The Living in Clarity Podcast, w/Coach Ratner

Recognizing and Managing Emotional Vampires: Practical Strategies for Healthy Relationships

• By Coach Daniel Ratner

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What if someone close to you is secretly draining your emotional energy? In this eye-opening episode, Coach Ratner explores the concept of "Emotional Vampires"—those individuals who leave us feeling exhausted and demoralized. From the perpetual victim who constantly shifts blame, to the narcissist and drama queen who thrive on chaos, we uncover the telltale signs of these toxic personalities. Using the biblical story of Korach as a backdrop, we delve into the insidious nature of the victim mentality and its impact on our emotional health.

Managing difficult personalities, especially within close-knit circles like family and friends, is no easy feat. Coach Ratner shares practical strategies for recognizing and establishing boundaries with these emotional vampires. We address socially awkward behaviors, particularly among those on the Asperger's spectrum, and discuss effective ways to create supportive environments. Personal anecdotes bring these scenarios to life, demonstrating the crucial need for boundaries and the benefits of external guidance, such as therapy or coaching, to navigate complex relationships.

Finally, Coach Ratner emphasizes the importance of surrounding ourselves with emotionally healthy individuals. By reflecting on our interactions and setting clear boundaries, we can foster more positive and fulfilling connections. We discuss the perils of envy and ego in relationships, and how these traits can erode emotional well-being. Learn how to prioritize meaningful interactions and build a network of supportive, positive influences that contribute to a balanced, happier life. Don’t miss the practical tips and heartfelt insights that could transform your approach to relationships forever.

Speaker 1:

Hi, welcome. My name is Coach Radner and today we're doing a class called the Emotional Vampire. What is the emotional vampire? Emotional vampire is someone who sucks the energy out of you. We all have them in our life. These are people like. We don't like getting texts from them. We see them on our calendar, it makes us not happy and we dread it, and there's five different character traits. We're going to go through that.

Speaker 1:

What I call is the people that really suck the energy out of you, and you may be in a relationship with them. You could be married to them, you could be your sister, your brother, you may work with them. They may be friends of yours. They may be, you know, college friends. You know friends when you were little, and recognizing these people in your life is very good for your clarity, because when you understand that they do suck the energy out of you, it doesn't mean you have to get rid of them. It just means you have to make healthy boundaries how to make these relationships healthy? The only thing you want to do is make relationships with people, especially ones we have no control of. We have to be close to them like a spouse or a brother or sister. You don't want to kick them out of your life, but you have to make these relationships healthy. So the order of the class is going to be five. We're going to go through five types of emotional vampires and then we're going to do what's called a friend audit. We're going to go through an audit around friends and figure out are these people we should have in our lives? And then we're going to go through why you might have emotional vampires in your life, how to make those relationships healthier and, ultimately, how to find the keepers, because we want want to find, we want to understand who should we have close to us in our life.

Speaker 1:

Now, this class is not about dating and marriage. That's a different class I do. This is more for people that you have in your life, your business associates, your friends, and there might even be relatives or brothers and sisters, and we recognize they might suck the energy out of you. You'll find a way to make the relationships healthier. So it's about living with clarity.

Speaker 1:

Okay, number one is what I call the victim. This is the person that complains all the time. Everyone does something against them and we see this in one place in the Torah. Anyone know in the Torah who plays the victim in the Torah Coming up in a few weeks, korach. Korach plays the victim. He's the same grandson from Kehasosh as Moshe is, and Moshe and I don't have all the COVID and yet he's still Leviam. But he gets you know, his wife eggs him on, kind of like and like.

Speaker 1:

Sometimes, like I always say, as you know, the biggest decision we make in our life is what who you're going to marry, if you have a wife or husband, I guess that eggs you on. That wants you to complain and blame. That's going to be a tough life, right, it's going to be a tough life. And Korach complains all the time, blames somebody else. Of course, look what happens to him. He gets swallowed up by the earth and we all have people in our lives that blame everything else and everybody else. In fact, when I give my class on self-esteem, probably on Wednesday this week, we talk about one of the ways in order to cure low self-esteem is to forgive the source of your pain. If you don't forgive the source, you're never going to be happy in life.

Speaker 1:

I have an example of a guy in my business and he is always suing people. He always has an attorney on his phone. He's constantly suing people His whole life. He's from the United States, bob. He is from the United States, he's from Denver originally and he's gone through life. I always said that this guy is going to make millions and lose millions, and he did. He's now 62 years old, completely broke. He's been married three times, has no wife now and nothing to his name Nothing, because he's always playing the victim and victims can never get ahead in life. And just like we talk about in my Ten Commandments of Marriage class, we talk about commandment number two, number three do not worship idols and not say God's name in vain. We talk about the marriage commandment of do not criticize and do not get angry, because every time you criticize and get angry, you're saying god, you made a mistake. And when you're playing the victim and you're complaining about someone else and blaming something else, you're saying god made a mistake. That's called the victim. People, we all, we might, I won't. You don't have anyone in your life. He knows a victim.

Speaker 1:

But why are women more apt to criticize their husbands than the person? Well, how do you know this for a fact that women are more likely to criticize? Is there data on this or just from your experience? Experience Okay, from your personal experience in your life, you might have more women who criticize you, but there are plenty of men who criticize. Also the reason why I think people are more critical. Also the reason why I think people are more critical. I think it's not a noisy thing that we always like to tell our kids to. We don't want to be doctors, lawyers, and we criticize them not doing the right thing and I think it becomes criticism, becomes part of our life. We don't even realize we're criticizing, we don't even think about it.

Speaker 1:

I give the example which I probably told in this class before about this woman who I was coaching, who was in her early 40s, nice looking woman. I mean she is passionate. I mean there's a lot to this woman, I mean a ton to this woman. And she goes on a date with some and she's doing. And she goes on this date with some Sephardi guy to Natanya for lunch and he's not religious but he's like Sephardi, so he knows what's going on, and they're having a pizza or a sandwich and she goes and she washes her hand for all the time you're dying. And she comes back she says her bracha, homo de la minoras and she eats her pizza or sandwich. He goes and washes his hand, comes back and eats the sandwich and she says to him are you going to say a bracha? And he says no. She says you know you're supposed to say a bracha. And he says I washed my hands because they were dirty not to do to say a bracha. And I said to her of course this relationship didn't work.

Speaker 1:

I said to her do you realize you were criticizing him? She goes no, I wasn't. I'm like, yes, you were. She goes I wasn't criticizing him. I go from your perspective. You're not criticizing him from his perspective. He's being criticized because it comes so nasty to us. We don't think we're criticizing and we do it all the time.

Speaker 1:

This is why recently I have my book, my latest book. My latest book is called Infinite Marriage is, I think, in my head. When I'm involved in my family, my kids and my wife, I do not want to criticize, because criticize is not how you make an infinite marriage. When I make an infinite marriage, I want my kids to have a great marriage and I want their kids to have a great marriage. I want to make generations of people have amazing marriages, because if you have dysfunction in the relationship, that dysfunction transfers from one unless someone gets a lot of therapy or has a good coach. It makes me crazy. How old are you? 22. You want to get married. How many classes have you taken on dating and marriage? None One, the bigot.

Speaker 1:

What do you do for work? You're a student. You're going to get a job someday, right. Come doctor or lawyer, whatever you're going to do, come a pediatrician or a real estate agent, whatever. You're going to get a job someday, right. Become a doctor, a lawyer, whatever you're going to do, become a you know, a pediatrician, a real estate agent, whatever you're going to do Social worker. Social worker You've got to study and study in order to do that. Yet the biggest decision you're going to make in your life is you're going to marry. Right, no-transcript. Just look at the stats. I don't show them to you. You know it and there's no reason for it. God did not put us on this earth to fail in our marriage. He put us on purpose to have an awesome marriage, and recognizing these emotional vampires can help you pick someone else out better, you know, maybe better for you. Anyway, that's the victim Number two is, by the way, there's one person in the Torah who could have totally played the victim and didn't.

Speaker 1:

And that's Yosef. Yosef at Sodom, I mean, he was sold by his brothers into slavery. He was a slave to Potiphar, then was in jail for 12, 20 years. I always forget. And when his brothers came down to Egypt and his brothers didn't recognize him and they were starving, they wanted food, and they come down and he finally can't hold it back anymore and he says to them is my father still alive? And the next thing he says to them it is not your fault, it is not your fault that you sold me to slavery. He completely gives them a mechila. He tells them it's not your fault, it was God's plan. The whole time he didn't play the victim card. He could have easily played the victim card. He didn't. And look what happens. He saved the Jewish nation, he saved the Egyptian nation and that started the Jewish people. Because Joseph saved the Jewish people. It was all from him going by the way, it all started when he was in jail, because when he noticed that the Pharaoh's baker and his winemaker were in jail and they looked aggrieved, he walked up to them and goes you guys look aggrieved.

Speaker 1:

What's your problem Like when you think about being in jail. You don't think of the circumstance, like, of course you have a best friend and you're walking down the street and you see them on the street oh you look sad. What's going on? That's your best friend, but you're going through health issues. You shouldn't pray for yourself. You pray for somebody else. When you pray for somebody else, then God will help you.

Speaker 1:

Number two the narcissist. The narcissist is only care about themselves and their own problems. They tend to take up all the oxygen in the room. They need to be center of attention and typically when you spend time with a narcissist, you realize you've really got a word in and they never ask you a single question about their life. And, by the way, we have a lot of people in our lives today that are more self-absorbed than ever because of the internet and because of social media. We spend so much time on social media. We're not involved going out into the real world. We have our friends who are not real friends.

Speaker 1:

I wish I mean it's very this is very big in my self-esteem class about social media and how it really causes people to feel bad about themselves. And, by the way, you know, self-esteem is rampant nowadays. Everyone feels bad about themselves. You're supposed to grow out of it when you get to be in your late teens and early 20s. Nowadays, everyone feels bad about themselves. You're supposed to grow out of it when you get to be in your late teens and early twenties. But we don't grow out of it and your happiness is the most important thing you have in your life and you need to protect it. You have to understand it, recognize yourself, recognize other people. When you do, you'll start doing things to make yourself happier.

Speaker 1:

For example, I get asked to teach on Zoom. Now I don't get paid for this. I do this as a volunteer. I love teaching. I love being in a room full of people teaching and inspiring hopefully inspiring. I have no idea Doing my best, whatever I can do, right. But you put me on a computer. That's not fun for me. I don't enjoy it. I mean, if I had to do it I would do it, but I don't want to do it Like that sucks the energy out of me being in a Zoom class. I'm talking to a computer. It's one of the worst experiences for me. I say no to it. I don't like turned down classes. I usually take everyone I can get, but because it sucks the energy out of me. I don't like doing it. I get energy from my students. That's the narcissist. Number three, the drama queen. They seek out and relish drama. You can easily spot these people on your social media feed because they're always oversharing everything they experience, good or bad. They exaggerate about the norm and show what a horrible experience they have to go through.

Speaker 1:

People complain a lot about traffic or traveling or the food on the airplane. I always think it's funny that people complain about the food on the airplanes. Anyone here like the food on the airplanes you do. I love it. I do too. You don't like it, do you why? I think it's amazing that I can be sitting in an aluminum tube, sitting in a chair, going 600 miles an hour while this flight attendant comes and brings me a hot meal and a soda. I think it's amazing. I'm like this is unbelievable. It's amazing. That doesn't negate the food. You know what? I enjoy the food no matter what, even though sometimes it's below par, I agree. Generally, if the food is just average, I think it's like a five-star meal and I enjoy it and I look forward to the meals. I know I fly a lot to America and I fly the Red Eyes out of Tel Aviv and my next flight in two weeks is at 12.30 on Saturday night and they're going to serve dinner at 2 am and I stay up for that. I stay up for the dinner because I get pleasure out of it and I don't always eat it all, but then after that's when I go to sleep, so that's after that's when I go to sleep. So I look forward to dinner.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so if you ever have these three people in your life the victim, the narcissist or the drama queen and you try to tell someone, you know you're a little self-absorbed, you're a little bit too dramatic maybe you should try to play the victim card. What they do is they do three things they blame others for their problems, or the victims are blaming someone else. Always they argue with you that you're incorrect, or they are in denial and the denial is not a river in Egypt. And these kind of people who don't want to hear the truth or maybe you have someone else talking to them, or you say it in a way that's, you know, you sugarcoat it in a way that they're causing you to take energy out of you these are people who are bad in your life, people who blame, argue or are in denial. They're bad in your life. You don't want them in your life and you can avoid it. Of course, sometimes we have to have them in our life. By the way, this is a new class. After you, let me know what you think about it in the comments. I'm happy to hear them.

Speaker 1:

Number four is the socially awkward. These are people who don't fit in socially. It can be someone who's made possibly on the Asperger's or on the spectrum of having Asperger's, and people who are socially awkward but recognize they're socially awkward, actually don't suck the energy out of it. You can be socially awkward and not suck the energy out of people, as long as you recognize it and know how to act in front of other people. It's the one that don't recognize that they're socially awkward, have no clue on how to help themselves and therefore I mean I don't know if I do, but I've had we invite a lot of people over to our house for shabbos meals and there are people who want to come to my house and I can't have them over unless I have like five or ten other people, unless I have five or ten other people so they can blend in, because they suck the energy out of me or my wife when we don't like them or they talk too much, whatever it is, it's like they're too much for us and they don't recognize it. You have a big group of people ten people then they blend in and you're okay with it and it might be someone who's close to me relationship-wise that I have a hard time with them and we all have those people in our lives that we have a hard time with. And what's going to leave me? By the way, even though some of these people can't help that, they're socially awkward. But then if they admit to this awkwardness and then seek help out, get some therapy to understand how to be in front of other people, they can help themselves. I know people one or two guys here at age I know have Asperger's. I know they're socially awkward but I know they've gotten help because I know when I talk to them they have a set of questions they ask me because it comes wrote to them and they know how to act. They don't act, do stupid things, they think to themselves before they speak. Are they like socially, like, you know, exciting? No, they're not exciting, but they're not sucking the energy out of me, where I know other people who don't realize they have these problems and it's really hard to have them at my table because they're socially awkward.

Speaker 1:

Number five relatives spouses are in-laws. Now, the reason why I wrote this in is because they're hard to be with Some of them, not all of them. Not only can they be one of the four items above. If you are not related to them, you would have much more empathy towards them. And I added this as a fifth vampire, not because all of them are vampires. All your relatives or spouses are vampires, it's so. They have a different relationship with you than anyone else. You have no choice but to interact with them. That makes associative them a little more volatile. Think about it. You might be best like if your mom. Is that your mom, okay, did you get along with her? Okay, yeah, but like some people don't, if they weren't the mom, they might be best friends.

Speaker 1:

And the reason why I realize this I have a friend in college I was very close to and him and his brother did not get along. He didn't like his brother at all for many years. They get along now and I met his brother after college. I met his brother and I'm like. I can see why he's maybe a little annoying, but he's not annoying to me because I'm not his brother and I have someone who's close to me who I have a hard time being with, and I can see that if he wasn't so close to me, that I would have more empathy towards him, because I see other people in my life realize that he's got some issues, but they're empathetic towards him because they're not his close relative.

Speaker 1:

I don't want to say who it is. You understand my point. You understand my point and so you need to say to yourself how would I respond to this situation if I was not related to them? And it'll bring you a lot more empathy in life. So you have someone close to you who's annoying you, like a brother or sister or in-law or spouse. If you think to yourself, you know, if they weren't so close to me, how would I react?

Speaker 1:

And I see this with my girls, my girls. Last or two weeks ago they were fighting over a pair of shoes. Right, my one daughter wanted to borrow the other daughter's shoes. They're close in age, they're like 15 months apart and they're having a fight over it. And I said to them if you guys were best friends and not sisters. You totally would not care. And my daughter said to me you're right, I wouldn't care, I'd love a friend to borrow my shoes, because it's a sister, it's a tight relationship. And so those people recognizing this, my son says to me, my older son, he's 19,. He says, abba, because every parent should learn how to parent from you that's the nicest thing a son can say, unbelievable to say. Because I see this, I see it. I said pretend she's not your sister, how would you act? And they see that they grow out of it. I think, huh, when they get older, yeah, they grow out of everything. It's like when Esau came back from the field and he sees his brother cooking the lentils, he says give me some of that stew, right? And he wouldn't have said if it was a friend, he'd be like oh, can I give you some stew, do you understand? Because they're brothers, they don't get along very well. But if they're not, but if they're friends, you'd have a much better relationship with them.

Speaker 1:

By the way, this is very true in marriage. This is why you have to have wisdom in a marriage, because and this is why most marriages fail, because you get so close to each other, that little things annoy you, like there's an idea that sticks and stones will break your bones and words will never hurt you. You've heard this like if you're eight years old and some kid in the neighborhood says to you you smell, like you cry for a minute and you're fine, like after you forget about it, right. But if your wife says it to you, forget it. It hurts, it's painful, right. Forget it hurts, it's painful, right, it's very painful because you go to account, you go to people, go to counseling for it. By the way, it's interesting that I gotta say I, uh, it's not acceptable, I, I. It's really funny that you know the average fortune 500 company spends 300 million dollars a month on consultants. And reason why is because it helps their bottom line. I mean they hire consultants to help run their business. Yet when do people who are married hire consultants? When things are falling apart?

Speaker 1:

I think it's ridiculous that people don't go into a relationship, marriage, without someone who's got wisdom, a rabbi, a revison, whoever, a coach, it doesn't matter who. It is Someone to guide them through relationships, because when you're so close to someone you don't have the clarity it's hard to see. I feel like there's trust and intent. If I smell, I want my husband to tell me. Of course, really, I would want him to say something. That wasn't a good example. That wasn't a good example. Intent matters. There's a way to say it, though also, it depends how you convey the message to your sponsor. There's a way to say it. That wasn't a good example the smelling one but it just came out of my mouth that way.

Speaker 1:

Okay, like I said, people who play the constantly the victim card, the drama queens, probably don't have a great relationship with God Because they're always blaming somebody else. Their life's not exciting enough, so they make you know and they're hard to spend time with. And the reason why we're doing this class is because I want you to find the keepers in your life. I want you to figure out who's emotionally healthy. But first, what I do is I call the friendship. Bother you go to your friends and first of all, do you look forward to spending time with them. Are you excited when they call or they text you? And if you're not, there might be an issue.

Speaker 1:

And, by the way, most of our friends in our life, just so you know, are friends of circumstance. I've seen them in kids a long time my kids are like oh, we have a lot of friends. They do have a lot of friends, but I don't really have friends. I have like one or two friends. That's it Because most of my friends throughout my life have been friends with circumstance. I went to college with them. I went to Yeshiva. I didn't go to Yeshiva, but I went to Yeshiva, I went to Yeshiva with them. And then you become your friends and guess what? As you get older, your life circumstances change.

Speaker 1:

Then you become friends with your kid's friends' parents or people in your business and and I started figuring this out like you know, just because they're my business and I do a lot of business with them doesn't mean I have to be friends with them, because some people are not healthy to be friends with. There's guys in my business I do a lot of business with and I'm like I don't want them coming to my house for Shabbat dinner Because they're not healthy. They're not healthy people and you have to recognize this. Do you have to either really spend a lot of energy paying attention to them or listen to them, talk and I know it's good for friends to rely on each other sometimes and sometimes that reliance is weighed heavily one way or the other, or if someone's going through trauma, you have to help them out and you're needed there for them. But hopefully it comes back to you a different way, because if it's a one-way relationship, it's not a healthy relationship and you need to get them out of your life or find a healthier way to have this relationship.

Speaker 1:

You know what I talked about clarity before, because I'm not involved in these relationships. I coach a lot of people here who are dating and for some reason, I can see clearly what's going on in the relationship. I don't know why. It's funny because I wasn't raised observant, but I always knew. Growing up, when I was younger, I always had a good read on people. I could always read people really well and I don't know why. God just gave me the skill to read people and now that I started learning about relationships, I can see this really coming into play. When I meet with people who are dating, I think I have clarity in what's going on Because I'm not involved. I'm not in it, I'm not his best friend. I'm telling you the truth. Like I said, I'm not here to be liked, I'm here to tell you the truth. Okay, once you've discovered a few emotional vampires. By the way, this is not a clinical term. You'll need to determine whether or not these friendships are worth keeping. Okay, reasons why you're friends with potential emotional vampires. What first drew me to this person? Just admit like you may have fallen in love with your spouse. What are the reasons? It's interesting.

Speaker 1:

I was reading about two companies who, after Corona came out you know, we have a lot of divisive things going on in America between the elections and Corona and BLM, all these different things going on they decided to make a rule in their companies no social issues involved in our company, we're not taking a stand, not taking a stand. And so what happened was that 5% of the workforce quit. Now they don't care what you do in your own social media, but in their own business side they don't want any sort of like we're parv, we're not taking a stand. And some people quit and they quickly revealed those rules and what happened was businesses that took a stand lost focus on what their job is. Their job is to make money or sell widgets, whatever they're doing. And these companies succeeded and they said, and they made a point that character is not when we join the stampede, but rather when we take a principled stand against conventional wisdom at precisely the moment when it's hardest to do so.

Speaker 1:

In a world that often renders verdicts instantly, in real time, this is the best arbiter of ideas is to wait them out and wait to see what the truth is. Just like today, we're going through what's going. You know anti-semitism, as soon as Israel is attacked on October 7th. We hate the Jews, jews are evil. Like we didn't do anything, we got attacked and it takes time for the truth to come out. And I believe the truth is going to come out, you know. I believe that in the end we'll see. We need to have news blackout also. Oh, the news is what's killing? It's so funny. When I went back to America and I walked the news. I'm like no wonder people are like, oh, it's okay. How's Jerusalem? Is it okay? I'm like, yeah, it's fine. I went to the store today. He goes is it safe? I'm like, as long as the chickens don't attack me, I'm life, you live.

Speaker 1:

Obviously we're at war right now and you have to be prepared and be smart about it and be aware. But you know, you go to Chicago, you've got to be careful. You go to New York, you've got to be careful. You go to Miami anywhere you go in the world you have to be careful where you walk, who you talk to. There's crime everywhere. You go to a mall in America and get shot Like I don't it All the guys with guns. You walk down the street. They're on my team, they're my family and they're going to protect me In America. You don't know who's got the guns, because everyone's got guns. I'm not against guns, I'm just saying they're not on your team. Half of them are against you and I recently heard an author share that he only reads books that are over 10 years old.

Speaker 1:

He says that if people are still talking about a book after 10 years, it's certainly worth his time. So you have to reevaluate your friendship because maybe people you were friends with years ago are not worth being friends with now. As you grow in age, I tell my kids all the time the kids you're friends with now are not going to be the friends you are in 10 or 20 years. You might have some of them. I'm not saying you can't, it's possible, but chances are your friends change as time goes on and then, if you have relationships that are unhealthy, you need to set up boundaries. I'm going to talk about them in a second.

Speaker 1:

Reasons why you're friends with potential emotional vampires. One what drew me to this person? Two maybe you like to be drama adjacent, drama, adjacent vampires. One what drew me this person? Two maybe you'd like to be drama adjacent. Drama adjacent are people who like to be people who are loud or have a lot of drama because it makes their life more fun. Right, you might have some of your life who's like exciting and fun. You like to be with them because it makes your life more fun.

Speaker 1:

This thing is wrong but, like you know, I know in my business there were people who like to gossip a lot, or troublemakers and cause problems, and they have a lot of. They always cause problems and they always have an audience. They always have an audience because people like to be drama adjacent or like to be near a narcissist because they are fun. Narcissists can be a lot of fun and have a lot of energy and a lot of passion. But when you look deep down and spend more time with them, it's not healthy. And are there hidden benefits from you for this relationship, like access to other people or opportunities?

Speaker 1:

By the way, a lot of people you know, like you're here at AISH and it's a fundraising organization. It's not just teaching children and doing outreach. They have to make money to pay this bill, to pay the air conditioning, lights and to bring people in and teach. It's they need to raise money Because they're not. It's not like if you, if you're going to business. Outreach is not like a business. It's just something that's a passion. That's great to do and I love doing it. But it's not like you don't make money doing it. You have to beg for money, so they have to.

Speaker 1:

When people come in who are wealthy, get to schmooze them, bring them a nice lunch, take them to dinner, try to get them to be engaged in the program that we're here for. But some of those people, if they didn't have money, you wouldn't be friends with them, you wouldn't associate with them. What's the pitch? Why are people calling you? Why are they nice to you? Because you have money. It's the way the world works and a lot of these people who have money have Asperger's or social misfits.

Speaker 1:

I always joke about the guy in high school who was a geek and then went on a date and now he owns a Fortune 500 company. He's like because you don't know what people are going to turn into. You know, okay, and is this, by the way, or is this the price of admission? For example, you might have had a childhood friend and you want to relive those memories every time, you see them, because you had good memories and it's fine. But maybe they're now sucking the energy out of you and you have to rel. But is it worth the price of admission to be a friendless person? Is it worth the price of admission to get money from someone for your organization? And you have to set up boundaries. I have lots of examples, so let me give you some ideas for boundaries.

Speaker 1:

No one needs an all-access pass to your life. You can set boundaries for what you want in your life, for your time in your life, because we only have no matter how much money you have in the world we all have the exact same amount of time. I mean 24 hours a day. Even if someone who's wealthy can't buy more time, they can't. So your time is the most valuable thing you have in the world. You have to make sure that you're spending it with people who make you happy, not with people who are sucking the energy out of you.

Speaker 1:

As my wife says you do not have to respond immediately to text for those who need your attention. We now live in this world where we have access to information and people instantly. At night, I turn my 9.30, I turn my phone off. I turn the Wi-Fi off, I turn the phone off, I put it away and then, after I've dived in the morning, after I've gotten up and had some breakfast, then I turn my phone on. You don't have to have access past my life. You will leave a message. Leave a message, great, I'll get it in the morning, but you don't have to.

Speaker 1:

Sometimes I'm very I like communicating. I, I like communicating. I'm a very good communicator. My wife says you know you're communicating too fast. Like think about the question. Like people come for dinner, oh, can we bring eight people for dinner? Oh, yeah, of course. Like think about it first.

Speaker 1:

You know, sometimes newly married couples need to move away from their parents. And I know this because I was recently coaching a couple 39 and 41, an observant couple, and they really love each other and they have a lot of positive traits. And the parents of both these couples the uncle of one did a business deal with the parents of the other and they supposedly cheated them. I have no idea. So now you have parents from one side who don't like the parents of the other side and they ask me should we get married? We want to get married, but our parents hate each other. That's a big issue and I and I the guy the guy took me to lunch. You're not married to the parents, you're married to each other. Well it's, you are married to the parents. If it's a good relationship.

Speaker 1:

I was in Brooklyn, I spoke in Brooklyn. This was my big speaking trip. I spoke 11 times in seven days when I was in New York and Chicago and he took me to lunch. We talked for like an hour hour and a half and I basically came up with the idea. It took time. I said if they were 21, I would have probably said no, but she's 41, she's 39. Never been married. I go, you guys should get married and move the heck out of town, get away from your parents, because it's not like they're young anymore and they love each other. It sounds like a great relationship and sometimes you have to move away.

Speaker 1:

And my sister? I have someone in my life, my sister. It wasn't healthy for her to be near my parents, my mom especially near my parents, my mom especially Not my dad, but my mom. My mom had some unhealthy tendencies and it wasn't good for her. My father said you should go away to school. We live in Virginia. She went to school in Miami and she stayed there and met her husband and got married and stayed in Miami, stayed in South Florida. Because it wasn't healthy for her to be near my mom. And I can see why, because once I got to be 20 years old, I was living at home after college. I'm like this is not healthy for me to be at my mom's house. I moved out and she didn't talk to me for six months. She had some dysfunction the way things work sometimes, but I could see it. I Through this in my class.

Speaker 1:

I am in my coin business. I do a lot of them. People have deals of points to sell and they company that. Daniel, because that's my name, do you want to make an offer? I'm like sure I'll make an offer. But sometimes people have you make an offer on their coins and then they take that same deal and they show it to someone else or someone else and they get other offers. They sell the highest offer, which is fine. I don't mind that. But sometimes they're using my information against me, because I'm pretty good at what I do in the business and I'm pretty sharp with my pricing, and so they sometimes use my information. So what I do is I'm happy to make an offer on one condition.

Speaker 1:

It's a conditional relationship. I'm happy to work with you and give you my offer. If you pass my offer, you have to make me a counteroffer, because if I'm going to spend the time to do the work until it comes to a price that's very competitive, I don't mind if I don't buy it, but I want to have a shot. At least if you price it and it's too high, I can say you know what? I had my chance. You sold it to someone else, even for a little less money, I had my chance. But if I'm going to go into this relationship with someone else to do with business dealing, I want to have a chance to buy it and I don't mind giving my information over as long as I have a chance. And it's worked well for me Because I had that clarity to know. I don't mind being involved in this relationship, but I don't want to be a one-way relationship all the time.

Speaker 1:

Okay, now we're on to the part that this whole class is made for how to find the keepers in your life. So if you've been to my classes before, you know I like to use acronyms, as you saw in blame, argue and denial. We want to find the keepers. These are people we want to close to us. Keeper, it's not keepers.

Speaker 1:

We first want to get rid of two E's. The first E is envy. We don't want someone who's envious, because when they're envious they're never going to be happy. They're always looking over their shoulder. There's a better wife, better looking husband, more money, better car. They're never happy with what they have in life and it's not a really good person to be friends with because it's not bringing a lot of positive vibes to the relationship. So you want to be with someone who's happy with what they have in life, because when they're envious they're not happy Because they always want something more. God didn't give them enough. God made a mistake.

Speaker 1:

And then you don't want someone with ego. What? What is an ego? We all have some sort of egos. Huh, go ahead. Who are great egos? They think a lot of themselves, how great they are. I had one when I was in my early 20s I was in the coin business and I was doing very well, successfully, and I thought I'm the greatest. Look at me, look at me, I have good eyes, I like to do business with me. And I quickly became arrogant and someone said to me you're arrogant and I brought me down. I don't want to be arrogant. I didn't grow up as an arrogant. I grew up in a nice house, loving parents, made a little bit of dysfunction but, like whatever, it was a pretty good house. I have positive memories of my mom and dad. We're not alive anymore, but ego Because ego means that you have everything you've done in your life is all because of you, that God has nothing to do with it when I started to realize that God gave me my eyes, god gave me my brains, god gave me my fingers, god gave me wisdom, he gave me insight that I'm thanking God for everything I have.

Speaker 1:

God wrote each of us a check in life and your job in life is to cash your check. He wrote you a check for $5,000,. You go to check for $10,000. You never consider going to the bank and saying just give me $8,000, keep the change, because when you go through life and don't reach your potential in life. That's exactly what you were doing. What I think I do here, my job here is for you to help me, to help you reach your potential in life.

Speaker 1:

I'm giving a class today, shiva. Over the next four or five weeks, on Tuesdays, on success. Have a class on public speaking. Have a class on success, building an organization, persuasion whatever class on that, the rates are poor, anyway. So you don't want something with the ego because your ego by the way, this is also marriage. Your ego is not your amigo. Egos destroy relationships and ego also stands for exiting God out. Everything I have is because of me, not because of God. You want to be with someone who doesn't have envy and who doesn't have ego and the last four things we want to have in our relationship with people.

Speaker 1:

This is not for marriage. This is just people in general Kind, peaceful, empathetic and respectful. Empathetic are people who can feel your feelings. They're not afraid to say I'm sorry. They're willing to admit they're wrong. They also will be there for you when you're going through a rough time and they feel your sorrow, they feel your pain, they feel your happiness. When your kid gets married, they're the first one person at the divorce, the first person there at the engagement party celebrating with you, that's someone who's empathetic, and a lot of people don't have it. They don't have empathy. It doesn't mean they can't learn to have it. It doesn't mean they can't pretend to have it, because I'm not super empathetic, but I know at certain times in my life that I have to be empathetic to people at least show it, in order to have a relationship that's healthy with people. I think women are more empathetic than men. I think I think women are more likely to become vulnerable and share their feelings and open up. Men are a little more closed off. This is why I'm giving my dating relationship classes, my marriage classes.

Speaker 1:

The thing that a man has to do to make his wife happy is to form an emotional connection to her. And the reason I say that Gamara talks about the penalties for a woman cheating versus a man cheating. The penalty in the Torah law is worse for a woman cheating versus a man cheating. The penalty in the Torah law is worse for a woman to cheat than a man or her husband. And the reason why when a woman cheats, it's probably because she's looking for an emotional connection somewhere else. Her husband is not giving her emotional needs, where a man cheats because of opportunity. Of course these are just generalizations. There are exceptions to the rule. So a man must do a good job of connecting to his wife.

Speaker 1:

I always talk about when I used to come home from Rockville and I lived in Rockville. I come home from work. I've been gone all day. I want to grab a beer, something to catch. I want ESPN highlights. I don't want to talk to my wife, but marriage is not about me. Marriage is about we. It's about understanding her needs, what it means to have a passionate relationship.

Speaker 1:

Anyone can get married. Like I said, the reason why I call my book based on the four phases of love anyone can get married. Marriage is not the end game. Never leaving is that's the point you get in your relationship. You know there's someone better in almost every characteristic trait and you realize the person you married isn't perfect, but you realize they're perfect for you. And understanding the emotional vampires in your life will help you understand character traits, understand why people are acting the way they do, and when you look for people in your life that are kind, peaceful, empathetic and respectful, you hang around the people I always say like part of my dating class is you want to catch the right fish, you need to catch the right bait. So, like, the people you attract are the people most likely you're going to marry.

Speaker 1:

So, if you put out, I talked about how I used to have big muscles in the 19, like, yeah, I used to have like 250, you know, in my late 20s it was a lot of weight two pounds, not kilograms and I went to parties and bars. By the way, it's all from low self-esteem, just to be honest with you. That's why we lift weights. Seriously, you're walking down the street, some old lady drops her purse. You're like you know, lady, I just benched 250. I got your purse. Look at me. Unless you're like what do we need muscles for? It all comes from low self-esteem, a little bit, a little bit.

Speaker 1:

I always say when you spend over an hour and a half in the gym, it's vanity. Hour hour in the gym it's just vanity. Everyone should work out. I'm big on working out. Everyone should lift weights, run. But when you spend that much time in the gym, it's just because of the vanity. I had it myself. I had the mirrors. I'm like that was just family, because I didn't have strong self-esteem when I Love myself as a person, understand who I am, and when I used to go to these singles events, I put on my tight black shirts and show my guns and jeans and I'd have these girls circle around me who like me for my nice, my nice muscles, and I found myself in this constant treadmill dating people who are tracking me for the wrong reasons Because I put out the wrong bait to catch the right fish.

Speaker 1:

It's just like if you're a woman and you have nice body parts and you show off those body parts you know what I'm talking about. The guys around you are the ones that like those nice body parts. You wonder why five or ten years later, you're in a horrible relationship Because you didn't put out the right bait to catch the right fish. Personally, I wanted to catch seared halibut or seared salmon. I was catching gefilte fish in fish sticks.

Speaker 1:

So it's very good to find people in your life that are kind, peaceful, empathetic and respectful and when you understand there are emotional vampires in all our lives and we can have them in our lives, but we just have to recognize it and try to form healthy relationships with it. Maybe keep your hands off, maybe not invite them to your house by themselves. Maybe you know, have to keep a certain distance from them and understand it. And if they're close to you, like a brother or sister or in-law, you're like. You know I have no choice but have my life. If they weren't that person, I wouldn't imagine them being friend. How would I act if my sister wanted to borrow my dress? I said no. But if it's my best friend, of course I would my best friend. I'm the loner to her. When you understand that dynamic in relationships, you'll make all your relationships much healthier. Thank you so much.