to look a little something like this, okay? My standards for myself, way too high, impossible to achieve. And I'm left feeling disappointed and bad about myself because I could literally win a Nobel Peace Prize and that would still not be enough for me. When my standards for myself are too high, I'm destined for failure. On the other hand, my standards for other people are on the floor. Okay? People can walk all over me. They can say mean shit all they want. I don't care. Because my self esteem is so low from having unrealistically high standards for myself that I don't care how people treat me because I don't feel like I deserve to be treated well. Because I ultimately hate myself. This episode is brought to you by Hill's pet nutrition. Since 2002, Hill's Food, Shelter and Love program has been helping pets find new homes, providing more than $300 million in food to more than 1,000 shelters in the U.S. and Canada. Every time you feed your pet Hills, you help feed a shelter pet, which helps make them healthy, happy, and more adoptable, changing their life forever so they can Change yours. Over 15 million shelter pets fed and adopted. Visit hillspet.com podcast to learn more. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. If you've ever wanted to create a website but didn't know where to start, Squarespace is your answer. Their design intelligence blends AI and expert design to help you create a site that's functional, unique, and totally your vibe. And with Squarespace payments, you can even start selling and let your customers pay however they like. Get started with a free trial@squarespace.com and use squarespace.com emma for 10% off of your first website or or domain. So that's what tends to happen to me when my standards are unbalanced. But everybody's different. You know, you might have a similar situation. Your standards for yourself and others might be too high. Your standards for yourself and others might be too low. Your standards for yourself might be low, but for others are high. Everyone's different, right? But we all have in common the struggle to find the balance. And so that's what we're gonna be discussing today. And that's what I'm going to be giving you advice on. Even though, as I just said, I do not have it all figured out. Okay. I find myself in a period where my standards are imbalanced every few years. I will say, though, right now I'm in a pretty good place. I would say my standards are pretty balanced. Like, I definitely expect a lot of myself, maybe a little bit too much, but it's not to a point that I can't, like, I don't know, find some sort of feeling of achievement. Like, I. I'm putting pressure on myself, but I'm actually able to achieve everything that I'm expecting of myself. So that's good. And when it comes to other people, I would say my standards are. Are pretty balanced right now. I don't think I'm expecting too much, but I'm definitely not allowing bad behavior. Bad behavior is. Is not allowed right now. My standards are too high and good for me because it is much better to have people in your life who respect you. Anywho, my Cat is like meowing in the kitchen and it's just. It's unbelievable because I fed them 15 minutes ago. I just don't know what the cat could be wanting. And I don't know which of my cats it is. I have one girl and one boy. I don't know which one it is. Sounds like the boy. Do you hear that? Can I be honest? I need to go check on this cat. I just. It's meowing very loudly. I'll be right back. Okay, I'm back. I checked on the cat and everything seemed completely normal. They have full food bowls. I can't explain it. And whenever my cats start meowing out of nowhere, I convince myself that they are seeing a ghost in my house, that there is ultimately a spiritual intruder. And. And it totally makes me paranoid for the rest of the day. So I'm going to try to distract myself now by giving you advice. So let's just begin. Okay. Somebody said I have high standards in all of my relationships. Romantic, platonic, et cetera. I feel like they're too much for most friends and loved ones to live up to. Should I hold my standards anyway? Okay. I feel like most people tend to look at low standards as the most dangerous, the most negative. And they tend to dismiss the potential dangers of having standards that are too high. Now it's clear that you're concerned about your own standards and you're starting to question if they're too high. I'm just saying, as a society, we tend to see standards that are too low as being worse than standards that are too high. And to be honest, I think both are equally as dangerous. Okay. When your standards are too low, you'll let people walk all over you. You know, your quality of relationships will suffer because you just kind of let anyone in. And a lot of times that lowers your self esteem because you have people around you who are not of high quality. You don't respect them, they don't inspire you, they don't respect you, you don't inspire them. It's just like a net negative situation. And you allow it because you don't have high enough standards to put a stop to it. But on a personal level, when your standards are too low, you just won't achieve to the level that you could otherwise. And that's a shame because you're capable of a lot of magic. And when your standards are too low for yourself, you oftentimes don't have the drive to make shit happen. And so you're not functioning at the highest level. And we should all be striving to function at the highest level, right? So, yeah, it's very clear that having standards that are too low is not good, bad, detrimental. But I would argue that having standards that are too high are almost equally as dangerous, just for very different reasons. And again, there's a lot of people who are aware of this, but there's also a lot of people who aren't. When your standards are too high in friendships and relationships, nobody ever can live up to your expectations, which leads you to disappointment and leads you to creating a dynamic with your friends and loved ones where they constantly feel inadequate in your eyes. They constantly feel like they just can't win with you. And at a certain point, they're gonna get exhausted. Like, I just can't keep up with the expectations of this person. I don't know if I can do it anymore. And it sort of becomes this doomed situation of like, either the people in your life are gonna leave you because they just can't live up to your expectations, and the feeling of disappointing you is really challenging for them, so they'd rather just not be friends with you at all, not date you at all, not be around you at all, whatever, or your expectations are so high that you're constantly disappointed with your loved ones and you're the one to cut them off. But that's usually how that story ends. Isolation. If no one can live up to your standards, then you will be alone. Because unfortunately, nobody out here is perfect. In fact, we're all very far from perfect. And I challenge you to find someone who doesn't frustrate you, who doesn't fall short sometimes. Good fucking luck. It's just the way that it is. And we should have high enough standards for ourself that the people in our lives have a positive impact on our lives. But we can't take it to an extreme where we're expecting so much positive from these people that we end up creating a big negative. And when your standards are too high for yourself, oh, my God, so many bad things happen. You psych yourself out. You get mental blocks because you're so afraid of failure. You're so afraid of wasting time. You're so afraid of not, you know, using your time efficiently. You're so afraid of not being productive. You're so afraid of people judging you. You're so afraid of judging yourself that you end up frozen. You don't even know what to do. You don't even know how to start because there are so many daunting thoughts in your head when you do accomplish something, you don't get any feelings of satisfaction because your expectations for yourself are so high that you could never possibly accomplish enough to satisfy those standards, to reach those standards, and your self esteem just absolutely plummets. Listen, you get the point. Extremes on both ends are equally as bad. The reason I bring this up is because I think a lot of people are aware of the dangers of low standards, but are less aware of the dangers of high standards. Because I think in our society today, if you will, high standards are sort of promoted and praised. I, I see, you know, dating advice online, for example, that consists of people sitting there and saying, if your significant other doesn't buy you flowers every day, cook your breakfast every day, make your coffee every morning, give you a back rub every night, only say nice things to you, only give you a gentle little kiss on the nose, have sex with you every single day, and have a really well paying job and in you never have to then drop them. If they don't have all that, drop them. I can't tell you how many times I've seen advice like that being like, come on people, we need to hire our standards. There are definitely a good chunk of people out there that end up raising their standards too high when they hear that advice. There are also people out there who just naturally have sort of dangerously high standards. And I think it's hard to keep it in check when no one's telling you that that's potentially a dangerous thing. And oh, my cats are fighting now. Are you guys kidding me? Like, I'm just, I, I can't get through anything with you guys around. Okay. So I'd say once you are aware of sort of the gravity of the dangers of having standards that are too high, you can properly analyze your own. But I think until you see it as something that can be potentially dangerous, you're not going to be as critical of your high standards. Because there's a lot of noise telling you that having high standards is, is a good thing. It's a power move. It's girl boss, it's strength, it's girl boss, it's boy boss. You know what I'm saying? Whatever. But it's, it's boss. You want to have high standards, right? So step one is to realize that it can be potentially dangerous. And step two is to reflect on your standards. And this is how I personally would do it. Okay. I'd ask myself a series of questions and see what my answers are. Question number one, are my loved ones genuinely hurting me in some way? Like Am I questioning if my standards are too high because no one's living up to my, you know, expectations and it's really disappointing, or, like, are multiple people in my life actually hurting me? And that's why I'm questioning my standards, because I'm like, wow, it seems like everyone's disappointing me because everyone's hurting me. Do you see what I'm saying? Like, are the people in your life hurting you genuinely? I think that's an important first question to ask. And if the answer is yes, then that means no. I. I don't think your standards are too high. I think you have some challenging characters in your life that you might need to reevaluate. But if the answer is no, and the people in your life are not genuinely hurting you, they're just not living up to your expectations, they're not perfect listeners, or they're not perfectly attentive 24 7, or, you know, they sometimes have moments where they lash out a little bit or, you know, like, little things that everyone struggles with. Right. If it's stuff like that, okay, then maybe you should continue questioning a little bit more. The next thing I'd ask myself would be, am I communicating my standards? Am I even bringing this stuff up? Because you can't expect the people in your life to read your mind. And I get sometimes that there's sort of this feeling of like, well, if you really knew me, then you would know that this is what's important to me. I'm sorry, that is unrealistic. You need to communicate your standards. We are all different in so many ways, and you can't expect other people to know exactly what you want at all times. And so if you're not communicating, then you can't necessarily expect that from others. Can you expect basic respect, basic kindness, basic levels of communication? Absolutely. But you can't expect people to perfectly meet your standards because those are very specific to you. And if the people in your life don't know what those standards are, they cannot live up to them. So ask yourself, are you communicating these things? If you are, okay, great. Well, then they're aware, and they're either choosing not to put the effort in to live up to those standards, or they literally can't, and it's impossible. And so that's something you need to ask yourself. If the answer is no and you're not communicating, okay, well, you need to start out by communicating with your loved ones what your standards are, okay? Because they can't live up until you tell them. So my piece of advice Then is to go and communicate and then give it another few months and see what happens and then come back to this. But again, if you are communicating, okay, well, then now there's more thinking to do. Now you need to sort of analyze, all right, what percentage of my loved ones are actually able to live up to these standards? You know, is it 50, 50? Is it 90, 10? What are we working with here? If majority of your loved ones are now living up to your standards and they're not hurting you, your standards are too high. They're just simply too. Oh, we have a cat. You're all wrapped up in my cords, buddy. All good. Um, okay. But then again, you know, if there's sort of a small chunk of your loved ones who aren't living up to your expectations and everyone else is able to do it, then maybe you want to hone in on those people and see what the problem is. And maybe it's less about your standards and more about their compatibility with your standards. Right? And you want to maybe, you know, figure out some sort of workaround. And then from there, I think the last question to ask yourself is, could you live up to your own standards? If you were friends with yourself, if you were dating yourself, would you live up to your own expectations? If your expectations for others are really that high, chances are you wouldn't be able to live up. And that's something that's important to be aware of. So anyway, let's move on. Somebody said, I keep getting into situationships and I'm tired. How do I find something real? Okay, this is gonna sound really harsh, but I can promise you that it's not. I'm saying it with love. And this is something that I've struggled with before too, okay? So like, don't feel offended, okay? Let's not get offended today. We are in a safe space here, okay? Let's not get offended. It's clear to me that you need to check in with your self esteem and you need to check in with your romantic standards, okay? Because your self esteem is low and your romantic standards are too low, okay? That's how you got here. That's how you keep getting here, right? First, I think you should check on your self esteem, okay? Which by the way, we should all be doing frequently because similar to our standards, our self esteem is all over the place, okay? It's constantly fluctuating again, sometimes it's too high, more often it's too low. And when we're lucky, it falls somewhere in between. Right, Goldilocks? Self esteem. Holy Shit, there I go again. Oh my God. Another fricking little term that I came up with. Another Nobel Peace Prize. Lucky me. We should all constantly be checking in on our self esteem. When your self esteem is low, you're less critical of your romantic situations, okay? The feeling of reassurance that romance gives you allows you to participate in things that you wouldn't otherwise. When your self esteem is low, somebody being attracted to you feels 50 times better. You're like, oh my God, thank God. Just thank God that somebody likes me. And so I think the first step is to really try to rebuild your self esteem. And my piece of advice is always to make sure that your self esteem is being based on the right part of your character. It's very challenging to, to keep that in check. But it's crucial. You don't want your self esteem to be based on your appearance or your success or your romantic prospects. Okay? You want your self esteem to be based on your character. Why? Because that is the most consistent and fulfilling part of you that it can be based on. It's also a part of you that you have control over. You have control over your character. You don't have control over your appearance. I mean, to an extent you do, but not 100%. You don't always have control over your success. A lot of that's out of your control. You don't always have control over your romantic prospects. There are just times when no one around clicks with you. These are all things that are not only surface level, but also constantly in flux. And so relying on them for your self esteem is, is not good. The only thing that you have control over that you can always take action in, in work on and improve on is your character. Who you are as a person, what you do for others, how you treat others, your overall impact on the world, big or small. And that's actually really what big builds good self esteem. Is, is that so? Check in on that self esteem, okay? Because when your self esteem is in check, your standards that are too low are gonna start slowly but surely rising. But I also think it's important to specifically hone in on your romantic standards. It's clear that your standards for romance are way too low for your own well being. You want something real, but you're allowing in situations that are not real. Why? Because your desires and your standards aren't aligned, okay? You're not paying close attention enough to this disconnect to fix it. I think it's important to make a set of rules for yourself when you're Dealing with this sort of challenge. So a set of rules for yourself could look a little something like this. Number one, I'm not gonna hook up with somebody again until I date them. Yeah, it might be challenging. Yeah, it might take a little bit of discipline. But I know that this will help me get back on track. Number two, I won't date somebody unless they meet this criteria. And you can list things out. Good listener, outgoing, polite, gets along with my family. Make your own list. Okay. Number three, I'm not going to participate in anything romantic with anybody for the next six months. I'm only going to try to make friends, thus giving myself the time to rebuild my self esteem. Like there's all these different rules that you can come up with for yourself. But I think it's important to, I don't know, have some sort of set of rules to abide by so that you're not just kind of, I don't know, floating through life and not. And just allowing yourself to get into situations that you don't even want to be in. And I think that that can be really helpful. And I think it's particularly important to avoid situationships moving forward. Because when you're in a situationship, you don't have the availability to find something real. Every time you're in a situationship, you're getting in the way of finding something real because the energy that you're putting towards the situationship now cannot go towards finding something real. So you're in a lot of ways, like spiritually emotionally unavailable. You know, until you let the situationships go, you will not find something real. So it's very important to set sort of rules for yourself and not allow yourself to, to fall back into it because otherwise you won't find something real. And I also think moving forward, it's important to communicate with your partners early on. You know, you go on a few dates, things start maybe getting sort of romantic and you're like, I hate to do this, but what the fuck's going on? And what do you want from this? Because I really don't want to. I need to know. And it's cringe and it's uncomfortable and it's hard, but it's what you got to do sometimes. This episode is brought to you by Hulu. Buckle up everybody, because the Kardashians are back. The new season of the Kardashians is now streaming on Hulu. I have been watching the Kardashians since I was a kid, okay? I grew up with this family, okay? I always want to Know what they're doing. And in this new season, Kim is juggling multiple businesses and her blooming acting career. Chloe revisits old feelings and the family members support one another through their personal journeys. And as always, it's full of fame, family and fun. You won't want to miss it. The new season of the Kardashians is now streaming on Hulu. This episode is brought to you by ebay. This is what you do when you've just found that statement handbag on ebay and you want to build an entire wardrobe around it. You start selling to keep buying. Yep. On ebay. Over that all black everything phase. List it and buy all the color, feeling more vintage than ever. It's out with the new and in with the pre loved. Next thing you know, you've refreshed your wardrobe basically without spending a dime. Yeah, ebay, the place to buy and sell new pre loved vintage and rare fashion. Somebody said, I lost respect for a guy that I'm talking to because he has mentioned other girls looks in front of me. Is that unfair? It makes me feel bad. In my opinion and experience, if someone's actions negatively impact your perception of them, that's unfortunately out of your control. A lot of our judgments, you know, gut reactions, immediate feelings are out of our control. Like we. We can't necessarily change our thoughts. Our thoughts just sort of happen, but we can control how we respond to them. I say that because I think it's important not to feel bad for the thoughts that we have. So, you know, let go that feeling of guilt. I don't think that that's necessary. In fact, I think our sort of tendency to observe people and judge people and, you know, our intuition and our gut tell us things to protect ourselves. Right. Like that's actually in a lot of ways a superpower that we have. Does it misfire sometimes? Absolutely. But I think you should shift your feelings of guilt towards feelings of gratitude that your brain and body is having these reactions to protect you. It's for you. You know, it's a mechanism that we have to keep us safe. So I think you're all good there. Right. There's no need to feel guilt. However, this is a guy that you're talking to sounds like you're not dating him yet. But you know, when you're talking to somebody, it's because you might potentially date them. So to deeply analyze them is not a terrible idea at all. I think you should ask yourself why it bothers you. Now. I don't know what he said about another Girl, like, he could have said, her ass looks incredible in those pants. I don't think that that's good. I think that's in bad taste. He could have also said, oh, wow. Like that girl's hair just looks beautiful. Maybe, you know, she had like a beautiful, a beautiful blowout or something. Or perhaps she just had beautiful hair. Who knows? You know, he could have said, wow, her outfit is really cool. You know, I don't know what he said. Right. And there's varying degrees of sort of severity, I think. Like, like if he said something romantic or, you know, somewhat sexual in nature about another woman, like, oh, wow, like, yeah, she's hot. Eh, don't love that. I don't love that. I think it's in bad taste and it's disrespectful. I, I, I don't think it's nice. Okay, but saying like, oh, wow, like I really love that girl's outfit or wow, her hair is very beautiful, or something less sort of romantic sexual in nature. I see. I think that that's fine. However, that might be a boundary where you're like, don't look at any other woman. Okay, sure. You know what I mean? I think it's important to ask yourself why it bothers you. Does it bother you because it's genuinely disrespectful? He said something romantic and nature about another woman. That's a little weird. That's a little bit disrespectful. Fair enough. Or did he say something actually just kind of nice about another girl and you're a little bit jealous? Not necessarily because you even need to be jealous, not because he said anything that should truly threaten you, but because you maybe are struggling with your self esteem a bit. And, and that's sort of the problem. And it's really hard to be honest with yourself about this. Like, I've had moments in my romantic relationships where something has rubbed me the wrong way. You know, like something that a boyfriend has said to me has like, kind of pissed me off or like, you know, rubbed me the wrong way. And I've thought about it and when I really think about it, it's like, I don't think that they're being disrespectful to me. I think I'm insecure. And I think that the girl that he complimented or gave a little bit of attention to somehow taps into my insecurities. Maybe, you know, she has something that I don't. Maybe she has, you know, like, really cool style, like cooler style than I think I have Maybe, you know, she's just super naturally beautiful in a way that I don't think I am. You know, like, who knows what it is, right? But like, it's important to ask yourself that because the last thing you want to do is start an argument with your significant other over something unfair, you know, and then you end up in a worse position where now you're in a fight and your partner feels confused because they're like, I didn't do anything wrong. Why are you mad at me? And it's a mess. It's much better to be like, fuck, that bothered me. Reflect on it. Be like, I kind of took it too personally. Clearly I have some insecurity issues. And then to go and handle your self esteem from there, you know, I already mentioned sort of what to do when your self esteem is low. It's clear that you're holding your self esteem in your romantic relationship, in how you're perceived by your partner. You are putting too much weight on it on that, right? And that's not good. But also, there's a chance that this guy truly said something that is not cool and it genuinely bothers you. And that's valid as well. But you know, you can only come to that conclusion once, truly asking yourself if you are upset for the right reason, you know, Next, somebody said, I'm thinking of going back to my toxic friend group because I'm just way too lonely. Is that terrible? It is terrible. Do not do it, okay? But also, don't be mad at yourself for feeling this way. It is so normal to feel this way. A lot of times when we shed people in our lives that are bad for us, following that is a period of loneliness because a lot of times toxic people isolate us from other people. And it can be hard to rebuild friendships and relationships outside of the toxic relationships because toxic relationships tend to be isolating. That's not always the case, but more often than not it is. So it sucks. And even if the relationships weren't particularly isolating, it's normal to miss people that we were once close to. Even if they're toxic, it's normal to miss them. So all of the things that you're feeling are normal, they're not terrible. But what would be terrible would be to go back. Why? Well, number one, obviously because they were terrible. You left them for a reason. Their impact on your life is not good. But number two, this is such an incredible opportunity for growth, okay? These are the moments in life when you grow, when you're faced with the option of going Back to your old ways or emerging from the challenge a new version of yourself. These are the fricking moments, okay? These are the moments where you truly grow the most. And until I realized that and truly felt and experienced the truth of that, it was really hard for me to not revert back to my old ways whenever I felt tempted to. Right? Like, if I would end a relationship with a guy that wasn't good for me or break a bad habit that was, like, really comforting for me but was ultimately bad for me, or, you know, leave a bad friend group, right? Like, until I did that, overcame it, and came out the other side a happier, stronger person, it was really hard to motivate myself to do so. But now I know. I'm like, every time I'm faced with this sort of dilemma, like, I can go back to the my old ways because it's more comfortable and it'll feel better right now, or I could push through a little bit longer and grow, and then I'm better off forever. I'm better off for the rest of my life. You know, like, either it's instant gratification or delayed gratification. It's the choice between the two. And almost always delayed gratification is better. Right. There are some times when instant gratification is. Is good, right? Like eating a chocolate croissant. That is instant gratification. That feels really good, and it tastes really good. Eating a balanced breakfast with, you know, protein and fiber and healthy fats and all this, that's, you know, maybe somewhat gratifying in the moment, but it is, in a way, delayed gratification, because those are things that look really good on your blood panel when you get your blood work done. Right. But at the same time, we need to eat the chocolate croissant. We need that sometimes, and we should not, you know, okay, I don't know why I brought food into this. That's like a whole other. Oh, God. Let's not even go there. Let's not go there. Oh, my God. Sorry. I hit my cat a little bit. Let's not go there. Yeah, but you get the idea, right? Like, instant gratification is not always bad. And I think that there are moments in our life when we deserve it, but I think instant gratification is a bit naughty, and we should, you know, limit it. And I think we should always be striving for delayed gratification because it does benefit us in more ways than I think instant gratification does. Growing through this type of challenge changes you as a person forever. Going Back to your old ways completely stops your growth in its tracks, okay? You're not growing from that. You're going backwards. Now, is it okay to go backwards sometimes? Of course. We all do it, okay? We all go back to the shitty ex. We all go back to the shitty friend group. We all go back to our shitty old habits. It happens sometimes, okay? Sometimes you have to go back a few times before you can break the cycle and grow. I've done it. We've all done it, okay? But remember in these moments that by getting through it, you are truly, like, accomplishing something that you. You will actually be able to benefit from. You will win. Like, you will feel good. You're going to feel better if you wait and you push through. And, you know, that's helpful to say, right? And that, you know, gives you a bit of hope and maybe a bit of motivation, but it doesn't get the job done. So in the meantime, focus the energy away from your old friend group and put it towards being social with new people. Okay? Start going to a new coffee shop. Start chatting it up a little bit every once in a while with the baristas. Okay? Maybe that's your new friend. I always use the coffee shop example, but that's because I'm. I have a love for that environment. Okay? You know, get a new gym membership. Start chatting it up with people next to you on the treadmill. Start chatting it up with people next to you on the. On the weight machine, you know, here and there. Maybe make a friend at the gym. Start taking pottery classes. If you want to take pottery classes. Start going for walks in your local park and start. Start saying hi to the locals. Like, put your energy towards putting you into environments where you could perhaps make a friend. Is there a chance that you might not? Absolutely. There's a lot of people that go to the park, that go to the gym. They go to the coffee shop and don't want to talk to you. In fact, I'm one of those people. I was actually thinking about this the other day. Like, I go to my hot yoga class and every once in a while I'll briefly, like, for 30 seconds max, chat with someone, because I go there a lot and I see the same people every day and I. Whatever. But one of my favorite parts about going to hot yoga is that I actually don't talk to anyone. I'm around people. I feel people's presence. I don't feel alone, but I'm not talking to these people. And that's my favorite part about it, is that I feel the warmth and the comfort of being around a bunch of people, but I also get to weirdly recharge at the same time. And so, I don't know, I love that about it. And that might also be something that helps you, right? You might feel a bit lonely and maybe like, I just, I don't know, I'm not sure what I'm looking for in a friend. Kind of aimless. In the meantime, maybe you just spend time in these environments where other people are hanging out at and you don't even talk to people. You just enjoy the feeling of being around people without being friends. Sometimes that's delightful as well. But be patient because it will all be okay and you'll be happy that you stood your ground and you did not go back to that toxic friend group. This episode is brought to you by Mentos Gum. Keeping things fresh. It's important, right? And I'm not just talking about fresh breath. It's important to switch up your routine whenever you can. Like, for example, I love to try new recipes. I also love to try new workout classes because I absolutely love workout classes. And every once in a while, it's fun to try one I haven't tried yet. And of course, another way to refresh the everyday is with Mentos gum. Available in a range of fresh flavors like spearmint, fresh mint and strawberry. Mentos gum. Yes to fresh. This episode is presented by Sephora. So you know when you see something blowing up on your socials, like a new makeup trend or a beauty tutorial, that hot new look, of course you want to try it for yourself. And that's when you head to Sephora. They've got all the hottest names in beauty. You can't miss brands like Kayali and K18, the ones that everyone is talking about. The next big thing is only at Sephora shop now@sephora.com okay, moving on. Somebody said, I can't tell if I feel this bark with this new guy I'm talking to, but he's a really good guy. Really? With a lot of L's and a lot of Y's. Okay, really good guy. I'm trying to shift my standards for who I date and he seems like he fits the bill with how he treats me and the kindness he displays. But how do I know if I'm actually attracted to him or if he's just a great guy but not my great guy? When should I give up? Well, there's a chance that you might be like me and your standards for men in the Past were quite low. Now this is not me insulting the men that I dated, right? It's not. It's insulting myself. Actually. My standards were very low, okay? How could I expect the guys that I dated in the past to live up to standards that I didn't even share with them? They weren't even aware of. But also, my standards were not only just low in the past, but they were also toxic. Okay? My standards for men used to be I only want to date a guy that barely likes me. I want to have to win over this guy. I like guys that are incredibly hard to get, borderline impossible, because the feeling of getting them is so intense, is so exciting, is so explosive that it boosts my self esteem in a way that nothing else does. Okay? So not only did I have low standards for like, how I was treated, but my standards were also toxic, okay? I wanted to date a guy that was so hard to get that by the time I got them, it felt like I had run six marathons in a row. Like, it was it the exhaustion, but then the satisfaction. It's drug like, okay? And that's what I used to look for. And when your standards are low and toxic, it's really hard for you to date somebody who's good for you. Why? Because someone who likes you, who shows you affection, who is genuinely interested in you, who reciprocates effort and attention are not a challenge. There's nothing to conquer. And so the feeling of receiving those wonderful things, attention, affection, romantic interest, pales in comparison to receiving those incredible things from somebody who doesn't really like you, who's hard to get, who's not fully in it. It pales in comparison. And that is so toxic, okay? It's so toxic because it's not that it's not true, right? Like, it is true, okay? I've experienced both in my life, okay? Affection, romantic attention. All of this from guys that do not like me, literally, or they like me, but like, they don't show it a lot. I'm constantly questioning it. And they're in and out, you know, they're in and out emotionally. I've experienced that and the excitement that that is. And I've experienced a healthy situation where the feelings are just mutual or not even mutual. The feelings are genuine and available. There's no shortage of affection and romantic feelings. And it's just there and I don't have to fight for it. And I can tell you that nothing pales in comparison to that toxic romantic attention. Like nothing compares. It is truly drug like but drugs are not good for you. They're just not. They're potentially most unhealthy part is how good they feel, but how bad they are for you. Like that juxtaposition is. Is the worst part about it, right? It's like if drugs made you feel bad and were just really bad, it'd be like, well, stay away from those. The problem with drugs is that they feel really good and they're really bad for you. That's the problem. So, yeah, you should really give this guy a solid chance, okay? Because the only way to sort of grow through that toxic habit of dating guys that don't like you, the only way to get through that is to date a guy that's good for you and is to figure out how to be satisfied with normal romance and normal affection. And you can't do that when you're dating toxic guys. You just can't. So I really think you need to give this guy a solid chance, okay? Give him a solid chance. And I can't define what a solid chance looks like, unfortunately, like, only you can figure that out. But I would say, you know, that it's not working if you get to a point where you truly feel like you're fooling yourself and. And this person, you know, where you're like, okay, at this point, it's been, you know, X amount of months, perhaps even a year, perhaps even two years, and I'm just not feeling it. The feelings just never came. And at this point, it's starting to feel unfair to them and to me that we're in this situation and it just feels irresponsible at this point that the likelihood that, you know it's going to work out is. Is low enough now that it's just, I got to let it go. And that's okay too, right? You might give this guy a chance and really, really give it a solid go, and it just does not work out. And there's a chance that he's just not for you. Like, that's totally fine too, right? As long as you gave him a solid chance. You can move forward knowing that you, number one, are taking steps to get over your toxic habits. But number two, that you didn't just jump to conclusions about this person. You actually gave it a try, it didn't work out, and now you know for sure. But unless you try it, you'll never know for sure. But now you tried it, so now you know for sure, and it didn't work out, and that's totally fine, and you move forward and and it's not your type of guy. But now you know what it feels like to experience, you know, a really good guy. And so now you know what to look for. There's someone out there that has the same traits that this guy has, but is, for whatever reason, more of a click for you. And it is sort of unfortunate how somebody on, on paper can look like the perfect person for you. You know, they have every single trait that you're looking for, but for some reason, it's just not right. Love and romance is sort of unexplainable. It's almost like cosmic. We can try to explain it or, you know, be like, well, you know, this type of person is compatible with this type of person and this and that bullshit. It just. It. It just is. Do you know what I'm saying? Like, we can't predict. It's almost like it's not up to us. Like, the universe has its own sort of plan when it comes to love, and we just don't. We just have to trust that. And if something's not working, it's not. But something. If something is working, then it is. But sometimes when it's working, it's because it's toxic. And you're feeling explosive feelings of, you know, lust that you can't even explain and you can't even describe, and it's toxic. So, anyway, that's actually all I have for today. That was today's advice session, and if you enjoyed it, tune in to Anything Goes every Thursday and Sunday. New episodes available anywhere you stream podcasts, but video is on YouTube and Spotify. Anything Goes is on social media at Anything Goes. I'm on social media at Emma Chamberlain. I also am Anything Goes. I don't have a co host. This is my show, but I also exist at Emma Chamberlain on social media. And I have a coffee company on social media at Chamberlain Coffee and online@chamberlaincoffee.com and in stores at Target Sprouts, Whole Foods, and more. Go look at the store locator if you want to find a store near you. That's all I got for today. I really appreciate you all listening, hanging out. It was truly, as always, a pleasure. And I don't know, let's just try to find our Goldilocks standards. Okay? Let's all work together to have Goldilocks standards. I'm waiting for the email from Nobel Peace Prize foundation or whatever about my creation of the term Goldilocks standards. Can't wait to receive that email. Although I'm really horrible at checking my email, so I probably won't see the email. Okay, I'm done. I'm done. I'm fucking done. I'm done joking around. I'm done. I'm done talking. I love you all. I appreciate you all. It's always such a joy to talk and hang out, and we'll talk and hang out very soon. All right, bye.