Relationship Building Skills – Susan Winter
SUMMARY
KEY TAKEAWAYS
The way people date and select partners has changed over the past decade.Technology has stifled emotional dialog.
A smart move men can make when dating is to get the woman off chat and call them on the phone.
A great recipe for women in dating is to know what their worth is.
Don’t be afraid to go against the fashion.
Treat your partner the way you’re going to treat them five years from now.
Game will get you game.
Quality, character, and manners are never out of fashion.
Knowing what you want, and being a person of integrity, is never weak and needy.
TRANSCRIPTION: RELATIONSHIP BUILDING SKILLS – SUSAN WINTER
Kamala Chambers
On this episode, we’re going to talk about relationship building skills in the modern world and navigate love with technology taking over.
Today, we’re here with Susan Winter. She’s a best-selling author and relationship expert specializing in higher thinking for an evolving world.
Luis Congdon
All right, Thriving Launchers, we are here with Susan Winter. She’s a relationship expert and someone that’s going to help us today dial into relationship building skills, how to know if you’re even going after a healthy relationship, how to spot a healthy relationship, and how to be a good partner.
In the world of dating, there’s a lot of different relationship building skills going on. For all of us who are busy, who are trying to get the most out of life and who are trying not to waste a lot of time learning relationship building skills, it’s important to know if we’re even wasting time. Wouldn’t you say, Susan?
Susan Winter
I would indeed, Luis. Thank you for that.
It’s a funny thing. Everybody wants love. You would be surprised how few times people will even spend five minutes lying at the groundwork for how they are going to achieve that or even what they want.
Learning Relationship Building Skills Takes Time
Susan Winter
We take a lot of times with our mission statement. We take a lot of time structuring our business and getting input. In love and relationship building skills, we tend to think it’s going to happen naturally, and we think that if we meet people, it’s just supposed to go right or it doesn’t. I believe we need to back up and take a look at how we are learning relationship building skills and realize it’s not that much different than the other aspects of our life where we are trying to achieve something professionally.
Luis Congdon
One of the things you were saying before the interview is that a lot has changed in the last decade or so in regards to relationship building skills, how people date, and how people select partners. Also, the relationship building skills we’re using has changed because now, we’re in this hookup culture.
Personally, I’m not a hookup culture type of person. I’ve never been that kind of person, and it’s been awhile since I’ve dated as well. Even when I was still dating a lot and trying various relationship building skills, I wasn’t using apps. I was going out meeting people. I had different relationship building skills than what was popular.
I’m curious from you.
What’s changed? What do you think needs to change for people now in regards to relationship building skills?
Susan Winter
That’s a great question.
Relationship Building Skills Have Changed Over Time
Susan Winter
Unfortunately, there are those of us who can reminisce about how relationship building skills used to be when you met somebody, had a conversation with them and got to know them over a period, and took them out, and began dating them.
What we understand Luis is foreign to some people in their early 20’s.
This has never been a part of their life. Sex comes first. If you like each other, there’s cumbersome, “Maybe it’s going to last, maybe it won’t. Did I get played? Yeah, I guess I got played.”
Our reference point for what is formalized dating is, what a relationship is, and what the relationship building skills are, are very different. We have a convergence of technology and evolving society.
Traditional Relationship Building Skills
Susan Winter
About the year 2000, I swear it was like 11:59. Everything just came undone. I am grateful that we have released the constraint untraditional models and relationship building skills that I think sometimes confined people.
A good relationship looks like this; the white picket fence, the man and woman, and the three kids. Whatever it was, I think we have discovered more inclusivity. Love comes in a lot of different packages, and a lot of different formats.
At the same time, the box broke open in the 2000’s, and people began to live their authentic form of sexual, romantic expression.
Relationship Building Skills Getting Condensed
Susan Winter
We also had the hookup culture and technology driving it forward, and we have things like Tinder, and all the apps that you’re talking about like, swipe, and hook up. Relationship building skills got so condensed, our emotional connection with the person between text messages being a conversation, not real conversations, looking at a person’s photo, having minimal texts and swiping on them. Relationship building skills have become very shallow.
People Getting Impatient To Learn Relationship Building Skills
Susan Winter
I find it most people I know regardless of age can’t wait to find some way to meet humans in person and get to know them over time.
Kamala Chambers
I’m wondering what the solution is. Do we go further into the technology? Do you feel that’s where we’re going? Or do we just need to get out there as a culture and try to make real connections with people off of our phones using real relationship building skills?
Susan Winter
True. The latter that you said is true, but that presupposes that we know how to communicate.
Losing Relationship Building Skills Because Of Technology
Susan Winter
All of this technology has truncated our emotional dialog so that we do not have complete sentences. Some kids don’t know how to write by hand, and let alone to express themselves, and when emojis become your form of expression. We have gotten to the point that we have truly edited down our emotions.
You would suggest one get offline, and meet people organically, and to look for hobbies and activities. Also, we have to continue to work on our communication and relationship building skills to be a partner that when we meet somebody, we can show up and have a conversation, and make a connection with them. It’s because some of these interaction and relationship building skills are being lost.
Sensationalized Relationship Building Skills
Luis Congdon
What I like about what you’re saying is you’re reminding people that the shortfall in the way you are currently dating seems like we’re going after what sensationalized. This is very troublesome for a lot of people I’m talking to. They are very busy entrepreneurs or CEOs. They’re trying to date, and telling me, “I’ve gone on 20 dates this month.” or, “I’ve gone on 30 dates this week.” or, “I went on three dates in one day because that’s how I have to do it. I’m meeting all these people, but I’m not having any luck.”
I start asking questions like, “How soon did you have sex?” They’d say, “It’s within the first week. I just thought that’s the thing to do.” I’m like, “But how well do you know this person?” They would answer, “Oh. Well, we texted for weeks, and then we met twice.” and I’m like, “That doesn’t seem like you met the person. It sounds like you exchanged a lot of things with the person, not a lot of time to filter and give you exactly what you wanted to hear. Then, you were treating it as if it was an online thing, but sensational headlines and a movie that cuts straight to the chase but that’s not the way life works.”
Susan Winter
Bull’s eye.
Human Instincts To Do Relationship Building Skills
Susan Winter
Luis, you know this because you have experienced the other. You have experienced getting to know somebody, having it evolved, making a connection, and taking time. Probably, you’ve spoken in complete sentences. I bet you didn’t text. I bet you called, visited, and saw somebody by the time you’ve gotten to a relationship. This is how humans work.
When you substitute this technology which forces us to truncate all of our emotions and to smash ourselves into these small boxes for ease and speed, it’s perfect for logistics like “I’ll see you at 7 o’clock on 51st and 9th Avenue.” But it’s not great for communicating.
Technology Is Not Great For Relationship Building Skills
Susan Winter
This is the thing that’s lacking.
Here, you’ve got your brilliant entrepreneurs that probably have the emotional capacity and desire to have a relationship. However, the very way in which we are forced to interact nowadays is cutting them off at the knees. It’s unfortunate.
We can work around it though. We can indeed work around it by upping our skills so that even if we’re forced to speak in 144 characters or some minimized versions of ourselves that we can let ourselves shine through. That requires our individual work on who we are, our energy.
We have to keep working on ourselves to make sure our message can translate into this medium that we’re in right now.
Current Applications Can Still Teach You Relationship Building Skills
Luis Congdon
It sounds like you’re saying that for the busy entrepreneur and the type of person that listens to the show, the current applications for dating can still work for them. Applications like swipe left, swipe right, minimal messages back and forth, and the texting and the way people are doing it can work.
For me, I know that if I were back in the dating game, I would have to approach that very differently. Maybe I would use those tools, but I know that I would become of an odd duck because I would want to create my way of doing it.
But it sounds to me that you’re saying you can still use what’s available and what’s popular but you have to create your math, and then it can work for you.
Susan Winter
Absolutely. I love the fact that you read my mind. Thank you so much, Luis. You could just say it for me.
Here’s the brilliance. Whoever you’re getting feedback from, intuitively, they knew they were not connecting. I’m sure they showed up, had a lovely date, had some drinks, and did small talk but they have edited themselves down to match the period. This is where we have to fight back a little bit.
Relationship Building Skills – Get Offline And Call The Other Person
Susan Winter
A brilliant move guys are making and I teach my millennial men to do this is get her off chat and say, “May I call you?” Yes! Our cell phones are capable of making a phone call. Chat. Talk on the phone. Get her on Skype and talk to her. When are you going to meet her? Take some time to get to know her.
I do know the current stats. Every young good looking guy that I meet in the gym and my buddies say, “Definitely, you can get a girl in bed within three days.” It would be a very small amount of women that would not fall into that category. In the first date, you can get 60% in bed. In the second date, you get your other 40%. Then, the other 20, you get on another date.
Where Problems In Learning Relationship Building Skills Lie
Susan Winter
We’ve sped up the sexuality, and that’s where the minute you open up the sex door, then you get over reactive. You don’t know where you stand, and they haven’t talked about it. This is where all the problems lie in learning the relationship building skills, but we can’t slow down that train. That’s not going to happen.
What we have to do is truly show up, know ourselves, be very articulate as to what we want and what we need, and truly evaluate this person to say “Do they have the skillset to be a partner? Do they want to have a partnership? Are they looking to play? Do they want what I want?
The dialog you have before you hit the sheets is important.
Relationship Building Skills – Don’t Be Afraid To Walk Away From Something
Susan Winter
Don’t be afraid to walk away from something. If somebody doesn’t want what you want, that’s okay. Move on to the next.
It’s like ordering off a menu. They don’t have to want what you want, and I think you’d save yourself a lot of time and emotional heartache.
Kamala Chambers
I feel like this is extreme. For some people, hearing these stats about how quickly people get into bed, but I have always tried to practice a minimum of 30 days dating someone before I sleep with them. You can’t know someone in a couple of dates. Even in 30 days, you barely get to start to know someone.
I found that’s been successful for me because it gives us the time to see. Is this something that we want to do? It’s so painful for me to watch women just sleep with a guy right away because it’s as the respect level goes down instantly. It’s just I see that they lose men if they sleep with them too soon.
Susan Winter
I agree. Yeah.
Did you have a couple of guys fall by the way aside to say, “Really, I like you, but you know what? I’m Not doing this.”
Kamala Chambers
Not waiting? I never had that problem. Guys always kept coming back, and I’ve had guys chase me for years because I never slept with them.
You have way more power of collecting men and having them come after you if you’re not giving it up right away.
Susan Winter
That is the simplest solution.
15 years ago, after Older Women, Younger Men came out, which is my book, I thought I would like to say this to women, but I know they’re never going to listen. They do not. They’re going to have some drinks. They’re going to hook up. They’re going to do what they do because this is what they’ve learned in their social group. This is the way you date. This is going out on a Friday night. This is “Your supposed to come home with somebody.”
Simplest Solution To Have Relationship Building Skills
Susan Winter
So I realized that telling them to slow down is not going to work. I didn’t want to preach to them so then, I thought, “Well, the best thing I can do is to understand, put myself in their shoes, and then what would I do differently?” Can I prove that it would work? Can I prove that she would have a little bit of a safety net?
You don’t have much leeway if the person doesn’t know you. They don’t have a commitment to be good to you. You have to show up and be a high-quality person that commands their respect by how you treat them and how you act yourself. That’s good for any discipline, and even in your profession.
We can’t be too desperate, and needy. We got to know what our worth is and that is a great recipe for women.
I’ll tell you, very few are going to do it. In reality, they will kick and buck. I think they’re so afraid they’re going to lose the guy because everybody else is doing it. But I agree. There are men that I’m still on their bucket list too for the sheer fact that they never got me, and they didn’t understand, and I was even older, and they were making a concession to even go out with me.
Some men thought it was hot, but it’s like, “Okay. She’s older. I shouldn’t want her.” But they still feel this way. We’re talking 10-15 years later because I didn’t find them agreeable to sleep with. I didn’t want to start a relationship with them.
Relationship Building skills – Be Courageous To Stand For What You Want
Susan Winter
You have the right idea. I would urge everybody not to be afraid to go against the fashion. I’m not saying be a prude.
Whatever works for you, make sure you know what works for you, and come from you own authenticity.
If all of your friends are hooking up, they’ve agreed that by the third date, you’ve got to give it up or guys, if all your friends are pushing you to you got to close the deal, get her number, get her in the sack, or dump her.
Have the courage to ask yourself if that’s what you want. That’s one of the relationship building skills
Have the courage to walk on a different path. That’s how you draw in the partner that’s right for you.
Kamala Chambers
I just want to back up what you’re saying with way too personal of information, but like Luis, he pursued me hard. He went after me, and I’ve never had a guy who said, “Let’s do this,” so intensely as Luis. I could have succumbed to the —
Luis Congdon
Awesomeness.
Kamala Chambers
To the strong pursuits to sleep together quicker, but I knew that I would lose my place of power, and he also did something different. He called me daily. He would not let me get off the phone. That helped. He was showing up and showing that he wanted me.
Having A Real Partner Through Relationship Building Skills
Kamala Chambers
After that month of waiting before we sleep together, I knew that he was for real because sometimes, guys come on strong like that, and then, as soon as you give them a little something, they’re out of there.
Susan Winter
I know.
Kamala Chambers
That’s our success story.
Anyone who’s listened to the show, you know Luis, and I are solid. We just got engaged, and I think a lot of learning about relationship building skills has to do with how we set ourselves up for success from the beginning.
Susan Winter
Congratulations. I thought maybe you were a couple, but I wasn’t sure. So, forgive me for not knowing that.
First of all, I commend you for knowing you needed to take the time to feel comfortable and doing that. Luis, huge bravo! If all the guys would listen to what you did, I cannot tell you how important it is and how much respect you gain from us when you go after what you want, and you do it in a gentle manner. Oh my goodness! It is compelling.
My girlfriend who has done online dating for most of her adult life, and had relationships, but is of the generation where you drink, party, play, and that’s all good. Okay, he left the house. She did that cycle for a long time, and wanted love, and kept trying.
She was just about ready to get on the last app. She was on Bumble. She’s like, “I can’t stand it. They chat me up. Then, they disappear.”
Using Relationship Building Skills Are Effective To Finding The One
Finally, a guy clicked in. She just clicked on for the last minute, and she said, “Ugh! I’m so sick of it.” It was somebody who was out of her range of distance, but they were a match. And so, she whimsically just clicked on it and as did he, and they connected, and he started to chat with her online. They had done no more than a couple of sentences when he said, “Do you mind if I call you?”
Kamala Chambers
Oh, wow.
Susan Winter
She stayed on the phone about four to five hours. He was 90 miles away in Sacramento. She lives Pleasanton. He made a plan to come down and see her. He was seeing his best friend who lives in her hometown.
He invited her to dinner before he saw his friend. Then, he asked her Saturday night to go to San Francisco as a group. Sunday was Super Bowl, and they’re getting engaged, and I’m traveling to Italy with both of them next week.
You couldn’t have a better fit, but he did everything right. He went after her. He knew what he wanted.
Not All Coaches Teach Real Relationship Building Skills
Susan Winter
A guy’s just like lazy. I don’t think they know what they want. Am I right? Have we not bred the laziest men in the world, and wait! The teaching coaches online teach these guys to be lazy, play hot and cold, add tension. They have these classes and 15,000 guys spending $3,000 a weekend where they’re saying, “Never chase her. You only text, “You home? Dinner at my house 8 o’clock.” You only text for sex.”
They’re teaching them this, and guys are learning not to pursue women, and so, women can’t admire or respect them. They don’t look like an alpha. Women start chasing men, then, they hate the men and themselves.
Some things have worked for centuries that we should acknowledge like animal nature, and what works.
Luis Congdon
That’s right, and we pursue the women. I’m just kidding.
Susan Winter
The woman opens the door. She lets you know it’s safe for her for you to pursue. I agree.
Luis Congdon
What I think is important here though is I’ve studied pickup. I’ve been around a lot of men who were interested in pick up, and learning lines, scripts, and games. The thing I learned from watching other people do it from my brief stint into applying some of the lessons I’ve learned. I went to classes. I studied and hung out with people that were into that.
What I ended up learning was it would get you one result. It would be either you will be going on a date, sleeping with someone or getting a kiss or getting the sensation of approval from a girl or a guy. The thing is that it’s not going to win you, love.
Susan Winter
Absolutely.
Luis Congdon
What I learned from a lot of the guys who were teaching this stuff is they weren’t engaged. They weren’t married. They didn’t have any.
When I looked through the relationship history, I was like, “You were all sorts of screwed up and left a trail of women that hate you, and people that are very unpleased.”
Past Experiences May Affect Relationship Building Skills
Luis Congdon
If I’m looking back at someone’s dating history, I want to know how your partners feel about you. Do you have a bad history?
If the people you dated repeatedly say they don’t like you or you had a negative past, that’s a cue that you probably didn’t treat them very well.
Let’s say I’m going to leave my job. If my former boss says, “He was going to employ, but he needed to leave,” or “It was just wasn’t right,” that makes more sense. Or “Things didn’t work out. We had some kinds of tumbles but at the end of the day, I know he’s a good guy.” You want something like that being said about you.
I think the other problem too I notice with people who are teaching this pickup stuff is they might teach the things, and they are in a deeply committed relationship. But when I watched their committed relationship, if it is healthy, they’re not doing the things they’re teaching you. They’re behaving very differently.
For me, and this is something I’ve been very clear with Kamala from day one is I want to treat you the way you’re going to be treated five years from now. I’m not going to behave differently. I’m going to try my best to be the man that you want to be with several years from now.
Relationship Building Skills – Be The Person Your Partner Want You To Be
Luis Congdon
I will improve, grow, and change but the goal is you get to see who you’re going to be with. Not have someone who’s playing a game, and then later, I have to maintain that game if you like me and I like you. You fell in love with the game. Not me.
Susan Winter
Oh man. You’re incredible. Okay, we got to clone you. That’s first of all. That’s a must.
I have a lot of guy friends who primary members of the real thing in LA. I have to tell you. Throughout the Odyssey of them coming back and forth to New York, we’d get together and finally, I said: “Game will get you game, but love gets you real.”
Getting Real Love Through Relationship Building Skills
Susan Winter
Real gets real, and a game gets game. There’s no other way to cut it.
I asked one of the founding members, “When you got what you want, did you get what you wanted?” He said, “No.” He then began a journey of helping men to evolve, and then he got engaged and got married. He’s had his first baby this year. He’s out of that field now because most of the guys that are in podcasts, they’re high level. If they’re out on the West Coast or whatever, they started some aspects or some incarnation of the pickup artists or some angle.
Then, of course, those guys morphed into a business and everything else because their life is richer now that it was before. That was one phase of the journey, and it is good for scared guys that don’t even know how to approach a woman. That, I understand, but you’re right, I’ve have had clients that have gone to different YouTube coaches, then they meet me.
The philosophy you said is correct. Luis, it will get you a date and get you laid. However, it will not get you to a relationship. If guys begin to like this woman and then try to change mid-stream, it doesn’t work. Then, they are completely lost, more desperate, and needy than ever before.
Relationship Building Skills Are Never Out Of Fashion
Susan Winter
Quality, character, manners, and good breeding are never out of fashion. Knowing what you want and being a person of real integrity is never weak and needy.
We need to take hold of our vision for what we want in relationships and make it as important as the way that we craft our goal for our career success. It’s the same thinking. It’s the same steps you go through to create a vision, to follow it through and to be in integrity with yourself. It is possible even at this time.
Susan Winter
You guys approved it.
Kamala Chambers
Yeah, definitely.
It’s been so fantastic having you on the show talking about how to up our game in the dating and relationship field with the use of relationship building skills.
I just encourage everyone to drop your phone. Go out tonight and talk to someone. Have a conversation face to face. Your ability to do that is going to build the foundation for a relationship.
If you only have capacity to talk to someone and get to know someone via text, that’s only going to go so far as building a relationship.
Thank you so much for tuning in everyone. I encourage you all to go out and practice relationship building skills. Keep thriving.
Thank you for this fantastic interview. What a thrill to be able to have such an in-depth conversation with you both. I’m so pleased at the fine work you are both doing to foster higher thinking and becoming the best version of ourselves. Susan Winter
It’s an honor to have you here at Thriving Launch! Thank you Susan!