The Art of Manliness - The Infidelity Formula

00:00:00.000 Brett McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.

00:00:10.940 Among supposedly monogamous couples, 23% of men and 90% of women have cheated on their current

00:00:16.120 partner. And while studies have long found that men are more likely to cheat than women,

00:00:19.760 that gap has significantly narrowed over time. In fact, married women between the ages of 18 and 29

00:00:25.100 cheat at a slightly higher rate than men do. Behind cold bits of data like this are the

00:00:29.300 many real stories of infidelity and the heartache and destruction they create. If you're not yet

00:00:33.740 part of the cohort who's experienced the fallout of cheating firsthand, you probably want to avoid

00:00:37.780 joining its ranks. Well, my guest has a formula that explains what three factors add up to infidelity.

00:00:43.440 And once you know it, you can reverse engineer things to prevent those factors from showing up

00:00:47.760 in your relationship. His name is Andrew G. Marshall. He's a marriage therapist with over 30 years of

00:00:52.180 counseling experience. Today on the show, Andrew first shares the breakdown in age and gender

00:00:56.280 amongst the clients who come to see him in this practice and the two stages of life where he's

00:00:59.980 found infidelity to be the most common. Andrew shares his formula for what leads to infidelity.

00:01:04.580 And as we unpack its elements, we discuss how quiet desperation is a major driver of cheating,

00:01:09.140 why men who don't have good male friends are more likely to have an affair, how to know if you're

00:01:12.880 forming an inappropriate friendship that could lead to infidelity, Andrew's seven deadly sins of bad

00:01:17.100 communication, and more. We also talk about the practices that healthy couples use to ward off

00:01:21.200 infidelity, and the best question to ask yourself to start improving your relationship today.

00:01:26.200 After the show's over, check out our show notes at aom.is slash infidelityformula.

00:01:42.980 All right, Andrew G. Marshall, welcome to the show.

00:01:46.360 It's a great pleasure to be here.

00:01:48.000 So you're a marriage counselor, and you've written several books on infidelity. I'm curious,

00:01:53.140 based on your experience as a marriage counselor, how many of the couples that you work with

00:01:57.760 come to you because they're dealing with the fallout of an affair?

00:02:02.080 Well, I've been doing this for 35 years, and infidelity has changed a lot. Basically,

00:02:08.420 my clients used to fall into two categories. About 50% of them were coming because one partner had said,

00:02:15.220 I love you, but I'm not in love with you. And then the other half came because of affairs.

00:02:20.680 More recently, I've moved to Germany. And here in Berlin, I'm getting a slightly different cross

00:02:26.280 section of people. And I'm getting younger people as well, because it's a much younger city than

00:02:31.300 London, where I used to work. And often, it's about how to communicate better. So it's almost like

00:02:37.000 stages you go through. If you don't actually resolve better communication, one person tends to fall out

00:02:42.760 of love. And if you don't solve the fact that one person has fallen out of love, generally,

00:02:48.580 the relationship becomes much, much more vulnerable to an affair.

00:02:52.240 Yeah, I'd like to flesh that out more, because you have this formula that you've developed about

00:02:55.360 what leads to an affair. But before we get more into the specifics, what do you think is at the

00:03:01.240 root of the prevalence of infidelity in general?

00:03:04.620 I think we take love for granted. We feel that when we fall in love, it's like sort of entering

00:03:11.600 into a new building. And once you're in that building, only if it burns down will you come

00:03:16.180 out of it. But we sort of know very little about love. We don't want to look at it too much,

00:03:22.840 because we're frightened that we might spoil the magic. And with that special connection,

00:03:28.000 this sacred connection almost, we think we've got all what we need. But we need to put the work in.

00:03:33.880 We need skills. We need to know how to communicate effectively. And we need to know the things that

00:03:42.120 kills love. And the first and most important one is that we put our work over everything else.

00:03:48.200 And this one's a controversial one, but we put our children before our relationship. We think

00:03:52.780 the children should come first. But no, the children sit in the success of the relationship. So you need

00:03:59.060 to put the relationship first to really look after your children. And we sort of put our phones before

00:04:04.440 our partners. How many times you've been in a restaurant, and there's a couple, and they're both

00:04:08.520 sitting there looking at their phones. So we don't know the skills. And we sort of take love for

00:04:13.960 granted. Oh, and on our phones, there's 1,001 ways of connecting with somebody else without our partner

00:04:21.480 knowing. I mean, when I first started, if you wanted to have an affair, you used to have to phone

00:04:27.220 people from phone boxes. You know, nobody had a personal telephone. If you wanted to write to

00:04:32.500 them, you'd have to put a note through their door. Now, all the time, you're getting thousands of

00:04:37.960 messages. It could be from your bank. It could be from your lover.

00:04:42.560 Okay, so infidelity is very common because people just assume when they get married that that's it.

00:04:46.980 They're done. They've done it. They're set. Let's talk about this. Like, are there differences

00:04:51.720 between men and women when it comes to infidelity? Well, I mean, traditionally, men are looking for

00:04:58.740 sex and women are looking for love. And that's a lot to do with how both men and women are actually

00:05:04.560 socialized differently. But actually, underneath it, we're looking for the same thing. We want to

00:05:11.240 feel alive. We want to feel connected to our partner. So there's no difference. I mean,

00:05:16.660 in your practice, was a male more likely to commit adultery, same as a woman?

00:05:23.660 Well, when people try and ask, you know, do more men cheat than women, you have to remember,

00:05:28.660 who are these people cheating with? The vast majority of men cheat with women.

00:05:35.000 So, and most of the time, it's another couple. So effectively, there are two relationships in crisis.

00:05:42.200 Yes, there are single women who will have a short-term dalliance sometimes with a married 1.00

00:05:48.520 man. But generally, single women have actually realized that it's a bit of a dead end. And so, 0.72

00:05:54.020 most of them are not that stupid. Generally, people have affairs out of desperation. And 0.99

00:05:59.100 generally, you've got a desperate wife and a desperate husband. They just belong to different

00:06:04.700 people.

00:06:05.180 I thought that one of the things in your books, you highlight case studies from your practice.

00:06:09.980 And of course, you change the names and everything. But I was surprised the number of

00:06:13.400 affairs that happened between couple friends, right? So it's like, the husband had an affair with the

00:06:19.220 best friend of his wife, who's also married.

00:06:23.340 Yes, that's incredibly common. And I think that the difference between men and women that is actually

00:06:30.720 really interesting is that women, when they're feeling that their relationship is in a very dark

00:06:36.420 place, generally are more likely to say, I've had enough. And we know from statistics, it's far more

00:06:42.320 women who initiate divorce than men. But men, because they are more likely to outsource their emotions to

00:06:51.400 a woman, are likely to line up another woman before they leave. So if a man is going to end a 1.00

00:06:58.960 relationship, unfortunately, more times than not, there's either a woman who actually he's having

00:07:04.700 an affair with, or what sometimes people call overlap of relationships. So he has effectively

00:07:11.200 left the relationship, he just hasn't told his wife. So they tend to line somebody up, whereas women 1.00

00:07:17.040 generally tend to say, I've had enough, I'm going to have some time to reassess, see what I want,

00:07:22.740 before starting on another relationship. So often when a woman ends a relationship, it's sort of much 0.99

00:07:28.080 tidier than the way the man ends it. And that generally makes for a better relationship the

00:07:34.160 next time around. Well, let's talk about this. Is there an age when people are more likely to have

00:07:39.860 an affair? I think that ending up seeing a marriage counselor tend to be two particular phases. It's 0.70

00:07:47.380 when you have very small children, and when your children are teenagers. And why are those the two

00:07:54.820 particularly dangerous times? When you've got a woman after she's given birth, all of her hormones 1.00

00:08:02.440 goes into bonding with the child. It generally takes about 18 months for that to return to normal.

00:08:11.200 And what is the age difference most people have between their children? About two years. So almost as

00:08:19.340 soon as their hormones are back together in a normal kind of way, then they've got the second child. 0.54

00:08:25.700 And during this time, women are available for sex, but they're not going to feel spontaneously horny. 0.96

00:08:31.900 They've actually got to be wooed and persuaded to make love. At this point, a lot of men feel that 0.59

00:08:40.380 their wives are not interested in them anymore. It's not that they're not interested. They just don't

00:08:45.820 know how to recruit them. So two children under five is an incredibly difficult time for people's

00:08:51.660 sex lives, and that can lead to an affair. And the next time is when the children are teenagers,

00:08:57.020 because it sort of reminds the parents unconsciously of the fact that they're getting old. They're feeling

00:09:04.860 less vibrant. They're heading towards midlife and the changes that come there. And instead of

00:09:12.920 actually dealing with those, instead of answering the difficult questions like, who am I? What do I

00:09:18.260 want to do with the rest of my life? They answer an easy question. And an easy question is, do I fancy

00:09:23.880 the woman sitting next to me at work? And they tend to have affairs at that point as well. 1.00

00:09:28.900 So the teenage years, you're going to be probably late 40s, early 50s, likely.

00:09:34.160 Yeah, that's the sweet spot for an affair or a sweet spot for a really serious affair.

00:09:39.240 Okay. So there's two points in your life, Sam, where you're most susceptible to an affair right

00:09:44.580 after the kids are born, and then when they become teenagers. Let's talk about this. In your work

00:09:49.140 and with dealing with people who are dealing with affairs, you've developed this formula

00:09:54.040 for what causes an affair. What is that formula?

00:09:58.740 It's problem plus poor communication plus temptation equals an affair. And the problem

00:10:05.920 is often an individual problem. Sometimes it might be something that you're very aware of,

00:10:13.860 like you've had a knock in your confidence from losing a job. It could be something that actually

00:10:20.300 you're unconscious of and is actually beginning to sort of build up unknown to you. So, for example,

00:10:27.300 your father left when you were eight or nine years old. And when your own children get to that age,

00:10:36.280 it unconsciously brings back all of those kinds of issues of abandonment and pain. And rather than

00:10:45.660 actually being aware of those feelings coming up and actually thinking about doing something about them,

00:10:50.580 that unconsciously you are going to do exactly what your father did. So, the problems can be personal,

00:10:59.240 and they can be conscious and unconscious. It could also be relationship problems. It could be that

00:11:04.840 there are unresolved issues in the couple. You know, they can't talk about money, for example.

00:11:09.940 I mean, that it can be a shared problem, but often it's an individual problem. Or in fact,

00:11:14.560 actually, both people have problems that aren't actually being dealt with, and they're turning up

00:11:20.500 in nasty fights between the two of them. If you have a problem and you and your partner can talk

00:11:26.900 about it, then it's going to be resolved. You know, if, for example, the problem is you have a dull or

00:11:34.860 non-existent sex life, if you had good communication, you could actually say,

00:11:40.060 you know what, honey, I'm a little unhappy about our sex life. How are you feeling about it? Would

00:11:46.560 you like it to be better? And then you could sort of possibly do something about it. But if you can't

00:11:52.100 communicate, all of these problems go underground. And then you've just got to have a little bit of

00:11:57.580 temptation coming along, and you've got an affair. In your practice, what have been the most common

00:12:03.460 problems at the root of most affairs?

00:12:05.460 Well, I think you're going to like this answer because I know you're a Thoreau fan. The mass of

00:12:12.820 men lead lives of quiet desperation, and the mass of women lead lives of quiet desperation. And 0.97

00:12:18.660 what is often called resignation is confirmed desperation. So, you know, what is this quiet

00:12:25.980 desperation? We sort of don't, we feel that we're not being seen. We feel that we're not attractive.

00:12:33.000 We sometimes actually feel that we're not truly alive. We might be angry, or we feel controlled.

00:12:41.580 You know, these are the sort of surface kind of things. But somehow deep inside us, there's a

00:12:46.400 feeling of deadness. And instead of actually thinking, why am I feeling dead? And, you know,

00:12:53.080 the answers might be spiritual, it might be professional, it might be all sorts of things.

00:12:58.820 But we look for a connection. And the sort of, our culture says the answer is love. You know,

00:13:08.780 listen to all the popular songs, love will build a bridge, love is the answer, love will save the day.

00:13:14.560 You know, it's easy, you find love, and all problems magically melt away. So we've got quiet

00:13:21.960 desperation, a feeling of deadness, wanting connection, and our society is pushing love as

00:13:28.380 the answer.

00:13:30.360 And how do you figure, like, how does a couple figure that out? Like, let's say they're, you

00:13:35.060 know, someone's recognizing, I'm on the path to, I mean, I'm looking, I'm feeling this quiet

00:13:39.380 desperation, I want to maybe spice things up. Or maybe they're in the throes of it, and they're

00:13:43.440 trying to figure out, like, what happened? Like, how do you, how do you figure that out,

00:13:46.540 especially when the source of the problem could be hidden or buried?

00:13:52.640 I think you need to look at what have been the most difficult parts of your life. You know,

00:13:59.280 go back, you know, what sort of relationship did your parents have? What sort of relationships did

00:14:06.760 you have with your parents? What was your very first ever memory? Because sometimes those actually

00:14:14.480 holds the key to what's going to be issues for us further on. If you, your first memory is actually

00:14:20.900 of being abandoned, you know, that might actually give you some clues about what's going on. I think

00:14:27.360 you have to think possibly about getting therapy, talking to somebody, talk to your friends as well

00:14:33.880 about, you know, what they discovered about their marriages. I mean, I think this is the big problem

00:14:40.240 that men have. We're not socialised to ask for help. We don't actually talk to our friends about

00:14:46.420 anything beyond football and, you know, sending jokes, and we might talk about politics a little

00:14:51.700 bit. But you don't actually talk openly and honestly about your relationship. Women talk about 1.00

00:14:58.860 these things all the time. They learn from each other. The number of women who contact me for help 0.99

00:15:04.340 versus the number of men that contact me for help, it's like 80% of people who speak to me are

00:15:10.840 women. Only 20% are men. So get more friends. I think that's always my advice to men, you know,

00:15:18.760 get more friends. Start talking to your friends in a different kind of way. I had a male client who was

00:15:27.720 going through a sort of midlife crisis. And he was going back to, I think it was his 20th, 25th

00:15:35.660 anniversary of college breaking up. And I said, you know, at this reunion, will you tell your friends

00:15:43.760 from college days that you're actually having, you've got a therapist and you're looking into,

00:15:48.660 you know, why have I got a life of quiet desperation? And he said, hmm, that's an interesting idea.

00:15:54.120 Maybe I will. And do you know what happened? What happened? Well, every last one of his friends,

00:16:02.640 bar one, were also in therapy as well. The one person who wasn't in therapy, they all agreed

00:16:07.780 should have been in therapy. But it takes one person to say it, and then suddenly everybody's

00:16:14.620 saying it. Yeah, this idea about male friendship, I thought that was interesting. You made this,

00:16:19.340 you've noted in your practice, you've made an observation that men who don't have a solid group

00:16:25.540 of male friends are more likely to have an affair than men who have good male friendships. And that's

00:16:32.240 just because they've got someone to talk to? Yeah, because if you start talking to somebody about

00:16:38.380 emotions, you get closer to them. If it's your male buddy, that is absolutely wonderful.

00:16:45.200 If it's the woman sitting next to you at work, that can be incredibly dangerous. Because I've said 0.98

00:16:51.860 this before, and I think it's worth saying again, men outsource their emotional welfare to women.

00:16:57.920 You know, when they're young, it's their mother, then it's their girlfriend, then it's their wife.

00:17:02.300 Now, what do you do if you've got problems with your wife? 0.70

00:17:05.760 Right, and then you find an office wife. It's basically a co-worker. And you first, 0.81

00:17:10.620 it's just sort of like you keep it professional, but then you're like, well, you come in, you're

00:17:15.040 looking like dejected. And she's like, what's going on? It's like, well, and then you start

00:17:17.740 unloading the problems. And that's when things can go awry.

00:17:21.420 Yep. Or she's unloading her problems, and you can become the knight in shining armor and rescue her

00:17:27.240 from it. And then you immediately feel brilliant. So that you're the savior. It's the same dynamic,

00:17:33.240 it's just the opposite way around.

00:17:35.640 Well, and similar to this idea of, you know, and the importance of having male friendships,

00:17:38.580 so you can talk to your, you know, if you're having marital problems, you can talk to them

00:17:41.600 instead of confiding into a woman who could be potentially an affair partner. You have this

00:17:47.120 idea about inappropriate friendships. And this has become, this is something that's harder in this

00:17:51.540 day and age. And if you ask this question 150 years ago, most people, they had homosocial 0.75

00:17:57.700 relationships, right? Just men were friends with men, women were friends, there's like two separate 0.64

00:18:01.580 domains. But now, men and women can be friends.

00:18:05.080 Which is wonderful.

00:18:05.760 Yeah, which is great. But sometimes those friendships can become inappropriate. How do

00:18:09.800 you define an inappropriate friendship?

00:18:12.340 Well, an inappropriate friendship is one that you can't actually have in the full daylight.

00:18:18.320 If you're off and you're going to watch rugby together, that's a very English example. If you're

00:18:25.280 going off to watch sport together, that's perfectly acceptable. And, you know, if anybody else wanted

00:18:31.060 to come along, that would be fine. The minute you actually have to start lying about where

00:18:36.600 you've been, you know, you've been to lunch together for the 15th time at work with another

00:18:41.700 woman, the minute that nobody can actually look in on this event, the minute you are actually

00:18:48.800 crossing over between, you know, I saw X today, and we had lunch together, and we talked about

00:18:56.720 why. If you can't have that conversation, you are actually lying to yourself. Most people

00:19:04.060 who end up having affairs are lying to themselves about actually how serious it's getting. You

00:19:09.700 know, they sort of tell themselves things like, oh, you know, we're just friends. But they actually

00:19:15.000 know that it's more than that. Once you're actually lying about what you're doing, you are in a danger

00:19:23.660 zone, you are having an inappropriate friendship. If you can't invite them home to the family

00:19:30.820 barbecue, they're in an appropriate friends. We're going to take a quick break for your word

00:19:35.880 from our sponsors. And now back to the show. Okay, so there's always a problem at the start

00:19:44.740 of an affair. And usually it's this quiet desperation. People just don't feel alive. They don't feel

00:19:49.000 appreciated. They don't feel loved. And because they can't communicate with their spouse, they'll

00:19:53.900 go to someone else. And for men, that's usually another woman, because they don't have good male 1.00

00:19:58.180 friendships, or they don't feel like they can talk about their problems with their buds.

00:20:02.320 Let's talk about this communication aspect between a couple. Like, what is the communication problem?

00:20:07.780 Is it like they're just not talking at all? Or is it they just kind of snip at each other? Like,

00:20:11.580 what is stopping people typically from talking about these problems?

00:20:15.400 Okay, I've got seven deadly sins of bad communication. So count up how many of these

00:20:21.260 you do, Brett. I'm right and you're wrong. I mean, I can't tell you how many hours couples can argue 0.99

00:20:28.220 this one about. And I've just reached the point where I was saying we're just having another game

00:20:33.320 of I'm right and you're wrong. You're never ever going to win this. So let's stop.

00:20:38.460 Number two, trying to control your partner. It's not trying to get them to do this or that,

00:20:44.460 but it's the sort of I'll be okay if you do X, Y, Z. So if you give me more sex, I'll be okay. 0.91

00:20:52.260 Or if you don't keep on on and on and about that problem, I'll be okay. You're trying to get your 0.98

00:20:57.620 partner to behave in a particular way. The next one, and this is one that is less likely to happen

00:21:05.460 from men than from women. This is called unbridled self-expression. So what do I mean by that?

00:21:12.840 I had a female client who said to me, but I should be able to tell my husband how I feel.

00:21:21.680 And of course she should be able to, but not at any time in the same way that it's like men saying,

00:21:29.300 well, you know, we're married. I have the right to have sexual intercourse. You know, 0.95

00:21:34.540 women think they have the right to unload their feelings, but you have to ask for sex. 1.00

00:21:42.580 You have to check that your partner is in the right mood. You have to woo them to get them into

00:21:49.000 the right mood. And with unbridled self-expression, you're just dumping your feelings. You're not

00:21:55.020 saying, can we talk? Is this a good time? It's just bleh. Obviously we've got the opposite one,

00:22:00.820 which is the one that men tend to do a lot, which is called shutting down. And this might be

00:22:07.080 leaving the room. It might be mentally switching off. It might be stonewalling,

00:22:12.980 but you are shutting down the communication. This is a really horrible one, but people retaliate.

00:22:20.220 You know, you did this and therefore I'm going to do that. One I see a lot is judging. And then you

00:22:28.920 analyse your partner and tell them what they're doing wrong. And I promise you telling your partner

00:22:34.340 what they're doing wrong is not going to get them to say, oh yes, you're right. They tend to get

00:22:38.860 defensive. And then you go on the attack and you can see we're back into I'm right and you're wrong.

00:22:45.220 And the final one of the seven deadly sins is making assumptions. You know, my wife doesn't 1.00

00:22:52.200 want to have sex with me because she doesn't love me anymore. Well, it might be that you're asking for 1.00

00:22:58.460 it in all the wrong way that's turning her off. It's not that she doesn't want to, it's just you're

00:23:02.880 making it incredibly difficult for her to say yes. But that's an assumption. I'm always getting my

00:23:08.820 clients to, I say, stop making assumptions, turn that into a question. And I'd much rather it was an

00:23:16.960 open, curious question like, why don't we make love anymore? But if it has to be, do you still fancy

00:23:24.180 me? That's much better than the problem is you don't fancy me. And where do these poor communication

00:23:30.740 habits come from? Is it just from childhoods? Like this is where you grew up communicating like

00:23:34.700 this? You just bring it to your relationship, your marriage? Well, I think we've got several

00:23:39.620 problems. First and foremost, most of our parents were not particularly good at communicating. You

00:23:45.600 know, I came from a family where nothing was ever spoken about. What a surprise I became a marital

00:23:52.100 therapist. Other people have parents that argue like cat and dog, or even worse, they argued like

00:23:59.320 cat and dog, and then one of them left. So there was actually, they never saw good communication.

00:24:05.060 We're not taught how to do it at school either. So, you know, how are we going to get it? Is it going

00:24:10.320 to be beamed down from space to us? No, yeah. Well, you have to, you have to, it's hard. You have to

00:24:15.500 learn how to do it. And it's, it's like any other skill. I mean, it is really hard. You know,

00:24:20.340 somebody tells you that they're upset. And we live in a culture that says, you know,

00:24:25.000 if your partner tells you they're upset, it's your job to put it right. But no, you know,

00:24:31.520 you're not responsible for rescuing your partner. What you are responsible for, and if you can just

00:24:37.760 do this, your life will be transformed, is you've just got to listen to them. It's as simple as that.

00:24:44.200 You can reflect back. So you're saying you're unhappy because the children are impossible,

00:24:51.560 for example. Tell me more. I mean, tell me more are the three most loving words in the English

00:24:57.920 language, because it's very easy to, to say, I love you. But when your partner is unhappy,

00:25:06.660 and you're saying, tell me more about it, that's a really difficult thing to do.

00:25:10.940 Yeah. Ask them curious questions. You know, why do you think our children are so difficult at the

00:25:16.980 moment? What is it? What's going on, do you think? You don't have to come up with a solution.

00:25:23.740 But unfortunately, and I think men are particularly prone to do this, if their wives tell them about a

00:25:29.440 problem, they immediately feel responsible. And they either try and cut the problem down to size

00:25:35.440 and minimize it. And I promise you that will not be very popular. Or they will just throw their

00:25:42.420 hands up and think, oh, I can't do anything, and they'll shut down. But all you have to do is listen.

00:25:49.300 Yeah, I think that's why, as you said, like a lot of people, the problems that can lead to an affair,

00:25:53.700 they're multifaceted. But at the root of it, it's probably like people just want to feel appreciated

00:25:57.860 and noticed. And they're not getting that in their marriage. And so they go somewhere else,

00:26:02.360 I think they're going to get it there. And I think I was surprised the number of instances where,

00:26:06.140 you know, yeah, a man left because he felt like he wasn't getting the sex he wanted in the marriage.

00:26:10.880 But what he talked about was like, well, I just feel like I get so much attention from the other

00:26:16.060 woman. People just want to feel appreciated and noticed. Yeah. And I mean, one of the incredibly sad

00:26:24.300 things is often how much attention is going to the children and how little attention people give to

00:26:33.820 their partner. They become, you know, co-parents rather than lovers. And that is a recipe for

00:26:42.780 disaster. Okay, so there's a problem. People can't talk about the problem and that the problem just

00:26:49.420 festers. And then along comes the temptation. What are the typical temptations that you've seen in

00:26:54.960 your practice? Well, we've covered quite a few of them. You know, somebody tells you you're wonderful.

00:27:00.920 And if at home, you're either being ignored or you're being told that you're messy and inconsiderate

00:27:06.460 and everything else like that, sort of all your desire just sparks up. If you feel that your life is

00:27:14.960 a complete and utter mess, I mean, the hardest thing to solve is your own problem. Somebody else's

00:27:19.700 problem is a piece of cake. So, you know, there's somebody who's crying at work and the easiest thing

00:27:25.080 to do is to listen to them and feel empowered. And that is incredibly tempting. I mean, the alcohol is

00:27:32.720 another temptation, you know, have alcohol and your judgment goes out of the window. Another thing that's

00:27:39.300 been thrown into the mix over the last 35 years is the amount of street drugs, you know, social drugs

00:27:46.820 that are used, cocaine and various other things. A lot of my clients have problems because they're

00:27:53.280 going out, they're drinking a huge amount, they're taking cocaine as well, they're coming home at four

00:27:59.560 o'clock in the morning, they forget my golden rule, nothing good happens after three o'clock in the

00:28:04.440 morning, go home. Temptation is all around when you get into that situation. And how have smartphones

00:28:11.580 changed the game? Oh, well, number one, you know, you've got a thousand one dating apps, there are

00:28:18.440 millions of women waiting to meet you. You know, they sometimes don't even wait for you to contact 1.00

00:28:23.760 them. You know, there's women from Russia contacting you to tell you how wonderful you are. I mean, that

00:28:29.600 smartphones, on one level, they've revolutionized the help and support after infidelity, it's much

00:28:36.060 easier to get hold of support and information that, you know, we're powering up in the marital

00:28:41.760 therapy world. But the cheating world is being super powered as well. Like what is the role? I mean,

00:28:49.240 I guess one thing that's happened in the past 10 years is like these like, like only fans, right? Where

00:28:55.100 it's like, you know, you can sign up and like follow these people because they, they talk to you,

00:29:01.080 but then they do like provocative things. Has that been an issue you've seen in your clients?

00:29:06.340 I haven't had people with just fans, but there, I get a lot of people who've been to massage parlors

00:29:13.760 and their partners have found out and there's a, what's called a happy ending and the prostitution,

00:29:20.460 that's very big as well. It's gone from being 35 years ago. If somebody came to me and they were

00:29:27.080 seeing prostitutes, you know, I would be quite surprised. Now, you know, I just take a deep breath. 1.00

00:29:33.080 So I would say that generally infidelity is getting more toxic.

00:29:38.440 Well, another interesting thing you pointed about the smartphones is that it makes having an affair

00:29:42.580 easier, right? Because there's, you can access temptations. It's all around you 24 seven,

00:29:47.160 but then it also makes it easier to discover the affair because you leave behind an electronic paper

00:29:53.960 trail. Yeah. And your wife at the moment might be not at all tech savvy, but I promise you that the

00:30:02.660 FBI has got nothing on a wife who thinks their partner has had an affair. She will find every last 0.92

00:30:10.980 message. She will read every last message. When she's in a dark place, she will reread those,

00:30:18.340 those words that you casually said, you know, you're the most wonderful person in the world

00:30:22.880 because you thought, well, this might help me facilitate a bit of nookie. That is going to be

00:30:29.380 brought back as evidence in the cold, hard light of day. I promise you, you will be discovered.

00:30:36.060 Your credit card is leaving messages. Your phone, they know where you are every step of the way.

00:30:44.260 Everything will be found out. It is impossible to have an affair without being found out. I have

00:30:50.100 people who are discovered 20 years later through various means, and it's just as devastating if it

00:30:58.180 happened 20 years ago than if it happened 20 minutes ago. You will be found out.

00:31:02.900 Okay. So when it comes to affair, this formula, again, it's problem plus poor communication plus

00:31:08.180 temptation equals affair. So that can like, what I like about that formula, it gives you different

00:31:12.880 ways you can tackle the issue or to prevent an affair in the first place. One, if there's a

00:31:17.940 problem, you got to learn how to talk about it, right? And focus on improving your communication.

00:31:23.140 And I think this is really important for men. You've actually got to recognize and own up to it.

00:31:28.060 We live in a world where we're lone wolves. We've got to solve it ourselves. And you don't,

00:31:35.740 you know, you can ask for help. You know, if you're feeling that quiet desperation,

00:31:41.480 look inside and try and find out what it's about. And if you're not used to looking inside,

00:31:47.800 get some training on how to look inside. You will find a thousand and, you know, and if therapy isn't for

00:31:53.960 you, there'll be a thousand and one podcasts that will actually get you thinking about your

00:32:00.360 relationship. And as you hear other people talking about their stuff, it will suddenly make you begin

00:32:05.860 to think about, hmm, yes, that sounds familiar and will give you a path to start going down.

00:32:12.760 And then the other part of the temptation part, if you are going through a rough patch

00:32:15.960 in your relationship, like be aware of that, maybe reduce temptations in your life.

00:32:20.180 Would that be something to do?

00:32:22.620 Yes. I mean, look at your alcohol consumption, for example. You know, if you're in a dark place,

00:32:28.960 don't go down to slippery places because, you know, you will slide straight into a brick wall.

00:32:36.240 I'm curious. So we've been talking about when marriages go wrong. Let's talk about best

00:32:40.720 practices in healthy marriages. Like what are the, what you've seen in your experience that help keep

00:32:46.380 the temptation of infidelity at bay? Like what do healthy marriages look like? 0.94

00:32:50.180 Well, if you're in a healthy marriage, rather than saying my problems are you need to do this,

00:32:57.020 that, and the other, the sort of you, you, you, I can, you can almost imagine me pointing my finger.

00:33:03.420 You ask this question, and this is the most beautiful question. You're probably going to hear

00:33:08.000 today. What can I do differently? Because ultimately the only person we can change is ourself.

00:33:15.420 So what could I do differently is a really interesting question because generally,

00:33:21.940 if I ask people in unhealthy marriages, what they could do differently, they sort of are shocked and

00:33:27.620 they shut up. If I asked them, what could your partner do differently? You know, I have to shut

00:33:32.600 them up because they're going to go on for the next 40 minutes. We've, we've got a huge list of what

00:33:38.220 our partner could do differently. A very small one of what we could do differently. And then this is

00:33:44.940 probably the core of good communication. And I have a saying, and if most of my clients end up being

00:33:53.640 drilled on this one, so I'll give this one to you for free. I can ask, you can say no, and we can

00:34:00.340 communicate. And the problem is a lot of people were never trained to actually ask. They will hint

00:34:08.000 or they will hope, you know, if I do lots of nice things to you, you will somehow guess what it is I

00:34:13.000 want. But to say, can we have an early night tonight and it's just going to be you and I,

00:34:20.080 and we're going to have a bath and we're going to relax and we're going to have time together.

00:34:23.880 That can be really hard to ask for because we're terrified of getting a no. So can you ask,

00:34:33.000 can you say no? And this is quite surprising. A lot of people find it really difficult to say no

00:34:41.340 to their partner. If they want something, you sort of feel you've got to give it to them.

00:34:47.000 And, you know, it's lovely to say yes to your partner, but if you're saying yes,

00:34:50.820 and it's actually costing you every time. I had a couple where the wife wanted to go

00:34:57.380 to her sister's every Christmas Eve and the husband wanted to stay home and just have a

00:35:05.760 Christmas Eve together, particularly as they would be seeing his sister-in-law and all her family the

00:35:11.680 next day on Christmas Day as well, when they'd be coming to their house. And every year it hurt him

00:35:19.740 a little bit more, but he couldn't actually say no. Guess when this all came out? After it had the

00:35:25.600 affair. So can you say no? And can you negotiate? Couples don't know how to negotiate often. You know,

00:35:35.520 they're actually trying to fight all the time for who is right and who is wrong. Can you negotiate?

00:35:41.160 Can you do a trade? Can you find a compromise? Once again, these are skills we don't know,

00:35:47.260 but if you're in a well-functioning marriage, you can ask, your partner can say no, and then you can

00:35:53.100 negotiate. So back to my first request of, can we have a night where we're going to have a nice early

00:35:58.860 night and a bath and spend time together? You know, you can say, actually, no, I'm really tired, but

00:36:04.140 let's put it in the diary and do it tomorrow. And we've got a good piece of communication.

00:36:10.300 So it sounds like just learn how to be an adult, basically. Like engage with each other as an

00:36:16.720 adult. Because I think oftentimes people kind of are in kid mode when they, instead of wanting to

00:36:20.320 ask what they want, they just kind of expect people to know what they want. Sort of like a parent

00:36:25.220 knew what you needed, right?

00:36:27.460 Yeah. One of the things that people have discovered post-COVID, and they've actually seen their partner,

00:36:33.300 you know, in Zoom meetings, they've actually seen, they're really nice to people at work.

00:36:39.300 They're just horrible. They bring their worst person back home. Because somebody loves us,

00:36:45.420 they've got to put up with all of our, you know, bad behavior and our poor communication,

00:36:49.880 and we're tired and we don't put so much effort into it. So yeah, you've got to show up with your

00:36:55.840 best part of you. Of course, not all the time, but you know, if your partner gets the worst of you,

00:37:02.080 it's not going to make for a good marriage in the long term.

00:37:06.240 Well, Andrew, this has been a great conversation. Where can people go to learn more about your work?

00:37:10.860 Right. I have a podcast, which is called The Meaningful Life with Andrew G. Marshall,

00:37:16.040 which is all about trying to understand what makes life meaningful. And for a lot of people,

00:37:20.700 that's relationships. And so we cover relationships a huge amount, but you know, we also cover work and

00:37:28.580 friendship and all sorts of other things. But often the skills for one area are transferable to

00:37:33.960 another area. I have a website, which is www.andrewgmarshall.com, where you'll find

00:37:40.940 details of my books. And on this one, we've got, why did I cheat? This is for people who've been

00:37:47.460 unfaithful. How can I ever trust you again? This is if your partner has cheated. If you've got a really

00:37:54.820 serious long-term problem, I can't get over my partner's affair. There's another book that you'll

00:38:01.200 find interesting. I love you, but I'm not in love with you. I'm also on Twitter and Facebook. And

00:38:08.140 do you know Substack? Yes.

00:38:10.680 I have a Substack account. That one's called The Meaningful Life. And join that and you get a

00:38:16.820 fortnightly newsletter. All right. Well, Andrew G. Marshall, thanks for his time. It's been a pleasure.

00:38:21.420 It has been a pleasure for me as well, Brett.

00:38:24.820 My guest name is Andrew G. Marshall. He's a marriage therapist who's written several books

00:38:28.360 about marriage and relationships and infidelity, including the book, Why Did I Cheat? They're all

00:38:32.660 available on amazon.com. You can find more information about his work at his website,

00:38:36.180 andrewgmarshall.com. Also check out his podcast, The Meaningful Life with Andrew G. Marshall.

00:38:40.780 And check out our show notes at aom.is slash infidelityformula,

00:38:44.280 where you can find links to resources, where you can delve deeper into this topic.

00:38:51.420 Well, that wraps up another edition of the AOM Podcast. Make sure to check out our website at

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00:39:30.140 I'm Brett McKay. Remind you on the List They Win Podcast, but put what you've heard into action.

The Art of Manliness - November 16, 2022

The Infidelity Formula

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