Matthew Hussey: 

This video is a big deal because my wife Audrey is answering your love and life questions. And the reason this is a big deal is because Audrey did not want to do this video. It required an insane amount of convincing. But with this nice cake.

I baked you and it’s filled with all of your favorite things. Compliments. It’s a cake filled with compliments. Yeah.

Audrey Hussey:

What?

Matthew Hussey:

Everything that you love.

Audrey Hussey:

Oh F**k. 

Matthew Hussey:

But you asked for it. You literally said we demand Audrey. And so I’m going to bring her onto this video. Meeting Audrey has changed my life in so many ways. We have been in a relationship for over five years. We met around six years ago and we’ve been married for two, going on three years now. We had a son three, four months ago, and I just have never been more at peace in a relationship in my life.

I’ve never been close to this happy, and it’s such a joy to be able to bring you someone who has taught me so much and changed me so much, and frankly, to have her answer your questions herself for once. So we went through the questions that came in from our prior YouTube video. Yes, we read your comments in case you didn’t know.

Make sure you leave them on this video too. And we also pulled questions from our Love Life coaching group. If you don’t know, we have a coaching community with thousands of members who are actively working on their love lives and life in general. Audrey is a coach in that group. She is an active mentor there. The link is in the bio for anyone who wants to check that out.

We have categorized the questions into two big themes questions about Audrey and questions about my relationship with Audrey. As always, like and subscribe for more. I know that your love and your encouragement would mean the world to Audrey.

David:

Check, check.

Audrey Hussey:

Action.

David:

You got it. All right. Our first question comes from makeupkoala on YouTube who asks, “I would like to know how Audrey is so confident and secure. Of course, it helps that she’s absolutely beautiful. But there must be something deeper here. From what she has said, it’s clear that she’s gone through the same stuff that many women go through, but somehow she managed to stay true to herself?”

Audrey Hussey:

Well, first of all, thank you so much for the compliment. That’s really kind of you. And I’m three months out of having a baby, and so telling any new mom that she’s beautiful is just the kind of thing you can do. So thank you so much. I find it so interesting that you think I lean secure because I’ve always identified with being more anxious and anxiously attached.

In fact. And what I found to be a helpful realization is that one of the antidotes to anxiety is actually connection. And what I mean by that is that when we are looking for love, we’re looking for oftentimes a sense of belonging and acceptance. You know, we want the person to accept us. We want to feel worthy. And it’s not steady ground when you’re dating because you often don’t really know how someone’s feeling about you.

So instead of looking for certainty in that person, I looked for sort of connections and a sense of belonging with my friendships, my family dynamics, and that connection and that ability to feel seen and accepted within those relationships really helped take the pressure off when it came to meeting potential connections and people I liked. And that’s something that I, you know, had to work hard on.

I think it’s very active work. I don’t think it’s something that just happens by itself, certainly not for me. I’m by no means perfect in that area required a lot of discipline, a lot of, shifting my focus from, you know, the way that I’m feeling and the uncertainty that I might be feeling about somebody to the fact that I have got a home and a sense of connection and sense of belonging and all these other people, and constantly reminding myself of that and bringing myself back there. So that’s something that I did that, has helped me a lot with not feeling anxious and feeling more secure.

David:

All right. Our second question comes from a Love Life member who asks, “have you ever felt like you’re not good enough or lacks self love? And how did you choose to value yourself in those moments?”

Audrey Hussey:

So the short answer is yes. Absolutely. I have felt that many, many times in my life and to a certain extent, I think a feeling of unworthiness is something that a lot of us carry with us forever, and we just have to learn to manage it, and we have to learn to kind of coexist with that feeling and remind ourselves that it’s just it comes from past wounds, it comes from past experiences.

And for me, one of the things that’s really helped with that feeling of unworthiness, that feeling of not being good enough, is to try and attack the problem from all angles. To give you an example, when I was in my 20s, I suffered with hair loss. But instead of hiding away and just feeling down on myself, I decided to do everything I could to prevent it and get my hair back to how it was before.

So I saved money to get expensive hair treatments. I did all of the research I possibly could under the sun, around the supplements, the products, all the different things I could do to help it. I did a whole hormone panel. I did all of these things and you know, over time I actually got better as a result of it, which is fantastic.

Matthew Hussey:

Let’s say your hair had not improved. What would you have done to maintain a sense of self-esteem and self-love, despite the fact that this thing that had rocked your confidence didn’t actually get better?

Audrey Hussey:

What I would have done is I would have then tackled the feelings that I had around the fact that it hadn’t gotten better, so it would have then morphed from a very kind of like physical thing that I was trying to fix, to a psychological thing that I was trying to fix, and a mental health, you know, where am I putting my confidence?

Why am I putting my worthiness? How can I start to feel better about myself? What can I actually do within my control to feel better about this thing that is out of my control? But I would have probably felt really, really bad about it for a really long time before I did that. So I think it’s also important to say it’s, you know, at a certain point, I think it’s important to bounce into action and see what you can do, but that can that can take a little while. Next question.

Matthew Hussey:

Wait, wait, can I just make one comment on this video before we continue?

Audrey Hussey:

Sure.

Matthew Hussey:

There’s something we need to tell people about.

Audrey Hussey:

What?

Matthew Hussey:

We know a lot of people watching this, they want to find love. And you know that we have something that’s happening in April that is going to help people find love. It’s called the Year of Love.

And basically it’s predicated on this idea that modern dating kind of sucks. But the love of your life is out there and they’re looking for you the same way you’re looking for them. And you’ll be grateful to each other for not giving up on each other when you do find each other. I am running my Year of Love event the last time we did this in January.

Tens of thousands of people showed up. It was literally the biggest live event I have ever done and it was designed to help people find love who are just sick and tired of modern dating. I believe that the right person for you is out there looking for you right now, the same way you’re looking for them, and you just have to meet each other.

And to do that, two things have to happen. One, you need to not give up. And two, we can show you everything we’ve ever learned about how to find love in the most efficient and enjoyable way. You can sign up for free at JoinYearofLove.com.

Audrey Hussey:

And now back to my video.

Matthew Hussey:

Okay.

David:

All right Leo-tn2QC on YouTube asks, “how did you become the woman who knew exactly what kind of partner you truly wanted? And how did you communicate that so effectively? Did you have specific role models in your life, or was it more about learning from past relationships that didn’t work?”

Audrey Hussey:

I don’t know that I when I met…

You.

Matthew Hussey:

Matthew. It was like you forgot your husband’s name. 

Audrey Hussey:

No, I was trying to say if I was going to say Matt. And I was like, should I say Matthew because that’s how people refer. Anyway. It’s a really great question, but I don’t want to give the impression for any of the stories that Matt and I share that I had everything figured out. We even have everything figured out today. I don’t I think we’re all a work in progress.

You know, for me, what helped me in life was to actually go through difficult experiences and really learn the lessons that came out of those experiences. To give you an example in the context of dating and love, before I met Matt a few years before I met Matt, in fact, I was dating somebody. I really liked them. I thought we were exclusive.

It turned out we weren’t exclusive, and when I sort of confronted him about it and said, like, if you want this to carry on, we basically have to be exclusive. He said, no, I don’t want to do that. And that really hurt me at the time. Of course it did. But that lesson that I learned that day, which is, you know, you can’t assume exclusivity, first of all.

And also, you always have to communicate what you expect from the relationship and where you think the relationship is at. That lesson allowed me to be more confident and have more standards and be more communicative. When I met Matt and, you know, everybody talks about this message that I sent him, but that only came from having experienced what it’s like not to send a message like that.

Matthew Hussey:

So I texted Audrey after the show and I, I’m sorry, but I was looking for a little convenience. I was like, can you come to my part of town so we can maybe have a drink together here? And she was having none of it because we had already met up in my part of town for the last couple of days.

So when I said, do you want to come over here? She said, hey, there’s this great bar near me. It does great drinks. Come meet me there now. I sent a message back. Being like, my family’s here right now, it would really help me if you could come over this way. Do you mind? Audrey was having none of it because she was like. Look, I don’t know what your intentions are yet, but I am going to make sure there’s equal investment. So she sent me a message back and she said, it’s okay. We can totally do another night. She, like, took it off the table. And I was like, I want to see you tonight.

Audrey Hussey:

The reason I say all of this is, I think that you can only get to a place in life where you’re really, really proud of your actions by experiencing difficult things and, you know, having to kind of go through the pain of those difficult things. And the other thing I’ll say is you always have to believe that love is possible.

You always have to believe that people are good and that you’re going to meet people you are really into and who make you really happy. You you have to believe that because otherwise what’s the point? And I think believing that means that actually you end up attracting more of that, because what you’re doing by doing that, what you’re doing by staying optimistic, by staying hopeful, by staying romantic is you’re actually allowing for romance and beauty and love to enter your life.

Matthew Hussey:

Do you think that person who didn’t become exclusive with you is deeply unhappy and having a horrible life now?

Audrey Hussey:

Of course.

Matthew Hussey:

Right. I just wanted to check that.

Audrey Hussey: 

Duh.  All right. What’s the next question, David?

David:

People have heard about the rocky start to your relationship from Matthew being slow to commit to that sharp text you sent him in early dating that made him take you seriously, what was your internal state like in those moments? Were you anxious? Desperate? Sad? Indifferent? Something else?

Audrey Hussey:

The word I would use is resolute. The reason I use the word resolute is because when there started being inconsistencies in communication, I started grieving the relationship or the situationship. It’s a harder transition when you’re blindsided and everything is seemingly perfect. But for me, at that point, there were already signs that it might potentially not work out.

And so it didn’t feel like I was losing this great big love. A younger version of me would have probably not been as comfortable sending a message like that, but for me, at that time, my Northstar, as you put it Matt, was a great relationship that I felt good in a teammate, someone I could, you know, it was me and them against the world.

And so when in these early stages, I started seeing signs that it wasn’t going to be that relationship and lo and behold, it turned out to be that relationship. But I didn’t think it was going to be that relationship through the the sort of actions I was seeing. I didn’t feel like I was losing my great love. I just thought I was losing someone who wasn’t right for me.

I had a lot of radical acceptance around what that was, and my goal was never to get you Matt. It was to meet my person. And so I think that that helped me feel resolute instead of anxious and sad. Now that I didn’t go through sadness and, you know, disappointment, I think is a good word to use. But by that point, I was pretty convinced that it wasn’t going to go anywhere. And it wasn’t the right thing for me. And so I wasn’t too sad about it at that time.

Matthew Hussey:

We should underline that line that you said the my goal wasn’t to get you, it was to meet my person. Very good. It’s really good.

Audrey Hussey:

Thank you.

David:

All right. So many women date by seeing the potential and the change for the better in a man. However, all dating advice tells us not to date for potential, so it’d be great for Audrey to touch on the potential she saw in Matthew that made her keep trying, and how she made him commit.

Audrey Hussey:

Many people in my life, my friends and just people that know me really well, have said to me that one of my superpowers is vulnerability. And the reason I say that is because in the early stages of mine and Matt’s relationship, I was incredibly vulnerable about how I felt. I was very open about the fact that I really liked you, and I would tell you, and I didn’t have any fear that it would put me somehow on the back foot because I shared how I felt.

I was vulnerable and open about what I wanted. When you did things that upset me, I, you know, talked about it and I was kind of open and vulnerable about, you know, why those things made me uncomfortable and kind of what I wanted more or less of. And I think if you can be vulnerable and if you can be open about, you know, kind of what you want, who you are and lead by example, you don’t really leave the other person with anywhere to hide.

What I mean by that is that they either have to walk away or step up. You know, you shouldn’t date for potential, but you can allow for people to step into the role that you want them to be. And to a certain extent, we all date for potential because we don’t really know people in the beginning. So we have to model and we have to communicate the kind of relationship and culture that we want to see and see if that person can meet us there.

Don’t be persistent about potential. In other words, if you don’t feel like somebody is meeting you, that if somebody isn’t able to step up, then that’s probably a sign that they’re not going to be the right person for you. And it’s not a mandate to keep trying and keep giving them chances and keep saying that maybe one day they can turn into this person that you want them to be.

Matthew Hussey:

It’s not don’t date for potential. It’s don’t stubbornly hold on to your idea of someone’s potential.

Audrey Hussey:

That.

Audrey Hussey:

I really like that distinction because it allows people to take a risk on someone. But a calculated risk.

Audrey Hussey: 

Like you say invest than test, right? It’s like you take a risk, you tell them what you want, you express what your needs are, and you observe and see whether they can meet you there. Thank you for these questions. Very good.

Matthew Hussey:

Shall I do the outro real quick or…

If you loved this video, I know you love the videos I’m posting every single week here on this channel because everything Audrey mentioned about her standards, her boundaries, her communication, when to be vulnerable, when to give a little more. When you do see potential. These are all things we talk about on this channel. For me, the biggest takeaway here is that Audrey didn’t make me commit.

She tested and then backed off when she didn’t receive the standard that she had defined for herself. Thank you so much for watching. I will see you again next week and I can’t wait to read your comments.

*This transcript was whipped up with the help of AI. While it does a pretty impressive job, it may have the occasional typo, mix-up, or moment of creative interpretation. If you spot anything that looks a little . . . adventurous . . . thanks for your patience (and your sense of humor).*