SPEAKER_01 0:00

Ghosting is a good sign. In today's podcast, we're going to be talking about ghosting and why it can actually be a good sign in your life. And now I understand ghosting hurts. It's really frustrating. It's really painful. And I think, quite frankly, it's the rudest thing anyone can do to another human being throughout the dating process. And when you meet someone, you can sometimes feel like it's really promising and then just like poof, out of thin air, there's nothing there. There's no explanation. There's no goodbye. There's just silence. And then your brain starts to go into crazy places like what I do wrong? Why wasn't I enough? Am I attracting the wrong type of people? But what if, what if ghosting isn't always a sign of rejection? What if in many cases it's actually evidence that your standards are working? So today, Gary and I are going to be reframing one of the most painful experiences in modern dating. Welcome to the Love Strategies Podcast, where we help successful women attract high-value men, date with a strategy, and improve their relationships. Now, whether you're single or dating or in a new relationship, we're here to help you dive into the male mind and provide raw insights found nowhere else, backed by science, psychology, and our own personal experiences. Your hosts today are myself, Adam Lagolce, professional dating coach and founder of Love Strategies, and Dr. Gary Lewandowski, relationship scientist, professor, and our head relationship coach here at Love Strategies. Please share with a friend and enjoy.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

Gary, you want to explain how all this works? I love it when we do this. I love this, right? It's like ghosting's not a sign that you're losing. It's a sign that you're filtering out the garbage, right? And is ghosting is not a sign about your worth. It's a sign of their character and their capacity. This is what so much of the advice out there about ghosting gets wrong. It's you see, you look like online. Why did he ghost? Text this, don't text that, wait three days, be more mysterious, wrong framework, wrong question, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. Completely. It's not a communication problem. Ghosting is not on you. It's not a you problem, it's a them problem, their character, their capacity. And when I say capacity, what I mean is they're not ready for the type of relationship that you deserve. They don't have the capacity to offer what you need. And so emotionally healthy people end things with clarity. Emotionally avoidant people end things by disappearing. Their behavior is telling you everything you need to know about them. So the question isn't what did I do wrong? The better question, the question you're going to be asking yourself by the end of today's podcast is how can I make sure I keep doing this right? Because when they're disappearing, you're doing something right. You're clearing out the garbage.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

Do not allow a low-value man, don't allow him to change your strategy. Because what can happen sometimes is you're kind of moving forward. You know, sometimes we'll have a client who's working the little love steps, and then they, you know, meet a guy and it didn't work out, or in worst case, he ghosts and they think, well, maybe I need to change my strategy. Maybe I need to change it. We're like, no, don't do it. Here's why. The first thing that I'll always say to that situation, and this happens a lot with our brand new clients. And I know this isn't the best marketing, but stick with me here. All right, everybody. When you start to raise your standards, it naturally repels low investment people. Let me repeat. When you raise your standards, you are naturally going to be repelling these low-value ghosters and flakers. They're going to go out with you and they're going to see, you know, like these low value guys will go out on dates with women and they're going to test boundaries. They're going to see how much can they get away with. Is she the type of woman who I can control? Is she the type of woman I can take home with me? Is she the type of woman I can tell exactly what to do? If they realize they can't do that with you, they will ghost. Great. Fantastic. It's working, right? Scare these men away. Standards, on the other hand, don't repel healthy men. They don't repel men who want a healthy, committed relationship. They don't repel men who meet those standards, right? Gary, it's like it's a very counterintuitive way of looking at ghosting, but it's like so, so important.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

If you're hiring somebody and you have high standards, that doesn't scare people away. It's some people are like, oh, I can't meet those standards, I'm even going to bother. Good. But there's always going to be people out there that meet those standards. And so it is one of the big concerns that you'll see with clients is like, oh gosh, if if I have these standards, I'm going to scare good men away. No, you're going to scare away lots of bad men, but that's fantastic. And so what we share with our clients all the time is when you're out dating, be very clear about certain things. Be clear that you're looking for something real. Be clear that you find communication and commitment important. Be clear that consistency is critically important to you. Also be clear that you value emotional availability. Don't sacrifice on these things. Because if you start having to, you know, dial down those expectations, you're going to end up with someone who doesn't meet what you're looking for. And like that's not worth it either. And so the strategy is always lead with clarity. When people don't meet those standards, they're going to, a guy's going to see, like, oh gosh, I can't, I can't be who this woman is looking for. Cool. He's going to show himself out. And sadly he'll ghost, but fine. That's it, makes things quicker. It's a little bit more efficient. It's not failure. The wrong people will exit. The right people are going to lean in because standards, you know, you have a job and you have all these like job requirements. If you have those job requirements, that's not intimidating. It's like, good. You're looking for a certain kind of person. I'm at that level. Let's go. Like that is a that's a match made in heaven. Right. And so make it about being unmistakably clear about who is the right guy for you and who is the wrong guy for you.

SPEAKER_01 6:17

Yeah. Which I think leads us well to point number two is that ghosting is information. It's not rejection. Now, I think this is really difficult, especially for those type A people out there. Those people who just don't like to quote unquote lose. Like, and I happen to be one of those people, like I'm very competitive, and I don't like when I can't win someone over. And there was a part of me, probably about 20 years ago, where if a woman was showing disinterest, or in the worst case, ghosting, I would do everything in my power to win her back. She would get 90% of my emotional energy, 90% of my brain. I would ruminate and think, how do I get her back? Until one day, I was actually having a conversation with my one of my friends about this. And he's like, he said in very kind words, he's like, Why would you want to be with someone who doesn't want to be with you? I'm like, that's so true. And it took me years to develop this. And of course, when I became a dating coach, we start to get more clarity in this messaging, which is no one can actually reject you except for yourself. Like I was rejecting myself in that situation because I was thinking to myself, how do I win her over? What's wrong with me? How do I be better? But the reality is, like, I I was just, I was honestly just rejecting myself. She can't reject me if I just take that situation, it's just like, okay, that's great information about her character and who she is. I'm not gonna let that affect me. And that's such a powerful framing that will protect you through the dating process. Because if every time someone ghosts on you, or anytime someone's even flaky, or if someone breaks it off with you, we think to ourselves, oh my God, they've rejected me. Guess what? That's just gonna chip away at your self-worth when it's unearned. These people don't even know you, they don't even know who you are. Why would we hand that person so much power? They don't deserve it.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Yeah, I mean, dating is all about learning about the other person and trying to see if they're compatible, see if they're a good match or a good fit. Now, when someone ghosts you, it gives you a ton of information. It tells you how they handle discomfort, it tells you how they communicate under pressure, it tells you whether they're able to be accountable. And it gives you information about all three of those things in very negative ways. It makes should make it very, very clear that this person is not for you. And if you learn that after three dates, yeah, you know, it sucks that it was on day three, but it's fantastic that it wasn't on year three. And that's really the way to think about it because what we know in psychology, behavior matters. Behavior is the most information-rich thing we have. It far surpasses intentions, empty promises, and empty words, because people will have lots of those. And so this goes even beyond ghosting, right? It's like people spend way too much time trying to decode what the other person's thinking and what they mean and their motives and their intentions. Like, no, no, no. What did they do? What they did tells you everything you need to know. Because someone disappearing, that is the information. There's nothing to interpret. You saw the behavior. Stop searching for any kind of hidden meaning. Ghosting closes the book. They're now off the list. They're done. I'm a big, you know, someone ghosts, don't even give them a chance to contact you back because a lot of times they do try to contact you back, and you should already know you do not want them. Block them. Yeah, they're done. They showed you everything you need to know. Move on. No further analysis required.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

This actually happened a couple months ago with a client, and I'm such a jerk sometimes on masterminds. I don't know about you, guys. You're so much nicer than me, I feel like. Or you're direct, you're direct and honest. I can be a little bit direct, and it depends on my mood. I think on this day I probably didn't get enough sleep. It was one of those days. But the client was telling me about this guy that she went on two dates with, and on the second date, she thought it went really well. And then, you know, it had been two weeks since she heard from him, and she was really distraught about it. Essentially, he had ghosted her, and she asked Adam, why did he do this? Why? And I said, Who gives a rat's ass? Who cares? Who cares? I can't read this guy's mind. I can't. I wish I could. I mean, I guess maybe not, you know what? I don't even wish I could read this guy's mind. Who cares? Because he did it, he showed his character, he showed who he really is. Let's move on and go find someone better. Let's put all of our emotional energy into that. And guess what? She listened. I was a little bit tough. She was a little bit mad at me after that, but she listened. And now, two months later, she's in the best relationship of her life. And I know that she's just getting started with this new relationship. We'll see where it goes, but she's in an exclusive committed relationship with someone else. This guy who ghosted her is just a remnant of her past. Who cares? Bye-bye. We're not gonna try and decode this man who showed low character traits. Why would we do that? What a freaking waste of time. Gary, do you ever have moments like that where you're like, oh my God, what are we talking about? Who cares about this guy?

SPEAKER_00 11:39

It's so funny you say that because as you're saying, I'm like having a flashback to I think sometimes some of the best coaching we do is by not answering the question the clients want us to answer. Totally. Totally. It's like because I we had had a client, she'd been in the program a month and been on a couple of masterminds. I knew enough about her backstory to know that this certain guy had ghosted her. So fast forward a month later, she's she comes on. Her question is, how what do I do? This guy who I had been, she didn't say ghost. She did she was hoping I forgot that this guy had ghosted her. And said she's like, he's back, and I want to know how to make this work. Like, what should I ask? What should those conversations look like? And I said, No. No, I'm not answering that question. I remember this guy. He ghosted you. What I want to know is why is he still able to contact you? Like he should, you he told you everything you need to know. We do not need this guy. You're wasting your time and emotional energy with a guy who already made it very, very clear he's low character. You deserve better than him. And so she's like, oh, fine. Like, and she was, she was kind of funny about it. She's like, okay, I get it, fine. Like she was being like kind of pouty about it. But then sure enough, two weeks later, she meets this amazing guy who she would not have met. She would not have gone out to that particular party had she been messing around with ghoster guy from before. And it's like, I don't know, it's the benefit, like we get to see the bigger picture and we're not emotionally involved in these situations. But it's like sometimes you need like that outside source who's who won't answer the question you think you want answered. Um, because that actually is what's most helpful.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

Definitely. And for those who are listening in, like, well, what is a mastermind? What do you guys even do? Well, Gary and I, and the entire team of coaches here, we have a very special executive love coaching program we call Love Accelerator. And in this program, we not only do live masterminds, we teach a uh series of steps. We call the seven little love steps to get out there and find love and be able to move forward with high character men. We also give you access to our relationship AI companion. So you at any time you get instant access to like the collective of coaches. Um, and we also do accountability coaching to ensure that you really stay on track one-on-one with our accountability coaches. All of this is kind of wrapped into this suite that really guides you every single step of the way. And if that sounds like something that would be helpful for you, then head on over to loveapply.com. You can apply for a very short conversation with someone on my team who's gonna really understand your patterns, why we're attracting these lower value guys, or why we're giving them any energy in the first place, and how to really attract the right type of healthy relationship. And then we'll see if love accelerator is right for you. If it is, we'd welcome you with open arms. If not, you're gonna walk away with a lot of great ideas to be able to move forward in your love life. Again, that's loveapply.com, or you can click the link in the description to uh to be able to apply for that session.

SPEAKER_00 14:49

All right. So let me let me let me shed some light here on what this whole ghosting is good thing, the the best lesson in the whole thing. Stop personalizing someone else's limitations. This is true about ghosting, this is true about lots of things in dating relationships and your own whole entire life. It's not he rejected me, he doesn't know you. Here's what it actually is. He rejected the level of relationship that you required. He's not ready, he's not looking for the same thing. Don't take it personal. His limitation is he's not emotionally ready, his attachment style isn't where it needs to be, whole bunch of things. We don't even know what it is, but we just know he's not ready. Don't take that personal. So what we were saying earlier. Don't get thrown off of what you know works just because it's not working with this one guy. You're not trying to win every man over, just the right guy. And so people don't reject your value, they reject the cost of living up to it. They don't reject your value, they reject the cost of living up to it. As long as you're being reasonable and realistic, people should meet your standards. Don't take it a personal when they don't. They're just not there yet, they're not ready. And so it's not I wasn't enough. It's he wasn't ready, he wasn't capable, we weren't aligned, we weren't compatible. Cool, you're not gonna be compatible with every person. You only need to be compatible with one person. That's all it takes.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

Yeah. For whatever reason, this reminds me, this topic reminds me of a moment I had when I was coaching men. And before I started with love strategies and everything we do here, coaching women, I used to coach guys on how to initiate conversations with women with great body language. And really, I would help the good guys out there who kind of struggled with creating those connections right off the bat with first impressions, and I would guide them to being able to do that and overcome a lot of the fears. And I just remember one time when I was working with this guy, great guy, super kind, super nice, but he was shy and he really didn't have a sense of style. So we worked on that. Um, and so we went on a little shopping spree. We got him spruced up, he's looking good. And I remember I'm like, okay, let's start a conversation with one woman. You know, I remember we were walking in the Boston Commons, it's like a major park downtown, and he saw a woman. He walks up to her and he's like, Hey, uh, just wanted to say hello. I saw you walking past, and I just want to introduce myself. My name is, I won't say his name. And she looks him in the eye and is like, ew, get away from me. I do not want to talk to you. And she like literally puts her hand up, like in the movies, like, go away. But Adam, why don't you like approach me more? That's a different, that's a different podcast for a different time. But he comes back to me and he is so distraught. He's like, Oh my god, why would I hire you? What are we thinking? What is happening? Why am I such like I'm so bad at talking to women? And I simply said, like, do you think her response had anything to do with you? Like, honestly, let's really look at it. Because you went up, you had a smile, you were engaging, you look great, you had great body language. Like, honestly, did it have anything to do with you? He's like, I don't know, man. Maybe she's just having a bad day. And I said, It looks like she's having a terrible day. Honestly, like, for all we know, she just got out of a meeting with her boss who just told her that she's getting fired. We don't know what's going on in her life. I'm not sure what is happening, but by her doing that, that is not a rejection. You cannot get rejected by someone in that very moment. All you did is go up and say hello. And I think the same applies for women. It's like we put so much, we give the people so many people so much power in these situations to impact us when come on, it has nothing to do with you. It's something that they got going on in their own life. And guess what? Once he he had that right framework, he went on talked to someone else that given day. She was incredibly receptive. Maybe she was having a good day, maybe she just exercised and you know, whatever. Who knows? And it went really well. So it's like just don't allow yourself to ever get rejected by a stranger. It's just why would we give that person so much power? Doesn't make sense to me.

SPEAKER_00 19:20

Yeah, I mean, we don't know them, we don't know what's going on. It's it there's a thousand things that are taking place in their life at any moment. We're one of those things. And it's like one out of a thousand just doesn't have that much impact. It just doesn't. And so it's it's just an important thing to remember. If sometimes we make the stakes way too big and it, we talk ourselves out of a lot of connection because of it. Um, I think the the last piece here with ghosting, which is another good general reminder for dating, is that dating isn't about getting chosen. It's about screening. And so one of the biggest mistakes people make in dating is walking around thinking, like, how do I get picked? How do I make them like me? How do I be the one? And that's the wrong game, right? That's not that's the wrong strategy. Healthy dating is about selection, it's not about performance. It's about making sure that someone's a good fit for you. You're evaluating them. And so it's this idea of like an emotional TSA. Like the TSA, before you get on a plane, they go through make sure you don't have any bad things in there. But when they are you're going through that airport security, the TSA people aren't offended when they find something you're not supposed to have, right? Yeah, what is about? I don't know. What do you have? But it's like, but it's like, no, like this is the system working. Like, oh yeah, you have a water bottle in your carry-on. Shouldn't have that. Okay, cool. And we all move along. And it's like, it's the same thing. It's like somebody ghosts you, it's not like, oh, I'm so offended. What's wrong with them? Uh like, let's not spend emotional energy that way. Just be like, oh, they ghosted that the system's working. My standards scared somebody else away. Good. You're not designed to let everybody in. You don't want to let everybody through. We're not just willing, hey, come on in, bring all your garbage with you. Like, no, no. Our standards are there to screen people out. We want faster no's. Faster no's our wins. It saves us time, it saves us emotional energy. This is something we do with our clients that's gonna sound weird. On our masterminds and in our community, we will celebrate people getting out of relationships quickly. We'll celebrate people having like, you know, we went on a date and then things didn't work, and then it fell and I never heard from again. Great. That's fantastic. Everyone like hears them on, clap ready, clap it up. Like, let's go. Because that's now less time. That that person, here's the thing: when that happens, that person was never going to work out. If that's all it took, it was never gonna happen. You just found out faster. Finding out faster, that's everything. It's addition by subtraction. Because ghosters are the time wasters, they're the energy drainers, they're the heartbreakers. You're finding out faster instead of wasting six months to then end up be like, oh gosh, this didn't work. Because slow heartbreak, that's the worst. That's the most emotionally expensive thing you can go through is the slow, like, is this working? I don't know. The seven-month situationship that never goes anywhere, and you're just filled with hope. And then after seven months, you're like, I don't know, maybe this is just how love is. And then it's now a year and seven months, and then it's like, oh, it didn't get any like, oh, that's the worst. So ghosting by comparison, it's a walk in the park. It's nice.

SPEAKER_01 22:36

It honestly is like in the short term, it's painful. There's no doubt, because you're human and it feels like a loss. But I would way rather invest a couple weeks in a person and it goes nowhere and it gives them a short-term sting than invest two years into someone who's flaky.

unknown 22:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:59

Two years into someone who's not right for me, two years into someone who's clearly low character. And so if we can reframe moving forward, that you are no longer going to chase these guys. You're gonna be a chooser moving forward. You are choosing who is right for you. And if a man makes that choice easy by ghosting on you, good. Later, bye-bye. That's it. It really is that simple. And for those of you who want really more guidance in your love life, just head on over to loveapply.com, apply for a love strategy session. We'll help you every single step of the way. This is what we do around here. We protect you through this process and we maintain that ironclad mindset that you deserve something incredible. And when someone does something so low value is ghosting on you, they don't deserve a seat in your life. Thanks, Gary. Appreciate you, man. Thanks, Adam.