#018: The Dating Blueprint: What Women Want But Won't Tell Men | Jason Evert
Men are rarely given advice on how to pursue a woman. In fact, they're usually just told what not to do.
In this episode, author and speaker Jason Evert gives practical advice based on his new book The Dating Blueprint:
Answers from 1,000 women about how they want to be pursued
The #1 vice women want men to overcome before dating them
How to break up with a woman
How to know if "she's the one"
How to guard your love and make it strong
Plus, enter our random giveaway to win The Dating Blueprint book! We’re giving away three. Details at the end of the episode.
Buy the Book
The Dating Blueprint: What She Wants You to Know About Dating, But Will Never Tell You
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Links & Resources
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Books & Research:
The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: The 25 Year Landmark Study
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TRANSCRIPT
Transcript produced by artificial intelligence. Please pardon any errors!
Men this episode is for you. There's a lot of confusion. When it comes to dating, pursuing a woman and building love. We may not know what she wants or how to go about it all the right way. And often we're told what not to do, but nobody tells us what to do. But thankfully, my guest today has answers for you is practical, concrete advice on dating.
My guess is Jason Everett. And he wrote a book called the dating blueprint. What she wants you to know about dating, but will never tell you he asks over a hundred thousand women who follow him on social media. The following questions. He said, how would you want to be asked out on a date? How would you not want to be asked out on a date?
What habits or vices would you want a man to overcome before he dates you? If he's not interested in continuing the relationship, how do you want him to communicate that to you? And other questions like that, and over a thousand women responded and left more than 30,000 words of feedback, Jason sifted through it all.
And he compiled it into the book that we're gonna talk about in this episode. And so what we're gonna do for you is we're gonna pull out some of the wisdom in it to help you. We talk about how can a man know if she's the one, how should a guy ask her out on a date? How to guard your love and make it strong.
And what do you do if your woman has made a lot of mistakes in the past, and that kind of haunts you, Jason even shares how he and his wife Lina have dealt with the effects of her broken home, on their marriage. She comes from a broken family. So he opens up about that too. And by the end, you'll have really solid at dating advice and advice for building the love that we all long for.
And my hope is that you'll feel even more confident in pursuing women. We're also gonna do a random book giveaway. We're gonna give away three of the dating blueprint books, and I'll tell you more about at the end. So lots of good stuff ahead. Keep listening.
Welcome to the ReSTOR podcast, helping you cope, heal, and grow from the trauma of your parents' divorce or separation. So you can feel whole again. I'm your host joy Pelli. Thank you so much for listening. This is episode 18 and we're in the middle of our love and relationship series. Research shows that the biggest effect from our parents' divorce is on our romantic relationships.
Why is that? Because we don't have a roadmap for love. We've seen a broken model of love and marriage. And so when it's our turn, we feel lost in struggle in numerous ways in our relationships. So we're bringing you a roadmap, actionable tips and expert advice on how to find and build authentic. Love a little about my guess.
Jason Everett has spoken on six continents over 1 million people about love, relationships and sexuality with his wife, Lina, they have authored more than 15 books, including how to find your soulmate without losing your soul pure manhood. And if you really loved me, Jason earned a master's degree in theology and undergraduate degrees in counseling and theology with a minor in philosophy at Franciscan university of Steuben.
Jason and his wife are frequent guests on radio shows throughout the country and their TV appearances include Fox news, MSNBC, the BBC and EWTN, Jason and Chris were married in 2003 and they have a really beautiful family. And before we dive into the conversation, I wanna say to everyone listening who isn't religious, I know we have a lot of listeners who aren't religious and I'm so happy that you're here.
I just wanna say that, uh, Jason is Christian, he's a Catholic Christian. And so he does talk about God and faith in this interview. Uh, but even without those parts of the episode, you are still gonna get a lot out of it. And so if you can keep an open mind, keep listening. Here's my conversation with Jason, Jason, thanks so much for coming on the show.
It's an honored to have you. Well, thanks for having me on looking forward to it. Let's dive right in. Before we get to the content of the book, I wanted to ask you what inspired this book? What did what'd you. Well years ago, we had written a book for single young women called how to find your soulmate without losing your soul.
And, uh, it did real well for the women. They loved it. And, you know, requests started to come in. Well, where's the book for guys. Where's the book for guys. And I, you know, I kept saying, well, guys, don't read, you know, so that's not an issue, but they kept bugging me like, no, you know, we're literate. We read.
And so I figured, okay, we, we gotta do this. And so I started writing the book and got to the point of feeling a bit of a writer's block halfway through of like, I feel this is missing something like it's missing its soul. I realized what it was is that I was just giving the guys a bunch of dating advice, but they don't care what I really have to say.
They wanna know what the women think about dating. So I figured, well, I looked on our social media analytics and we had about a hundred thousand single women following us on social media. So I thought, Hey, I'm gonna tap into their wisdom. And so told them, Hey, we're writing this book for guys on, on dating and dating etiquette.
And, and I just wanna know from you women. How would you want a guy to ask you out on a date? How do you not wanna be asked out on a date? You know, how about when it's time to break up? How do you want him to communicate that to you? Uh, in a way that's clear without ghosting you. And then, so I just said, Hey, leave your comments below.
And we'll integrate that into the book. And like, boy, I mean, the floodgates opened, I mean, women submitted more than 30,000 words of feedback, which is longer than the whole book was at that point, but it was just gold. Uh, the, the advice and the tips that they gave, just so incredibly useful for men who just want concrete, specific guidelines, but oftentimes the women, Fields's not their place.
To give that feedback to the guys. I figured, Hey girls, you tell me, and then I'll tell the guys and I'll stand in the breach and we'll make sure that they get this information. And, uh, and that's what the book ended up being love. It, love it. It's so needed. And, uh, I've read the book in preparing for the interview and it's, it's such actionable stuff.
This is not kind of abstract thought. This is really practical advice. Yeah. I, I wanted to keep it, you know, cuz men don't do not do well. And with abstract general principles, I mean just, just give us the specifics, the blueprint, what is it we need to do, and then we can do it. And a lot of this stuff, I mean, you just hear it once and you can remember for the rest of your life.
Oh, okay. I need to make sure not to do that. Like, you know, I, I was asking the girls like, where do you wanna go on a date, not go on a date. And universally, the women did not want a man to ask them out to go to the movies on a first date. They said, that's a horrible first date. Cause the whole point of a first date is really get to know each other better and spend that time together.
And it's really kind of hard to get to know some guy when you're sitting in silence. Staring at a screen for two hours together, go to a movie on a third or fourth date. Great. First or second date. No way. And so if a guy hears something like that, it's like, okay, like you said, actionable items. I can do that.
I can come up with a different idea than a movie on a first date. What's your hope for the men who read it? What's the outcome or the result that you want for them? Well, you know, I want them to realize first and foremost, like marriage preparation is not something that begins when you get engaged. Uh, this begins long before you even start dating the woman.
And so this isn't just a blueprint on how to ask her out and get her to say yes and have a fun date. This is like, are you even ready to date? How do you know, it's the right time? How do you know it's the right girl? You know, are you prepared, you know, to enter into romantic relationship, to take care of this girl's heart and her soul and her body.
Yeah. To really do that introspection and, you know, look into your heart, take a real sober assessment of, you know, is there junk in my life that I really should root out before I embark on what could be the beginning of my vocation. And so encouraging the guys to do that and taking that deep look and then giving them the specifics and then not just how to ask her out, but how to keep that relationship strong and then how to continue to date God willing, even in your marriage.
I think it's fair to say. I think anyone listening would say that there's been a real crisis of masculinity in our culture. And so just curious from your point of view, what do you think has happened to men in our culture? Well, Thomas Aquinas gave a definition of a FY in one of his writings. And now by a FY, he does not mean femininity.
And he does not mean homosexuality. He's talking about a FY, which is to be emasculated. And his definition of that is that when a man refuses to let go of that, which is pleasurable in order to pursue what is arduous or difficult. And so what is it out there that's really enticing men to let go of what's pleasurable in order to pursue what's perhaps difficult or arduous?
I would say the most biggest thing that's making men a feminine is pornography because we are getting emasculated. By the millions, essentially being trained that a woman should be valued by how much lust she generates in me. And if I'm bored and I'm lonely and I'm angrier, I'm stressed or I'm tired.
Well, I can just go to porn to get my fix. And so men effectively or emotionally are not maturing at the rate that they should be where you're having a guy who's 25 years old and he can't even ask a girl out face to face. He doesn't wanna look her in the eyes. He'd rather be home playing video games or looking at pornography on a cell phone.
And so, you know, 50, 60 years ago, men were grown up a lot faster. I mean, my grandpa at the age of 20. Was flying a world war II, you know, airplane deliberately into thunderstorms to avoid Japanese enemy aircraft. I mean, at the age of 20, I was playing ultimate Frisbee in college. I mean, it was a very different scenario.
And so they grew up a lot faster because of those trials. And I think, unfortunately, what's happening today. You look at the porn statistics since coronavirus hit. And, you know, I saw the numbers just for Italy and through the roof. I mean, once they did the quarantine, the poor numbers skyrocketed, I mean, do we even know what to do when we're bored and have extra time on our hands?
Or if we're stressed out or life is difficult, do we just run to using women as our fix? And I think that's what pornography has done and emasculating men, I've heard you talk about comparing that to the one child policy in China. And I, I think it's so accurate. Would you talk about that analogy a little bit?
Yeah. Well, in China for decades, they've had the one child policy that, you know, you can only have one kid, uh, because they wanna control population. And so their way of doing that is telling you, you can't have more than one kid. If you have a second kid, not only will we find you and, you know, deprive that.
Education, uh, we will find your coworkers. We will dock their pay if you have a second kid. So you will punish all of their families if you're irresponsible and having a second kid. And so what's happening is a lot of these families are only having one kid, but they're having only the male child, because that can carry on the family name.
It's more, you know, financially productive and honorable or whatever to have a boy. And so the girls are all getting aborted and have been for a very long time, much more disproportionately than the male babies. And so what you're having now is now these male babies are all grown up. They're looking for a spouse and she's not there cuz she was aborted 22 years ago or whatever.
And I think pornography is having the opposite effect in America where there's plenty of young adult, single devout women wanting to start a vocation. And the men are nowhere in sight. They're in their mom's basement playing video games, you know, at the age of 26 or whatever, you know, and that that's not to say that men are the only ones impacted by pornography.
Many and many women struggle with this as well. It's not just a lust, isn't a guy problem. It's a human problem. But precisely because more men historically have been into this stuff, we've seen the effects play out more fully than we have with the females who are now beginning to struggle with it. Cause a lot of girls think, okay.
You know, look at the stuff first out of curiosity of, well, what do I need to look like and who do I need to be? And what do I need to do? And how do I need to act in the bedroom? But they don't realize that women weren't created to be porn. They were created to be loved. And so it, it, we owe it as men and women to get rid of this junk so we can be free to love.
Couldn't agree. More. One of the questions you asked the women is what is the number one fault that you would want a man to root out of his life before he enters a, a dating relationship and their answer was pornography. What else did they say? Yeah, I mean, we got some funny responses there. I remember, you know, we asked him, what's the one thing you want a guy to stop doing in his life before he dates you?
One girl said, well, not take your ex-girlfriend to the duck pond. I'm like, okay. I'm like, alright, I'll make a mental note of not taking, ex-girlfriends do a duck pond, but you know, other things. You know, excessive gaming or laziness or pride alcohol, things like that. But pornography four times to one, uh, was the number one response from the women.
Like, get that outta your life. Before you even ask me on a date, look, you can have your pixels. Or you can have a person, but you can't have both pick what you want. You know, if you really want me, you really want a girlfriend, then not only break your porn habit, but heal from its effects as well, because it's a mistake to think, okay.
I haven't looked at porn in a month. I'm good. But that's like, if I stabbed you, you know, the big piece of rebar and I pulled that outta your guts. And I think, okay, the rebars out of your stomach, you're okay. Now it's like, well, no, you're not okay. There's a gaping hole in my stomach. And my intestines are halfway out.
Like I'm not healed because the wound has been pulled out. Because, you know, the damage in the scar tissue remain. And so we've gotta be able to take some time and heal from the effects of pornography to retrain our imagination and self mastery so that we can be free to love. And this is stuff we should do before asking a girl out.
Instead of treating her like a, she's a prude. If she doesn't allow us to look at pornography during the relationship, because, Hey, that's just what guys do, you know, that's not true fidelity. It's cheating. And to a man who may be thinking, I'll get this outta my life. Eventually I don't need to do it. Now.
Marriage is five years away, 10 years away. What would you say to him? Why is it important for men to eliminate those vices now and to start healing from their effects? Well, one is that the longer you stay involved in a porn habit, masturbation, whatever the deeper, those hooks sink into you, it's not like it's gonna get easier to break free as you get older.
I mean, that's the, the lie the devil tells us, oh, well, you know, eventually this will just go away. You know, just let's deal with it tomorrow. Well, tomorrow's kind of full, let let's deal with it next month or next year, next decade or presidency or whatever. It's like, no. Now, now is the moment of salvation.
Now you've gotta act. And so one is just the sense of urgency. It's only gonna get more difficult the longer you hang on. and then secondly, like you're really clogging up your love life with something that's bogus because you know what, if you think, oh, well, I'll be ready to settle down. In two years, five years, the punishment of certain sins is the pleasure you get from them.
And I know that sounds kind of weird, uh, because like some people think, well, aids is a punishment for promiscuity. Well, so. The pleasure you get from these addictions is the punishment in itself because it gets you hooked on something that, you know, it seems to bring temporary satisfaction or relief, but does not meet your deeper needs.
And so you keep end up going back for another hit and another hit, but you're not really satisfied. You don't experience the joy of authentic human love, which is what God wants to give to you because you're too busy binging and basically eating out of a dumpster instead of enjoying the buffet of steak and lobster tail that God wants to give to you.
And yeah, real love is demanding. It's much more difficult than pornography because with porn. She's got no demands. She has no needs. She doesn't need you to hold a conversation with her. She can't reject you. She doesn't have problems she's instantly and constantly sexually available whenever you want.
She's completely disposable. And as soon as you get bored with her, you go to the next flawless supermodel. And so it, it just makes us slops when it comes to real love. It just makes us so lazy and soft belly and weak because it's all about us. And if you think you can just flip a light switch and transition from complete self gratification and selfishness to selfless, sacrificial, love your in for a big surprise.
It's almost like, imagine you get Tom Brady and man, like, dude, that guy knows how to throw a football, you know, but let's say, okay, starting the game tomorrow, you have to throw left handed. I mean, he might not be able to throw the ball 15 yards down the field with any precision whatsoever. If he's now having to retrain his brain on such a drastic level.
And it's the same thing when it comes to switching from lust to love, we've gotta learn how to do that now, instead of when our future spouse walks into our life, and then we are far from prepared for her. In the book you give some really practical tips on how to overcome vices, such as pornography. I, we can't get into all of them, but would you give us one or two tips?
Well, one thing I would say is don't go lone ranger, you know, don't think, okay, well, you know, I got this, I'll conquer this on my own. I mean, you're gonna fall flat on your face. You need accountability. So one thing I recommend is called covenant eyes and, uh, covenant eyes. If you go to their website and just type in the, uh, promo code chastity, they'll give it to you for a month for free.
And that'll not only block pornographic content, but it'll send your accountability partner or report. Of what you've been looking at, so that you're not on your own, that he knows when you mess up and you can call you on and, and you think twice about clicking a site when, you know, somebody can see that, that that's what you're into.
And so you've got that accountability. A second thing I would try to do is that, you know, even if you don't have a computer on you, it doesn't mean that you're not gonna have any temptations. I mean, what about that woman jogging down the street? What about the girl working next to you in the gym? You know, what about, uh, you know, when you're at church and like, you have a thought of lust from two years ago and like where the heck did that thought come from?
Or you're just getting ready to go to bed and imagination start stirring. What's your strategy in those moments? Most people don't have a strategy. It's just like, well, uh, I don't know, but we have to be prepared. And so one thing that I would say is, you know, just stop and trace the little sign of the cross on your forehead, you know?
And the first part of the cross is up. So GRA think of that as a prayer of gratitude, you could think God for the beauty that he gave to that person. And the second part of the cross goes down, that could be like contrition, you know where you're God, I'm sorry. For the times I have not looked. Upon your daughters, you know, creating me a clean heart.
And so you're asking for forgiveness and for purification, then the cross comes up and it goes off to the side and that's like, now you're looking over to her, you know, or that source of temptation of like, maybe if it's a pornographic flashback, where is she right now? Like, is she, I mean, she's just human being, is she, you know, trying to get outta the porn industry?
Did she have an abortion last week? You know, is she struggling as a single mom to make ends meet and is doing this on the side? Like, or is she, um, been sex trafficked? You know, is she a human slave? Basically that ended up online. Like this is a human person. This is your sister in humanity. Let's pray for her.
And so you're transforming temptation into intercession. And then the final part of the cross kind of moves away from her to the other side of the source of her beauty, which is God. And because the devil didn't invent the human form, that's God's idea and all beauty comes from him. And so I think the beauty of others can lead us into maybe a prayer of adoration and the beauty that God possesses.
And so this is a little anecdote that you could use. If you don't remember all four points, it's fine. Just do one or two of them, but you just gotta make sure you have a game plan, uh, that you're not repressing and stuffing your desires. Like, oh, desires are bad. Sexual desires are all evil. It it's like, well, no.
I mean, passion is a good thing. Sexual desire is a good thing, but it's lust that pollutes it and wars it. And that's when you take the person's sexual value and you place it above their personal value. And so what love tries to do is arrange that rightly where you're valuing them as a human person, instead of a commodity for your own sexual gratification, that makes so much sense.
It's almost as if we're so focused on the body that we're missing the person. Yeah. Yeah. And, and that's, that's the thing with pornography. I mean, the, the porn stars, they're the focus of all of the attention and yet they're completely ignored. And so they're getting all this attention, but like, you don't know where she's at in life.
You don't know what's going on with her. If the porn industry really revealed too much, it would go out of business because if it really revealed, oh yeah, miss September. Yeah, she was molested when she was 12 and she was raped when she was 18. And right now she is addicted, um, to cocaine and, uh, she is an alcoholic and, you know, she has two kids and she's had three abortions.
And that porn video that you saw last week. Yeah. She actually did conceive a child during that porn video who was aborted, you know, eight months ago. like, okay, what man on earth, no matter how depraved your struggles may be, would take delight in watching that movie. If you were fully revealed the woman, you know, and all of her humanity instead of just her body parts.
And so our job is to clothe these women, uh, with, with dignity and with their personhood again. And there's so much freedom in that. And we'll talk about freedom in a little bit, but one of the things that you had said in the past that really helped me break free from pornography, uh, years ago was that you really need a greater desire to overcome a strong desire.
So if you have a strong desire to look at pornography, you need a greater desire to overcome it. And so find that desire, guys, everyone listening, find that desire, whatever it may be, you you're probably gonna have to dig for that a bit. It may not be obvious and you may not have seen good examples of what love is supposed to even look like.
So you may not even be motivated to do that, to, to find love, to build love that lasts, but spend some time with that find that greater desire that will help you overcome. The lesser desire, anything to add to that. Yeah. And you know, in terms of what is that desire? Is it your love for God love for a future spouse love for your future children?
I mean, you think is any, you know, maybe there's a guy out there listening right now. Who's, you know, 23 years old or whatever you gotta think. Okay. Where do I wanna be 10 years from now? Do I really wanna be a 33 year old porn addict? Who's gotta slap my laptop shut when my five year old daughter walks the room, cuz she can't see what dad's seeing.
Like no man wants to be that man. And so well, let's start now. Then let's use motivation for love of my future children, love of my spouse. Uh, you know, cuz you'd think like what. Dad would bring his child. Like if he struggled with pornography would bring that kid into an adult bookstore and be like, why don't you just kind of sit over here in the waiting room while I shop around for a little bit and just try not to look at too much on the shelves.
I'll be back in a minute, sweetheart. I mean, you would never bring her into that. I mean like my gosh, I mean, yeah, you wouldn't even let her sit in the car in the parking lot. Well, but we're doing something worse as fathers. If we're struggling with pornography or husbands, we're bringing it into our own house.
And, and, and so we have to be the gatekeepers in a sense, but we're leaving the barn door wide open for evil to plunder our entire kingdom because we don't have control over our of ourselves. And so we've gotta take this thing seriously, cuz our entire vocation could be at stake. One of the things when I was engaged and dating my now wife, one of the things that helped me to just keep our relationship pure was borrowing a tip from sports psychology, actually in sports psychology.
When you're in a, you know, nerve wracking situation, you wanna have two or three things you could think of to give you confidence. So you think of situations where you were, you know, in a tough situation, but you succeeded. And for me, I had three really vivid images in my mind of why I wanted to be pure.
And that really helped me because one of them was having a baby girl. How would I want someone to treat her. And so to, to all the guys listening, that's something I would definitely recommend to. It helps to have a really vivid, visual reminder that you can quickly pull up if you're in a moment of temptation.
Yeah. Yeah. And that, that way you're not just doing it for yourself, you're doing it for somebody else. Cuz you know, life you, I think his mother Teresa said life is not worth living unless it's lived for others. And so that gives you so much more meaning behind the sacrifice, you know, cuz if you're just, you know, shedding blood for no reason at all, other than just.
You know, self control, you know, sometimes it's easy to lose motivation, but it's like, no, this is for something. This is for the sake of love. This is so I can be free to love and free to be loved shifting to chapter two. So in chapter two, you talk about how you can figure out if she's the one. And so my question, do you, yeah.
How can a man know if she's the one I know if they'll read the book, the guys will get 10 questions asked to know if she's the one, but what do you, uh, explain a little bit about how they can know that? Yeah. Well, I mean, one of the things you gotta do is like, okay, what is it you you're really looking for in, in a future spouse?
You know, do you want, um, are you in a agreement in terms of like the size of a family? Is it in terms of like, does she possess a virtue? Because even if you marry miss universe, But she does not possess virtue. You will have a miserable marriage. Whereas if you marry someone who might not be a miss universe, but you're still attracted to her, but she has virtue.
You're gonna have a happy marriage. And so you really gotta ask, you know, does, does she possess virtue? Is she working on that? It doesn't mean that she's gotta be a Saint, but she at least needs to want. To be one, uh, you've gotta ask yourself to, does she share your faith? You know, hopefully that's something that's important to you and that you're gonna want your kids to be saints.
And is she gonna help you get to heaven? So you've gotta ask that stuff. I mean, you know, does your relationship have a good history, you know, or is it been an emotional roller coaster soap, opera, you know, drama fighting bickering back together, break apart. Because the best indication, the future of relationship is a passive relationship.
And if the past has been pretty darn Rocky, um, that's probably what you have to look forward to for a lifetime, because it's like, well, you know, she's really stressed right now, or I'm really stressed. And so I've done this that, well, trust me, marriage has infinitely more stress than you're gonna have as a singled person dating.
And so you've gotta really take into consideration, you know, are you ready as well? It's not just like, okay, is she ready? Cuz if so, well then I just gotta plug that into my life and we're good to go. You've gotta look into your own life. Am I ready? What do the people who love me think about her? You know, do my parents think that she'd be an awesome spouse or do the people who care about me the most tend to point out some red flags, Hey, you know, keep an eye on this.
You know, that that could be an issue, you know, and I know this is a, this last one's kind of a tough one because it's not up to her. I mean, she, this is beyond her control, but it's almost like a bonus point. If her parents have a strong marriage, it's such a blessing because in an effect, she will have sat in a classroom of authentic love for the first 18 years of her life.
Whereas I, if she was not unfortunately raised in that environment and her parents had a broken relationship, divorce fighting, whatever, you know, it doesn't mean that she's incapable of love or incapable of a happy, wonderful marriage, but it's just gonna be an extra challenge and a sense for her. And maybe for you as she perhaps needs to learn and develop the skills that she never had, the blessing of witnessing.
And so that can be a challenge, you know, but it's not a deal breaker by any extent. I mean, I, I was able to come thanks me to God from parents who still are married today. My wife came from, you know, a very broken family and, uh, you know, but, and she'll be the first to admit, you know, that. You know, creates an uphill struggle when you don't get to see what that interaction is supposed to look like from a husband and a wife.
So, you know, so those are some questions. What guy needs to look at. Not only is this the right girl, but is this even the right time, you know, for her, for me, because even if you find the right girl, it might not be the right time to jump into relationship. You know, maybe she's going to. UCLA next year, and you're going to Louisiana state university, and you're gonna have a long distance relationship, 4,000 miles apart for the next, you know, who knows how many years it can be pretty difficult.
And so you really gotta discern not just is this the right girl, but is this the right time? Love that. I love what you said about virtue two. That being really the main goal of finding a woman who's virtuous. And I know what I've seen in marriages around me is that the more virtuous the spouse is the happier the marriage.
Yeah. And so I think it's really the secret to a happy marriage is find a virtuous spouse, be virtuous yourself. Yeah. It's, it's not much more difficult than that. Marriage is very difficult, but if, if you can both, you know, be pursuing virtue, uh, you're far more likely to have a happy life together to anyone listening, who you maybe discourage because you come from a broken family.
I just wanna say there's so much hope. I know statistically, we're more likely to get divorced. We're more likely to maybe not even get married in the first place, but it is possible. And Jason's wife, uh, Lina, which hopefully will have her on the show at some point. Uh, she proves it and I'm living that out too.
I'm a baby husband, but, uh, I'm, I'm working it out and it's difficult. It's challenging. And like Jason said, you made it to work a little bit harder. You're gonna have to dig into your brokenness and find healing. But it's possible. So don't lose hope. Yeah. And, and that's the key, like if, if there is brokenness in that person's life, are they really willing to face those demons?
Are they really willing to work actively and, and take charge of that part of their life? And like, yeah, I'm gonna go to counseling. I'm gonna pursue this. I wanna work on this. Or just forever making excuses for why they've got other things to do then to really pursue that or dig that deep into those things.
And so you wanna make sure that, you know, they're willing, you know, as you should be as well to do the heavy lifting for some healing that might need to take place. Why is it ideal for man and woman to form a friendship before they started dating relationship? Well, one of the things, when I asked the girls about being asked out, a lot of the girls said, I would just much rather be asked out by a guy who gets to know me as a friend first, because otherwise he could have just as equally asked out my twin sister, simply based upon what we look like.
And we'd rather be asked out because you admire more than our physical appearance. Um, so that's one reason, but a more substantial reason is that, you know, you don't wanna date somebody unless you can see yourself marrying that person. And so that's the, the whole graced season of friendship gives you an opportunity to really get answers.
These questions of like, okay, Yeah, I'm attracted to this girl, but does she, does she really possess virtue or do I just kinda have a crush on her? Cause she's really pretty, um, you know, what type of spouse would this person make? What type of people do they hang out with socially? Does this guy hang out with other guys that are, you know, drinking all the time and vaping and looking at porn?
Well, that tells you a ton about a guy. If that's, who he's choosing as his male companions. And so does this person share your morality or do they just kind of respect and tolerate and put up with your morality? The purpose of friendship is to get answers these questions before you tend to get more clouded in your judgment, by a relationship that may be physically or intimately close, cuz once you get close in those ways, Your objectivity is pretty much shot.
I think back to some relationships where that I've had where their initial attraction was, the physical, you know, she was beautiful. And, uh, we did develop somewhat of a friendship in the dating relationship, but it really was lacking. And when we got to the point where feelings started to fade a bit, it was a struggle.
And so I, I just can't imagine playing that out through years in a marriage, not having that friendship. It's that must be a real cross. Yeah. I mean, cuz you can imagine being married to someone and, and maybe you possess the physical stuff, but you don't have anything else. You know, you don't have mutual admiration and love and respect and all this stuff, the physical stuff, the value of it just tanked because, you know, if you don't have someone that you could have an intellectually stimulating conversation with and, you know, just companionship at the end of the day of just your friendship and spiritual intimacy and all those other things that really are the lifeblood of a marriage, what you're left with is pretty shallow mm-hmm
And so you need to make sure that the choice you're making is not simply because of the physical, because even over the years, the physical itself will fade, you know, and then you're left with what is the value of the choice that you've made. And why did you make that choice? And all of those things will then come to the light.
Really good. You say in the book that you should involve your family and your friends in the decision to, to date, or to enter into a romantic relationship with someone, why is that important? And what advice would you give to someone who comes from a broken family where maybe they can't rely on mom or dad?
They don't have a good relationship. What would you say to them? I remember hearing once that one of the best indication of the health of a female's relationship is what the girls, female friends think about. The guy, meaning, you know, do they think this guy is a creep and he's got a real bad history and he's just bad news for the girl.
If so, that girl better to listen up. Because they're not, you know, wanting her to break up with him so they can poach him off of her and date, date, him themselves. No, that they see some red flags there and they care about their friend and they just want her to be careful with her heart and with her body that she not get ahead of herself and make a bad relationship decision.
So, you know, maybe if your parents are out of the picture, whether it's a pastor, you know, a priest, youth minister, an uncle, an aunt, a best friend, you gotta get input outside of yourself because it is so hard. You know, especially when you get close, it's like reading a book when it's only two inches away from your eyes.
You can't see the text, it's too blurry. It's too close. Those that are more at a distance kind of holding the book can see the text much more clearly. Absolutely. And I've seen people who kind of go it alone and it usually doesn't end so well. And you know, if you think of big O other big decisions in life, like which college you're gonna go to, what job you're gonna take, we usually ask the input of other people.
So I couldn't agree more. It's really, they see things that you don't see. And I remember reading something, uh, when we were writing the soulmate book for the girls, uh, these two guys were having a discussion about, you know, trying to take advantage of women. And they said, well, what you wanna do is try to get her in bed is fast as you can in the relationship, because they said before, she sleeps with you, she's looking for reasons not to sleep with you.
Oh, why? Why should I invest myself in this guy? Why is he worth my time? Why should I do this with him? But they said, look, after you get better with her, she doesn't even ask those questions anymore. The question then becomes, you know, all the positives, like, you know, I need to keep this guy because you know, I've already given my heart to him and he's, they're no longer so critical of the negatives, cuz they're trying to justify why you were worth getting in bed with in the first place.
And obviously these guys are shallow as can be, you know, but, but it, it reveals something true of that. Once you a woman lets a man. Closely to her that, you know, she's not just given her body in many respects. She gives her heart. And then after that choice has been made, sometimes they look for every excuse imaginable to stay in a relationship that frankly is headed nowhere.
But having people outside of the relationship who care about you and love you. Can help you to see things that you might not be able to. I love the backward advice you give to the men about what not to do to date a woman, if you would, would you tell them what that advice is? Yeah, I mean, it's a, it's, it's kind of a fun little section in, in the book and, you know, I, I might as well just read it just cuz I mean it's only a couple paragraphs, but it's kind of fun to go through.
Um, so basically what I said, and now you first you gotta realize that this is all backwards. Okay. So if you wanna understand this, rightly you have to understand this is all inverted logic, but basically what I say is like step one is to incessantly flirt with her while keeping her in the friend zone and the strategy offers you a couple benefits.
First, it gives her the opportunity to ask you out, which is the safest route. You're a modern man liberated from the confines of binary. Gender stereotyping also creates romantic tension cuz she has no idea what you're thinking. This is a good time to show her that you're a true gentleman by asking for revealing pictures.
That way you can get to know her on a more personal level. Now, if she drags her feet. And doesn't ask you out after one or two years, uh, it's time to act decisively and have your friend text her on your behalf and ask for her social media information. Since she couldn't find her on Tinder. Now, if she says, no, you should be persistent, cuz uh, a little cockiness goes a long way, text her and tell her you think she's hot and call her little mama and ask her if she wants to hang out or chill at your place.
After all girls love dark basements, old couches and gaming, you know, hashtag romance. And I said, if, if persistence and poutiness don't do the trick, go public and ask her in the presence of multiple people. Women love being put on the spotlight that and whatever you do, don't say the word date. Um, that's way too clear.
Uh, that could mean rejection for you. And uh, and that's not a risk you really want to take your feelings could get hurt. So you wanna spare your ego. Um, it's all so smart to keeper guessing what your intentions are, cuz this makes you a man of mystery. And then if she asks what the plan is for the date.
I just kind of wanna avoid eye contact and mumble and say, you know, I don't know, what do you wanna do because, uh, indecisiveness is irresistible and a man now, when you pick her up for the date, I mean to hang out, uh, just text her here in all caps to let her know that you've arrived since she's capable of walking to your car alone.
Um, and if the car smells, it's kind of sprints, some masculine smelling body spray all over it, um, you don't have to open doors for her cuz you don't wanna be offender by being too patriarchal and then go to a movie so you can get to know her better sitting in silence for two hours. Um, and then, uh, you know, after the dinner bill gets there, just stare at it with big eyes and slide it over to her and say, I wouldn't pay that much if I were you, you know, just kidding.
Um, that's rude. You can just split the dinner bill. You're already paying for the gas. And then at the, uh, end of the date, you just wanna make sure to, uh, I mean, you deserve a payoff, so try to enter her dwelling and get really pouty or frustrated if she doesn't at least give you a prolonged, passionate kiss.
And then if you're not sure if you ever wanna see her again, um, don't communicate that to her. Just kind of fade into oblivion without communicating her intentions. Moving forward. You wouldn't wanna give her clarity when she can. You know, speculate about it with her girlfriends for the next several weeks.
Um, and if all, all that doesn't work, you know, getting back to seriousness, I say, look, put down your dumb phone, stop hiding behind the screen. Look a girl in the eyes and ask her on a date. You have to face the fear of rejection, like a man, because a woman is worth it. And so all that was basically.
Backwards dating advice of, you know, use the word date. Don't say let's hang out, be clear, be intentional, be chased, uh, be, be deliberate. And look, she owes you nothing for going on a date. The date itself should have been the reward that she was willing to spend that time in your company. And so when it comes to the physical stuff, don't wait for the girl to say, no.
I mean, it's such an UN gentlemanly thing to do to be like, well, you know, as long as she's willing to do it, then I'm okay with it. You know, take some leadership in, in terms of relating this relationship in a way that's pure and godly so that she doesn't have to wake up tomorrow morning. Wondering if she went too far with.
So good. I was cracking up over here, so I love the backward advice. Um, let's flip that around a little bit and you just did, but would you elaborate a little bit more? How should a guy ask a, her out? And I know the whole book is the answer to that question, but if you would play that out a little bit, based on the responses you heard from the women.
Well, one is don't text her out. You can never ask her out over a screen. Very tacky looks cowardly. Um, you know, one girl said the guy's just trying to take the easy way out if he gets rejected. And she said, look, if anything, I'll probably just say no to him. Even if I do wanna go out with him, because he asked me out over a text.
But if a guy asked me person and me not really wanna go out to them, I'd probably just give it a shot. Cause he was confident and up for the challenge. Another woman said she put this really succinctly. She said to the guys, look, she said, let me just say the easier it is to ask a lady out the easier it is for the lady to say no.
so get some guts, ask out face to face. And when you ask out, you have to save the word date. You can't say, hang out, get coffee, chill. No, she has no idea what you're talking about. Like you want to hang out, like, what do you, what do you mean? Like you wanna play Minecraft together? Like what does hanging out to you mean like no date is clear.
They know what you're asking for. If you're asked on a date and so it's making them clear. Um, one girl said, look, being vague. Doesn't exactly. Make a girl go weak at the knees. And so clarity. Don't ask your friends to ask her out, risk it, ask her out face to face, even if you're nervous. That's okay. It, it makes her feel valued that you're willing to take that risk.
Even if you're nervous. One girl said, I can't even imagine being with a guy who won't take any risks and give her advanced notice. Don't be like, want to come over my house tonight? No, give her a couple days, like, Hey, this Saturday, would you want to go out that doesn't work out maybe next weekend? Uh, give her advanced notice plan it.
Don't do this. What do you wanna do? I don't know what you wanna do. Like put some thought into it, make it fun in a, a way that you can talk and have fun together. That's that's the basic premise and there's a million different ways that you could kind of figure out how to do that. And, uh, you know, dating etiquette.
If she says, no, look, it's not the end of the world. Okay. Uh, you've just narrowed down your search for your future spouse by one, take it in stride. And if after a few dates, let's say you don't wanna move forward. Don't ghost her. Don't fall off the faith of the earth. Be clear and be intentional and, and honest with her that might be hard, um, to do, but you know what?
It shows respect for her. Cuz look, a lot of guys can be like straightforward and brave confidence, sincere and honest. When it comes to asking girl out. But can you be straightforward and brave and sincere and honest when it comes to breaking up? Uh, that's much more measure. I think of being a real gentleman, being able to clearly say, Hey, maybe we're not the best match, but I wanted to, you know, be, be open and honest with you that I don't really see this going further.
And I really thank you. And I think you're a great person and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. It might be a painful, difficult conversation for both of you, but let's grow up and be able to have tough conversations. You mentioned ghosting. Let's talk about that. What did the women have to say about ghosting? Oh my gosh.
It, it drives 'em insane. Like one girl said ghosting is basically sending the message that you don't respect someone as a human being enough to have a crucial and hard honest conversation with 'em about how you're feeling. And honestly, if you're not mature enough to talk about your feelings or lack thereof, then maybe you're not ready for relationship whatsoever.
I mean, yeah, it hurts. This girl said, but at least no more. Time's gonna be wasted. You can move, invest it in someone who's invested in you. There's nothing wrong with not liking someone cuz we can't all marry each other. But then if you do let go, one girl said don't pop back in when it's convenient for you and use me as your emotional fidget spinner.
So basically if you break up at least commit to the breakup, but just make it clear either way. Uh, I think one girl just said it best. She said an ending of a relationship should be just as intentional and clear as initiating our first date clarity at the beginning, clarity at the end. Good stuff. You touched on fear and fear holds a lot of men back.
And I think at the root of so much fear is really a false notion of freedom. You mentioned then the book, would you talk about that false notion of freedom? I know one of the things that a lot of guys say is, well, what if someone better comes along? Talk about that. Yeah. Well, I mean, in a sense, yeah, someone better is gonna come along.
It's only a matter of time. That someone more attractive is gonna come along. Someone cuter funnier, more appealing is gonna come along. It might happen next week. It might happen 20 years into your marriage, but somebody more beautiful is gonna come along. Will someone that God has planned for you come along.
You know that that's a different story, you know, because a lot of times we're basing, you know, someone better on some instantaneous attraction versus someone who we can build a life together with because in the end you have to choose. You have to make that decision. But if we're forever being paralyzed with someone better might come along, you're gonna miss the entire boat.
You're gonna miss everything at the end, you have to choose. And we've been sold this false notion of freedom of you don't wanna date, cuz then you're tied down. You don't want kids. You don't want marriage balling chain game over, but this idea. You you're gonna have freedom by living for yourself, but you know, Vatican too is a document, uh, from the church, uh, council they had, and it said that, you know, man only finds himself in the sincere gift of himself that you only find yourself in giving yourself.
And, and so the man who is forever holding back out of fear is not finding himself. He's losing himself. He has become a slave to his fear. He's not liberated as a man. He he's enslaved. And so we, our freedom exists for the sake of love, exists to be given away. Freedom as an end in itself is a myth, you know, I can say, well, you know, I wanna, I wanna be free.
What, what does that mean? I mean, people who join the army are warriors of freedom, but consider how much of their own freedom they give up in order to provide that for others, you know, freedom to them is not the end game. You know, freedom for, for others, for the sake of love to have a free nation. You know, that gift of self is what puts meaning behind their sacrifice.
We often measure freedom by a lack of commitment, but I think like you've said really well, the truest measure of freedom is actually your capacity to love the greater your capacity to love. The more for you are the less your capacity to love the less free that you are. I think this is crucial and probably something we don't talk about enough.
Yeah. Yeah. Cause I mean, if, if, whether it's my anger, my selfishness, my Lu, whatever, what ever inhibits my ability to love it's to that extent that I'm not free. And so someone like, you know, mother Teresa, you know, who would get up in the morning and do her religious prayers and go serve people all day and clean lepers out of people in the gutter and like would devote every moment of their life to others.
She was truly. She's free to love cuz that's what you're, it's not simply what you should do. It's who you are. You're made in the image of likeness of God. God is love. And so all of God's commands pertaining to human love and human sexuality is no, not so much an aught. This is what you ought to do. It's more of an is like, this is who you are.
You know, you are a son of God, you are a daughter of God. And we live in a way that's contrary to that. Dignity of what real love is about, you know, we're not just breaking a rule. I think we're breaking ourselves in the process. You know, we're, we're losing our identity instead of really discovering it.
And what has said life for of a man who just lives for himself. I mean, it's just so tragic to think of a guy who would go through his life, focus on himself, making himself feel good instead of giving himself for others. And I think anyone who's been stuck in the vice of pornography addicted to porn or, or anything else, like you mentioned video games too.
Once you break free of that, Because it is enslaving. You may think it's freeing to be able to look at all that stuff, to be able to play those games whenever you want, however long you want with no one checking in on you, but it really, really is enslaving. And so many people have gone from being enslaved or addicted to freedom can see that it's night and day.
Yeah. And you know, one of the challenges is it's not like the victories one at a certain point in our life. Like I got married, I've made a gift to myself and now I'm free. Like, no, I mean, the demands upon our selfishness are. We're given an opportunity, literally every 15 minutes of like, do I choose for me?
Do I choose for another? And you know, we win some, we lose some, but you know, let's why John Paul II said that love is a constant challenge thrown to us by God. And so that's why we wanna start working on our vices, whether it be self absorption or whatever, prior to marriage, um, or, or whatever vocation that you may be called to so that you can live, you know, as your created love in the book, you tell the men to go all the way with her, but that's not in the way that they may think.
Would you explain that? Yeah. To, to, to have a one night stand to sleep with some girl on prom night or whatever. Like you're really not going all the way. I mean, if, if just to simply have physical intercourse with a woman is not going all the way, it's really hardly going anywhere because you know, there's that song that came out a couple years ago by what's a guy pit bull or M where he is singing.
Like, give me everything tonight for all we know we might not have tomorrow. It's like, yeah, that inspires a lot of confidence. But like, I remember first, all I heard, like give me everything tonight. I'm like, is this a bank robbery? Like, what is he asking for? Like, you know, but give you everything. What's a girl supposed to say that I think she should say, okay, you want everything?
I I'll give you everything. You know, I'll give you my body. I'll give you my heart. I'll give you, I'll give up my last name. I'll give you my children. I'll give you their dirty diapers. I will give you my, you know, nursing home bills when I turn 85, like, I'll give you everything. And you know, at that point, such a man would probably recoil and be like, oh, well, you know, buy everything.
I didn't mean everything. And it's like, well, what did you mean? Well, well, he just wants the body. That's not everything. That's not going every, all the way. Like if a man really loves a woman, he doesn't just give her some pick up lines and a promise ring. You know, he gives her every breath he takes until the day that he dies.
You know, he gives her his bank account, his last name, his address, that's going all the way. And so it's not the church or God that's saying, oh, don't go too far. Don't go too far. It's like, no, we're the ones holding back. We're the ones who are afraid to go all the way, because just grabbing some physical gratification is not going all the way.
You know, it, it's heartily using today's lingo, going to first base, you know, we need to make much more of a gift of ourselves. And that's why sex in marriage is really speaking the truth with your body. Your body is saying, I give myself totally to you. I'm completely yours. And that's true. If you're a husband and a wife, if you're not married and your bodies aren't effect saying I'm all yours.
When in reality that person be, be outta your life two months from now, it's a lie spoken in the language of the body. And so all that God's asking for is sexual honesty that when a man and a woman make love, they should be renewing their wedding vows in the flesh. Once men start a relationship they're pursuing a woman, you say it's so important to guard your love and you give 10 tips in the book.
We don't have time for all of them, but would you share one or two? Yeah, I mean, one of the things that I recommended when it comes to, to guarding love is that make sure that there's emotional space in the relationship that you're not getting emotionally married super fast, uh, in this relationship that, you know, there's, you have interest apart from that relationship, you're not getting emotionally married right away.
Give it, give it some time, uh, when it comes time to like this, the physical aspect I alluded to this earlier, don't wait for the girl to say no. Um, a lot of guys, well, I'm a good guy. I wouldn't force her to do anything. It's like, you don't get points for not forcing a girl to do something against her.
Will, that's your duty. It's not a sign of like your moral quality. And so we need to actually take more of an active role instead of expecting the girl to be the chasy cop. You know, she's the one who says no, and I'm the one who gets to push the envelope and see how far things can go. That's not healthy.
It's not respectful of a woman. And, you know, and ultimately try to keep that relationship chased and pure. You know, avoiding the occasion of sin, you know, practicing chastity as a couple, and this is not gonna drive you apart. I mean, if chastity drives a wedge between you, then it's not love that's there it's lust.
Chastity will divide people who are United in lust, but for those who are unit in love, who actually want to do its best for the other person, chastity will intensify that love and it'll draw them closer to each other. Even if they've made mistakes in the past, they're always capable of starting over.
Would you just give a quick definition of chastity for people who are listening, who have no idea what that is? Yeah, well, chastity is a virtue like courage or honesty that just applies to her sexuality. And the function is to free us from the utilitarian attitude, meaning using someone else as an object for our own gratification.
And so we're all tempted to do this in one way or another. And so what chastity does it doesn't kill our sexual desires. It orders them according to the demands of authentic human love. And so the question would be for a guy practicing chastity. It's not just, okay, I'm not gonna sleep with my girlfriend, cuz maybe it's not good for her to get pregnant right now, but it's like, am I faithful to her with my imagination?
In my speech. Am I respectful in the way I talk about women? What I'm looking at on my cell phone, it's a virtue that encompasses far more than sexual abstinence, uh, to a virtue that really helps to regulate our sexual desires and make sure we're expressing them with love. So it's an integration of desire, not a repression of them.
Cause people think, well, look, I'm either gonna indulge on my desires and make me happy, or I'm gonna repress 'em all and make God happy. You know, which what what's it gonna be? And it's like, well, look, there happens to be another option out there besides indulgence and repression. And that's chastity of realizing, yeah, I've got these desires, you know, God created my sexuality.
It's something good, but I need to master these desires so I can be free to love instead of simply using women as an outlet for my. In the book you touch on how some men find it really difficult. If the woman that they're pursuing has a really dark and broken past, maybe they've made a lot of mistakes.
What advice would you give to men like that? Who are listening right now? Yeah, you know, I mean, it can be tough, you know? Cause my, my wife, she shares openly her testimony. She lost her virginity when she's 15 years old, came from broken family and, and uh, and then she turned her life around and I know a lot of people have reached out to me of like, dude, how do I deal with this?
You know, I have, you I've made some mistakes, but nothing too big. But my, my girlfriend or my fiance has been a lot, these different guys and just a thought of her with those other men just haunts me. And I, I feel like I'm getting bitter towards her or resentful or pouty or whatever. And. You've gotta be able to do something with those things.
Otherwise they're really gonna infect the relationship. And so what we gotta do is like, okay, stop realize she was not unfaithful to you, you know, unless you were dating her at the time and she did these things, she probably didn't even know you back then. And oar, she hardly knew herself back then. These are mistakes.
She probably regrets that she had made, uh, wishes that she had never made those choices. But you play an active role in her healing and her being a new creation that you fall in love with who she is today, not who she was 10 years ago. And so when those thoughts of her, those other guys come to mind, Pray for those guys, pray for their own conversion.
Pray for your, the girl that's with you. Now. Pray for her healing as well. Uh, you know, from maybe some bad experiences in those relationships so that you can play an active role in her healing instead of forever holding this over her head, because you don't save your virginity to get someone else's virginity.
It's not like a give and take kind of thing. Hey, if you could both share that on your wedding night, that's awesome. Unfortunately, a lot of people can't nowadays, uh, cause they've made different choices and so be able to realize, okay, but maybe if she had already lost her virginity, maybe you're still a Virgin.
On your wedding ad, you'll still be experiencing, making love as a sacrament for the very first time. She's never made love as a sacrament. She's had fornication. That's a very different thing than consummating a sacrament together in the state of grace. And so realize that that's an altogether new experience for the both of you to enter into together.
And if you can't let go over past. You know, you really need to work through that or let go of her because she deserves someone in her life who loves her for who she is today. And isn't gonna spend the rest of her life, rubbing her nose in something that she did five years ago. And so it's gonna take some patience on her part.
You gotta be able to talk out and share some of your feelings and be able to work through this. And it's a good test of your love. This is tough. Can we work through this together as a couple and make progress? Is she understanding, is she compassionate? Am I merciful? Am I patient it'll bring some of these virtues or the lack thereof up to the surface.
So you can take a look at that work on it. You mentioned before that marriage is tough. It's not easy. And I've experienced that. I've only been married two years, like I said, at this point, and it's already, it's challenging. I kind of expected it to be like a honeymoon phase for a few years and definitely surprised to find out that it wasn't.
Uh, but it is really good. I don't wanna discount that, but it is hard. And when things get hard in marriage, Just like in any other point in life, it can be tempting for a man to seek out comfort and advice. Like we mentioned pornography or other types of vices, or maybe another woman. And so I just want you to speak into that a little bit.
When a man may be tempted away, maybe he's listening right now. What encouragement would you give to him to stay faithful, to stay strong, to keep fighting for his marriage? Yeah. I mean, one, one of the beauties, you know, of, of having children is that your fidelity extends not just to your spouse, but to all of them as well.
And so, although your relationship with your spouse might be strained and painful and feel dead, you can look into the eyes of those kids and be like, Hey, you know, I feel like I could have an affair on your mom, but I couldn't have an affair on. You know, I couldn't break your heart. Uh, you know, maybe she's broken mind and she's hurt me in this way and that way.
And I wanna get back at her and, you know, I mean, I've heard some horrific stories of pain and marriages, you know, there's a lot of hurt that can be going on there, but, but you know, God, thanks me to God. Sometimes kids keep you in check. You know, they, they hold you accountable just through the innocence of their own eyes and the unconditional love that they always pour upon you.
And so realize that. You know, you, you owe your fidelity to them as well. You know, if, if there aren't kids in the picture, I remember two pastors once for up late discussing, like why does some marriages last really long and some don't and the end answer that was that, Hey, the marriages that last and the couples that are willing to show up and fight for their marriage, when things get tough, that's all, it comes down to not a secret recipe of compatibility, but rather two people who are willing to fight for something good.
You know, when the tough times come and trust me, they're gonna come. A lot of listeners come from broken families. And I know you mentioned before that your wife comes from a broken home. And so as much as you're comfortable with saying, how has that affected your own marriage and how have you guys overcome those challenges?
Well, it's been a challenge cause like, you know, not only did she never had a dad, she never saw a mom interacting with a husband, you know, and because she never had any younger siblings either, so she never saw parenting. So, so she was kind of coming in this thing, you know, I, I think kind of. Hey, you know, this is gonna be great.
You know, now I can have what I never had and it was tough. It's been tough, you know? And, and, and so she and I have been to marriage counseling, you know, and we've done it many times, gone to marriage counseling, try to work through this patch or work through that time. And you know, I'm not ashamed in saying that because, you know, you think of the, the king of any nation or any president or prime minister, they're surrounded by a cabinet of ministers and advisors on different things.
They're not just trying to, I mean, Trump's not trying to figure out. Uh, you know, I'm sure, you know, economically he's a smart businessman, but he's not trying to figure it all out on his own with the coronavirus, when it comes to, you know, international conflict and foreign diplomacy, you know, he's got people around him that he's gotta tap into their advice and hopefully follow it.
And the same goes for any leader of any nation. They need people who specialize in different fields, whether it's the armed forces or economy or whatever. And it's the same thing in marriage. Like you gotta get people that know more than you do and can, can work on it, whether referee with a counselor or heal those deeper wounds.
So just, don't be afraid to be able to go get counseling that you need, instead of thinking that you can figure all out on your own really good. My wife and I have been already, and it's a little bit more preemptive for us. Um, but still there were some struggles in our marriage and we went and it helped.
And we were able to, to move ahead and I'm not pretending that our marriage is perfect at this point, but, um, but it helps so much. And it's someone who has a lot of tools and techniques they can give you to help overcome the conflict or whatever it is that you're struggling with. Yeah. Yeah. And preemptive, it's the best way to go.
I mean, if you can get counseling before you even get married, For your stuff, her stuff, or both your stuff. It's one of the best gifts you could give each other love that Jason, how can people follow you? How can they buy your books, your products, things like that, uh, easiest way is just go to chastity.com.
And if you go to chastity.com, so C H a S T it y.com. It's there that they connect with us on social media, on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or on all those different platforms. And then, uh, all our books like the dating blueprint book for the guys, or how to find your soulmate without losing your soul for the girls.
All of that is available@chassis.com and we sell stuff in bulk for $3 or less. So people can get these. Boxes at a time if they want to share with their youth groups, their colleges or, or different groups study these things in a group studies setting, um, all that's available@chastity.com. Awesome. We'll throw that in the show notes for you guys, as well as, uh, Jason mentioned before covenant, I we'll throw that in the show notes, so you don't need to remember those.
Jason, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you for all the work that you've done. You've been an inspiration to me and a mentor over the years, and so just very grateful for you and everything that you've done. Keep it up. Well, thank you for having me on and, uh, I didn't just ask your listeners to please pray for our marriage or family.
All the people we speak to. And, uh, we'll actually be launching a podcast ourselves in the next two weeks or so. We're gonna be launching that. So if any of your listeners want some more podcasting stuff, we'll have that coming out soon. We'll be announcing it through our social media stuff. Excellent. And we'll throw that in the show notes as well once, uh, once that's up and ready to go.
Well, Hey man, thanks so much for your time. Thanks for having me on God. Bless. Isn't he, the man, Jason is honestly the best speaker that I've ever heard. I know a lot of people who've heard him speak, agree with me on that. And like I mentioned, he has changed my life. He's really helped me in a lot of ways.
I heard him speak when I was 14 and he answered all the questions. I didn't even know I had when I came to love and sexuality. And so we're bringing him back. We're bringing him back next episode to do a show for women. We're gonna talk about the book he and his wife wrote for you ladies, how to find your soul.
Without losing your soul. So make sure to subscribe. So you don't miss out on that. If you wanna buy the dating blueprint for yourself or someone else it's really easy to do. You can go to restored ministry.com/eighteen. Again, that's restored ministry ministries to singular.com. Slash 18 1 8 on that page.
You'll see a link to where you can buy the book either on Jason's website or Amazon, whatever's easier for you. And then go ahead and complete the purchase to get the book. Like I mentioned, at the beginning of the show, we're also doing a random book giveaway. We're gonna give away three of the dating blueprint books.
And so you can enter that giveaway by just joining our email list, go again to ReSTOR ministry.com/eighteen. Scroll down a little bit. You'll see a form where you can put in your name, your email, and just answer a quick question on May 31st, 2020, we'll email everyone to announce the three winners. And if you're already on the email list, don't worry.
You're already entered for the giveaway. And if you wanna go ahead and buy the book, now you can still enter the email list for the random giveaway. Let's say you buy it and you win it. You could always give the extra book away to someone that you. The resources mentioned during the show notes@restoredministry.com slash 18.
Thank you so much for listening. If this has been useful, go ahead and subscribe and share this podcast with someone that you know who could use it always remember you are not alone. We're here to help you feel whole again and become the person that you were born to be.
