By Dr Daniel Gordon • 3, Nov 2026
You know exactly what a healthy relationship looks like. So why do you keep ending up in the opposite?
We choose the person who keeps us guessing over the one who texts back. We stay long after we've privately decided to leave. We describe a connection as "electric" and treat that as proof it's right.
When I sat down with psychoanalyst Stephen Grosz for the first episode of our new interview series on The Health Perspective, I wanted to ask the questions people rarely say out loud. Stephen has spent more than 40 years in a consulting room listening to exactly these stories. He's the author of the bestseller The Examined Life and, more recently, Love's Labour.
What follows are eight uncomfortable questions from that conversation. They don't come with neat answers. But they might change how you look at your relationships, and at yourself.
1. Are you ignoring the warning signs?
What if the person you're most attracted to isn't necessarily the person who's good for you?
We tend to think of red flags as obvious: cruelty, control, dishonesty. Most people would walk away from those, or at least know they should.
The harder patterns are harder to recognise:
A pull towards someone who’s slightly unavailable
Being drawn to someone who blows hot and cold
Finding calm, steady people somehow “boring”
Attraction is powerful, but it isn't a compatibility test. It tells you something is happening. It doesn't tell you whether it's good for you. Recognising an unhealthy pattern often means questioning the very feeling you've been trained to trust.
2. Why does unhappy love feel so familiar?
Why do we keep choosing people who make us miserable, even when we know better?
This was the part of the conversation that stayed with me longest.
Familiarity feels safe. Stephen's view is that we drift back to what we know, because predictable feels secure, even when it hurts.
Happiness can feel scarier than pain. Unfamiliar happiness can be more unsettling than an unhappiness you already understand.
This isn't new. Freud noticed patients improving, then sliding back into old ways, and was genuinely perplexed by it.
Insight isn't a magic fix. Knowing your pattern doesn't make it disappear. Stephen calls shifting it the very limit of a therapist's skill.
So be patient with yourself. Change takes time, and that's normal, not failure.
Ask a better question. Not "Why am I so stupid?" but "What is this pattern doing for me? What does it protect me from?"
3. Is it love, or a red flag?
That instant spark feels incredible. But does it actually tell you anything about the future of your relationship?
Love at first sight is real. That rush of chemistry, the racing heart, the sense you've known them forever. It happens, and sometimes it lasts.
But chemistry only tells you one thing: you're attracted. The spark is instant. Connection is built slowly.
When the spark might be a red flag
You feel most alive when you're least sure where you stand
The highs are intense, but so are the lows
Calm, steady partners feel "boring" by comparison
It feels strangely familiar, in a way you can't quite explain
You're focused on being desired, not on getting to know them
Signs of meaningful connection
You feel safe, not anxious, about where you stand
You're learning who they really are, not who you imagined
You can disagree and still come back to each other
You understand yourself better because of the relationship
You bring out the best in each other, not the worst
It's exactly why Stephen Grosz called his book Love's Labour. We're sold effortless love. As Stephen sees it, the effort is the point.
So fireworks don't prove it's right. And hard work doesn't prove it's wrong.
4. Why do people cheat?
Is cheating always about sex, or is something else missing? Why would someone in an apparently happy relationship have an affair?
In Stephen Grosz's experience, affairs often grow where something is missing. Very often, in his opinion, it's tenderness:
Physical affection fading
Softness disappearing
The feeling of being desired slowly falling away
Over time, that gap can leave someone vulnerable to attention from elsewhere. There's no single explanation. The same behaviour can mean very different things for different people.
None of this excuses betrayal, or makes the hurt any less real. But it's a more honest starting point than simply labelling someone a cheat. Understanding why it happened is often the only way to work out what, if anything, can be rebuilt.
And it raises another question for every long-term couple: when did you last make your partner feel wanted?
5. Is sex a natural antidepressant?
Can sex improve your mood? And why can depression medication affect your sex life?
Stephen Grosz raised a provocative thought: sex can lift mood, so isn't it strange that so many antidepressants dampen desire?
It's a fair question. But here's where psychology and medicine need separating.
What the medicine says
Antidepressants can work very well. I've seen them help a great many patients do really well.
Some do have sexual side effects. Low libido, difficulty reaching orgasm and erectile dysfunction are among the most common. And unfortunately, they can be prolonged and, for some people, even continue after stopping taking the medication.
But depression itself often dampens desire. Low mood very often comes with low libido. For some people, taking medication can help their mood lift and help them recover intimacy in their lives - If their libido had been dampened by depression, low mood or anxiety.
Recovery often brings intimacy back. As mood lifts, many people find their sex life returns too.
Side effects aren't the end of the road. Medication can often be adjusted or switched. To learn more, watch my video on antidepressants and sexual side effects.
The bottom line: intimacy and mood are deeply connected. But sex is not a treatment for clinical depression.
6. What if happiness is the wrong goal?
What if trying so hard to be happy is stopping us from understanding what really matters?
This might be the most counterintuitive idea of the whole conversation. Stephen Grosz doesn't believe the aim of therapy is happiness. Chase it directly, and it tends to slip away.
Happiness vs understanding
Happiness is a feeling. It comes and goes, and you can't force it.
Understanding is achievable: seeing yourself more clearly, knowing the people you love better.
Compassion follows. The more you understand, the kinder you become, to others and to yourself.
It echoes Viktor Frankl: success, like happiness, can't be pursued. It ensues when you commit to something that genuinely matters.
So swap the question. Not "How do I get happier?" but "What would it mean to understand my life more clearly?"
7. Is your inner voice your worst enemy?
Would you speak to someone you love the way you speak to yourself?
The conversation in your head never stops. As Stephen Grosz points out, the last person you'll ever talk to is yourself.
Signs your inner critic is in charge
You replay ordinary mistakes for hours, or days
You call yourself names you'd never use on a friend
Nothing feels good enough, however well it went
The voice feels less like an opinion and more like the truth
What a kinder inner voice sounds like
Curious: "Why did that happen?" not "How could you?"
Realistic: "Most people would have reacted the same way."
Compassionate: the tone you'd use with someone you love
The hardest part? Most of us don't even hear it. Part of therapy is someone overhearing that inner dialogue and gently pointing out how harsh it is, until a calmer voice becomes your own.
Talking is how we organise our minds. And no, therapy doesn't have to mean lying on a couch being asked about your mother. Psychoanalysis is one approach among many.
8. Married… but to alcohol?
Can you be married to someone who's emotionally committed to something else?
Stephen Grosz draws a line between being legally married and psychologically married.
His example: a husband dependent on alcohol. When he's anxious or frightened, he doesn't turn to his wife. He turns to drink. Legally, he's married to her. Psychologically, he's married to alcohol.
Signs of an emotionally absent partner
They reach for something else, not you, when life gets hard
You share a home, but not your worries
You feel the absence long before anyone names it
One important point: alcohol dependence is a medical condition, not a character flaw. People can and do recover, and support exists for partners and families too. If you are concerned about your own drinking or that of someone you care about, support is available. Visit Drinkaware to explore the different ways you can get help.
What ties it all together
Eight questions. One idea: love is about seeing clearly.
Seeing the patterns that pull us towards the wrong people
Seeing the difference between a spark and a relationship
Seeing what's missing before someone looks for it elsewhere
Hearing our inner voice for what it really is
Noticing whether the person beside us is truly present
None of it is quick. None of it fits a ten-step guide. But understanding is achievable in a way chasing happiness rarely is. And it makes us kinder, to the people we love and to ourselves.
Watch my full conversation with Stephen Grosz on The Health Perspective. Love’s Labour is out now in paperback. Find out more at stephengrosz.com.
Disclaimer
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