Hey friend,

Today I sat in a coffee shop and did something I haven’t done in years.

I opened my old Gmail account and typed in the names of women I once loved.

There are over 400,000 emails in that inbox, dating back to 2006.
The first names I searched were the erotic ones, the women with whom the chemistry was electric. The kind of stories you tell your friends.

I opened the first few exchanges, read some flirtation, remembered the heat.
It made me smile. It made me blush.

But then I kept scrolling.
And that’s when it got heavy.

Breakup emails. Apologies. Get-back-together emails.
The “I’ve changed” ones.
The “I miss you” ones.
The “I think we’re soulmates, let’s try again” ones.

My stomach twisted.
Not because I missed them but because I remembered the version of myself I was back then:
The little boy inside the grown man, still believing that if I could just find “the one,” everything would be okay.

The soulmate. The twin flame.
The magical unicorn goddess who would see me, save me, and complete me.

I wasn’t just revisiting old messages.
I was revisiting an entire belief system, one I had lived inside without ever questioning.

The system that taught me love means finding the one.
That healing means finding a woman who will finally stay.
That I could fix my life by being adored.

This is what A Course in Miracles, a spiritual psychotherapy program that shifts your perception from fear to love, calls the special relationship.
And it doesn’t just apply to lovers.

It applies to anything we try to use to complete ourselves:
A partner.
A job title.
A bank balance.
A following.
A compliment.
A body.
A brand.

But let’s focus on romantic relationships, because that’s the trap most of us fall into.

We think it’s love.
But it’s a death pact.

That’s what we call intimacy.

Yes, I know. It’s dark.
But we need to start waking up to the truth about what most romantic relationships really are...without the window dressing.

At their core, they’re often this:

That’s what we put on wedding websites.
That’s what we celebrate on Instagram.

And if you’re willing to sit with that, if you’re willing to let your worldview be a little offended, you might recognize yourself in what comes next:

• The high of being chosen.
• The shame of not being enough.
• The pressure to become what they want.
• The fear of being seen—and the deeper fear of not being seen at all.

It’s a seduction… followed by a slow erasure.

We think:
If I perform just right, they’ll stay.
If I withhold the parts I’m ashamed of, they won’t leave.
If I mirror what they desire, I’ll finally be worthy.

We’re not loving.
We’re bargaining.

It’s the woman who molds herself into “wife material” because she believes it’s the only way to keep him.
It’s the man who buries his truth to hold on to the sex, the support, or the sense of worth he’s been outsourcing.

It’s all a lie.
But it’s the lie we’ve all agreed to.

This world teaches us that love is found through sacrifice:

• Sacrifice your truth.
• Sacrifice your freedom.
• Sacrifice your identity.

But most of what we call love is not love at all.
It’s a special relationship, built on lack, fueled by fantasy, and designed to fail.

Let that sink in.

So many of our relationships become a silent trade:

And then we resent each other when neither of us lives up to the fantasy.

Here’s the thing most of us don’t want to admit:

The ego doesn’t actually want love.​
It wants control.
It wants validation.
It wants to feel special.

And when I use the word ego, I don’t mean arrogance or self-importance.
I mean the voice of fear in the mind.

The ego is a false self...
a thought system built on the illusion that we are separate from Love, from Truth, from Source, and from one another.

It is not who we are.
It is who we think we are when we forget the truth.

And this thought system doesn’t just live in our heads...
it shapes the entire world we see.

It’s the operating system behind:

• Our culture
• Our politics
• Our ambitions
• Our self-image
• Our relationships
• Even our spirituality

It runs on judgment, control, comparison, fear, and attack, no matter how polished or positive it appears.

And while the ego often promises love, success, safety, or worth, its path always leads to the same place:

Confusion. Suffering. Disconnection.

This world is a reflection of that mistaken thought system...
a kind of shared hallucination.

So the kind of “love” most of us seek?
The one we buy diamond rings for?

It’s ego love.
Not real love.

Because real love doesn’t deal in specialness.
It doesn’t rank.
It doesn’t withhold.
It doesn’t say, “You’re mine.”

So if you’re in a relationship right now, or dreaming of one, let me gently offer a truth bomb:

You don’t actually want love. You want to be special.

You want someone to finally make you feel like you’re enough.
And every time they don’t?

You blame them.
Or you blame yourself.

But it’s never going to work.

Because when you enter a relationship from lack, you will always demand a sacrifice.

You’ll need them to validate you constantly.
You’ll panic if they pull away.
You’ll punish them when they don’t meet your hidden needs.
You’ll over-give to keep the connection.
You’ll quietly resent them for not fixing what’s broken inside.

This is not love.
This is hostage-taking.

You didn’t marry a person. You married a hostage. And the diamond made it look holy.

And this dynamic is everywhere:

• It’s in our first crushes.
• It’s in our Hinge dates.
• It’s in our songs and movies and vows.
• It’s even in our spiritual communities, disguised as sacred union.

But it’s still the same lie:

Don’t get scared by the word Heaven.
The Course isn’t talking about a religious afterlife.
It’s talking about reality, the truth that exists once the ego is undone.
The love that’s already here when we stop believing in fear.

Heaven is not a destination.​
It’s what remains when fear is gone.
When the mind is no longer ruled by the lie of judgment, control, comparison, fear, and attack.
It’s what’s left when you stop believing in the voice that says you’re not enough.
It’s not far away.
It’s right here, underneath the noise.

Love doesn’t sacrifice.
Love doesn’t need.
Love doesn’t attack.
Love doesn’t judge.
Love doesn’t control.
Love doesn’t compare.
Love already knows: I am whole.

There is no black and white.
No Democrat and Republican.
No Israel and Hamas in reality.

Those are illusions.
Collective hallucinations.
Built on the architecture of the ego.
The effects of forgetting who we are...
which is love—and believing instead in a false self.

Everything of this world is a lie.
A lie created by the ego.

Our schools.
Our religions.
Our science.
Each one teaching the lies of the ego.

It’s like that Seinfeld episode where George Costanza starts doing the opposite of everything he’s ever done,
and suddenly, life starts working out.

It’s the same for us.

Start doing the opposite of what your fear tells you.
The opposite of what the voice in your head—who you think is you—says to do.

Ask yourself the most important question you’ll ever ask.
And ask it 100 times a day if you need to. I do.
And I’m teaching my kids to do the same:

What would Love do in this situation?

Because if you don’t ask that question…
Guess who’s going to run the show?
Guess who will be kissing your spouse goodnight?
Guess who will be swiping on that Tinder profile?
Guess who will be arguing with your partner?
Guess who will be making love after the kids go to bed?

Yep. Fear.​
Also known as the ego.

But when you start asking what Love would do...
and you start listening to the answer...
you’ll start arriving in a new place.

A place called peace.

So of course love doesn’t work...
not the way we were taught.
Not when our GPS is programmed to fear by default.
Not when it’s modeled after specialness instead of wholeness.
Not when we idolize chemistry and compatibility over healing and completion.

What we call love is often a form of warfare...​
two incomplete selves trying to merge into one illusion of completion.

It never works.
And it never will.

Because the real function of relationship isn’t to complete you...
It’s to expose where you still believe you’re incomplete.

And if you’re willing, that exposure can become your most sacred path home.
Not by getting the other person to stay.
Not by fixing yourself to become lovable.
But by remembering...

Who you were before the world got its hands on you.

That you were never missing anything.
That you are already whole.
Already enough.
Already loved.

And then, maybe for the first time...
you won’t seek love as a form of escape…

…but as an expression of truth.

So let me ask you...
Are you still chasing the illusion?
Or are you ready to return to Love?

With love,
​Tony

P.S. If this message resonated with you, here are a few ways to walk this path beside me:

• 🕊️ Join the Fear to Love Fellowship​
  A free weekly gathering where we blend A Course in Miracles and 12-step-style truth-telling. We meet every Wednesday at 6:30 PM PT to share, witness, and undo fear together. No need to speak—just come listen.
  👉 Register here​
• 🎭 Attend Not Enough Live​
  I’ll be guiding a powerful 3-hour in-person workshop in Venice Beach, CA on September 25th at the Electric Lodge Theater. It’s a deep dive into one of fear’s most convincing disguises: not enoughness.​
  👉 Get your ticket​
• 🏢 Bring me into your business​
  If you’re in the corporate world, I teach leaders and teams how to negotiate, influence, and connect—not through fear, but through love. Magnetic communication. Conscious commerce. Co-creation over conquest.
  👉 Explore my work​
• 🌄 Join the Topanga Retreat waitlist​
  This January, I’ll be hosting a 3-day, 2-night immersive retreat in Topanga Canyon. Cold plunges, warm fires, deep truth-telling, sacred silence, and a return to who you were before the world got its hands on you.
  👉 Join the waitlist​