Episode Description - Mid-Life Dating Secrets: The One Thing That Changes Everything
What if you could turn the chaos of post-divorce dating in mid-life into a journey of self-discovery and empowerment? Jonathon Aslay, one of America’s top mid-life dating coaches, did exactly that.
After losing his 19-year-old son Connor, Jonathon embarked on an unexpected journey that transformed his understanding of love, relationships, and human connection. While grieving this profound loss, Jonathon discovered that the biggest challenge facing most singles isn't finding the right partner - it's learning to truly love themselves.
Jonathon is now on a mission to help singles cultivate more meaningful relationships by building their own self-love and emotional health. His insights are drawn from years of guiding others and his own experiences navigating the dating world post-divorce.
Jonathon candidly reflects on the trials of online dating and the deeper emotional wounds many people bring into relationships. He explains why dating profiles often fall short and reveals the subtle ways self-awareness can create more authentic connections.
This conversation isn’t just about dating; it’s a profound exploration of forgiveness, self-compassion, and growth, coupled with practical, actionable steps for healing and growth.
Show Notes
About Jonathon
Jonathon Aslay is a dating and relationship coach who focuses on helping his clients discover a deeper, self-sustaining happiness. He realized that the process of dating reveals the most common emotional health issue faced by many singles seeking a partner: a distressing lack of self-worth, self-regard, and self-love.
Today, he is on a mission of encouraging both men and women to fully love themselves with a new book, "What The Heck Is Self-Love Anyway?"—packed with fun, engaging spiritual and personal growth practices—and his dynamic Mid-Life Love Mastery mentorship program, that inspires hundreds of people daily, around the world.
Connect with Jonathon
You can connect with Jonathon on LinkedIn at Jonathon Aslay and on Facebook at Jonathon Aslay. You can follow him on YouTube at Jonathon Aslay, on X at Jonathon Aslay and on Instagram at Jonathon Aslay. To find out more about Jonathon’s work visit his website at Jonathon Aslay.
Key Takeaways From This Episode with Jonathon
- Jonathon Aslay became a midlife dating coach after his own divorce and dating experiences, including going on over 100 first dates in one year, which led him to realize he needed to work on himself.
- After losing his 19-year-old son Connor in 2018, Jonathon's focus expanded beyond dating advice to exploring self-love and emotional healing, leading to his book "What the Heck is Self-Love, Anyway?"
- According to Jonathon, 98% of online dating profiles (both men and women) are poorly done, often due to resistance or resentment about having to date online, despite over 65% of new couples meeting through online platforms.
- He recommends a "3-2-1-3" rule for online dating: 3 text/email exchanges should lead to 1-2 phone calls and then 1 date, all within 3 weeks.
- Chemistry alone is not an indicator of relationship success; shared values, vision, lifestyle compatibility, and emotional maturity are crucial factors that take time to discover.
- Rising divorce rates (50% for first marriages, 60% for second marriages, 70% for third marriages) indicate widespread emotional immaturity and poor relationship skills among adults.
- Jonathon emphasizes the importance of self-awareness and emotional intelligence, recommending people spend time studying relationship books and working on themselves before dating.
- The healing time needed after divorce depends largely on how much anger and resentment a person holds onto from their previous relationship, with more contentious divorces requiring longer healing periods.
- Many people engage in conditional rather than unconditional relationships, seeking others to fill their emotional voids instead of developing self-love first.
- Forgiveness, which Jonathon defines as "forgiving love", is a crucial component of self-love and healing, and it's something you do for yourself rather than for others.
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Transcript
Mid-Life Dating Secrets: The One Thing That Changes Everything
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
self-love, forgiveness, healing, emotional maturity
SPEAKERS
Karen Covy, Jonathon Aslay
Karen Covy Host
00:10
Hello and welcome to Off the Fence, a podcast where we deconstruct difficult decision-making so we can discover what keeps us stuck and, more importantly, how we can get unstuck and start making even tough decisions with confidence. I'm your host, Karen Covy, a former divorce lawyer, mediator and arbitrator, turned coach, author and entrepreneur. And now, without further ado, let's get on with the show
With me today, I have the pleasure of speaking with Jonathon Aslay, and Jonathon is one of America's leading midlife dating coaches. His focus has now expanded into a deeper, essential philosophy of what it truly means to love.
00:57
After losing his 19-year-old son Connor in 2018, Jonathon's grief led him on a soul-searching inner journey where he became aware of an often-overlooked dimension of the dating conversation. He realized that the process of dating reveals the most common emotional health issue faced by many singles today singing seeking a partner, a distressing lack of self-worth, self-regard and self-love. Today, Jonathon is on a mission of encouraging both men and women to love themselves fully with the new book what the Heck is Self-Love, Anyway? Packed with fun, engaging spiritual and personal growth practices, and his dynamic midlife love mastery mentorship program that inspires hundreds of people daily around the world. Jonathon, welcome to the show.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
01:45
Hey, I'm excited to be here, Karen.
Karen Covy Host
01:48
I'm excited to have you here, but before we dive into all the questions, I can't wait to ask you, tell me a little bit about your backstory. Why become a dating coach, or a midlife dating coach at that?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
02:01
Well, nobody goes to college and says I'm going to become a dating and relationship coach Well, I mean, you might go to become a therapist or psychologist and that sort of thing. Many people who do this fall into it by accident and I'll give you the cliff note version of it. After turning 40 and going through a divorce back in 15, 20 years ago, 18 years ago now, I found myself back in the dating marketplace and there was this thing called online dating, where you could simply punch in what you want and someone would magically appear. And I went out on a date with one woman and we had a good time nice date but something wasn't right. And then I went out with another woman nice date, something wasn't right. And this went on and on and on and in one year I had over 100 internet dates.
Karen Covy Host
02:51
Wow, when you say internet dates, do you mean dates from the internet where you actually physically met the person.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
02:56
Yes, I'm sorry, let me clarify that 100 physical first dates. I was literally having two a week, which wasn't. I mean you can get to a hundred, you know, pretty quickly with two a week. And after about a year I realized that the common denominator was me. And right at that time the movie the Secret came out and I was like, oh, totally into the law of attraction and wanting to understand myself and I'm going. If I'm the common denominator, maybe I need to work on myself.
03:32
But what was interesting, Karen, was I wasn't just dating some of these women, I was communicating with women all over the country, talking on the phone. It was both an addiction on my part I was addicted to the communication and the feminine energy. But it was also therapy for me, and what I mean by therapy is talking to someone about their relationship problems. Talking about my relationship problems became therapy. But what was also happening is I was making friends and I had communicated with so many women. I didn't even meet many of them, but they would call me up and say hey, Jonathon, would you look at my dating profile? Can you give me the man's point of view and help me make it better. And I'm like sure, so sure enough, I tell him move this picture, do this, write this, and then a month later I'd get a call. Jonathon, I've got this date with this guy. Will you look at his profile and tell me what you think about him from the male perspective? And I go bing. A light bulb hit my head or went off in my head. I could start. I'm actually doing this as a hobby. How about do this for a business?
04:40
And 15 years ago I put up a cheesy website and back then websites were kind of the Wild West, you know, 15, 20 years ago. And I say it was cheesy. But somehow I got recognized publicly. I mean, I got asked to do radio shows and give my advice on relationship and I'm like, I'm so green. So I began studying every book behind me. I started to read the Gottmans, I read every book I could get my hands on dating and relationships, because this was turning into my new profession.
05:14
And 15 years later I'm actually considered one of the top midlife. And the reason why I focus on midlife is I was such a broken man 15 years ago I went through a divorce, lost my high-end corporate job, got wiped out in the market crash of 2008 and 2009. I was such a broken man that I gave advice to women about understanding that divorced broken guy. And so it evolved from my woundedness. But I was giving advice based on using me as the template of what oftentimes happened and you know, as a divorce attorney, you know divorce particularly is the unraveling of the tapestry of our life with another human being and there are so many emotional ramifications that are oftentimes undiagnosed, unrealized. It's a domino effect and many people are hurting after a divorce and they immediately put themselves out in the dating marketplace, going, oh, you'll save me, you'll complete me. And what happens is there's a lot of people going through trauma, bonding and that sort of thing. Anyways, I draw attention to all of that and that's what I do in my work.
Karen Covy Host
06:37
Wow, I have so many questions, I don't even know where to start. Okay, so let me start here, just because I know that there have got to be women out there who really want to know what does a man look for in a woman's online dating profile? What should they put out there? What should they care about?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
06:58
Well. So men are visual creatures, so we're going to I'm just going to be blunt, we're going to look at your photographs more than we are going to read your essay, just on face value. So I mean, from a dating perspective, putting together quality photographs will yield much better results. As a man who reviews women's profiles daily, I can tell you, Karen, that 98 out of 100 women's profiles are crappy. The photographs are poor, they've got poor energy. I mean, I'm just telling you very few out of 100 are actually good quality. Most of them are mediocre or poor. They just put poor effort.
07:45
Well, because there's this, there's almost this resistance to. It's like almost someone who wants a job but doesn't really want the job. Like they'll make the, they'll put, they send in a resume, but it's not this amazing resume. It's like, yeah, I'll just mail the resume, I don't care. And there's so much ambivalence in the effort for online dating. And, by the way, I just said that about women. Men are equal in this percentage. Men and women equally make mediocre effort. And what saddens me, Karen? I habitually talk about this, I constantly talk about this, and yet most people would rather be rigid and say, oh, I'm just going to do it my way. even women, people that pay me for this advice they still are so rigid because they don't believe that they have to put quality effort to be seen.
Karen Covy Host
08:42
Wow, that is amazing to me because I know one of the big fears that people have going through a divorce is oh my, I have to date now, I have to, and the way that I mean. You know better than I do. What are the stats on how many couples meet online these days?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
09:00
Over 65% of all new couples happen through an online connection.
09:16
Karen Covy Host
So with that statistic, I would think that anyone going into that dating pool would put some time and effort into their profile.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
Right, yeah, but there's this almost cognitive dissidence, or there's almost this resistance, because they're angry that they have to do it this way. And when I use the word angry, they're resentful, they're angry, their arrogance even comes out. I shouldn't have to do it this way. So it's okay if I do something mediocre. There's almost this unconscious bias. Is what I meant, not cognitive dissonance, but this unconscious bias that I'm just going to put out mediocre. That way, if I get mediocre results, it's almost the subconscious is saying, oh, that just proves that this isn't the way I should be doing it.
Karen Covy Host
10:02
Wow, that's a real revelation. Isn't the way I should be doing it? I mean, I personally have not been in the dating pool for quite a long time, but this just fascinates me because when I was getting out of dating, when I met my husband, online dating was starting to be a bigger and bigger thing, right? So this is just all amazing to me. But you said what men look like look at first with the woman is her picture, what? What do women look at for men's profiles? Because you've seen both ways, you've worked with both sides.
10:37
Yeah, I've worked with a man do for his profile, for his profile to make it appealing to women.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
10:43
So I mean men and women. Both are going to look at the photographs and there is a biased the hard part. As we age and again I work in midlife, which I say is after baby making years and before retirement there's almost this age discrimination that both men and women participate in. Women because we no longer look like we did when we were in our 20s and 30s. We don't have the physical shapes or the hair or the tight skin, that sort of thing. So women, we judge, we human beings can be rather superficial. We judge based on looks and women judge based on looks as well.
11:24
If they like someone, then they're going to want to read the profile and, by the way, people who are genuinely looking for a life partner will also read what's in the profile. So what's written in the profile matters equally not equally, but it matters. You know, commensurately with the photographs, okay, but it matters. You know, commensurately with the photographs, okay. So, so a well-written profile garners better results. Well curated photographs garners better results and better results.
12:00
Meaning you're just going to be seen out of the crowd. It's like, okay, you're at a football stadium. If everyone wearing black and someone wears red, they're going to be seen in the crowd. So that's the way you want to approach the online process and I feel like I've been preaching this for 15 years. I mean, it saddens me that I have to keep repeating this. It's like if you had your ideal dream job, wouldn't you put together your ideal dream resume? You would think. And sadly, when I say 90 out 98 out of 100, that's true for men and women alike it's mediocre at best.
Karen Covy Host
12:39
Wow. So let's say, somebody is willing to go the extra mile, they want to be the 2% right, they want to stand out. What kinds of things should they emphasize? Because from what I understand, I do have children who are in the dating pool and it's like everything kind of sounds the same. It's like I like long walks on the beach and romantic evenings and blah, blah, like it all kind of sounds generic after a while. So what do you say?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
13:11
You know this is tricky because most humans aren't naturally gifted writers, okay, so one thing I've done for my clients is I've cut and paste all the best profiles that I've ever read, which are usually stories, which are usually humorous stories, which usually says something with some meat and some robustness. So you know, in fact, I'll just share with you what the first sentence on my profile says, just to give me an example. And it starts like this Imagine we just walked out of a personal development, self-help and spiritual retreat and we can't wait to share with each other how we felt and all the ahas we experienced. Okay, now, what I did there is I just painted a picture of a story of what it'd be like to be together, because personal development, self-help and spiritual is like, is like the big thing in my life. And I painted a story.
14:13
I paint excuse me, painted a picture. You want to paint a picture of what it's like to be together. You want to share maybe some details. You can even be granular and go. I just imagine that we're going to go to Poncho's for dinner to grab a margarita on a Sunday afternoon, okay, so you get granular, you name a restaurant that matters to you and you describe what it's like to do this together. That's going to garner more, better results, because you've just in, you've just you know opened up the creative centers of a person's mind. Versus I like long walks on the beach holding hands, candlelight dinner, yada, yada yada. We just paint a picture that's real, that's in your life so what would you say?
Karen Covy Host
15:02
I think I know the answer to this, but I I'm interested in hearing your perspective. What would you say to the person who says, yeah, but you know what if this person doesn't like the same? Like? What if I paint this picture? Isn't that going to turn some people off? What if I lose the right guy because he doesn't like ponchos?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
15:24
Well, first off, let's be real. If someone hated that restaurant is going to say no to you for that reason. There's a lot of other issues within that human being's psyche that you've just dodged a bullet. I that there's a fear of being so specific and granular, as I'm saying, but the truth is you know somebody who maybe isn't doesn't do that would go, wow, maybe I'll try that. In other words, you've just created an opportunity for to do something new, even though they haven't done it, and that demonstrates flexibility, open mindedness, curiosity, spontaneity all these great, juicy, delicious qualities within a human being. If they read something that they haven't done and go, wow, I'd like to try that. So now, the reason why you're making it specific and local is that, ideally, you want to date from a proximity perspective within your backyard. Ideally, and let me explain why. You know, proximity breeds continuity and continuity. Continuity meaning doing things regularly together. Proximity breeds doing things regularly together. Continuity and continuity builds trust.
16:52
A lot of people today are spending an inordinate amount of time did I say that properly? Inordinate amount of time on their devices. They're just texting one another. They're, they're texting how's your day going? Did you have a good day? I hope you had a good day? Was your day good? Tell me about your day. And it's not real communication other than finding out specifics about the day. But the problem is and Esther Perel, who wrote the book Mating in Captivity, did a great YouTube video on something known as artificial intimacy. Artificial intimacy Many people today are spending more time communicating via their devices than they are face-to-face connecting with each other. And they build up this artificial connection, this artificial familiarity, and then, when they actually spend time together, they find that they're misaligned with one another. So when you're writing that ponchos, you're saying hey, have you been there too, let's go together, kind of thing, ideally, and this doesn't always have to be the case. But the closer two people live together, the greater chance their relationship success is.
Karen Covy Host
18:10
That's so interesting. I love that and I am a big fan of Esther Perel and I'm going to have to look up that video now because I have not seen that one. But the concept makes so much sense, this whole artificial intimacy. But how do you navigate that territory?
18:28
Because if you're starting with the device, right, so you meet the person on the device, like at what point do you say it's time to get off the device and meet in person? Do you do that right away, or do you wait and text and go back and forth a while? But that could create the artificial intimacy we're talking about. So where's the happy medium?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
18:51
Yeah, you know this is a great question and I'm going to attack it in a couple different ways, because here's the thing these days, unlike 50 to 100 and thousands of years OK, so let's go back in time. You know, 100,000 years. You made it within the tribe you lived in, which was all about 30 people, and this went on for a hundred thousand years. And then, really up until about a hundred years ago, we pretty much mated with people that we knew, okay, and that started to shift a little bit in the sixties, but you know, or the fifties and sixties, and what's happening today, particularly if 65% of all new relationships happening online is that we're meeting strangers, so we know nothing about them, and what's caused is a need for accelerated learning. This is a new concept I've been discussing. It's almost created an artificial need for accelerated learning, meaning learn as much as you can about this person. This is why chemistry on the first date. If it's not there, people don't have interest to get to know you anymore or any further, unless there's this instant chemistry because you're like I don't want to invest in a person, whereas in the past you could have known someone for six months through like school or work or something. All of a sudden, chemistry was there and it ignited the relationship. So the question is how much should you communicate?
20:30
I have a rule of thumb. It's called three, two, one, three, okay, 3-2-1-3. Okay, the three stands for no more than three. Text exchange, email exchanges should lead to one or two telephone calls. So get on the phone, speak Could lead to one date, all in three weeks, okay. So that's my rule of thumb Three, two, one, three, three. Email exchanges, one or two phone calls, one date, all within three weeks. Now you might say but, Jonathon, we live 600 miles apart. Well then, you better figure that out. In that context is my suggestion.
Karen Covy Host
21:15
Unless you want a long distance relationship where you never see each other, but that's its own issue.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
21:21
Well, and a lot of people are choosing long distance relationships and they do it very, you know, ambivalent, ignorant, without intention, because they're not thinking about the thinking in the bubble the bubble of chemistry, and they're not thinking of the big picture. So, they rarely ever discuss how are we going to take this distance from long to short with a genuine plan, because they're amped up on chemistry oftentimes and I didn't get to say this earlier, Karen but chemistry is not an indicator of relationship success. It's needed, but that in and of itself is not an indicator of relationship success.
Karen Covy Host
22:03
Okay, say more about that.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
22:05
So, I want you to think about it like an iceberg. Okay, Above the waterline is the top of the iceberg, is chemistry Below the waterline, and this takes time to learn. It's shared values, shared vision, lifestyle compatibility and this is the tricky part emotional maturity. We have a population of human beings that are rather radically emotionally wounded and, worse, have poor relationship skills. How do I know this? Because one out of first marriages end in divorce, six out of ten second marriages end in divorce and seven out of ten third marriages marriage is ending divorce. That's an indicator. We aren't good at this yet.
Karen Covy Host
23:01
Agreed, but you know, if you listen to people of a certain age, people in middle age and beyond, so we'll just call it 45 and up for the month.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
23:10
Yes, perfect, perfect.
Karen Covy Host
23:11
So for people who are in that demographic?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
23:46
Well, I'll be blunt and say you're delusional. You know most humans. I'm going to be very granular here and let's talk about men, for example. Most humans do a very poor job identifying their emotions but, more importantly, being able to articulate your emotions to another human being. But let's take it even a step further articulating it in a way that can be seen and heard and understood by another human being, provided that they're capable of receiving. I am being blunt here.
24:13
We have an emotionally dysfunctional population of human beings. That doesn't mean that they don't pay their bills on time, doesn't mean that they're not ambitious, doesn't mean that they're irresponsible, but from an emotional level we are infants in many ways. How do I know this? First year marriages end at 50%, second end at 60%, third end at 70%. That speaks volumes. And it's usually this Karen, you go into any therapist office, couple's therapist office and this is what happens she points the finger at him and he points the finger at her. I mean this is a significant percentage of the time. Rarely do people look in the mirror and say remember, I said I went on 100 dates and I realized I'm the common denominator. Very small percentage of human beings are actually deeply introspective and take ownership. Now I'm saying it's a small percentage, I'm not saying it's zero, but most humans aren't aware that they are the common denominator.
Karen Covy Host
25:26
So how do people go, assuming your statistics are close to being right, and I'm sure-.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
25:32
It's anecdotal, but yeah.
Karen Covy Host
25:33
Whatever Right, but so that a significant let's call it a significant portion, if not, you know, definitely the majority of people are emotionally immature or not, you know. They don't, uh, know enough about their own emotions to express them clearly, and yada, yada, yada. Um, what to do mean? Like if I was in the dating pool right now and I heard this, I'd be like, you know, slip my wrists.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
26:00
You know it's interesting. Could I tell you a quick little story? And it relates to divorce attorney. So I remember at one point in my divorce, which was 2007. So that was a long time ago, we went to divorce court. We had to have a hearing for something and when I got to the courthouse it was the morning we were the fourth docket I believe they call it docket the fourth case to be heard. But we had to be there before. So I heard the case before three cases ahead of us, and it was fascinating.
26:38
Fascinating to witness the, the infighting going on between the couples and the arguments and I'm sharing this because you have sat in court, I'm sure multiple times, witnessing this and I realized that I thought to myself this is we. Should we, everybody should spend a week in divorce court before they ever get married as a way to reverse engineer. If we know these are the reasons, why then? What can we do to avoid it? So my point is there are fantastic books. In fact, the Gottmans have something. The Gottman Institute, John and Julie Gottman, have interviewed over 40,000 couples and found the common denominators of most frustrations in relationship. In fact, they call it the four horsemen of the apocalypse, which is contempt, criticism, defensiveness and stonewalling. So what I would invite everybody to do and remember you started with sharing my bio. I wrote a book about self-love.
27:53
So, my invitation for everyone is to know themselves, know your fears, know your insecurities, know your limiting beliefs, know your negative patterns, know your judgments of others. Become self-aware. Love yourself. Number one. Number two study relationship books. This is what I habitually talk about on my YouTube channel Study the mechanics of a relationship. And I'm only asking people to invest one hour a day for the next couple months. That's it, you know. One hour a day reading a book. Learn about yourself. Invest in yourself, because the better prepared you are when you're in the dating marketplace, the better results you're going to have. So invest a little bit in yourself First, kind of understand who you really are, find your nooks and crannies and then learn about relationships. But I say this out loud, but I would venture to say that 80, 90% of people go gee, what's the definition of insanity? If I keep doing it my way over and over and over again, I'm going to get the same exact results, and I'm being rhetorical here, you know, just like George from Seinfeld, try the opposite and see how that works.
Karen Covy Host
29:12
Yeah, I, you know it's interesting and I just so resonate with so much of what you've said. It's like people want it starts in the marriage. They want the other person to change, not them, um, and then when you get into the dating pool, it's just more of the same, more of the same, more of the same. So really, I think your advice is well taken, that you start here, you start with yourself, and I know that you're really deep into self-love. Now Can you talk a little bit more about that? Tell your listeners what your more recent explorations into self-love have revealed and what they can do to deepen their own sense of who they are and their own self-love.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
29:57
Yeah, thank you so much and I appreciate that. And, as you shared in my bio, when my son passed away, I was giving his eulogy and I remembered I stopped in the middle of it and I said to everyone look, we can grieve with suffering or we can grieve with love. And what I meant by that is that I chose to celebrate his life and I chose emotionally to just fill my heart up with as much love for him as I could possibly do. But what I was really was filling my heart up with my own love. And what I mean by that is we human beings can be so cruel to ourselves self-crucifixion, self-doubt, self-judgment, I mean the list goes on and on. I think we are the cruelest to ourselves, oftentimes first in our heads. And so I, for the last 15 years, I've immersed myself. So let me explain, let me backtrack.
31:08
When I went through a divorce, I lost my high-end corporate job, I got wiped out in the marketplace and I was going through a divorce. I was an emotional train wreck. As I shared earlier, I was that. The reason why I coach women on dysfunctional men is because I was that guy. It's the personal development, self-help, spiritual work and therapy that I've done, that's create, that put scaffolding, emotional scaffolding, around me. So by the time my son passed away, I didn't collapse. And, by the way, I've met so many people now who have lost a child and they literally have collapsed and not come back from it.
31:47
Self-love is all of that scaffolding I was just describing through personal development, self-help, spiritual work and therapy, to really kind of learn how to regulate your emotions, to navigate your emotions, to understand what they mean, to not allow them to engulf you, like I talked about, with suffering before. Self-love is your self-worth, your self-confidence, your self-reliance, your self-esteem, and it's not a destination, it's not that you get. I believe you become fully actualized seven seconds before you die. That's when it happens in my mindset and I'm being tongue-in-cheek. It's a work in progress, but the benefit is that I believe doing inner work creates more joy in a person's life. I think we've we're a society here in United States in particular we believe things equals joy, and I, most people, who there's a lot of people that have nothing and are completely happy. So I think once we really begin to love ourselves, that's where real joy resides.
Karen Covy Host
33:03
That's so interesting, and I, I love that perspective, right, I just I really do. Putting it in the context, though, of somebody who's just gotten divorced, right enough to jump back in the dating pool, because I, you know, I've had clients who, you know, the ink was just barely dry on the divorce papers and they were already out in the dating world, right. I'm not sure that, you know, I don't know if that's the best thing, but I guess it depends on the person. I don't know. What are your thoughts on that?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
33:43
That's a great question. So I think it's going to. There's going to be degrees. I think the more contentious the divorce number one most often, the more time that needs to be healed. The more there's anger towards the other person, the longer it is going to take to heal, and what humans often do is they go immediately go find a replacement. That you know. You know that line from Jerry Maguire. You complete me. Like I've got this hole inside of me. I got to go get it filled right away. Oftentimes that's codependency being filled.
34:18
There's no set timeline, but I will say this the more anger you harbor towards your previous partner, the more resentment you harbor, the more contentious a relationship is, the longer it's going to take to heal, and ultimately, one of the big functions within self-love is forgiveness, and forgiveness simply means forgiving love. Forgiving love this is my interpretation. I didn't make this up, I heard this from someone else, but this is the way. It isn't about absolving somebody or anything like that, as forgiveness is for yourself, it's not necessarily for the other person. When we can approach life from a place of forgiving love, we are better prepared to engage in love with somebody else.
35:21
See, sadly though, Karen, most people engage in transactional relationships, not deeply coveted loving relationships, there's usually a transaction involved, and I don't mean monetary per se, but I, you know it's. It's let me reframe that not transactional, it's conditional. You do this, I do this. There's a lot of conditions, a lot of expectations. There are plenty of couples that have genuine, unconditional love and genuine, you know, they come from their heart. But many people, sadly, are blocked from their heart because they're harboring a lot of pain and then they go have somebody else go fill that. Here in the United States we are suckling on the nipple of I need you to love me so I can feel good about myself. We are a society here suckling on that, sadly speaking, and I can only speak for United States because I know in other parts of the world there's just a different energy that has to do with their environment versus here. But to answer your question, there's no set timeline. It oftentimes depends on how hurt you are.
Karen Covy Host
36:38
You know I agree 100% and I also really appreciate that you highlighted that the amount of time that it is going to take any person to heal is directly proportional to how much anger and hurt and pain they're holding onto from their divorce, Because you are just feeding into what I work so hard with my clients not to do.
36:59
It's like why do you want that amicable divorce? Why is it better to be prepared to educate yourself, to go through this in the least destructive way possible? Because when you do that you're in the best position to start your new life and be healthy and whole Right, but the challenge is people go through the divorce and they want to hang on to that anger, they want to hang on to that hurt because they want to hurt their spouse. They don't want to be seen for giving love to someone who clearly doesn't love them and may have walked out on them and whatever the story is. And so it becomes really difficult for them to let go of all of that. And they think that because they don't want to let their spouse off the hook.
Jonathon Aslay Guest
37:46
Yeah, unfortunately, there's an expression hurt people, hurt people, because when you're hurting it's going to bleed everywhere in your life. That's why forgiveness and it's very difficult to do, you know, I'm going to say self-love is not for the faint of heart. You know this is like and, by the way, it almost requires ninja level effort. I mean, I'm being very sincere here. You have sat in court, I'm sure hundreds of times, and you've witnessed almost the you know the gutter of anger. In fact, divorce court is probably one of the melting pots where there's the deepest anger amongst couples and that's sad. And so learning real forgiveness, learning real compassion, learning real love, the sooner we get there as a society and as an individual human being, you know, I think this is eventually where our world will flourish.
38:54
And you know, this starts with one person, and I say this as a man who had a contentious divorce and and I was in a relationship with a therapist and she said mend the relationship with your ex. And little by little, little by little, little by little, little by little, I just kept being more kinder, gentler, loving, compassionate, and not that you know, like we're best friends, her and I. It's not that. But all it takes is one person. I know that's hard to hear if you think the other person genuinely hates you, but I'm going to tell you something. You're not doing it for them, you're doing it for yourself. I felt better giving love, even in the face of you know, rejecting, you know like resentment. From that it just feels better when we give love. That's how I view it anyway.
Karen Covy Host
39:45
A hundred percent and that I think that brings us kind of full circle where you know, starting in love, going through the dating, ending in love, it all makes so much sense. Do you have any other words of wisdom that you want to share with the audience before we call it a wrap?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
40:03
Oh my God, I like have a thousand. You know what? I always look at it this way. You know, life is a journey. I genuinely look at it this way and there's no right or wrong. You know there's no. If we can embrace real compassion for ourselves, real love for ourselves, and not from an arrogant, narcissistic, self-centric way. I mean just, you know, as I said earlier in this broadcast, we are our worst critics and enemies and that sort of thing. The more we infuse ourselves with love, it's an antidote to suffering.
Karen Covy Host
40:49
So, you know, self-love is a vaccination to suffering, in my purview, that is a beautiful way to wrap this up and to end the interview, but before we do, one last question when can people find you? If they want to get your book, if they want to check out your work, if they want to find you, where can they do that?
Jonathon Aslay Guest
41:11
Well, if you're watching the video, my name is listed there, so you can simply plug that into Google and you can get to my website. I also have a YouTube channel where I've got almost 200,000 followers. I record five videos a week talking about dating, mating or relating from that midlife perspective. I usually have live videos too, so you can hop on, and I actually do live interviews and that sort of thing. So either my YouTube or my website, or once you put in my name, you can find all my social media and all that good stuff.
Karen Covy Host
41:44
Wow, and I would really encourage anyone who's watching, anyone who's listening, to do exactly that. If you are in the dating pool or you're about to be in the dating pool, you definitely want to check out your Jonathon's videos, his book, all the things, because this is advice from somebody who's been there done that. So, Jonathon, thank you so much, and if you are again, if you're watching or listening, please, if you like what you heard, if you want to hear more like this, more interviews like this, give it a thumbs up, like subscribe, and I look forward to talking with you again next time. Thank you.
