So how do you break the hot-cold cycle? You have to be willing to withdraw your attention through direct communication.

you don’t necessarily have to be good at both of your pairings. But you do have to be passionate about them. The two distinct poles create a kind of energetic field where anything seems possible.

had. So when Mark didn’t pay him on time, practically making him beg for his paycheck every month, when Mark showed up several hours late to meetings (or not at all), when Mark said things had been done when they hadn’t and vice versa, Randall would tell himself, “He means well, and he’s been there for me.” Randall endured two decades of mistreatme

We have to be systematic if we want to move on. After doing a full sweep of your house, bagging up the snapshots, sweatshirts, and novelty socks that remind you of them, get it off the premises.

And ex-President George W. Bush may have retroactively won a few votes when he started devoting himself to painting sensitive portraits of veterans and immigrants.

it can feel intensely uncomfortable, and that instead of sitting in this discomfort, most people return to what is known, even if it makes them unhappy. Part of this discomfort is simply that it’s a new experience,

leave his job. It can feel like a small miracle when someone I’m coaching gets the dominoes of their life to fall in a different direction. And appreciating how truly hard that is—to deviate from our programming—is key to self-forgiveness. Randall had always done his best, and now, because of the work he was putting in on himself, his best was now

“F-U confidence” comes from having that kind of sturdy support in your life already.

Experts will tell you these are the hallmarks of narcissism. First, it’s selfish to create incredibly intense feelings only to drop someone at the first sign of human imperfections—in other words, just when the connection starts to shift from fantasy romance to real commitment. Second, it’s objectifying. The narcissist (or at least the person behav