the dating advice that changed my life — Transcript

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1. 0:00I was 16 the first time I thought I was
2. 0:01in love. It was a kind of love that
3. 0:03lived mostly in the stomach, giddy,
4. 0:05embarrassed, half laughing [music] at
5. 0:07itself. I didn't know yet what love was
6. 0:09supposed to be, back when it was raw and
7. 0:11unadulterated and allowed to just be
8. 0:13whatever you wanted it to be. That was
9. 0:15before the word got tarnished, before
10. 0:17movies and TV [music] and think pieces
11. 0:20and TikTok therapists decided what love
12. 0:22was supposed to look like. [music]
13. 0:24Somewhere after that, love became a set
14. 0:25of instructions. Wait 3 months. Don't
15. 0:28text first. Don't text back. Leave
16. 0:29before you're left. Want, but not too
17. 0:31much. I [music] spent years listening to
18. 0:33friends, to strangers, to women on the
19. 0:35internet who spoke about men like
20. 0:36opponents to be outmaneuvered. And none
21. 0:38of it ever sounded [music] like the
22. 0:39thing that I remembered. None of it ever
23. 0:41sounded like love.
24. 0:43Fast forward to the summer of 2025
25. 0:45[music] when I met a boy and he
26. 0:46introduced me to the series of essays
27. 0:48Looking for Alice by Henrik Carlson.
28. 0:50[music]
29. 0:51And it might just be the best dating
30. 0:52advice I have ever read.
31. 0:58In 1862, Charles Darwin got a package in
32. 1:01the [music] mail. It was an orchid from
33. 1:02Madagascar with a nectary, which is like
34. 1:04the tube at the center of the flower.
35. 1:06[music] And the nectary was as long as
36. 1:07his forearm. So, he wrote a letter to
37. 1:09his friend that said, "Good heavens,
38. 1:11what insect [music] can suck it?" He
39. 1:13figured that somewhere in Madagascar
40. 1:15there must exist a moth with a tongue
41. 1:17long enough to reach the bottom of this
42. 1:19flower because the flower wouldn't have
43. 1:20grown this long if something hadn't
44. 1:22evolved alongside it. And he [music] was
45. 1:24right. They found the moth 40 years
46. 1:25later. I think about the orchid and the
47. 1:27moth a lot. About what we evolve for and
48. 1:30whether we actually choose it or if
49. 1:32we're just shaped by it. [music] By the
50. 1:33movies, by the sleepovers, by the songs
51. 1:35that we would play on repeat at 19 and
52. 1:37call it [music] love. Someone once asked
53. 1:40Gertrude Stein if she was a lesbian. She
54. 1:42said, "No, she just liked Alice,
55. 1:44>> [music]
56. 1:44>> her partner, a specific woman, not a
57. 1:46category, not a type, not women with
58. 1:49strong opinions and good hair, [music]
59. 1:51just Alice."
60. 1:53And I read that and I thought about
61. 1:55every single conversation that I had
62. 1:57about what [music] my type was. Six
63. 1:59feet, charismatic, funny, creative, the
64. 2:02type of extroverted introvert [music]
65. 2:03that matched my extroverted
66. 2:04introvert-ness. We love to ask each
67. 2:06other what our types are. And that's
68. 2:07honestly probably like my favorite type
69. 2:09of conversation to have with the girls.
70. 2:10We're so good at this, we literally have
71. 2:12entire vernaculars [music] dedicated to
72. 2:13this. He's a golden retriever boy. He's
73. 2:15a Doberman boy. He's a finance bro, but
74. 2:18he has like a soft heart. But all this
75. 2:20is completely useless. Not because your
76. 2:22standards are too high, but because
77. 2:24[music] you're asking the wrong
78. 2:24question. This is what Carlson says. The
79. 2:27reason so many people are miserable in
80. 2:28dating isn't that they can't find their
81. 2:30type, is that they're thinking in types
82. 2:31[music] at all. You don't fall in love
83. 2:33with a category. You fall in love with a
84. 2:35specific, weird, particular human being.
85. 2:38And those are not the same thing.
86. 2:40Gertrude Stein didn't have a type, she
87. 2:42had [music] Alice. But how do you go
88. 2:44about finding your Alice? You go and
89. 2:46talk to a thousand people and see if
90. 2:48there are any patterns in who makes you
91. 2:49feel excited and alive and true and
92. 2:51heard. That's how you move from vague
93. 2:53guesses to true recognition.
94. 2:56Here's the math [music] that should
95. 2:57terrify you. Carlson estimates that
96. 2:59there are maybe 10,000 people on this
97. 3:01entire earth that you could live an
98. 3:03extraordinary [music] life with. 10,000
99. 3:05out of 8 billion. So, [music] when you
100. 3:08meet someone that completely rewires
101. 3:10your brain, when conversation doesn't
102. 3:11just flow but transform, when it feels
103. 3:14less like you're talking but more
104. 3:15[music] like you're becoming, you can't
105. 3:16afford to be casual about it. You cannot
106. 3:18afford to play it cool when someone's
107. 3:20weirdness matches your weirdness.
108. 3:22Gertrude Stein didn't play it cool.
109. 3:23[music]
110. 3:24She just liked Alice.
111. 3:27Speedrun authenticity.
112. 3:29There's a scene in this Werner Herzog
113. 3:30documentary where he is filming a prison
114. 3:33chaplain. And this prison chaplain is
115. 3:35about to watch this young man die by
116. 3:36lethal injection. [music] And the
117. 3:37chaplain, he's just giving these like
118. 3:39stock answers. The Lord works in
119. 3:40mysterious ways. We're all in God's
120. 3:42hands. These are just lines that he's
121. 3:44memorized and said over and over again.
122. 3:45And Herzog mid-interview cuts him off
123. 3:47and asks [music] him, Please describe an
124. 3:49encounter with a squirrel. The chaplain,
125. 3:52he's confused, but he answers. He
126. 3:54describes a real encounter that he had
127. 3:55with a squirrel at a golf course.
128. 3:57[music] But within seconds, he is
129. 3:59sobbing because no one has ever asked
130. 4:00him that before. He had to actually
131. 4:02think. [music] And thinking cracked him
132. 4:04open. And this is what you should be
133. 4:05doing on dates, not watching lethal
134. 4:08injections, [music]
135. 4:08but asking questions. For me, the ideal
136. 4:11first date is honestly just a long walk
137. 4:13and a late-night conversation. I [music]
138. 4:14think I know some people love doing
139. 4:16activity dates and they love having that
140. 4:18like activity as a buffer. But for me,
141. 4:20conversation is so crucial and so
142. 4:23important to getting to know someone and
143. 4:24getting to [music] know I just want to
144. 4:26know immediately if we're a good fit or
145. 4:28not. And I think the fastest way to do
146. 4:30that is through conversation. The
147. 4:32fastest way to know if someone is right
148. 4:33for you is to abandon the script
149. 4:35entirely. Skip the small talk and jump
150. 4:37[music] straight into the weird stuff.
151. 4:38Safe cafe conversations teach you
152. 4:40nothing. Be honest. Share the stuff that
153. 4:42you usually edit out and see who clicks
154. 4:43and who doesn't. Share the inside of
155. 4:45your brain and see who wants to live
156. 4:46there. Don't let the group decide. This
157. 4:49is the last thing. Tolstoy writes about
158. 4:51a man named Pierre who ends up marrying
159. 4:53a woman named [music] Helen because
160. 4:54everyone at the party starts treating
161. 4:56them like a couple. The hostess seats
162. 4:57them together. His friends get excited.
163. 4:59[music] Pierre himself isn't even sure
164. 5:01he likes her, but the whole room seems
165. 5:02to. So, he marries her. And it's a
166. 5:05disaster. Carlson's read on this is that
167. 5:07a lot of what we think is attraction to
168. 5:09someone is actually just our friends'
169. 5:10reaction to them. Your roommate frowns
170. 5:12when you describe the quiet one, but
171. 5:14your group chat loses its mind over the
172. 5:16really hot one. And suddenly you can't
173. 5:17figure out where your feelings end and
174. 5:19where the group's begins. So, here's a
175. 5:21test. [music]
176. 5:22Would I still like this person if nobody
177. 5:24in my life reacted to them at all? If
178. 5:26your answer is less certain than you
179. 5:27like, just notice that. You don't have
180. 5:29to throw this person out, but just
181. 5:30notice where the feeling's actually
182. 5:31coming from. [music] Because sometimes
183. 5:33the Alice is the one that your friends
184. 5:34can't quite see yet. You see them
185. 5:36because you're the moth, because you're
186. 5:38evolved for something specific that no
187. 5:39one else is looking for. When you tell
188. 5:41your friends who you're dating, you're
189. 5:42forced to compress this complex feeling
190. 5:44to words and you flatten it. Great
191. 5:46relationships are often very hard to
192. 5:48explain. They don't fit the typical
193. 5:49romantic tropes. They are wonderfully
194. 5:51incomprehensible.
195. 5:55Ultimately, the fundamental lesson here
196. 5:57is that [music] everyone is born with
197. 5:58this complex interiority that is
198. 6:00invisible to everyone else and to you
199. 6:03initially as well. But through trial and
200. 6:05error and experimentation, you get a
201. 6:07better sense of how [music] this space
202. 6:09behaves. Then you can find someone whose
203. 6:11inner world could [music] fuse with
204. 6:13yours in a way where A, it's impossible
205. 6:16to break beforehand, B, impossible to
206. 6:18explain afterwards, and [music] C,
207. 6:19completely transformative.
208. 6:22So, you do all that. You stop dating
209. 6:24your [music] type. You speedrun the real
210. 6:25stuff. You find someone whose weird
211. 6:27clicks with your weird. Cool. But now
212. 6:29what? This is where [music] every piece
213. 6:31of dating advice stops and this is where
214. 6:33the second essay begins.
215. 6:35Act two, loving Alice.
216. 6:38Dostoevsky as lover.
217. 6:41There's a Soviet philosopher named
218. 6:42Bakhtin who wrote a book about
219. 6:43Dostoevsky. It has literally taken me
220. 6:45months to finally be able to pronounce
221. 6:46this and I still can barely pronounce
222. 6:48it, so bear with me, guys. But his
223. 6:50argument is interesting. He says [music]
224. 6:52Dostoevsky loved his characters. Carlson
225. 6:54wrote, "Dostoevsky treats his characters
226. 6:56as if they were full human [music]
227. 6:58beings who owned the final word about
228. 7:00themselves. Dostoevsky refused to
229. 7:02contain his characters [music] inside
230. 7:03his own ideas about them. He let them
231. 7:05surprise him. He didn't write them as
232. 7:06mouthpieces, he [music] listened to
233. 7:08them."
234. 7:09And Carlson says, "That is exactly what
235. 7:11loving another person is. Love is
236. 7:13refusing to fit someone inside the box
237. 7:14[music] that you built for them."
238. 7:16Because here's what we actually do. We
239. 7:18meet someone, we fall for them, we spend
240. 7:20the first 6 months collecting data,
241. 7:21[music] and then slowly, without
242. 7:22realizing it, we stop collecting. We
243. 7:25file them. I know that he reacts to
244. 7:27this. I know she needs this when she's
245. 7:28like that. [music] I know that he's
246. 7:29going to say this before he says it. And
247. 7:31we call that intimacy. But Bakhtin would
248. 7:33say that's not intimacy, that's a
249. 7:35caricature. You stopped loving [music]
250. 7:36the person and started managing your
251. 7:38ideas of them. And the person is still
252. 7:40in there, growing, changing, becoming
253. 7:42someone you haven't met yet. And [music]
254. 7:43you're not even looking. So, the moment
255. 7:46you go, "Yeah, I know him," you stopped.
256. 7:48Carlson says, "Real love is closer to
257. 7:51prompt engineering. [music] You're
258. 7:52trying to build situations with a person
259. 7:53you love can say something neither of
260. 7:55you knew they were going to say. You ask
261. 7:56the weird question. You leave space. You
262. 7:58let them unfold in directions you didn't
263. 8:00predict. [music]
264. 8:00And they do the same for you." Here's a
265. 8:02quote from his essay. "A person can't be
266. 8:04contained in your ideas [music] about
267. 8:05them. This was a core idea for us. To
268. 8:08whatever extent I assumed I knew who
269. 8:10Joanna was, Joanna's [music] his wife, I
270. 8:12treated her as something that could fit
271. 8:13in my head, as something smaller than
272. 8:15me. But she couldn't fit in my head, nor
273. 8:17I in [music] hers. That was the exciting
274. 8:19thing about it. You can only ever know
275. 8:21another individual if you meet them in
276. 8:22open dialogue, if you treat them as
277. 8:24unfinished, as capable of surprise. Love
278. 8:26[music] is about being invested in
279. 8:28someone's continual expansion."
280. 8:32If someone truly loves you, you will
281. 8:34grow. [music] You will become someone
282. 8:36totally different than who you were when
283. 8:37you first met them, and so will they.
284. 8:39Which means a great relationship is not
285. 8:41two people who stay compatible, it's
286. 8:42[music] two people who keep diverging,
287. 8:44but find ways to meet each other over
288. 8:46and over and over again. I think in
289. 8:47long-term relationships you can panic
290. 8:49[music] when you feel like you and your
291. 8:50significant other are growing apart. But
292. 8:52I think that's part of the challenge and
293. 8:53part of the fun. Carlson, he talks about
294. 8:55how he started panicking when his wife
295. 8:57and him started behaving [music]
296. 8:58different interests. She was obsessed
297. 9:00with garden design and he got more and
298. 9:01more into writing. They were pulling in
299. 9:03different directions and he thought,
300. 9:05like, are we becoming strangers? But the
301. 9:07divergence was the point. When she
302. 9:09became someone he didn't fully expect,
303. 9:10[music] she became this richer material.
304. 9:13She gave him something to push against.
305. 9:14And he did the same for her. They
306. 9:16weren't becoming strangers, they were
307. 9:17becoming more themselves because of each
308. 9:20other. I think the Instagram version of
309. 9:21a good relationship is two people who
310. 9:23become essentially the same person. They
311. 9:25[music] mesh together into this one
312. 9:26unit. But I think the real version is a
313. 9:29relationship that makes two people
314. 9:30[music] more distinct, more fully
315. 9:33whatever they actually are.
316. 9:35There's a line in the essay, and if you
317. 9:36take nothing else from this video, take
318. 9:38this [music] line. He says, "We spoke
319. 9:40each other into being." Not we fell in
320. 9:42love, not we found each other. We spoke
321. 9:45each other into being. [music] That's
322. 9:46what the right relationship actually is.
323. 9:48Not two finished people who found their
324. 9:50match, but two unfinished people who
325. 9:52keep making each other through
326. 9:53conversation, through crisis,
327. 9:55>> [music]
328. 9:55>> through the thousand small moments of
329. 9:57being witnessed into who they are now.
330. 9:59You're not trying to find someone to
331. 10:01love. You're trying to [music] find
332. 10:02someone you can become yourself with
333. 10:04forever. So, go read the essays. They're
334. 10:06called Looking for Alice part [music] 1,
335. 10:082, and 3 by Henrik Carlson. I link them
336. 10:10below. Read them in order, then text
337. 10:12them to the person you're trying to
338. 10:12figure out whether to be serious about.
339. 10:14If they get it, you got your answer.
340. 10:16Thank you guys so much for watching, and
341. 10:18I'll see you guys next time. Bye.