Standards, Behavior, or Status: Matthew Hussey on Deciding Whether to End a Relationship
Matthew Hussey
How do you know whether walking away from a relationship is the right call or a premature surrender? Coach Matthew Hussey addresses this question through the story of a woman he knew, Erica, whose relationship ended twice for the same reason and who still could not let go. He frames the video as a one-on-one coaching session and offers a three-part model that he says he has taken thousands of people through. His aim, in his words, is for viewers to feel "a different level of peace" in their decision, whichever way it goes.
Hussey is especially interested in relationships that lack the obvious red flags. There is no cheating, lying, or abuse, just "two people who seemingly were right for each other until they weren't." He says these are the situations in which people most often question whether they are letting go of something good too soon.
Erica's Story
Erica was 31 when this chapter began. Hussey describes her as successful in her career, a go-getter, likable, with a couple of great friends and a real love of life. Her deepest goal was to find love, get married, and raise a family. She loved romantic movies and love stories and eagerly took in dating advice. After years of dating, she met a man who seemed to be everything she had been looking for, and it felt as if her own love story had finally begun.
Four years later, at 35, she was no closer to an engagement. Her boyfriend changed the subject whenever she raised marriage. She gave him an ultimatum, for the second time: she wanted to get engaged soon or she was out. He chose out. During the breakup he told her, "You are the love of my life," but said he was not ready for that big a step.
Erica immediately second-guessed her decision to speak up. Marriage mattered deeply to her, but so did he.
When a Period Becomes an Ellipsis
Hussey uses a punctuation metaphor for what happened next. Many breakups that should end with a period gain "those extra two dots that turn it into an ellipsis." For Erica, the first dot was her ex saying she was the love of his life, which gave her hope. The second came a couple of weeks later, when her cat got sick and she felt lonely over the holidays. She texted him, and they started talking again.
A pattern followed. Whenever Erica was lonely, she reached out. Whenever she was strong and went no contact, he became, as Hussey puts it, genuinely afraid of losing her for good, and he reached out. Eventually they slipped back into a relationship.
The Deeper Tragedy
Hussey acknowledges the sadness of finding someone you love who loves you back, only to discover that your visions for the future are incompatible. But he argues that a deeper tragedy was at play. The worse outcome was not that her boyfriend didn't want to marry her. It was Erica slowly trying to convince herself not to care about something that mattered deeply to her so she could keep the relationship. He calls this a different kind of emotional injury, one that can become chronic.
He clarifies that the video is not an argument for marriage itself. Many people build beautiful lives without marrying. The point is how much marriage mattered to Erica specifically. She wanted a husband, a family, and the security and commitment of building a life with someone excited to choose her fully.
Erica, in Hussey's reading, focused entirely on the danger of losing her boyfriend. She never weighed the danger of gradually negotiating herself out of what she truly wanted. He stresses that the boyfriend was not a villain. He may have genuinely loved her and been a good man who was genuinely conflicted. But "a good person can still be the wrong partner for your life vision." And when we keep returning to someone who has repeatedly shown that their vision doesn't match ours, Hussey says, we communicate without words that "their vision doesn't have to change because our vision is pliable."
The Three-Factor Model
Hussey's framework rests on three factors present in any relationship:
- Your standards. This is the behavior you are willing to accept from a partner, and also the vision of your future that you are committed to. Erica's standard was that four years of dating meant it was time to get engaged. She did not want to date endlessly.
- Their behavior. This is how the other person behaves, both in life and toward you. Erica's boyfriend showed that he would rather lose her than commit to marriage.
- The status of the relationship. This is whether you stay or go, the question Erica struggled with.
His central claim is that in any relationship where you are not currently happy or at peace, one of these three things has to change. "There is no scenario in which all three stay the same." He presents this as good news, because the choice about which one changes is yours, something he says many people forget.
How the Model Played Out for Erica
If you keep your standard (factor one) and stay in the relationship (factor three), Hussey explains, you are betting that the other person's behavior (factor two) will change. That requires advocating for yourself: saying you are not happy with how things are going and that you need the other person to act differently for the relationship to progress. Erica did this when she said she wanted to get engaged after four years.
If you have had repeated conversations about your needs and the other person's behavior still hasn't moved toward meeting them, something in the equation has to give. If it is not your standard and not their behavior, then it must be the status of the relationship.
Erica's ultimatum was a statement that she was willing to change the status if he would not meet her where she was. But when she went back to him without anything having changed on his side, she effectively told him she was willing to change her standard instead. Factor one shifted to preserve the relationship because factor two would not.
Hussey's lesson: "If your standards change really easily, their behaviors will not." Being unwilling to let go of someone, he argues, amounts to agreeing, whether consciously or not, to bend your own rules in order to stay.
The Telltale Sign: Friends and Family Notice
Hussey points to a warning sign of this dynamic. The people who know and love us best begin to see that we have become a different version of ourselves, that we have abandoned parts of what we wanted in the relationship or in life. When they say so, it becomes triggering, because it reminds us of an unhappiness we would rather not face.
He describes several reactions. People may start hiding parts of the relationship from friends and family to avoid questions they can't answer well. They may start repeating their partner's excuses to their family, defending the partner and, by extension, their own decision to accept the situation. Hussey says it "almost becomes like our partner is ventriloquizing us to the people we love." The result is that we quietly reset our expectations, away from the people who know what our heart really wants, and recalibrate our standards to a new norm.
After returning to a relationship that isn't working, he says, who you really are and what you once wanted remain inside you, but buried under "layers and layers of acquiescences." Because these adjustments tend to happen gradually, people often don't notice how far they have drifted from their original vision.
Healthy Evolution Versus Erosion
Hussey adds a caveat. Evolving your standards over time is healthy and normal, and can be a sign of maturity and wisdom. It would be strange to hold the exact same standards at 35 or 65 as at 22. The question to ask is whether you can adjust your standards in the ways this particular relationship requires and still be happy. For Erica, retracting the ultimatum meant accepting a relationship that might never lead to the engagement and wedding she really wanted.
Why the Boyfriend Didn't Panic
Hussey argues that this dynamic explains why Erica's boyfriend did not panic at the second breakup. He had learned that a breakup did not mean he was actually losing her. The only times he truly panicked were when she went no contact and he didn't hear from her for a while, because only then did he feel her loss. Whenever it looked as though she might actually change the status of the relationship, he would reach out in dread.
Hussey notes what he did not say when he reached out. He did not say he had been wrong or that he wanted to get engaged. There was no new information. That left Erica to decide whether she would finally do what she hadn't done before and move the relationship "from sort of done to actually done." To do that, Hussey says, she would need to tell herself that this was not the right man, that he could not give her what she wanted and needed, and that she would rather be single than settle for something that forced her to accept less than she wanted and deserved.
How It Ended, and the Question Left to the Viewer
Erica did not do that. Hussey draws the lesson bluntly: "We don't get what we deserve in life. We get what we accept." Asked why people keep treating us casually, his answer is "because we let them."
He closes by saying he wishes her story had ended differently, but the viewer's can. He asks viewers to look at a situation where they are unhappy, whatever the reason, and decide which of the three factors must change for them to feel at peace. It could be the other person's behavior, which they can influence by advocating for their needs. It could be their own standards, if the other person won't change. Or it could be the status of the relationship, ending it to make room for one that is right for them.
I wish this story ended differently. It didn't. And it might be a story you are very familiar with.
A few years ago, I knew a woman named Erica who had just gone through a breakup with her boyfriend for the second time. It ended for the exact same reason it did the first time, which I will tell you about in a second. But somehow, even though she had tried and failed to work through the issues with him, she still couldn't face the idea of truly letting him go.
Have you ever had someone you couldn't say goodbye to, even though what they were offering you didn't make you happy or meet your needs? As a coach for nearly 20 years, I have seen this story play out over and over again. People question if it was right to walk away or if they're letting go of something good too soon. It's even harder when the relationship doesn't have the bad parts that we so often hear about: cheating, lying, abuse. Just two people who seemingly were right for each other until they weren't.
If any of this describes you and you have a situation where you don't feel good right now, you're not completely happy with the way it's going, I want you to treat the next 10 to 15 minutes like you just joined a coaching session with me one-on-one. Because I'm going to take you through a little process that I've taken thousands of people through for figuring out what needs to be the next step in their relationship. And this is designed to bring clarity to whether ending things is the right thing for you or whether it would be premature to give up on this person. My hope is that by the end of this video, you feel a different level of peace in your decisions either way.
Erica's story went like this. Erica wanted to find love her whole life. She was 31, successful in her career, a go-getter, likable, had a couple of great friends, and really loved life. But her dream, her deepest dream, had always been to find love, to get married, and to raise a family. Despite everything else in her life, this was her number one goal. She loved love stories, romantic movies, and listened eagerly anytime she heard dating advice that she thought could help her find that kind of love for herself.
Then, after years of dating, she met someone who represented all she had been looking for. It finally felt like her very own love story had begun. The train had officially left the station and was on its way. The only problem was, she was now four years into that relationship and no closer to being engaged to a man who changed the subject every time she tried to bring up marriage.
Now 35, she had just given him an ultimatum for the second time. "I'd like to get engaged soon or I'm out." Her boyfriend chose out. He loved her. He even said, "You are the love of my life," during the breakup, but he wasn't ready to take that big of a step.
When things ended, she immediately second-guessed her decision to speak up. Getting married was deeply important to her, but she couldn't help how much she loved him. So often in breakups, what should have ended with a period gets afforded those extra two dots that turn it into an ellipsis. In Erica's case, her ex saying that she was the love of his life during the breakup gave her hope. One dot. Then, a couple of weeks later, Erica texted him when her cat got sick and she felt lonely over the holidays, which led to them talking again. Two dots.
So, their story continued. Anytime she got lonely, she would reach out to him. And anytime she was strong and went no contact, he became genuinely afraid that he was losing her for good and he would reach out to her. Eventually, they slipped back into a relationship.
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When we decide that holding on to a person is more important than our own needs or principles, we lose a part of ourselves. There is a deep sadness, perhaps even a sense of tragedy about finding someone we love who loves us back, but then finding that our visions for the future are incompatible. But there is an even deeper tragedy at play than Erica's boyfriend not wanting to marry her. And that is Erica slowly trying to convince herself not to care about something that deeply mattered to her just so that she could hold on to the relationship. That is a different kind of emotional injury and it is one that can become chronic.
This isn't a video about the virtues of marriage. Plenty of people build beautiful lives and relationships without getting married. The question here is how much marriage mattered to Erica, and it did matter to Erica. She wanted a husband. She wanted a family. She wanted the security and the commitment of building a life with someone who is excited to choose her fully.
Erica had focused all of her attention on the perceived danger of losing her boyfriend. What she hadn't factored into the equation was the danger over time of negotiating herself out of wanting what she truly wanted. Her boyfriend wasn't villainous. He may genuinely have loved her. He may be a good man who is genuinely conflicted, but a good person can still be the wrong partner for your life vision. And when we continue to go back to someone who has shown us repeatedly that their vision doesn't align with ours, we are communicating something without words, that their vision doesn't have to change because our vision is pliable.
There are three factors at play in any relationship. The first is your standards. In other words, what behavior are you willing to accept from a partner? This can also relate to your future. What vision of my future am I committed to as a standard? In Erica's case, her standard was that dating someone for four years meant that she was ready to move things to the next level and get engaged. Endlessly dating was not something she desired or wanted for herself.
The second factor in our model is their behavior. This is how someone you are with behaves both in life and towards you. Erica's boyfriend's behavior showed that he would rather lose her than make a commitment to marry her.
The third factor in our model is the status of the relationship. This is whether you choose to stay with them or not, something that Erica struggled with.
In any relationship where you are not currently happy or at peace, one of these three things has to change. Either your standards, their behavior, or the status of the relationship. There is no scenario in which all three stay the same. The good news is that you have the power to make that choice, and this is something a lot of people forget.
If you want to keep your standard the same, which is factor one, and you want to stay in the relationship, which is factor three, then what you're betting on is that their behavior is going to change. In this scenario, you'll need to be your own advocate and communicate that you're not happy with the way things are going, and that for things to progress, you'll need the other person to behave differently. In Erica's case, she communicated that by saying she'd like to get engaged after dating him for four years.
If you have had repeated conversations with someone about your needs, and their behavior still hasn't shifted in the direction of meeting those needs, something will have to change in this three-part equation. And if it's not your standard, and it's not their behavior, then it will be the status of the relationship itself. In Erica's case, when she gave him an ultimatum, she was saying that she was willing to change the status of the relationship if he wasn't willing to meet her where she was. But, when she went back to him and went back therefore on that ultimatum, despite nothing having changed on his side, she communicated to him that she was willing to change her standard. In other words, factor one changed in order to preserve the relationship because his behavior, factor two, wasn't changing.
If, like Erica, you are dealing with someone who is struggling to commit right now, and you want to know how to communicate factor one, your standards, in a productive way that gives you the best possible chance at changing their behavior and the decisions they are making right now, I have a free workshop packed with my very best advice on how you can get commitment. You can watch that right after this video at getcommitment.com. There is even an exact conversation in there that I have crafted that I've given to thousands of people who need to have that conversation.
Two friends of mine had this exact conversation when things weren't going well. He was dragging his feet, she wanted more. She had this conversation with him and within eight months they were—they're now married and have three kids. So, you can check out exactly what that conversation was at getcommitment.com.
Here's the important lesson. If your standards change really easily, their behaviors will not. To be unwilling to let go of something or someone is to agree, whether you consciously realize it or not, to bend your own rules in order to stay in it.
I wanted to say one more thing about this. There is a telltale sign that we are in a situation like this when the people who know us best and love us the most start recognizing that we have become a different version of ourselves. They recognize that we have abandoned parts of ourselves and what we have wanted in this relationship or in life. And so they'll start pointing those observations out to us and that becomes a triggering event of its own because it reminds us of the ways that we are unhappy that we don't want to be reminded of.
So, we have different reactions to that. Sometimes we start hiding parts of the relationship from our friends and family. We don't want to answer questions about things we don't have good answers for. We may even start parroting the excuses made by our partner to us to our family in an effort to defend them and thereby defend our decision to be okay with whatever is happening. It almost becomes like our partner is ventriloquizing us to the people we love. All of this leads us to internally reset our expectations for what we accept from the relationship away from the people who know us well enough to know what our heart really wants. We quietly recalibrate our standards to a new norm.
By the way, if you don't have anyone that you can speak to about this that doesn't bring drama or doesn't shame you or make you feel worse, this is a great thing to talk to Matthew AI about because it's objective, it's safe, it's private. So, try that out. The link is in the bio.
When you go back to a relationship that isn't working for you, who you really are and what you once wanted still remain lurking deep inside but buried beneath layers and layers of acquiescences. And these adjustments often happen gradually. So, over time we don't notice just how far we have departed from our original vision of the relationship.
Now, don't get me wrong, it is completely healthy and even normal to evolve your standards over time. It can be a sign of maturity and wisdom. It would be weird to have the same exact standards at 35 or 65 as we did at 22. The question we have to ask ourselves is can I adjust my standards in the ways that this relationship calls for and still be happy? In Erica's case, retracting her ultimatum and going back to her ex meant that she was willing to stay in a relationship that may never lead to an engagement and a wedding, both of which she really wanted.
By the way, this is why her boyfriend didn't panic when they broke up the second time. He had gotten used to the fact that the breakup didn't mean he was losing her. The only time he ever really panicked was when she got strong and went no contact and he didn't hear from her for a while, because it was in those moments that he actually felt her loss. In other words, anytime it looked like she might actually make good on her promise of changing the status of the relationship, factor three in our model, he would suddenly freak out and reach out to her with the dread of losing her.
But, what did he say when he reached out? That he was wrong and wanted to get engaged? No. There was no new information, which left Erica to decide if she, this time, was finally going to do what she hadn't done before, which is truly change the status of the relationship from sort of done to actually done.
And in order to do this, she would need to say to herself, "This is not the right man for me. He can't give me what I want and need, and I would rather be single than settle for something that fundamentally forces me to accept less than I want and deserve." Unfortunately, Erica didn't do that. And we don't get what we deserve in life. We get what we accept. The ultimate answer to the proverbial question, "Why do people continue to treat us casually?" is simple, because we let them.
I wish her story had ended differently. It didn't. But yours can. You can take a look right now at a situation in which you are unhappy, for whatever reason, which may be different from Erica's, and you can ask yourself which one of the three factors will need to change in order for you to feel at peace and content. Will it be their behavior, which you can influence by advocating for yourself and your needs? Will it be your standards if they don't change their behavior? Or will it be the status of the relationship by ending it so that you can make room for one that is right for you?
Thank you so much for watching. If there is anything you wish I had answered in this video, leave me a comment below. And also, let me know in your situation right now which of the three factors needs to change for you to start being happier. Thank you so much for watching. I will see you next week.
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