What do you do when your ex isn't ready for a relationship yet? That's what we're going
to be talking about in this video. But first, my name is Clay with modern. love.life, where
we help you get the great loving relationship that you're looking for without having to
play mind games without having to play hard to get, and without having to pretend to be
someone or something that you are not because you deserve to be loved for the unique, amazing,
and wonderful person that you are.
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So in this video, we are going to be talking about when your ex says they aren't ready
for a relationship. Now, what exactly does this mean? What do you do?
Usually what's going on here is that your ex has this heightened level of expectation.
If you are familiar with maybe me from some of the other videos I've done, or if you're
maybe in one of our courses, you may know this as being relationship-focused. You might
think that it's actually a good thing if your ex is relationship-focused, "Hey, it means
they're thinking about us being in a relationship."
But it's not necessarily a good thing if there isn't a strong enough emotional foundation
between the two of you, because if your ex thinks that, "Okay, if I'm interacting with
you, if we're talking, if we're texting, whatever, it means that we're getting closer towards
being in a relationship or we're getting serious, or maybe we're dating," or something like
that, it can scare them.
They might start to ask themselves, "Well, why are we getting together? Why are we talking?
Where are we texting? Is it because we're going to get back together again? Is it because
we're dating again? Is it because maybe you think that I'm feeling something for you right
now?"
And the thing is that they're not necessarily not feeling anything for you. It's just that
they don't have enough of that emotional foundation built up. And so what happens when you put
someone on the spot and there isn't a lot of emotional foundation beneath them to make
a choice one way or the other, they're likely going to choose to stay exactly where they
are right now, which is probably broken up with you.
And so that's what we call the law of consistency. People tend to act consistently with the choices
they have made before in the past. And so they broke up with you. They're probably going
to stay broken up with you until that emotional foundation gets built up a little bit higher.
Now, bear with me because this will all come into focus. But if you don't already know,
the emotional foundation is one of the main things that we talk about in a lot of our
videos and our courses and our newsletter down there, all sorts of places.
The emotional foundation really is incredibly important because once that emotional foundation
gets stronger, your ex is going to actually feel prepared to actually start thinking of
you in a relationship way. They might start to say, "Okay, well, in our own way, we've
been dating the whole time." Or like, "Actually I do want to get back together." Or like what
my big ex said to me on a warm June afternoon, back in 2004, it was, "Hey, can I be your
girlfriend again?" So yeah, that is the power of the emotional connection.
And so what we want to do is want to build that up. So we build this up through what
we call advanced relational skills. We do have an entire video playlist on advanced
relational skills. I'll put a video card, a link to it up there. So if you don't know
what these are, if you're new to the channel, first of all, subscribe down below, but also
check out that video card up there on advanced relational skills. It'll tell you a little
bit more about what these are, why they're important, how they help you build the emotional
connection.
Okay, and so what we want to do is we actually want to build up the emotional connection
and decrease your ex's relationship focused mindset. We want to pull it down to actually
being connection focused, because if they're busy worrying about where's this leading?
What's this adding up to? Are we getting back together? Do you think we're going to get
back together? Am I stringing you along? I don't want to think of myself as that kind
of person.
What we want to do is want to pull their focus from all of these, what ifs and worries about
what the future may hold or anything else and we're going to pull it down into the present
moment where the two of you can actually just enjoy interacting with one another. And as
the two of you enjoy interacting with one another, that emotional foundation is going
to get built up and up and up. And as that emotional foundation gets stronger and stronger,
that's when we can actually start to leverage it to actually get the two of you to be in
a relationship again.
So what I want you to do is I want you to really pull the connection down to actually
not worrying about what this is going to be. Just to say something along the lines of,
"Hey, don't worry about where this is all going. I think it's best if we're just friends
for the time being." Or, "I don't think we should try and force anything that's not there.
The truth is I just like talking to you and it seems like you like talking to me too.
So let's just enjoy talking to one another."
Things like that, that kind of deescalate that level of relationship focused newness.
If that's even a word and put it more on the connection, that's going to allow the two
of you to actually connect a lot more. And it's going to give your ex permission to actually
spend more time with you because instead of saying like, "Well, why are we texting? Why
are we getting together? Why are we spending time together?"
They're going to have an answer preloaded in their mind, which is, "Oh, we're doing
it because we're friends." "Oh, we're doing it because we like talking to one another."
"Oh, okay. I don't have to worry about that because we're just taking it slow. We're just
taking it one day at a time." Or whatever it is that you agree to with them.
And it's through that, that you can actually start to build up positive interactions and
bring the two of you closer together through those advanced relational skills. And of course,
I don't want you to just live in this nebulous, poorly defined quasi relationship forever.
But oftentimes if your ex isn't ready for a relationship, then it makes sense to deescalate
things, pull it back down to the connection focused level and build up that connection
a little bit more before we start pushing for the relationship.
I know a lot of other people out there might tell you that you need to deliver an ultimatum,
say, "We're going to get back together or we're going to be nothing at all." But this
is not helpful to where your ex is at emotionally.
And it's not going to build up that emotional connection. That's going to give them permission
to spend time with you and to actually allow them to make an informed choice about getting
back together with you, which is, one of the reasons why ultimatums rarely work out, especially
when it comes to getting back together with an ex.
I don't imagine they work out too well either. I have a small daughter, so I can tell you
that she's a little bit stubborn. She's a bit of a contrary. She only wants to do things
if they're her idea. And so basically this is a way of allowing your ex to come up with
their own idea that, "Spending time with you feels good. It's nice. It's enjoyable. And
I'm starting to think, I want to get back together with you."
Okay. So I hope that tells you a little bit more about what to do if your ex isn't ready
for a relationship. What you want to do is you want to slow them down, stay focused on
that connection rather than the end goal, the outcome of being in a relationship. And
that's going to allow you to build up the foundation through those advanced relational
skills.
And it's going to give them permission to continue to spend time with you. And it's
going to allow the two of you to actually enjoy spending time with one another, which
is just going to create a virtuous cycle, the opposite of a vicious cycle. People don't
talk about that as much, but that's a phrase I suppose, but that's what I'd recommend that
you do if your ex isn't ready for a relationship.
If you do want more tips, advice, and strategies on how to get a great relationship for you,
how to navigate this whole world of your ex's bizarre shifting, changing emotions, be sure
that you're on our email newsletter. You can find it right down below in the description
box for this video. You heard me talk about it before. If you sign up, you get a nice
little report and you'll get tips, advice and strategies, obviously.
Anyway, thank you so much for watching this video. Once again, my name is Clay. If you
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Anyway, thank you so much for sitting through that little tangent. If you do want to learn
more about those advanced relational skills, a great place for you to learn about those
will be in this video playlist over here on advanced relational skills, or you might want
to check out this video over here that YouTube has decided might be a good fit for you. Once
again, thank you so much, please take care and I'll talk to you in the next video.