Love on a Timeline with Esther Perel [VIDEO]
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I love roller coasters. And I remember saying to my friends once,

One of the things I love most about roller coasters is that people spend most of their time complaining that the line is so long and that they don't get to ride. They get into the roller coaster and then they spend most of the ride screaming, saying, I wish it would stop. Just get me out of here. Get me out of here. Get me out of here. Get me out of here. And then after the ride, they go, ah, that was so much fun. I want to do it again. Oh, I don't ever want to do that again. And in a way, it sounds like

The relationship is a roller coaster and then it becomes our ability to remember that we wanted a bit of a loop and we also remember when to hold on to the harness. But some couples live on a roller coaster and they like the edge feeling of it. And some people don't want to live on the edge.

They want to live in the line and then ride a roller coaster. They go to the other things at the fair. They just want to go eat and sit in the cups that spin. Or the little round. Yes, yes. Oh, the Ferris wheel. Yes, yes. Okay. This is What Now? with Trevor Noah. This message is a paid partnership with Apple Card. The holidays are almost here. And who doesn't love getting a little back this season?

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It's no longer a whispered secret. It's practically a badge of honor. I mean, for me, therapy has been a game changer, helping me work through everything from past traumas to career challenges and, of course, relationships. I would argue that few people have done more to inject the language of relationship therapy into the culture than today's guest, my friend Esther Perel. Esther's singular goal in life is to get all of us to have healthier relationships.

She's got her amazing podcast, Where Should We Begin, which features real couples working through their triumphs and challenges. She's got her books. She even just launched several online relationship courses for you to fix your world at home. Esther is a very busy person, but for the next hour, she's with us to lay out her theory of what makes for truly satisfying relationships and to walk us through the life cycle of a relationship from first date through moving in together to, yes, it happens, splitting up gracefully.

So settle in. Esther Perel joins me now on a couch, of course. Here we go. So Esther, I've known you for many years. I, like many people, have read your books and watched your talks for many years. And so in sitting down to have this conversation with you, I was trying to think of something that you haven't necessarily done before. And then I realized something.

that everyone says when thinking of a psychotherapist, a relationship therapist, an expert in sex and love and the way we see ourselves. And everyone says, I wish I had known this from the beginning. I wish I had started therapy sooner. I wish we had spoken to somebody sooner. And as crazy as it sounds, I thought to myself, what if you could start your relationship with Esther Perel?

What would it be like from the very beginning? You know, and I actually, let's start with that. Have you ever met somebody before their relationships and then like sort of gone through with them? Or do people only come to you when things are going wrong? No, people used to come when things were...

Going south. I think there was this there was so much stigma attached to psychotherapy that people only came if there was really trouble on the horizon or not even on the horizon in their midst.

And that has fundamentally changed. The idea that you don't go because things are terrible, but you actually go in order to prevent certain things from happening. Or because you've had other experiences and you know that there's certain vulnerabilities that you grapple with. And you come actually when things are still really good and you say, what should we prepare ourselves for?

That is a major thing that changed in almost 40 years in practice. This was a big shift. How do we immunize ourselves from what people are now terming over-therapizing? It feels like we lived in a world where people never went to therapy and didn't want to deal with the brain. And now some people are warning that we therapize everything and everyone. In fact, I read a tweet once that really made me laugh thinking about it. Someone said...

Every relationship in LA is a proxy battle between therapists now. It's two people in a relationship saying, well, my therapist said this and no, no, well, actually my therapist said this about it. How do we immunize ourselves? And do we even need to? Does your therapist know my therapist? Yes, exactly. Exactly.

You know, it's a little bit like sex. It used to be that you had to be ashamed if you had sex. Now you are ashamed if you don't. So the same idea that in this very psychologized society that we are now living in, it's a cachet to put your being in therapy on your dating profile. It suddenly doesn't take away from you. It adds. It stands for change.

I work on myself. I investigate my life. I seek insight. I seek to grow. I seek to be enlightened, etc. I think there is a risk of being overly therapeutized. I think that you can become a professional patient. But that doesn't mean that you have been in therapy for a long time. For many people, that long time has been

extremely beneficial. So it's not like you can make a statement and say, oh, you've been in therapy 10 years and show me what you got. You know, where are the goods? How do we know that it has really made a significant difference? So for some people, this is a very important endeavor that accompanies throughout their life. For other people, it sometimes is a way actually to not address issues. Oh. You know, you kind of can say I'm in therapy, but not much is happening there.

So it can be a subterfuge too. Like everything else, it can be used for great gain and for deep work. And it can be also used sometimes to perform, to pretend that you're doing certain things, but you're not really engaged in it.

So I think that you don't know until you ask four more questions. The fact that somebody says I'm in therapy or I have a therapist doesn't tell you much. What are the four questions? I knew you were going to ask me that. I mean, you set me up. I gave it to you on a platter. You know, they're never four times the same, but you could ask.

What brought you to therapy? And have there been times when the reason why you go has completely changed? Because what brought you may not be why you're still there. And have you had long periods where you stopped? And at this moment, how would you define what you do there? And if you thought about something that has really changed you because of the work that you did in therapy, what would it be?

Wow. That kind of questions. That'll tell you something about how the person thinks about their endeavor. What is the reflection about the reflection? I've always wondered, as a therapist, you're dealing oftentimes with people who are telling you about their world and how they relate to it, but you don't necessarily get to relate to their world. You only see it through their lens. Like, how does a good therapist know that?

When the person who's sitting on the couch, how do they know when that person is sort of like presenting? Not the truth, because everyone has a different truth. How do you know which perspective to work from? And how do you know how to guide the person when they're the ones presenting you with reality? No, they're not presenting me with reality. They are presenting me with their reality. Right. And when it comes to the reality of relationships, relationships are stories, right?

Everybody comes to talk about their relationship. They're coming with the story of their relationship as they see it. So that's the first thing. You have to keep in mind that what you're hearing is a version of the story. And that most likely there is another person, if we're talking relationships, who may have a different version of the story, a different way to tell the relationship, the dynamic in the relationship, the patterns. So one...

Once you know that, while you listen, you sit and you think, and sometimes you ask, if your partner was hearing this story, or if I asked your partner that same question, or this person you're dating, what do you think they would say? And then you try to see if this person sitting right here has the ability to even imagine that there can be another story.

It's one of the great challenges of relationships. And one of the great tasks is the ability to live with difference. That means another person. Yes. So, you know, one of the things that happens to us a lot as couple service, if I see you for a while alone and you've told me a whole thing about you. And one day I say, I really would like to meet your partner. And most of the time when you meet that partner, you're

It's got nothing to do with what I imagined. You know, over years, I made myself a picture of what this person was like. If this person was so sweet or this person was way more aggressive or this person couldn't stop talking or this, you know. So we also in our mind create a construct of who we're talking about until you meet the person.

And then you realize that many times relationships are like Swiss cheese, you know, it's like the holes. Everything one person didn't mention is exactly what the other one is highlighting. And it's the story is the combination of the two. A lot of this conversation actually reminds me in a different way about a conversation I had with the author Yuval Noah Harari on the podcast.

And what I loved is his view and what he was trying to do as a historian was trying to understand reality through multiple truths.

To figure out where the facts lie and then where people's stories overlap and coincide. It almost feels like listening to you, you're now dealing with the what do we do now when those informations aren't the same? What do we do when those realities don't coincide? So how do you imagine a family? Yeah. You know, how does your brother see this?

How does your father handle that? So it's systemic. I am a systemically trained therapist. I look at relationships as interdependent parts. And I look at how the parts influence each other and even create each other. Meaning a person is not just an essential being. A person gets created in the context of a relationship. You become part.

by version of how you act and behave in this particular relationship. And how you act, behave and believe is influenced by the reactions of the other person. So we create each other in a relationship. People come in and say, this is how she is. This is how they are. With you. With you. In this relationship. In this context.

problems take place in the context. People become defined by the context in which they are in. And in a different relationship, they may act differently. And that means that if you want to change the other, one of the most powerful ways you can do so is by changing yourself. I remember you said something. Does that make sense? Yeah, it makes complete sense. Because I remember you said something once that has stuck with me. The first time you said it, you said, it takes two people to create a cycle of

It only takes one person to break it. That's right. And that's essentially what you're saying here is like we have the ability to change the dynamic by changing how we exist in the dynamic. I had this situation yesterday with someone actually on my team. And we were talking about challenging conversations. Mm-hmm.

And situations where we become very reactive and polarized inside our families. And he was talking about how he didn't maintain the religious faith of his family, which the family is very steeped in, and has made that choice, so has his partner, therefore kids. And the mother is often very upset about all of that.

And I could see the dynamic. The dynamic is the mother comes and the son tries to say, you know, the boundaries. Yes, yes. And I said, that doesn't go anywhere. Have you ever imagined that even though you landed in a completely different place, what would happen if you told your mom, I just want you to know how much I appreciate the things that you taught me. They really have guided me.

Because your mother thinks that she failed because you didn't keep the faith. Instead of telling her, yeah, because this is all, you know, whatever. Right, right.

No, I think of you so often. Every time I make decisions, I think of the essential values that you gave me. I made different choices with them, but they are at the core of my choices. And you are at the center of my belief system. And I don't want you to worry about that. You are still very much present. Try that for a change.

And what happened? I didn't do it with him because he's on an assignment. I told him, go try. But I've done this many, many, many times.

Because instead of pushing the person away and saying, drop off, get off my back, I disagree with you. I've made a different life than you. You're basically saying, if you became such a thinker that you were willing to change your life, then obviously you took it from somewhere. And that means the thinking that was given to you, even though you're doing it in a different language. If you say to someone who feels they failed that they matter greatly,

They will relax and they will get off your back without you having to push them off. You often bring up parents when talking about people's relationships with their romantic partners. And oftentimes when people talk about their romantic partners, the last thing they mention is their parents. How much does working on your relationship with your parents...

even in hindsight, affect your relationship with your partner that you're currently with in a romantic situation? A lot. A lot. And why? Why is that? Because the first place where you learn to love, to desire, to be loved, to have needs, to have needs be met or thwarted, to feel protected or not, to be rocked or not, to be sued or not, is all with the people who took care of you. You learn about the emotional world first

in those relationships, the people who raised you, your caregivers. They don't have to be your biological parents. And you learn, you know, if you were allowed to cry or not. You learn if it was okay to laugh. You learn if it was encouraged to thrive. You learn if you were going to be protected at home or if you had to flee for protection. You learn if you could trust people. You learn about betrayal. I mean, the entire process

range of emotional experiences. And you bring that with you, parts of that, in what you want to experience again and in what you want to make sure to avoid. You know, a lot of, a friend of mine says that a lot of childhood is about having too much of certain things and too little of other things. I like that. Very real. And so you either say, you know,

I could never trust, you know, nobody was reliable. I have learned to take care of myself because, you know, there was nobody there for me. Well, that I've learned to stand on my own two feet. I am built for autonomy. I am built for self-reliance. You know, that becomes a lens with which, you know, through which you live and you make your decisions. And then you find yourself with someone who was raised for loyalty and interdependence.

And it's a completely different book of how you are connecting with people, of what you look for in people, of how you open yourself to them, of how you allow yourself to be vulnerable, of how you follow rules, all of that. So I think that's, by the way, a very good distinction you can often use, where you race for autonomy and self-reliance or where you race for loyalty and interdependence.

We're going to continue this conversation right after this short break. This episode is brought to you by Nordstrom Rack. Just in and so good. Thousands of new winter deals are at Nordstrom Rack stores now. Save up to 60% on Sam Edelman, Sorel, Free People, Colhan, and more cold weather finds. Great brands, great prices. That's why you rack.

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just to give people an idea of how we can differently approach moments in a relationship. So this is basically me going, you have Esther Perel in your corner from the get-go, from the inception of a relationship. So...

somebody's sitting at home they say to themselves i want to be in a relationship um they they whip out a tinder profile they they get themselves on on dating apps and and they go out to bars and immediately how does esther respond to that like what should i be looking at on my tinder profile to get me the person that i want or which bars should i be going to to meet the person i need to meet or is it a library instead of a bar where where should i go and how do i approach it

All right. There's two parts to the question. There's actually three things that come to my mind. The first thing is instead of asking yourself all the time, what am I looking for or who am I looking for? Why don't you ask yourself, who would you like to be in this relationship? Who would you like to be?

It's like it's a bit strange when you think of it. Like, who do you want to be in this relationship? If you know who you want to be, you have a good idea of what you are looking for rather than making a checklist. The next thing is, I think you can go and make your profile and go on an app and see what you find there. I also, at this moment, am very much in the kind of return to the analog. You know, where do you meet people? What are the things you enjoy doing?

So that you can actually meet people and talk about the things that you're interested in rather than meet people and start to do a job interview, which is what a lot of the first dates are like these days. Sitting in a noisy place and asking questions while you're looking to see if you've got some butterflies, you know.

moving in your belly. I mean, on what basis is that going to happen? But if you experience something with someone, you're listening to music, you're in a museum, you're a rollerblade, whatever you're doing, and you start talking about something that you're both looking at and interested in, then you begin a natural conversation. Then you find yourself suddenly walking and it's like two hours later and you haven't stopped talking. That's very different than I'm coming to see if I found the one because we're looking for a soulmate on an app.

So if I'm hearing you correctly, you're almost saying like what we're doing is counter to what we're trying to achieve in many ways. In many ways. I'm well aware that a ton of people meet online. But there is something ironic about, you know, the one and only on an app in the middle of a thousand people at your fingertips. How am I supposed to know that this is the one?

you know, and done in a context that is rather artificial and disconnected from your life because you live your life, your friends, your activities. I'm going on a date.

And that day takes place away from the rest of your life rather than I met somebody. I mean, bringing them along to whatever we're doing. Oh, that's OK. That's interesting. So let's say so let's say things have gone well. Let's say the person used an app, even though they maybe it wasn't their best choice, but they did meet somebody. Or let's say they were in an art gallery and they saw a painting and they spoke to the person next to them. Or they were even in the park and they were sitting next to somebody and.

conversation started because of a dog that ran between them. Either way. That's right. So now people have met, right? There's that feeling. Then the next thing is... Wait, but are butterflies good? This is something I'm always confused about. Like what... I hear some people saying butterflies are trauma. Other people say, no, butterflies are the feeling of something new and exciting. I say before butterflies, you want curiosity. Is this person eliciting your curiosity? Yes.

In what way? I'd like to get to know you more. I enjoyed this. I'd love to continue this conversation. Could talk to you for another few more hours. That's curiosity. I'm intrigued. I'm open. I'm curious. I'm, you know, it's that position. Yes. You know, rather than is this person meeting my standards kind of thing? You know, am I feeling something? No, maybe you're not feeling anything yet, but you're open. Yeah.

Curiosity is the beautiful word about that. Then you realize that curiosity connects with, I think about this. So now I'm thinking about this person, you know, and it enters my mind. And now I'm kind of, oh, I could ask about that.

You know, I'm curious about this. And so now you start to have the imagination about who is this person and you start to imagine things about this person. I think that when you look in small steps as to what awakens you to someone, you know, and physically too, it's not just all mental. So it's mental, emotional, physical, sensorial.

Mental, emotional, physical and sensorial.

Does he actually like... Is this the place he would go to if we were not on a first date? I mean, did he pick this for me or did he pick this because that's his kind of a dive? And you have a conversation with the person and a conversation with yourself at the same time. You're going back and forth. And this is music.

Different instruments are playing at the same time. Oh, I love the sound of that. Okay, so now we've played the music. We're in the beginning stages. What's a perfect first date? Is it a movie? Is it a comedy club? Is it a bar? Because you said, why do we meet one-on-one for a job interview? You go, I'm going on a date and then I'm going to my life. That's right.

So what is the alternative? I met somebody, I have a life and I'm bringing that person along for the thing I was planning to do. So you meet a person and then you bring them to like your real life. Yes, I find there's something very weird about you meet somebody away from everything, away from situations where you can get a ton of data points about the person, away from your friends seeing you in interaction with that person.

And then at some point you go for the big reveal. You know, you're bringing that person to meet your friends. There's something strange about that. I mean, it's not that it's one way versus another. There's something about saying we were going to have a picnic. Do you want to join? Yeah.

And then you don't make a big deal out of it. It's just, it's not like it's the person I'm dating. So I met this person and I'm bringing him along. And then you have a ton of information, actually, because it's happening in your life. And not only do you have a lot of information, but if it doesn't continue, you haven't left your life to go meet three nights in a row dates.

And then come back to report to your beloved. But then how do we balance the embarrassment and the pressure that comes with meeting a person with our people? Because, I mean, I know even for myself, I wish I could be a perfect friend. But I'm sure there'll be moments where I'd be like judgmental. And there's moments where I'd be like, huh, so why do you like this person?

Interesting. So they didn't laugh at that. You really think this will go somewhere? How do we immunize ourselves from choosing a person based on who our friends think would work for us because we've introduced them so soon? We don't. But we don't immunize ever. We constantly look at people in social situations. You look at them at a restaurant. You look at them when they order. You look at how they talk to the cab driver. You are picking up information about these people's

you know, as social creatures, as social beings. Your friends, you know, hopefully their opinion matters to you, actually. They often see things you don't see. They often, you know, often you don't care about what they see. But what I'm saying is that there is such a split at this moment. Right, a disconnect.

A disconnect between the life you lead, the things you enjoy doing and the dates that are taking place in this very, I think, sterile situation. So when you say what is a perfect date, a perfect date is a day that you want to have another one. It doesn't matter what you did. It's the fact that you would like to see the person again. That's a good date. And maybe that it ended up

with an open-endedness that you'd had no idea that this was going to unfold and it led to that. And that open-endedness, it's erotic. It's alive in that sense. It's full of possibility. And that is the definition that I'm talking about when I say erotic, not sexually, but it's vibrant.

That's a good date. The activity itself doesn't matter. A good first date is the beginning of how you write the first page of a story. I mean, everybody wants to ask couples, where did you meet? How did you meet? People want to know the beginning of the story, the origin story. The first date is the first moment of the origin story.

Today, I'm talking to Esther Perel about relationships and compatibility. You know, finding the right person. And you know how finding the right person to work with can feel just as important as finding the right partner in life? Both take patience, a bit of luck, and a process that actually works. Well, ZipRecruiter's got the process down to a science. Next Big Opportunity is brought to you by ZipRecruiter.

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Take this job listing I came across. A video game tester in Arizona. Okay, imagine your job is literally to play video games all day.

Sounds amazing, right? But I imagine the challenge of being a game tester is keeping your excitement in check. Like, it's still a job. You have to stay sharp and professional even while playing something fun. My advice? If you're looking for roles like this, lean into your passion, but be ready to show how you can bring value to the table. And what skills do you think it takes to land a role like that? You probably need incredible attention to detail, insane patience, and the ability to give constructive feedback that makes the game better.

If I were hiring for this role, I'd ask questions like, what's your biggest frustration when playing a game? Or can you describe a moment where you found a bug no one else noticed? It's kind of like getting to know your partner on a deeper level. You have to dig beyond the surface.

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Try it now for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash Trevor. That's ZipRecruiter.com slash T-R-E-V-O-R. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Is there a magic amount of time that people should wait before having sex? No, none of these things. I mean... No? No. I think that if you're somebody who knows that you attach very, very fast...

and that sexuality is deeply connected for you with intimacy, emotional intimacy, and that you have at times felt that you got close to people before you really were close to them, then you need to hold back. But that's not because there's a number. That's because you know that sexuality has a certain meaning for you.

If you are a person for whom casual sex is easier and, you know, it's a nice experience to have. It doesn't instantly bond you. It doesn't bond you. It doesn't elicit your dependency needs. It doesn't elicit your history of whatever sexual experiences you've had. Then it's less loaded for you. And that's, you know, I think it's more about self-knowledge and the meaning of sex for you that will determine

What do you need to experience, to feel, to have with this person that you met in order for you to be comfortable and to want to engage sexually as well rather than a set number? Here's the thing. You ask me questions that presuppose something you said before about, you know, you're the expert on relationships. And I really think that no expert these days has all the answers because relationships are more complex than ever.

So I answer you, but I don't mean to think I'm right. I can sound confident, but I'm sure of nothing. So this kind of questions, how many, how long do you, depends on you. Tell me what has happened to you before. Tell me your story. Then I can think with you. What would make sense for you at this moment in your life?

If you're 16, it's one answer. If you're 24, it's a different one. And if you're 45, it's a different one. I think people would like relationships to be as precise as

As their apps, you know, frictionless, polished, you know, one and zeros, binary answers. And the majority of relationship questions are often dilemmas and paradoxes that you manage and not problems with a precise answer. Not problems that you solve. Right. Okay, so let's move forward to the people are now together. People are in a relationship. When me becomes we. Yeah.

A lot of people will struggle with how to define that. Some people will say, well, we didn't define it enough. Others will say, oh, you defined it too rigidly. You know, are we a couple? Are we not a couple? What does that even mean? What does it not mean? And then how do people become a we in a healthy way? How do people not find themselves now feeling suffocated or feeling abandoned, even though they're part of something with somebody else? Okay.

Let me answer this like this. One is, what is the developmental stages of a couple? How do we become a couple? Yes. But how we become a couple has a lot to do with how each of us defines what is a couple. And so a lot of what that process is about is the synchronization of these two views of what is a couple.

And part of what defines a couple is how you straddle two axes, autonomy and togetherness, commitment and freedom, connection and separateness, security and adventure. It's those two lines. Every couple will need to define what is together and what is apart, what is me and what is we. And in the beginning, I meet you and I...

begin to want to meet you again. And now I was going to go see this band or whatever. And I thought, I'll ask Trevor if he wants to come too, because Trevor is entering the fabric of my life and the fabric of my being. So this I now gradually becomes we. And then I have another plan. And I said, would you like to join me on that? And then I

And then the first time I look at this jacket and I think that's a nice jacket. And then the second time I say, that's a very nice jacket. And then the third time I say, will you wear that jacket? Because I got licensed now to enter into your home.

Yes.

I bring things that reflect that knowledge of you. And that's part of the weaving of this we. And then I start to make decisions. And instead of making them all alone, I say, what do you think? Would you like to? I'd like to take a trip here. Would that interest you? Where would we go? And you start to see the pronouns changing. Now, this is when it all goes nicely. But now there is at some point one of us says,

I wish we did more we. And one of us says, I wish there was more room for I. That tension is at the core of many issues that couples grapple with. We all are born with these two sets of needs. We all are born with this need for the we, the security, the connection, and the need for the space, the freedom. But each of us comes out of our childhood. Some of us needing more protection.

and more connection, and some of us needing more space and more individuality. And the person who needs more protection and connection is often the person who is more in touch with the fear of abandonment. And the person who is more in need for space and individuality is often the person more in touch with the fear of obliteration. One person more afraid of losing the other, one person more afraid of losing themselves.

The one who says we to somebody who keeps saying, but what about I? Often, you asked me before, tracing it back to the parental story. This is a very good moment where you want to find out what is the origin story of each person that can help you understand. What is the charge when I say we and why do I instantly, some people instantly say

Won't we? I've seen you three times and I'm already thinking of we. And you're like, I just met this person.

And this is not just about we have different rhythms. This is about attachment. This is about dependency. This is about fear of loss. This is about a lot of other experiences that go and they play out as in you didn't invite me, you know, and you say, well, you know, I have a life. I have other people I see. I'm like, no, you're not. But I invited you to the, you know, I've taken you to everything that I've been doing. And you're like, whoa, this is going too fast.

And it looks like it's a rhythm issue because it plays out in rhythm, but underneath the rhythm is expectations, fears, losses, traumas. It's all of that that is actually being activated in this moment of, oh, why didn't you ask me to join you? So in that moment...

Does it mean that people have met the wrong person? No. No. No. This is synchronization. Synchronization is learning to live with somebody with a different rhythm, including the rhythm of attachment. So...

It's first of all, understanding. No, it's not. I just reject you. It's if I didn't call you or if I like to take my day off for myself, it's not because I don't like your company, but I enjoy my own alone as well. How can you experience that without taking it as a rejection? It's finding where you meet each other, filling in the holes. The relationship needs it. And the two individuals participate in the creation of the relationship and

and how it balances those two fundamental sets. We're going to continue this conversation right after this short break. This episode is brought to you by SurveyMonkey. The world is always changing and totally unpredictable, which is fun unless you're trying to run a business. So if you want to build products people actually love, keep your customers happy, and stop your team from setting their status to emotionally unavailable,

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Get answers to your questions. Go to surveymonkey.com slash dare. What I've always found funny is when I'll talk to couples, especially like couples who've been married for a very long time. Like me. Yes. I often find there are couples where they'll...

And this is not always the case, but these are the ones that I find most funny because they're on the extremes. I will meet a couple who have so much security. I mean, they almost, the other person consistently and constantly exists in their mind and they just believe that they are there. And then I've met couples where they're always like unsure, even if they've been married for 20 years.

And sometimes the couples who are the most sure will almost complain about it. Like I've literally talked to people who've gone, ah, I wish my husband would cheat on me. I mean, he's so boring. He's home. I know where he'll be. And on the other side, someone will go, I just don't feel secure. And my wife, I feel like she flirts with other men too much. And then the irony will be the couples who are like insecure will go, but we have the best sex.

And then the couples who are talking about like we're fully there and we know where we'll be and we understand, they'll go like, yeah, and I just wish we could spice it up. It just feels like it's vanilla. It's all the same. And the question is? No, so the question is, is it a pendulum that's always going to swing? And how does a secure relationship couple find the spark that comes from that freedom? And how does a couple that has no security find

find the security that they need whilst maintaining, or can they even maintain? Do they have to give up some of the spark of the sex?

Like, what is the compromise that we have to make? And do we have to make it? And when do we have to make it? Because everything I just described to you doesn't just happen once in a relationship. What do you mean? It means that you come up with a certain kind of dance around this I and we. And then 10, 15 years into the relationship, five years into the relationship, something happens and it changes. Oh, wow. This is hard work, Esther. So, no, it means that...

It means that you're not stuck with one model for life, for God's sake. That would be boring and rigid and so predictable. It's that actually a thriving relationship breeds. It's a living organism. And every living organism straddles stability and change. It's true in nature. It's true in relationships. And if you don't change enough, you fossilize and you die. If you change all the time, you dysregulate and you become chaotic. That's the dance.

So when something works, you don't let it just sit there like this to the point where it fossilizes completely. Needs arrive, changes take place in health, in the political situation, in the world outside and the world inside. And it says we need to readapt.

You know, if a person gets ill, you readapt. You become more available at home because you need to be there until that shifts again. So that to me is actually a very positive thing, is that this dance between I and we or between security and adventure needs to breed. It's the best metaphor I can use. And I...

You know, Mating in Captivity, my first book, was all about that tension. Yes. But the phrase I often used was, fire needs air. Fire needs air. You know, literally. Yeah, yeah, literally. So this is the answer to your question between, you know, you don't have to have insecurity to have passion.

But you can have space. You can have air. You can have more individuality, more differentiation. There's not one model. Seriously, there is no one size fits all. Every model can work differently.

if it works for the people that are involved in it, and if it gets, if it breeds, meaning that it expands and it contracts, it changes, it adapts to the conditions of life. That's actually one of the real strong ingredients of what makes for a thriving relationship is that it changes everything.

Look, I often say people will have two or three marriages at this point or committed relationships in the West in their adult life. And some of us will do it with the same person. Who can do it with the same person? It's those who are able to redefine that dynamic.

You know, you arrive here, you're two young people, two immigrants that arrived to New York. You spend a lot of, this is a couple I just saw, you know, the whole first phase of their relationship was about building this togetherness. Yeah. Helping each other, establish each other, finding the first place that they lived in, getting their first jobs. And then at one point, that's it. This was created. They had defined the relationship. Now they wanted to redefine themselves. Yeah.

Wow. That's a classic. It goes in both directions. You know, you have people who have spent a lot of time maintaining themselves and

And now it's time to actually consolidate the relationship. And consolidate the relationship is one of the things so that you can both rely on the relationship. It's like the relationship is the third entity. We start our adult life. But then there comes a point, you're 33 now or 39. And now it's like, who am I? You haven't defined yourself alone. Who am I? Let me ask you this. I know there are couples who...

And this is, again, because my favorite thing to do when I speak to people, especially who've been married for a long time, is hearing how they tell their story. And I've often been most amused by the stories that are told post everything. You know, I remember speaking to a woman who was, I think, 92 years old and her husband had died a few years prior.

And I remember saying to her like, oh, how long have you been married? 40 years. And she was happy. And then she said, oh, he was lovely and it was beautiful. But how I wish he had died sooner. And I said, I'm sorry, what?

I said, I thought you were happy. She says, yes, he was great and everything. But she says, I only realized after he was gone that I hadn't been living. Is there a way to know or how do we know? Or is that where people like you come in? No, you often know after the fact. You only know after the fact. Often. Time and perspective. When you're in it, you don't see. You know, if my finger is like close to my nose, I can't see the contours.

I have to put it there to see it clearly. So is there no tool that you can use as a therapist to know? Like, for instance, can you know that it's over for a couple? But you can know. You can know. This woman could know that she, but that doesn't mean she would have done anything.

She could know that she's given herself completely over to this relationship and that she kind of disappeared in the process. But that doesn't mean she will do anything. I just went on tour. And there were questions that people asked systematically, you know, from audience to audience.

How do I have a new relationship where I don't lose myself? That one came up every time. Or my ex-boyfriend was passionate but chaotic. My new boyfriend is stable but boring. You know, that's kind of the case you presented to me before. You know, it's either one or the other. And there is a way in which we enlist our partner in a certain role that we need from them.

You know, this woman with her stable and boring boyfriend, I'm sure that when she was done with the passionate, you know, chaotic, she said, now I want stable, trustworthy, reliable. And none of these words at the time sounded boring. So how did stable become boring? And what does it say when you find yourself wanting that person to be so stable that you in the process change?

kind of clip their wings a little bit. You make them more boring in order to make them more secure. And what it may allude to is more about your own fears than about their personality. Oh, wow.

This reminds me of something I said to a friend. I need you to not leave me, to not be abandoning me, to not be predatory in nature, to not be threatening to me. So I'm going to tame you. In my imagination of you, I'm going to make you that fellow, that dude. And then I will get bored of you. Yes. And then I will say, you know, he doesn't fantasize. This is a very important thing. Sometimes it says more about my fears and what I need you to be for me than who you really are.

And once you have worked in the realm of infidelity, as I have for many, many years, then you know that this is one of the big surprises because it's all these people that sometimes people think, I never thought you were capable of this. Who is this person? Which is such a gutting experience when your entire reality is shattered.

So, you know, when I work around sexuality, when I work around desire, when I work around fantasy, I really want to understand what does security represent for you? And here's the thing you can ask. If I think about love, I think of. If I think of sex, I think of. If I am loved, I feel.

If I'm desired, I feel. If I love, I feel. If I want or if I desire, I feel. And then you look at the relationship between love and desire, how they relate and how they conflict. As we move to the end, the big question I think a lot of people deal with that don't even realize they're dealing with is how do we...

Or is there even a way to have a healthy breakup? What does it mean to separate with somebody in a healthy and loving way? Because it seems like there either isn't or there is. You know, you hear ghosting and you hear gaslighting and you hear people love bombing and disappearing and you hear, you know, people disappearing in the relationship and breakup and heartbreak. But how do we separate from people in a healthy way?

I met a person in the last few days who I thought, what a beautiful separation. She said, you know, we are separating. We met, I was very young and I grew up with this person. And I think we have come to the end of this story. But my partner is a wonderful parent. We continue to have a family life together. We are now Latonico parents together.

And at some point they said to someone else, you know, I've recently separated. And that person said, oh, he must be so hard to live with. And she said, no, absolutely not. He's actually a wonderful person to live with. But I no longer choose to live with him. And I thought that is a very nice example. I care about you. I want good for you. I'm benevolent.

I don't know what it will be when I see you with someone else because we still have something that is very much at the center of our lives, but not in the romantic sense anymore. When they separated, they said what they wished they had done differently, what they wished for the other hands forward, what they wished the other had done differently, and what they...

and what they cherish that they will carry with them. Wow. That's my four questions of how I help people, you know, and I often have them write it

And read it out loud in the session. But I think that it's about not being filled with resentment and bitterness and competition and fighting around money and fighting over the kids and feeling that you wasted your life and feeling that they betrayed you. I mean, the negative stories that people carry with them are multiple.

And so it's about, you can be, you can break up. The question is, how are you emotionally able to disengage? People are divorced. That doesn't mean they are separated, emotionally speaking. So a nice separation is when you arrive to the end of a particular story.

And as she said, he will always be in my life. Whoever I will meet from here on will need to know that this person is a major person in my life. But I know different kinds of love and that love I no longer have for him.

Well, Esther, our story has come to an end, unfortunately. I wish it could have gone on longer. I wish we could have spent more time together, but I know we will in the future. I hope you will always be a part of my story. Thank you for taking the time. Thank you for sharing. I mean, it's funny how...

It feels like everything that you talk about is at the core of what humans are sort of looking for. Like there's this beautiful thing at the center of us. Because the quality of your relationships ultimately is what determines the quality of your life. I love that. Well, thank you so much, Esther Perel. I hope we see you again. Thank you. It's a pleasure.

What Now with Trevor Noah is produced by Spotify Studios in partnership with Day Zero Productions. The show is executive produced by Trevor Noah, Sanaz Yamin, and Jodie Avigan. Our senior producer is Jess Hackle. Claire Slaughter is our producer. Music, mixing, and mastering by Hannes Brown. Thank you so much for listening. Join me next Thursday for another episode of What Now? What Now?