Sharing a few of my favorite snippets from Rich Roll’s interview with relationship expert and bestselling author Jillian Turecki, published on November 3, 2025.

On relational accountability

“There are only two things that determine the quality of your relationships: who you choose and who you decide to show up as.”

On selflessness

“The highest form of love is selflessness — caring about someone’s happiness even if it means they’re better off without you.”

On expectations

“Unspoken expectations are premeditated resentments.”

On victim culture

“The victim mentality is out of control, and it’s particularly out of control in relationships. The more you make it someone else’s fault, the more you’ll repeat the pattern. It’s not your fault, but it is your responsibility.”

On discernment and perfectionism

“Choose three to five things at most that are absolutely non-negotiable for you — and be 100% open-minded and flexible about the rest. For example, I’m not going to date anyone who is in the throes of drug addiction or alcoholism — no matter how wonderful they are. That’s an act of self-honoring. Another non-negotiable for me is someone who knows how to work through problems. I’m not interested in being in a relationship where, once there’s a problem, I have to chase them for a week to talk about it. I don’t care what trauma you had or who your parents were — I’m not interested. You can need a day to think, but disappearing for a week is not it.”

On feeling broken

“Working on yourself isn’t about fixing yourself — you’re not broken. It’s about unlearning what keeps you from being free.”

My thoughts on emotional outsourcing

To me, Jillian’s most recent work is about calling attention to a trend that other people (in this context, our partners) are at fault for our problems, while simultaneously being responsible for our happiness. Some might call this “emotional outsourcing.” I see it as a form of agency collapse — believing that life happens to us, instead of through us.

As Jillian writes in her book, “every single relationship that you have has one common denominator — and that’s you.”