Speaker 1: The people who have failed you the most are not strangers.
Speaker 1: They are those who once wore to always be there
Speaker 1: for you, your friends, your family, those people in whom
Speaker 1: you placed all your faith, all your heart, all your vulnerability.
Speaker 1: The blow did not come from the world. It came
Speaker 1: from within, and that precisely that is what hurts the most.
Speaker 1: Have you noticed that the more you expect from someone,
Speaker 1: the more they disappoint you. That the more you give,
Speaker 1: the less value it seems to have. And here comes
Speaker 1: the brutal truth no one wants to accept. It's not
Speaker 1: that they are cruel, it's that you expected too much.
Speaker 1: We live trapped in a fantasy. We were raised to
Speaker 1: believe that family bonds are sacred, the true friendship is eternal,
Speaker 1: that if you give love, you will receive love. But
Speaker 1: that is nothing more than an illusion. Schopenhauer said it
Speaker 1: without anesthesia. Human beings are selfish by nature, not because
Speaker 1: they are evil, but because their priority will always be
Speaker 1: their own well being, and that, when you understand it
Speaker 1: changes everything. Think about how many times you have been
Speaker 1: forgotten just when you needed someone the most. How many
Speaker 1: times you have broken into a thousand pieces holding someone
Speaker 1: up who would never hold you how many times you
Speaker 1: confused utility with affection, because that's what we do. We
Speaker 1: believe that as long as they stay, it's because they
Speaker 1: love us. But in reality, most people stay as long
Speaker 1: as you are useful to them, and when you stop
Speaker 1: being being useful, they disappear without looking back. The problem
Speaker 1: is not with them. The problem is in what you expected,
Speaker 1: in that invisible contract you signed without them knowing they
Speaker 1: will be there for me because I was there for them. Lieutenant,
Speaker 1: there are no guarantees in the human heart. There is
Speaker 1: no emotional justice, no guaranteed reciprocity, and yet you remain
Speaker 1: attached to that illusion, waiting for messages that don't come,
Speaker 1: calls that never happen, words that will never be spoken.
Speaker 1: You hold on to the memories as if they were promises.
Speaker 1: But memories are just that, shadows of what was, not,
Speaker 1: certainties of what will be. Schopenhauer had a devastating but
Speaker 1: accurate image the dilemma of the hedgehogs. Two hedgehogs in
Speaker 1: winter seeking warmth. If they get too close, they hurt
Speaker 1: each other with their own spines. If they move too
Speaker 1: far apart, they die from the cold. Human relationships are
Speaker 1: like that Getting close is painful. Moving away is mortally lonely.
Speaker 1: So what's the solution finding the right distance? Not the
Speaker 1: one of blind passion, not the one of complete detachment,
Speaker 1: the one of prudence, the one of lucidity, And that
Speaker 1: lucidity starts with one decision. Reduce your expectations, not as
Speaker 1: an act of resignation, but as an act of power,
Speaker 1: because the one who expects the least is least disappointed,
Speaker 1: and the one who is least disappointed lives freer. Emotional
Speaker 1: self sufficiency is not coldness. Its protection. Its understanding that
Speaker 1: no one is obligated to save you, and because of
Speaker 1: that you learn to save yourself. It's stopping the habit
Speaker 1: of handing over the steering wheel of your peace to others.
Speaker 1: It's accepting that you can love without depending, care, without begging, share,
Speaker 1: without losing yourself. Society sold us a dangerous myth that
Speaker 1: happiness is in others, That you need a tribe, a partner,
Speaker 1: a circle, a family. But no one told you that
Speaker 1: those same people can be the source of your greatest anguish,
Speaker 1: that your bonds can also be chains. Has it never
Speaker 1: happened to you wanting to distance yourself from someone who
Speaker 1: hurts you, but you can't because it's your blood. Guilt
Speaker 1: ties you, duty ties you, the shared history ties you.
Speaker 1: But blood is not reason enough to allow suffering. The
Speaker 1: real bond is not imposed, it's built, and if it's
Speaker 1: not built, it falls apart by itself. You need to
Speaker 1: start looking at relationships with different eyes, not as sacred sanctuaries,
Speaker 1: but as human exchanges, natural, temporary, fallible. Stop idealizing, Stop
Speaker 1: expecting what you would give, because most of the pain
Speaker 1: is born right there in comparing what you do with
Speaker 1: what you receive. And no, it's not about becoming cynical,
Speaker 1: nor about stopping loving. It's about loving with intelligence, giving
Speaker 1: without mortgaging yourself, wanting without annihilating yourself. Because when you
Speaker 1: understand that human nature is not evil but selfish, you
Speaker 1: begin to see the game clearly and you can protect yourself.
Speaker 1: Think about all those times someone walked away without explanation.
Speaker 1: It hurt, yes, but what would you have done if
Speaker 1: you had known it was just a matter of time,
Speaker 1: If you hadn't expected anything, would it have hurt? The
Speaker 1: same expectation is the knife that holds disappointment. Learn to observe,
Speaker 1: to read beyond the way words people don't always say
Speaker 1: what they think, but they always act according to their interests,
Speaker 1: and that's not something to hate, it's something to understand,
Speaker 1: because in that understanding lies your freedom. Most of your
Speaker 1: emotional wounds don't come from abandonment but from attachment, not
Speaker 1: from rejection, but from the fantasy you built around someone.
Speaker 1: We idealize. We create mental versions of people, and when
Speaker 1: they don't fit that version, we feel betrayed. But in reality,
Speaker 1: they were just who they always were, the ones you
Speaker 1: didn't want to see. Accepting this is painful because it
Speaker 1: means recognizing that the responsibility for our suffering is not
Speaker 1: only external but internal, That no one broke us without
Speaker 1: our permission, that every disappointment was a lesson we refused
Speaker 1: to learn until it was too late. And yet it's
Speaker 1: also liberate, because if the pain was born from expectation,
Speaker 1: then you can heal it by changing the way you expect, or,
Speaker 1: better yet, by stopping expecting. True serenity comes when you
Speaker 1: understand that you owe nothing to anyone and no one
Speaker 1: owes you anything, that affection is given by choice, not
Speaker 1: by obligation, that gratitude doesn't always come back, that you
Speaker 1: can give and not receive, and that's okay because you
Speaker 1: gave from your truth, not from a transaction. Do you
Speaker 1: want peace, stop asking for emotional retribution. Do it for
Speaker 1: you and if the other responds, fine, and if not,
Speaker 1: also fine. Because what you do for others doesn't define
Speaker 1: you if you do it expecting a return. It defines
Speaker 1: you if you do it because it's who you are. Human.
Speaker 1: Selfishness is not an enemy to fight, it's a reality
Speaker 1: to integrate. People love from their lack. They give from
Speaker 1: their need, they move from their interest, and that doesn't
Speaker 1: make them monsters. It makes them human, just like you.
Speaker 1: Because you've also stopped calling when you no longer needed,
Speaker 1: you've also forgotten someone who once held you up. We
Speaker 1: are all villains in someone's story. And when you see that,
Speaker 1: when you really see it, you empty yourself of resentment
Speaker 1: because you understand that no one is here to fulfill
Speaker 1: your expectations, and you're not here to fulfill anyone else's.
Speaker 1: You don't have to be the perfect child, nor the
Speaker 1: ideal friend, nor the dream partner. Just you with yourself.
Speaker 1: That's the relationship you need to care for. Schopenhauer said,
Speaker 1: life is suffering, and suffering comes from desire. When you
Speaker 1: stop desiring the other to love you the way you want,
Speaker 1: you begin to see love for what it is, a
Speaker 1: momentary miracle, not an eternal promise. Then change the focus.
Speaker 1: Don't look for someone to fill your emptiness, fill it yourself.
Speaker 1: Don't look for someone to rescue you from pain, Learn
Speaker 1: to navigate it. Don't look for absolute loyalty, look for coherence,
Speaker 1: And if a bond stops nourishing, you have the courage
Speaker 1: to let it go, even if it hurts. Because the
Speaker 1: pain of the truth is always lighter than the weight
Speaker 1: of emotional lies. You may ask, what's left If I
Speaker 1: stop expecting from others, you remain Finally, you, with your silences,
Speaker 1: your emptiness, your wounds, but also with your strength, your clarity,
Speaker 1: your peace. Because an emotional self sufficiency, there is something
Speaker 1: no one can take from you. Control, control of your reactions,
Speaker 1: of your decisions, of your peace. The world won't stop
Speaker 1: to heal you. No one will come to pick you
Speaker 1: up off the floor, but you can decide not to
Speaker 1: drag yourself through affections that don't hold up. Look around,
Speaker 1: look closely. How many of your current relationships exist only
Speaker 1: out of habit? How many only work while you push,
Speaker 1: how many would survive if you stopped yielding. The answer
Speaker 1: will hurt, but it will also wake you up. Don't idealize,
Speaker 1: don't dramatize, don't beg observe, understand, and act, because freedom
Speaker 1: doesn't come when everyone loves you. It comes when you
Speaker 1: no longer need them to. And here comes the final twist,
Speaker 1: the real mystery of existence. When you stop needing others
Speaker 1: to value you, that's when they start valuing you the most.
Speaker 1: Because self sufficiency is magnetic. Peace is attractive. The one
Speaker 1: who doesn't demand seduces. The one who doesn't chase awakens curiosity.
Speaker 1: The one who doesn't cling floats, and floating is the
Speaker 1: art of living without sinking into any one. Except that
Speaker 1: not everyone cares about you, sometimes not even those you
Speaker 1: said would always be there. And still you can be fine.
Speaker 1: You can be at peace because it was never their
Speaker 1: task to hold you up. It was always yours, and
Speaker 1: now you know it. So don't lament what you didn't receive.
Speaker 1: Be grateful for what you gave, because that belongs to you,
Speaker 1: and what you give from your truth no one can
Speaker 1: take from you. Don't expect, don't idealize, don't deceive. Yourself, observe, understand,
Speaker 1: and free yourself. Reality is harsh, but it's yours, and
Speaker 1: only when you accept it does true peace begin. And
Speaker 1: if you've already accepted that no one is obligated to
Speaker 1: save you, now you must face the next level. What
Speaker 1: will you do with that essential loneliness? Because yes, what
Speaker 1: comes after abandoning expectation is a void, an uncomfortable silence
Speaker 1: that many confuse with defeat, But it isn't. It's the beginning,
Speaker 1: the zero point, where you stop being a satellite orbiting
Speaker 1: around others and become your own center of gravity. Here
Speaker 1: enters another brutal aspect that Schopenhauer touched on but few
Speaker 1: dare to face directly, the pleasure of renunciation. We're not
Speaker 1: talking about resignation. We're talking about power, learning to renounce
Speaker 1: false emotional needs that culture has instilled in you since childhood.
Speaker 1: You've been told that without constant connection, you're incomplete, That
Speaker 1: external validation is a sign of mental health, that being
Speaker 1: human means needing others. But who decided that? At what
Speaker 1: point did contact stop being a choice and become a need?
Speaker 1: This is where most people fail, because they confuse bond
Speaker 1: with dependency. Affection with addiction, closeness with control, and they
Speaker 1: end up chaining themselves to relationships that are cages decorated
Speaker 1: with flowers, people who smile while draining your energy, bonds
Speaker 1: that make you smaller, but which you hold on to
Speaker 1: out of fear of silence. Have you felt that that
Speaker 1: visceral fear of not receiving messages, of no one asking
Speaker 1: how you are, of absence becoming a habit, And yet
Speaker 1: that fear is exactly what's destroying you. True strength is
Speaker 1: born when you're able to embrace that absence as part
Speaker 1: of the process, when you realize that peace isn't in
Speaker 1: filling every social gap, but in leaving some emptiness without fear,
Speaker 1: because not every space must be filled, not every emotional
Speaker 1: lack needs a human patch. Some gaps are there to
Speaker 1: remind you that you haven't finished getting to know yourself,
Speaker 1: and until you learn to enjoy your own company, any
Speaker 1: relationship will be nothing more than a temporary anesthesia for
Speaker 1: your internal disconnection. Here comes an essential concept, emotional economy.
Speaker 1: No one teaches you this, but we all should manage it.
Speaker 1: Where do you invest your emotions? Who do you give
Speaker 1: your thoughts to? Who do you dedicate your energy, your doubts,
Speaker 1: your time to because all of that is limited capital,
Speaker 1: and if you're spending it on people who give you
Speaker 1: nothing in return, you're not being generous, you're being irresponsible
Speaker 1: with yourself. Emotional self sufficiency is at its core a
Speaker 1: form of intelligence, not emotional, not rational, existential. It means
Speaker 1: understanding that you can feel lonely without being weak, that
Speaker 1: you can love without possessing, that you can accompany without
Speaker 1: being indispensable, and above all, that you can walk away
Speaker 1: without guilt. But now we need to talk about a
Speaker 1: silent poison, emotional debt, that feeling that because you were
Speaker 1: once loved, you're obligated to stay, to endure, to tolerate.
Speaker 1: Often the past affection becomes a chain. They cared for
Speaker 1: me when I was down, they were there for me
Speaker 1: in hard times, and because of that now you stay silent,
Speaker 1: yield adapt. But affections should not become mortgages. What someone
Speaker 1: did for you, if it was genuine, doesn't require repayment,
Speaker 1: And if repayment is required, then it wasn't love. It
Speaker 1: was a contract, and you didn't come to sign contracts
Speaker 1: disguised as affection. We also need to talk about illusory reciprocity,
Speaker 1: that subtile cell deception, where you think you're receiving the
Speaker 1: same as you give simply because you're too afraid to
Speaker 1: look coldly, because you're afraid to admit that this friendship
Speaker 1: is one sided, that this partner only takes, that this
Speaker 1: family tolerates you more than loves you. But you keep
Speaker 1: justifying glossing over because admitting it would break you, without
Speaker 1: realizing that what really breaks you is staying. Do you
Speaker 1: want a deeper level here? It is Authentic love is
Speaker 1: only possible from freedom. And I'm not talking about emotional libertinism,
Speaker 1: but about the real capacity to say, I don't need
Speaker 1: you to be here, but I'm glad you are. That's
Speaker 1: the difference between needing and choosing, between depending and sharing.
Speaker 1: Every bond born out of the fear of loneliness is
Speaker 1: doomed to rot. Every love that survives from lack is
Speaker 1: an emotional time bomb. Schopenhauer wasn't pessimistic. He was lucid.
Speaker 1: He knew that the tragedy of human life isn't that
Speaker 1: we're bad, but that we're designed to survive, not to care.
Speaker 1: That our nature doesn't seek the good of others, but
Speaker 1: our own benefit, and that doesn't have to be terrible
Speaker 1: if you understand it. Because it stops surprising you, stops hurting.
Speaker 1: It doesn't mean no one loves you. It means no
Speaker 1: one will love you more than themselves, and that's fair.
Speaker 1: Expecting the opposite is emotional arrogance. Then comes the moment
Speaker 1: to make a conscious decision. Stop being the savior of others,
Speaker 1: because that role, no matter how noble it seems, is
Speaker 1: an anchor, an excuse not to work on yourself. You
Speaker 1: spend your life solving other people's dramas because it gives
Speaker 1: you a false sense of value, as if your existence
Speaker 1: only had meaning if someone needs reads you. But that
Speaker 1: cycle is as toxic as any addiction, because it makes
Speaker 1: you indispensable in the life of people who wouldn't do
Speaker 1: the same for you. And you know it, but you
Speaker 1: keep staying because it makes you feel special. Get out
Speaker 1: of there, free yourself. No one came to this world
Speaker 1: to carry the emotional life of others. If you can't
Speaker 1: handle yours, why do you insist on saving others. It's
Speaker 1: a distraction pattern, a neat way of avoiding the hardest
Speaker 1: work of all, sitting with yourself and asking what the
Speaker 1: hell you really want? And when you do, when you
Speaker 1: sit with yourself and silence the noise, a brutal truth appears.
Speaker 1: You've lived more for others than for yourself. You've been
Speaker 1: the model child, the loyal friend, the devoted partner. But
Speaker 1: when were you just you? Without roles, without labels, without
Speaker 1: the need to be necessary. That's the challenge. Stop being useful,
Speaker 1: to start being authentic, And here comes the most interesting part.
Speaker 1: When you manage it. When you align with your center
Speaker 1: and stop pursuing bonds out of fear, you start attracting
Speaker 1: different relationships, healthier, freer, real because you no longer demand,
Speaker 1: You no longer beg You no longer tolerate the intolerable,
Speaker 1: and that inevitably filters people. Some will leave, Others will
Speaker 1: hate you for ceasing to be functional. But the ones
Speaker 1: who stay, those are the ones who matter because they
Speaker 1: love you without needing you. They respect you without demanding,
Speaker 1: They love you without pretending to possess you, and you
Speaker 1: finally can breathe without guilt, without a mask, without debt.
Speaker 1: That's the final point of the journey. We started with
Speaker 1: this uncomfortable truth. No one owes you anything, but you
Speaker 1: also don't owe yourself to betray yourself to fit into
Speaker 1: an emotional system that doesn't represent you. Renouncing expectations isn't
Speaker 1: giving up. It's an act of rebellion against an emotional
Speaker 1: model that taught us to depend. And you're here for
Speaker 1: something bigger than that. You're here to live in your axis,
Speaker 1: and from there whoever wants to join can. But you
Speaker 1: no longer revolve around anyone, because now you know that
Speaker 1: true peace is not shared. It's built inside, in silence
Speaker 1: and without asking for permission. And here comes an even
Speaker 1: more uncomfortable but powerful truth. Inner peace is not exciting.
Speaker 1: It has no fireworks, no dramatic declarations, no movie reconciliation scenes.
Speaker 1: It's silent, slow, almost boring. And that's why most people
Speaker 1: don't choose it. Because we've been conditioned to confuse intensity
Speaker 1: with love, chaos with passion, suffering with depth. We've become
Speaker 1: addicted to emotional disorder, to turbulent bonds that make us
Speaker 1: feel alive even though they are bleeding us inside. But
Speaker 1: living is not about vertigo. Every day living really is
Speaker 1: learning to maintain calm without looking for a storm to
Speaker 1: justify it. And if you think about it, this explains
Speaker 1: a lot of things. It explains why you return to
Speaker 1: broken relationships, why you forgive the unforgivable, why you cling
Speaker 1: to those who hurt you, because you were taught that
Speaker 1: love hurts, that loving is sacrificing, that the one who
Speaker 1: matters most is the one who has the most power
Speaker 1: to destroy you. What if all of that is a lie.
Speaker 1: What if true connection shouldn't leave you exhausted? What if
Speaker 1: emotional health isn't seen as a drama scene, but as
Speaker 1: an afternoon without shocks, where you can breathe without fear.
Speaker 1: Many don't know what to do with stability because they've
Speaker 1: never had it. When someone doesn't manipulate you, you doubt
Speaker 1: their interest. If there's no jealousy, it seems cold. If
Speaker 1: there are no arguments, you suspect indifference. That's collective trauma,
Speaker 1: an emotional distortion that makes us look for problems when
Speaker 1: everything is going well, simply because emotional silence seems suspicious.
Speaker 1: But that silence, that absence of drama, that piece that
Speaker 1: scares is the real emotional home we were never taught
Speaker 1: to build. Here enters another angle that few want to
Speaker 1: look at. Expectations not only break relationships with others, but
Speaker 1: they also sabotage the relationship you have with yourself. How
Speaker 1: many times have you been disappointed by not living up
Speaker 1: to a mental image that doesn't even belong to you.
Speaker 1: You compare yourself, you judge yourself. You punish yourself for
Speaker 1: not being enough, as if there were a clear standard,
Speaker 1: as if someone were watching, as if not being admired
Speaker 1: were a crime. But no one is pointing at your flaws,
Speaker 1: only you, and in that battle against an invisible ideal,
Speaker 1: you lose energy that you could use to truly get
Speaker 1: to know yourself. Now we need to talk about the
Speaker 1: silent applause you expect every time you do something well.
Speaker 1: You don't say it, but you feel it. Part of
Speaker 1: you want someone to notice, someone to tell you you
Speaker 1: did well, I'm proud of you, You're worth it. And
Speaker 1: when that recognition doesn't come, doubt invades you. Was it
Speaker 1: really enough? And there again you return to the error
Speaker 1: seeking outside what you should have built inside. Approval is
Speaker 1: a drug, and like any drug, it numbs you for
Speaker 1: a moment, but then you need more and more, until
Speaker 1: you become a slave to others. Gaze to likes two
Speaker 1: compliments to the words that validate you and at the
Speaker 1: same time weaken you. Because the truth is this, every
Speaker 1: time you need someone to tell you your surrendering power,
Speaker 1: you're saying, I don't know if I'm worth it. Tell
Speaker 1: me you do, and that leaves you exposed. It makes
Speaker 1: you dependent, it makes you fragile. That's why Schopenhauer insisted
Speaker 1: on the solitary path of the wise, not out of
Speaker 1: contempt for others, but out of respect for oneself, because
Speaker 1: while your well being depends on what others think, you'll
Speaker 1: always be at war, always, even if you smile, even
Speaker 1: if you pretend to be in control. Emotional maturity doesn't
Speaker 1: come when you learn to relate to others. It comes
Speaker 1: when you learn to be okay without anyone, not as
Speaker 1: punishment but as a choice, because you understand that you
Speaker 1: are your center and from there you can build anything.
Speaker 1: But if your center is outside, in the hands of others,
Speaker 1: any wind will sweep them away, and your foundation goes
Speaker 1: with them.