The one that got away

0:00 Roger. Charlie. We're ready to rock. Happy Valentino, y'all. Yeah. If you know anything about me and if you've listened to any of my episodes, you would know that this is not my favorite whatever day. However, a couple of diamonds, a few roses and a lot of love. That works. So look, it's impossible to be around, let's say 40 and not have had a bad date. And this is what we're going to talk about. You see, you show up and usually they never end up looking like their picture or they kind of end up sitting with you and spending like 40 minutes explaining their crypto strategy.

0:52 It is a nightmare. But then there's my grandma. When the games begin, this is a true story. My grandma, well, she wins. And she actually had the ultimate it's not you it's me moment. You see, I'm not joking because she got married super young. I mean like super young, OK, and just about like 3 months in that honeymoon phase where you still pretend you don't use the bathroom. Well, her husband, being a sweet doomed romantic guy, buys her this beautiful lace dress as a surprise. And an hour later.

1:43 Unusual. Practice deeper than a TikTok Tighter. Than a book. He gets flattened by a force carriage. Yeah, crunch, I'm dead.

1:59 The dress he bought her is covered in his blood. Now that is a very dark way to start a week. Yep. Oh my God.

2:11 But here's the kicker, she remarries. My grandma ends up having nine kids. Y'all, that's a whole baseball team of Labor and lives another 80 years. But on her deathbed, who is the love of her life? Herridge Boy. The guy she knew for 90 days. And now that makes you wonder. No. So was that really the greatest love ever? Or was it just preserved in amber because reality never got a chance to ruin it with dirty laundry and Netflix arguments? You see, tragedy is basically what I like to call Botox for her relationship.

3:03 It just freezes everything. Think about it, three months in, you don't know that your partner snores like a chainsaw. You you haven't even had the why is there a wet towel on the bed fight yet? Research in social psychology suggests that idealization is all at its peak in the first few months of a relationship, when love is interrupted before maturity. There's no conflict, no disillusionment, and zero I'm leaving you because you didn't tell me you were a flat earther moment. What never evolves, never decays.

3:41 He didn't die a husband. He he died a highlight reel. So why can't our brains just let this go? Why are you still stalking your high school almost boyfriend on LinkedIn? You know, that's you. You see, there's a thing called the Zigarnik effect. It's a psychological phenomenon where our brains remember uncompleted or interrupted tasks better than completed ones. It's why you can't remember what you had for lunch yesterday, but you sure as hell remember the exact way someone looked when they ghosted you in 2019.

4:22 You see, the brain hates a cliffhanger. It's like a Netflix show that gets cancelled after one season. It's always the greatest show ever because we never saw the shitty third season where they ran out of ideas. And now let's talk about intermittent reinforcement. BF Skinner or Buddy, this guy who spent way too much time with pigeons, Well, he found that if you give a reward randomly, the subject becomes obsessed. When love is almost the reward is never finalized, so the attachment stays active forever.

5:03 It's a loop that never closes. Now, why am I discussing all this today and why did I choose this topic out of all topics? Well, Gee, Louise, yeah. Remember that we had Valentine a couple of days ago. Well, in those couple of days ago, something really radical occurred. I had people talking to me about their long lost whatevers and the person that, you know, that was gone and the person that left and the person that. And I wonder if. Yeah. So I'm here to tell you that, yeah, chances are it could be something worth exploring, but it usually isn't.

5:46 Because when you don't have actual data on a person, you fill in the blanks with your own imagination. It's kind of like a remember those Build-a-bear, but it's a Build-a-bear for a soulmate. If grandma's husband had lived, yeah, my grandma, we're back to her. Maybe he would have spent the next 40 years complaining about her cooking or forgetting even her birthday. But since he died in that especially lace dress moment, he is forever the Prince. We call this projective identification. She wasn't loving him, she was loving the idea of him.

6:37 He became a symbolic figure, a vessel for every dream she ever had. It's easy to be the perfect man when you're not actually there to mess it up. Stop the swipe. You're a builder, not a gambler. Most apps are built to waste your time. We built ayoumypartner.com to save it. One photo, 1 manifesto, one clear intent, high level business, real friendship, ambitious romance. Go to areyoumypartner.com Efficiency is the only luxury that matters. Find your alliance. We act like this is just a Victorian tragedy thing, but really and truly we do this every day.

7:19 For example, take situation ships. It's the modern wars carriage or ghosting, the psychological equivalent of being trampled by a stallion and wrong timing. Well, that's the lie we tell ourselves to keep the myth alive. We mythologize these almosts because they avoid the ordinary. An actual relationship is hard work. It is compromise. It is seeing someone with a damn flu, which I have, by the way, right now, so if I sound weird, I'm sorry. And it is including taxes, which I freaking hate. And almost love is pure adrenaline and mystery.

8:01 It is a what if that never has to face a what is? Brick, are you just looking at things in the office and saying that you love them? I love lamp. Do you really love the lamp or are you just saying it because you saw it? I love Lamp. I love Lamp. The pain Grandma felt wasn't just for a guy named Thomas, it was for the parallel life she never got to live. Philosopher Kiergard talked about the agony of the possible. When we lose an almost love, we aren't just grieving a person, we're grieving a version of ourselves.

8:42 We're attached to an imagined timeline. It's like being mad about a movie you never saw because the trailer looked really good. You're mourning a ghost of a future that didn't even exist yet. All right, now some of you are probably sitting there looking your current partner who is currently eating cereal over the sink like a raccoon and you're thinking, Charlie, you don't get it. Carriage boy wasn't just frozen in time, he was actually better. He was the LeBron of husbands before the injury. And look, let's be fair, there is a non zero chance that the one who left actually was a superior choice.

9:25 It's called the science of counterfactual thinking in psychology. That's what it's called. It's when our brain creates upward alternatives to reality. We don't imagine the version where the first husband lived and eventually left grandma for a younger lacemaker. Nope. We imagine the version where they lived in a cottage. He never lost his hair, and he never once complained about her mother visiting. But here's the reality check you didn't ask for. First of all, let's look at the baseline trap. You see, research on subjective well-being shows that after the honeymoon phase, which usually goes up to 18 to 24 months, almost everyone returns to their baseline level of happiness.

10:12 Then there's the utility of the almost. Most almosts stay almosts because they lack the structural integrity to become all ways. And the 9010 rule? Well, you might be missing the 10% of excitement that the one who left provided while ignoring the 90% of stability your current raccoon husband provides. Which was the case of my grandma and grandpa, by the way. He gave her an absolutely royal life. And yet, on her deathbed, she had the audacity to remind me of her first husband. My God. And we? Say bye.

10:56 Bye. Now I know you want to quench that curiosity. You want to know if that parallel life would have been a 10 out of 10. But here's the problem with the almost scenarios. You're comparing a finished book to a trailer you saw for a movie that never got made. If you really want to fix that itch, you have to realize that the better version of that person only really exists in your head. You've curated their best traits and deleted their browsing history. In reality, an almost scenario is usually just the lack of data masquerading as destiny.

11:42 Just remember this, we don't fall in love with people, we fall in love with the version of them that does not annoy us. Hang on yet I don't love you. I don't like you too. So back to grandma. Was she living alive for 80 years? Well, I mean, maybe, but that lie was her escape hatch. Whenever the nine kids were screaming or her second husband was being a typical 1940s guy, she could look at that blood stained lace dress and think, somewhere out there in another universe, I'm still 20, I'm still thin, and Thomas is still buying me clothes.

12:36 Don't forget to like and subscribe. You see, the almost Love didn't survive because it was better. It survived because it never had to face the ultimate killer of romance. Just another Tuesday. Like. Comment and subscribe. You see, it's easy to be a legend when you exit in the first act. It's a hell of a lot harder to stay a hero when you're still there in Act 5 trying to figure out how to use the damn air fryer. I like you, do you like me?

13:17 So back to my grandma. 80 years later, 9 kids later, and a guy from the first three months remains the king of her heart. Is that beautiful or is it just a really long term psychological glitch? Did the love endure because it was profound, or did it endure because it never had to become ordinary? What are you talking about? Maybe the greatest love of your life is just the one that didn't stay long enough to annoy the living perizzites out of you. What? So think of that before you decide to break what you've got today.

14:02 And if you still decide to do it, well then go right ahead and stay toxic. Poor baby. Stay romantic. I guess it's the same thing depending on how long you wait. Oh.

14:17 Yeah, Mom, somebody just followed me. Unusual practice. Rethink what you think you know. Yay, I'm. Working rocky roll.

14:33 That awkward silence when you're on a date and suddenly nothing, No stories, no ideas, just you and the risk of sounding kind of boring. Worry no more. Unusual Practice is the podcast that helps you rethink what you think you know. We turn years into minutes, so you've got fresh, unconventional ideas ready to spark conversation, impress, and maybe even ignite a debate. Unusual practice. Listen in, learn better, stand out, and never run out of things to say.