The Big Secret to Finding Lasting Love | Bela Gandhi | TEDxChicago

So how many people have fallen in

love

with the wrong person at some point in their lives by show of hands? Most of us, but if you think about it, choosing a partner is something we are never taught to do, it is just expected. to know how well when I was in business school I realized I knew how I had this and I would help my friends find good partners fall in

love

and nothing made me happier and I kept doing it and doing it a lot. so 12 years later I pulled the plug on a big, safe career to follow my heart and start my company that helps people fix their hearts and we have helped thousands of singles find happy,

lasting

love in a way they just weren't . we were able to do before and we haven't had any divorces to this day, as you can imagine, we've learned some pretty compelling things along the way and one of them is that people are dating using a checklist, now it's shocking when I ask women what is the number one thing you are looking for in the future guy of your dreams they say he is tall, preferably over six feet and when I ask men the same question they say attractive now how are we? working that?

Not so well if you look at the data and We look at the data. 50 of first marriages end in divorce in the US. 67 of second marriages and 74 of third marriages. Almost most of us are using the wrong checklist. Tall and attractive are a good start, but they are not what is needed. to find

lasting

love so what we have discovered is a better way, dare I say, a better list to help people find that love and this works no matter who you are or who you are looking for because love is love and this is what we are looking for. taught Anna when Anna came to us, she came to us after a terrible breakup, she thought her ex of two years was the one and when he broke up with her suddenly, she felt broken and heartbroken and wanted to make sure this It would never happen to her.

Again, the first thing I wanted to do with Anna was figure out what that list was in her head, so I asked her, Anna, to tell me about your dream guy and I'm going to make a list, and she said, " Oh, that's great". tall, he's over 6-2, of course he is, he makes more money than me, he has a great job, he's fit, he has hair, he's adventurous, and his list went on to include 34 more items, lest you think that Anna's list is unique, isn't it? I've interviewed thousands of women and 95 of them have pretty much the same list of dreams, so we finished that list and now I ask Anna a second question, a more important question, who are the people in your life that make you really happy?

And I start a second one. ready and she thought for a second and said, "It's okay, my best friend Laura, because she is always there to help me." I can tell her anything without judging her and she is very supportive. My brother Michael, he loves me unconditionally, he sees the best in me and tells him. For me, he's like my personal cheerleader and my friend Catherine, she's positive but she's very real with me and she tells me what I need to hear and her list goes on and I look at her and there are silent tears running down her face and she.

God said, I had never thought about these people this way before they made me so happy, I don't know what I would do without them, what Anna didn't realize she was doing was describing what we call elevator people, we call them elevator . people because like an elevator they lift us up and elevate us and like an elevator they keep us grounded and safe the elevator people in our lives are the crème de la crème of the relationships we have that keep us happy, grounded and alive, so now I show Anna the two lists we made side by side and I see her eyes start to open.

All of her exes met the criteria on her dream guy list, but she had never stopped to think about how they make me feel. like the relationships that make me happiest and the light bulb went on she had been dating for what she wanted in a partner but not for what she needed to be happy and that is the moment when everything changed for Anna and her love life and That's the moment when everything can change for anyone who wants to find lasting love, this may seem natural, intuitive and obvious, but no less than two percent of people ever put even one elevator quality on their list of dreams.

Why is it okay? of evolution, right, we are biologically wired to prefer the traits we make on our dream list in the cave days, women were looking for big, strong cavemen who could hunt buffalo, kill them, bring them home, feed the village and today, what do we prefer? as number one and men looked for cavewomen who were younger and could get through multiple painful births and maintain a good home and younger lingers on their dream list today, now I'm not saying there's anything wrong with being tall, younger or attractive. Attraction is really important in romantic relationships, but what I'm saying is that when you choose the qualities that make you happiest in your romantic relationships, it will lead you to the best, most touching love of your life.

How could I not? And then what happened to our friend Anna, so it took her a minute to start dating in this new way, to stop depending on that old list of dreams and to start dating people to see how they made her feel, if the They made her feel like the people in her life who made her happiest. and the good news is that she met him he is always there for her he is her personal cheerleader he supports her he is positive and cute he is intelligent he has a good job but he is only five foot nine because we convinced her they are all the same height lying down if you know what I mean, so everyone is doing well there and still counting their blessings every day they meet.

Now people often call me a psychotic optimist because I believe with every cell of my being that love exists for every person who wants it. I see beautiful stories happen when we consciously start choosing people who make us happy. Imagine if we all sat down and made our elevator lists and understood what makes us happiest in our deepest relationships and then imagine if I looked at that list and we became elevator people, in our partners, in our spouses, in our families, in our friends, in our colleagues. Imagine how much more love there would be in the world.

Imagine what divorce rates would be like. And imagine if we all started choosing the elevator. people to fall in love with romantically, hell, that might put me out of a job, but I love love and nothing would make me happier, thank you.