00:00:19
Raquel Baldelomar
Hi everyone, my name is Raquel Baldelomar and welcome to the Mega Podcast where I speak with high achievers on how they fulfill their professional dreams while maintaining balance throughout their lives. Today we are speaking with Gabriellla Aratow a professional matchmaker, and my longtime friend Gabby was born and raised in Berkeley, California and has lived all over the world, including Greece, Bali, Panama, New York City, and La Gabby holds a BA in film studies from Cornell University as well as an MFA in writing from Columbia University. She started working at Tokai America's fastest growing matchmaking firm in 2016. And within a few months, Gabby became their most successful matchmaker with the highest number of engagements and marriages. Now she is the owner of KISS - Keeper Introduction Services, a boutique matchmaking firm with clients across the world. The singles who seek out Gabby range from blue collar workers to billionaires, college students to seniors, and the whole rainbow of races and religions under the sun. You can get a glimpse of Gabby's matchmaking process on the Learning channels show. I am Shawna Ray, where she was a matchmaker for a woman with a disability, and Gabby is working on her forthcoming book Follow the Heart, which helps singles revitalize their dating mindset. Her work has been published on Medium Mind, body, soul, the Lilly Aspen magazine and the Roaring Fork Lifestyle Magazine. Gabby currently lives in Aspen, Colorado, where she spends her time working, riding, hiking, and fly fishing. Gabby, welcome to the Mega podcast.
00:01:51
Gabriella Aratow
I'm excited to be here. Thanks for having me.
00:01:53
Raquel Baldelomar
So good to have you here. And to people too, to our viewers who don't know this, I've known for Gabby f how long have we known each other? We actually five, six years. Yeah, I think it's been about that and we've had such really wonderful intellectually deep conversations about relationships. Yeah. And dating and your process for matchmaking, which I just find fascinating. But now it's really great that we could actually talk about this, like to to just my audience. Yes. So, yes. So the first question that I just like, I wanna ask, I know my viewer just has this, like, how do you get to become a matchmaker? So like, tell me your story cuz you didn't start out this way. I mean, you were like an entertainment Yeah. From
00:02:32
Gabriella Aratow
I worked at the William Morris
00:02:33
Raquel Baldelomar
Agency Right? Yeah. Before you even did this. So just kind of give our viewers a little bit of just like, just some, a summary of how you got to be a matchmaker.
00:02:40
Gabriella Aratow
You know, I got to be a matchmaker because I wanted a matchmaker. It, one night I saw an advertisement for a matchmaker. I I had seen previous matchmaker matchmaking advertisements. Sometimes you see them on things like air airplanes. But this one particular night I was sitting around thinking about my singleness, thinking about, you know, how I was gonna sort of do things differently. And a an advertisement popped up on my phone as I was scrolling and I thought to myself, oh God, this is an incredible service. Like when you think about it mm-hmm.
, that you have another person who's gonna go and find people for you instead of having to do it yourself and cut out all of the communication that can go so awry and go to nowhere. And so I, I was about to hire a matchmaker and then I had this thought like, I think I should do this. So instead of hiring them, I sat down and I wrote them a letter. Really? Yeah. And they called me the next day and they hired me that week. And that's how it, when
00:03:47
Raquel Baldelomar
Started, you started with Talk of five,
00:03:49
Gabriella Aratow
But it really still comes down to the core that it was something I felt I wanted for myself. Yeah. And so that's what made me sort of understand that this was important and that this was something people needed and
00:04:03
Raquel Baldelomar
Wanted. Absolutely. And I've always said that who you marry is the most important decision you will ever make in agree. I mean, there's a lot of decisions, but who you marry Yes. Is the most important one. Yes. And, and when you can give that gift of basically, you know, connecting somebody else with someone that they could potentially marry or have a very long-term intimate, deep relationship with. Yeah. That is like such a gift. Yeah. I mean, that is like fairy godmother, like angelic kind of a gift.
00:04:33
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. It's funny you say that. I tell people, I'm like, sometimes I think about my job as where an agent meets a fairy. Yes.
. Like there's an agenting aspect to it. Mm-hmm. . Cause I had worked so, so much in sort of agenting capacity.
00:04:45
Raquel Baldelomar
Right. So you were, you were an agent at C
00:04:46
Gabriella Aratow
A A I was a, I was a trainee at the William Morris Agency. Okay. But previous to that, I had worked in several other agencies, literary agencies and things like that. So I had my entire life kind of had a background in Agenting mm-hmm.
.
00:05:00
Raquel Baldelomar
Which really there's a lot of the skills that requires to be Yeah. A matchmaker. And
00:05:05
Gabriella Aratow
It is, in many ways, being a matchmaker is, there's an aspect of it that you're a booking agent mm-hmm.
, you're, you're booking. So there was an agent aspect, but then I also say, but it's also like being a fairy. There's Yeah. There is a sort of an element of magic about the whole thing. And I do feel, you know, the Dai Lama, one of the most profound quotes to me ever is when the Dai Lama says what you want for yourself, give to another mm-hmm. . And the deeper you go into thinking about that, it's so beautiful. Think about everything you want for yourself and then figure out a way to go give it. Yeah. And that's, that's I think, important for people to do. And that's what I
00:05:42
Raquel Baldelomar
Do. And I think that's partly like why our friendship has, has just grown over the years. Cuz I've realized that like you were, you're this such a spiritual person, you know? And I think we really connect that way. And just to people who, who know Gabby set me up years ago, that's kind of how we met. She set me up with a man that was in her database and it didn't work out, but it with a guy. But it's like Abby and I got this really wonderful friendship. Yeah. And, and part of that magic is that deep like spirituality that you're connected to. Yeah.
00:06:13
Gabriella Aratow
And it does bring people into my life like you. Yeah, it
00:06:17
Raquel Baldelomar
Does. I'm sure you've had like a, you have a lot of friends and just people who, this
00:06:21
Gabriella Aratow
Shop really opens my world in so many ways. I I meet the kinds of people I would never otherwise meet. Yeah. I, it's been, she's a
00:06:28
Raquel Baldelomar
Celebrity. I mean, when we go out to dinners, we go out to dinners, people just like randomly like say Hi, Gabby. Hi. I mean, they literally, people know you everywhere.
00:06:35
Gabriella Aratow
People do know me when I walk into a lot of places. You
00:06:38
Raquel Baldelomar
Do. Yeah. You really do. Yeah. So I also think it's really cool how your background, you have a background in film studies from Cornell mm-hmm.
. And you also got an MFA in writing from Columbia. Yes. So you have like this deep intellectual rigor in terms of just literature and history and film mm-hmm. . How do you think that like all of those learnings have have, have they been relevant to what you do as a matchmaker? Or does you
00:07:04
Gabriella Aratow
I still, I still like the story of things, the romance, the story Yeah. Is, I love, love stories and I love romance stories mm-hmm.
. And in many ways I, what I do now is I participate in the story. So for me, I think, you know, I I have converted some of my love for storytelling into my passion for this business because there is, there is a story, and when people do get married that I've introduced, there's a story about the match itself and where they, and that they used a matchmaker and where that first date was. And I'm sort of, I'm a, I'm a player on the stage. She used sort of Shakespearean language. Right?
00:07:42
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. You, you kind of are creating the fairy tales
00:07:44
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. For people. And I'm, yeah. And I'm in the fairytale, like, I'm, I'm a minor character, I'm a supporting character, but I'm in the
00:07:50
Raquel Baldelomar
Fairy. You're huge. I mean, you're a major character. You're the one that put it all together. Yeah. I mean, you created those two stages together. Yeah. I mean, there's a great Shakespeare quote that says, all the world's a stage and all the men and women are merely players. Right.
00:08:03
Gabriella Aratow
Exactly.
00:08:03
Raquel Baldelomar
They have their exits and their entrances. And one man in his life plays many parts. Right. And I think in many ways of what you do is that you basically find a way to find people who are living on their own stage and then bring, you know, how do you create tho their, their stages together? Yeah. And you do that day in and day out. Yeah.
00:08:23
Gabriella Aratow
Merging the lives of two individuated adults is kind of a phenomenon. Yeah. I mean, to me, every relationship is a miracle. Yeah. I, I think of them as miracle when I, they still kind of blow me away. Every single relationship is a miracle to me because when you think about what it means to merge your life with another person, it's, it's kind of a big
00:08:47
Raquel Baldelomar
Deal. No. Especially nowadays. Yeah. And you're at Toi you got the most number of engagements and marriages. I did that every, all of your competitors Yes. Talk about at the industry, the matchmaking industry. Yeah. I mean it's is I find that sometimes there's, it, it's just people sometimes just take the money mm-hmm.
, because, you know what I mean? I feel like that is a very big common thing where somebody is just willing to pay a lot of money for just a series of, just a lot of dates. But it's, how do you, where do you, where do you think you fit in the matchmaking industry as a
00:09:24
Gabriella Aratow
Whole? Well, I think, I feel like with so many industries, there's just good people and bad people. Mm-hmm.
. And I don't mean that they're bad humans, I just mean they're bad at the job. And I think that there are bad everything. Mm-hmm. , there are bad plumbers, you know? Mm-hmm. , there are bad house painters, there are bad seamstresses. And, and then there are really, really good ones. And I do think that it's, it's a kind of an interesting industry because there isn't any regulation or licensing or overseeing or insight or That's right. Anything you have to do. People say, how do you start as a matchmaker? And I say, well, you know, you can just start, you could
00:10:01
Raquel Baldelomar
Start, you can start matching people.
00:10:02
Gabriella Aratow
You can start find a client if you can find a client. Yeah. Now you're a matchmaker. Right. However, being good at the job is different than that. But there are people who are just in it for money. Just like there are people who are in medicine for money.
00:10:14
Raquel Baldelomar
What do you think is the re what is required to be a good matchmaker, you think?
00:10:19
Gabriella Aratow
I think it's a, a a sort of, you have to walk a lot of fine lines. For example, one fine line that you walk when you're a matchmaker is you do need to be empathic to the struggles that people have had. Mm-hmm.
. But on the other hand, you can't really buy into their bullshit.
00:10:41
Raquel Baldelomar
Mm
00:10:41
Gabriella Aratow
Mm-hmm.
if they're bullshitting themselves. Right. Some of your job is to not buy it. And so you have to walk that line where you feel for them and you feel for their experiences, but you also have to know how to put your foot down and where to correct them and when to say, no, no, no, no, no, I'm not, we're not going that direction. Right. I'm not buying that. So there's, to me, when I think about why I succeed in this job, it's somehow I am able to carry simultaneously what seemed to be almost contradictory traits and all of the matchmakers that I know that I like and think, do this job well also do the same thing.
00:11:26
Raquel Baldelomar
I also think being able to understand psychology really well and almost have this element of like being somewhat of a therapist Hmm. Is really important. Because what you have to do is you have to get people to talk really truthfully about who they are and what they want. Yeah. And in order to do that, they have to feel really comfortable talking to you. They
00:11:50
Gabriella Aratow
Do. I tell people all the time who call me, me, who are interested in working with me, that they need to be feeling it for me. Mm-hmm.
, you are, you shouldn't work with a matchmaker that you don't like or that you don't trust or that you don't have a good feeling about because then the whole experience and the whole journey is kind of on off on the wrong foot. Mm-hmm. . So, you know, that's your first, your first instinct is the instinct of who you're gonna pick to do this with you. Mm-hmm. people tend to be pretty honest with their matchmakers because there's money on the line and they don't, they want to get value out of what they've paid and may not be as much the case maybe with somebody who's in the, in the, the database. But there's a lot of tricky things with being a matchmaker because you have to have conversations that might be quite uncomfortable. Right. In other realms.
00:12:42
Raquel Baldelomar
Well, well even just like what you were saying, people are paying you money. Yeah. So I would imagine that a lot of times there's people who come to you with very unrealistic expectations of the time, what they want. So Yes. How, what, so give an example of that and like, how do you like that? What, is that an unrealistic expectation that you, that you are constantly coming, you know, having to deal with? And then how do you deal with that, with a client who's basically saying, I want this, here's my money. I, this is what I want.
00:13:10
Gabriella Aratow
Well, like for, for me, something that is potentially unrealistic is, let's say you're a man and you're 65 and you just never got around to having children. Mm-hmm.
. And now you've decided that this is what's gonna give meaning to your life.
00:13:25
Raquel Baldelomar
65,
00:13:26
Gabriella Aratow
I'm 65. Oh, they come, it happens. It happens. And then they call me up and they say, you know, I've decided I want to start a family. So I'm thinking like 27 to 32 would be good because then I get some time to meet her and we can date for a while and then of course we're gonna get married. And I don't want her to like have lost her fertility. Oh my God. That happens. And that you get that. How
00:13:50
Raquel Baldelomar
Often do you get that, would
00:13:51
Gabriella Aratow
You say? One a month. Really? Yeah. Oh my God. Yeah. One a month. So to me that's not being particularly realistic entirely. I, it, it depends. I mean, some of it depends. Mm-hmm.
, for example, there are places all over the world where there are incredibly destitute people who will do anything to get out of their situation, their impoverished situation. They'll do anything to get out of it. It might be actually realistic in that regard. Mm-hmm. , but it's probably not gonna be realistic for, it's for a matchmaker, it being the girl next door.
00:14:28
Raquel Baldelomar
Right. Exactly.
00:14:29
Gabriella Aratow
And it's probably, it's probably not gonna be realistic maybe for it to be someone you really, who, who understands your musical references mm-hmm.
and understands you know, everything about you. So, you know, I just say, you know, let's get real. And more than anything, I talk about age differentials and real statistics on age differentials and what you're asking to try to carry off. It just wouldn't be realistic to say, you know, I woke up this morning and I'm, I'm, I've decided that I don't like having no money in the bank, so I want a winning lottery ticket. You know, so I'm gonna give you some money and you are gonna go out and get me what is statistically speaking, like getting me a winning lottery ticket. I just go, you know, statistically speaking, we're not looking at good odds here about me actually finding you partnership and moreover me helping you fulfill on family. Cuz I don't have a problem helping people fulfill on family. I have a problem helping people fulfill on family in ways that are virtually impossible and potentially a little creepy.
00:15:33
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. Yeah. Well, in, in terms of the statistics you were talking about. Yeah. What are the statistics that you are aware of about just the age differences in marriages?
00:15:42
Gabriella Aratow
The vast majority of people in America, Australia, and the United Kingdom who are married, are married to somebody incredibly close to their own age. The, to get into age differentials that are 20 years, whether that be a man 20 years older or a woman 20 years older. But there's even less in those cases where the woman is the older one we're talking about less than, you know, 1.5% or even 1%. I'd have to pull out the, the, the data sheet. But this data is online. And what's surprising to me, some of what's surprising to me as a matchmaker is how many people come to me thinking that dating somebody 15 or 20 years their junior is totally normal. I'm not saying it doesn't happen. It does. And I'm not saying it's bad cuz I don't think it's a bad thing at all if it's organically true love.
But what's surprising to me is how warped people think that that's normal. And I think a lot of that comes down to maybe Hollywood movies or television where we see these huge age differential relationships and nothing sort of discussed about it or thought about it. Those relationships are rarities. It would be the same as somebody coming to a head hunter. I say to people, you know, let's say you go to a head hunter, you haven't, you haven't had a job in five years mm-hmm. And you've decided that you know, you really want a job. So you're gonna go to a headhunter and you're gonna ask for a job. So do you walk in and say, it's so good that you're a headhunter. I haven't worked in five years, I've been thinking about the job that I want. I think about 2 million a year would be pretty good and also summers off.
Mm. Yeah. And the headhunter would look at you and say, you know, you haven't even had a job for five years. Right. Maybe we should start talking about what's, and the, those jobs exist. There are jobs that pay you several million dollars a year and you probably won't have to work that much in the summer. But let's talk about, let's talk about reality and what, what I think might be a better way to at least start to get your foot in the door of getting back into the workforce in a way that's gonna gonna be rewarding for you.
00:17:50
Raquel Baldelomar
That brings up this whole concept of just when people say, you know, that person is out of my league. Mm-hmm.
, or you know, how do you, do you feel like leagues are a thing? And
00:18:01
Gabriella Aratow
I do, I think that there's something I've heard it referred to in the past as sexual market value. S m V. Oh
00:18:06
Raquel Baldelomar
My God. Really? There's an actual
00:18:08
Gabriella Aratow
Term sexual Yeah. I've heard. I don't necessarily, wow. I don't necessarily use those words a lot myself. I love that. But look, we all know and we can all agree that, that something like this does exist. We all know that there are people who are highly desirable as mates and those who are potentially less desirable in comparison to them. Mm-hmm.
. So I do think rough leagues kind of do exist. And as a matchmaker, one of my jobs is to make sure that I'm putting people out on dates that, that aren't ridiculous. Because I've known a couple of people who've come into the matchmaking world and tried to make it as a matchmaker and they just don't have the radar. They don't have a a a sense of like a hotness factor for people or a sense of league. And they just end up putting a lot of frustrated, unhappy people together out on dates. You know, so you have to kind of have that sensibility of, is this, is this actually correct in some ways in the world and there are premiums in the world that balance out in certain ways.
00:19:18
Raquel Baldelomar
Is there sexual market comp? Is there sexual, what is the term again? Sexual market
00:19:22
Gabriella Aratow
Value.
00:19:23
Raquel Baldelomar
Sexual market value. Yeah. But it's also sometimes, like you, you look at some of people like Marilyn Monroe mm-hmm.
and who was a person that the, the screenwriter she married the
00:19:34
Gabriella Aratow
Arthur Miller.
00:19:35
Raquel Baldelomar
Right. I mean, you look at somebody like them Yes. And you think like, how can they be a couple? Yeah. But there's something about the two that really,
00:19:44
Gabriella Aratow
But to me that relationship makes sense.
00:19:45
Raquel Baldelomar
It does. Yes. Really.
00:19:47
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. That really, it didn't work out
00:19:48
Raquel Baldelomar
Of course, but it
00:19:49
Gabriella Aratow
Made sense.
00:19:50
Raquel Baldelomar
But, but it goes back to also I think the compatibility. How do you look at at com, you know, finding, look what makes a couple compatible, cuz it's not exactly the same. Like, you know, it's not the same of what one person has of what makes them desirable.
00:20:05
Gabriella Aratow
Exactly.
00:20:06
Raquel Baldelomar
So how, how can you talk about that process? Is there something that you do or is it just kind of all by feel?
00:20:06
Gabriella Aratow
it's not all by feel. I think that there are several, what I would call like branches, you know mm-hmm.
or maybe columns, but for example, politics, for example, religion for example, activity level, for example. adventurousness for example, charisma. Mm-hmm. , you know, there's all of these different things and not everybody need, they, you don't need to match somebody in all of these different ways, but it's gotta work mm-hmm. in that somehow it balances out where both parties are looking at the other party feeling like they've, you know, feeling really excited that they've done very well out in their selection process. Mm. And for some people that might be a little bit of, well, I'm an introvert and I really love that she just walks into her room and can talk to anyone and this is really good. And so those kinds of things can, sometimes opposites actually can be good together, but ultimately you need two people who are going to get along, ult ultimately get along and see eye to eye. Yeah. And I, I'm, I put people together that I believe will do that
00:21:30
Raquel Baldelomar
On the same note is like, you might see two people who on paper seem like they would be a perfect match. Yeah. But then you just, you talk to each of them and you feel like this just isn't gonna work for them. Yeah. I feel Do you, I find people maybe who like, you know, maybe you wanted to match me or just, it just, I would go out with them and on paper they sent seemed great. Yes. But then it just, there was no chemistry.
00:21:56
Gabriella Aratow
I think. So I think personalities really important mm-hmm.
. And it's hard to totally quantify somebody's personality because our personalities are dynamic. Right. And they change with whoever we're sitting with. So, so for example, I consider myself very funny, but I'm very funny around certain people and I'm not funny at all mm-hmm. around other people. And I think if someone said, oh, you know, Gabby, she's a real jokester, she's always coming up with witty, funny things to say, somebody else would say, not the Gabby. I know. So I do think that when two people sit down together, there's almost this instantaneous organic agreement Yeah. Subliminal agreement about who they're gonna be together. So that's gotta take place on the date. Yeah. So there's a personality thing, but then I also do think there is a chemistry thing. You know, I sort of call it like the smooch factor, which is you've just, you're out with this person, do you want to smooch them or not? Yeah. And you could have very similar outlooks on life. You could even have a similar sexual market value, but you just don't want to exchange bodily fluids. That's, you just don't want to,
00:23:10
Raquel Baldelomar
You can't. Like, I mean, the thing about chemistry is that it's either there, it's not, and it's not, it's not a checklist. Yeah.
00:23:16
Gabriella Aratow
But I also do think that chemistry can builds in certain cases, I think for some people, if it's just completely absent, it's never gonna be there. Yeah. And you'd be wasting your time. Yeah. But I, I'm a big believer in like, if there was enough, why not have a second date? Why not have a third? You don't have to have a fourth. Certainly don't go into a full fledged relationship with somebody. Right. That you're feeling a lot of uncertainty about. But sometimes that little seed of intrigue that might not read as sparks or fireworks from date one can become something else. And I also think our priorities change over time. I mean, my priorities aren't the same that they were when I was 25. And that tends to be the case for most people. Our lives change, we change do we like changes?
Yeah. Yeah. your body changes. Mm-hmm.
, I mean, your body changes. So your jobs change, your circumstance changes. And so the truth of the matter is chemistry, which might have been really important to you when you were 24 years old, maybe at 54 years old. It's not as important as finding someone incredibly trustworthy.
00:24:33
Raquel Baldelomar
Mm-hmm.
, that's just so fascinating in terms of just, even just the chemistry. I mean, what I've also discovered is that like, like I might think somebody is just okay on a first date mm-hmm. . And then over time I get to know them and I discover something, like a skill that they have. Like they're an incredible cook or, you know, they, they teach me, they teach me something that I don't know, and then all of a sudden I'm like, at first maybe I didn't find them that I'm, I I didn't have a chemistry. But then after like I learned something that they taught me Yeah. Or they taught me, you know, they made an incredible meal for me. I'm like, wow. Like I, it actually happened. So Yes.
00:25:13
Gabriella Aratow
And the reverse. Yeah. I mean, I have, I have gone out with men that I just looked at them across the room and thought, wow. Like that's my type. Yeah. I, I look at it, I want it, but then we got to know each other better. And I, I'm like, they're mean. Yeah.
00:25:31
Raquel Baldelomar
And you
00:25:32
Gabriella Aratow
Know what, yeah. Meanness is a big turnoff for me. That's true. I don't like mean people and suddenly I'm not that interested anymore in how good looking or how much chemistry because I don't want to have my life around somebody with those attitudes. And so it really can happen both ways.
00:25:50
Raquel Baldelomar
Do you, is it your role to tell that to a to a client that you know that, because I know that's part of the whole matchmaking process. As you get some feedbacks,
00:26:02
Gabriella Aratow
You get feedback. So I would say that there's kind of two categories. One would be called date coaching. Okay. There's a whole industry of date coaches where they don't even do any matchmaking. They just are date coaches. I include some date coaching in my matchmaking work because I feel like it's, it needs to be integrated. I could never, so if someone comes to me and they ask me a question, I'm not gonna be like, well, you know, I'm not gonna answer that. You gotta find a date. Of course, I'm gonna do some date coaching while I'm working with someone. And I, I would actually be very nervous about somebody who wouldn't be open to some date coaching with me. So I do do some date coaching, but that, so there's the coaching element and then there's what I would call the feedback element. One of the, the incredible things that happens when you work with a matchmaker is you hear the things that you have never heard before because people are non-confrontational and they're often not going to tell you to your face what they did not like about you on the date.
But they're probably pretty inclined to tell a third person. Mm-hmm.
. So, for example, one thing that happens a lot on dates is just somebody who talks incessantly about themselves and doesn't express any curiosity in the other party. But do you think the other party's gonna say on the date, you know, you haven't even asked me anything about myself and I'm finding you very boorish right now. Not a lot of people are gonna do that, but I might get the feedback from several people that this person didn't express any curiosity and just rambled on the entire time about themselves. And that might be very enlightening for them. Mm-hmm. , they may not even realize that they're doing that. Yeah. They probably don't.
00:27:47
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. Do you ever find general lines of just requirements between sexes of like men in general want this in a woman? Yes. And then women in general want this? Or is it two, is it all over the map?
00:28:06
Gabriella Aratow
No, it, it follows like you know, very strong trends.
00:28:10
Raquel Baldelomar
Okay. Okay. What are they? So let's talk about what men want in a woman.
00:28:14
Gabriella Aratow
In the many, many, many years I have done this pretty much every single man that I have worked with has asked me to introduce him to somebody younger than he is. However, I will say this, I have one married couple where she is significantly older. They actually had a baby last week. I was just l looking at a picture of it just hours before I came here. When he came back from that first date, he said, could you get me someone just like her except like, you know, a little younger? And I said, no, , no. If you want someone just like her, there's her. I highly recommend you go on another date with her. They're married now. But in general with men with me, they ask for younger. I think it's a big mistake in general that actually begins to take place a lot more as they get older.
So a guy in his mid twenties is gonna probably have a lot more flexibility around age than a guy in his mid sixties. A guy in his mid twenties will say, she's 30. Okay, I'll try it. But a guy who's 65, if I say she's 70, he's not going to try it. so younger is probably the number one thing. And I have a lot of like bones to pick and issues around this. And I'm always trying to sort of manipulate and try and like massage and coach out of. But typically men are asking me for younger. women tend to like men who are taller than they are. I have never had a woman who came to me and said, you know what? I like a guy, like about three or four inches shorter than I am would be great. So, you know, I think in a funny way, there's a, there's a mirror, there's a mirroring that happens with the genders where we're doing a little something to each other and we all need to kind of own up to maybe having a little more openness and flexibility about these things.
00:30:17
Raquel Baldelomar
How, and what about money? Like how do you consider matching people when money is involved in terms of just how, how much money they're each making and what happens when one person, there's a big discrepancy between how much money somebody is making versus another person.
00:30:36
Gabriella Aratow
So I have definitely put people out on dates who are in vastly different financial brackets. Mm-hmm.
, I think that is l largely an incredibly individual kind of feeling. So I know some women, for example, who are extraordinarily wealthy and they say about their wealth, this is a gift. I have a gift to have this wealth. I'm happy to share it. And I don't really need a man with money because I have more than I could ever spend myself. And I don't even mind, you know, spreading it around a little bit. I have other women who come to me with a lot of wealth and they say, well, he's got to have what I have. Mm-hmm. . And I say, why? And we get into, we sort of get into that. So I think money can really vary from person to person, but more than money in the bank. It almost becomes a question of lifestyle. How does somebody envision themselves living? I don't think somebody who is comfortable with extreme frugalness is gonna have a great relationship with a big spender. Right.
00:31:44
Raquel Baldelomar
But going back to also just the whole unrealistic expectation, you gave the example of like the 65 year old man wanting to date a 38 year old woman. Right. I'm sure you also get a woman who let's say is 30 years old mm-hmm.
, but she doesn't really have a very well paying job, but she wants to date a multimillionaire. I mean, that is, that's, that's her requirement. I mean, she wants a, you know, and I've seen, I mean, you see this in LA all the time, you know, these young women want a sugar daddy. Right. So h I mean, how do you also deal with that? People who basically are, are really just wanting, they want that sugar daddy. Well, I
00:32:26
Gabriella Aratow
Put, I try to put them together with their appropriate pair
. Really? Yeah. I mean, those relationships exist. Usually the man is significantly older. Mm-hmm. , she's very young and pretty. He comes in with a lot, lot of money. He doesn't mind the fact that he's paying for everything, and she doesn't mind the fact that he's a lot older. And to me, I say, okay, as long as two consenting adults are comfortable in this dynamic, then that's the relationship that they want. But I also say to people working with me, you know, you're not shopping for a bank account with me. I don't, I don't, that's, it doesn't work like that. You know, I, you can't just come up to me, knock on my door and say, you know what? I think I'd like 20 million. Like, give it to me. So it doesn't really work like that.
But I do think there are people who are more financially driven than others. And I, I don't necessarily have a problem with that. I just see if there's an appropriate match for that. But for example, if somebody came to me and wanted to hire me, and she said, look, this is, I make very little money, but I'm gonna take whatever little money I have and I'm gonna hire you, and he needs to have a minimum of this many millions, I would probably not take that client. I don't think that that is would be a healthy way to go about dating. Yeah. And and it wouldn't be somebody that I would wanna work with. But I'll tell you, that doesn't happen that often for me, really. That somebody's coming to me asking for that kind of thing less than you would think is what I
00:34:03
Raquel Baldelomar
Would say. It's also, I think partly your reputation too. I mean, I'm sure there's certain matchmakers who who will do that, you know? Yeah. But I think your reputation too is like, I mean, is is different. Yeah.
00:34:17
Gabriella Aratow
Well, I make all kinds of couples. I certainly have put many, I have had many male clients who had an enormous amount of wealth and put them out with women who had no wealth, who were kind of what they were asking for. And they've gone on and dated and, and had relationships. So I'm not opposed to this. What I'm opposed to is, is somebody who's who, who isn't thinking about what's realistic for them. and as long as I, in my understanding on the observation deck that I sit on, think that something is realistic, then I might be able to work with them.
00:34:56
Raquel Baldelomar
So now let's get into sex.
00:34:58
Gabriella Aratow
Okay. .
00:34:59
Raquel Baldelomar
So I remember going on a date with a guy years ago when I first moved to LA at third date. He's like, we're gonna party. And I'm like, okay, great. And he takes me to a BD s m party. Okay. And and it is like, there's flogging people are having sex. I mean, there is like all the, I mean, it's like eyes wide shut, basically without the blindfold. And he's like, listen, I want you to know this is something I'm really into if you really, you know, I mean, and I, we got actually, I kind of liked him, you know? Okay. Up until that third date. And then I just realized I was, and then he's like, how would you feel about me putting you in a cage? Mm-hmm. And just, just, you know, just I really get off on that. Okay.
And I just, I mean, and it was a fun experience Right. To see it. I mean, I've never been to a BDSM party before. Yes. But to understand like, people's people have their kinks. Yes. And that's Yep. And accepting, you know, different people of different kinks and accepting what, you know, I think it's great that people can find each other and there's a whole, the community of people who are into that fetish, into that BDSM fetish. Yeah. But it made me realize that it's like, okay, I have to realize, like, what are my limitations in terms of like, what I'm willing to do? And like, you know, I don't think, I'm not willing to be in a cage and be left there for three hours .
00:36:18
Gabriella Aratow
You
00:36:18
Raquel Baldelomar
Know. So do you get with, do, do clients come to you? Do you, I mean, how does, because that, that's part of dating is the sex, I mean, there has to be the sexual compatibility and that is such a personal, dynamic, intimate kind of connection. Yeah. But because you're now like in the middle of that, how do you, how do people get you involved?
00:36:38
Gabriella Aratow
So, you know, I would say, so I, I am largely a heterosexual matchmaker. I have not taken on many gay clients. That is not to say that I wouldn't take on a gay client that I think that I would be able to serve. But in my history of matchmaking, I have worked almost entirely with heterosexuals in the world of gay matchmaking, I think there's probably a lot more upfront conversations about sex. Mm-hmm.
, tops, bottoms. Mm-hmm. , you know, all these things. In my personal business, I really do not dive into that. And I'll tell you one of the reasons why, you know, in my own sexual past, it's been somewhat inconsistent, which is to say that I've had boyfriends that I really enjoyed having a lot of sex with them. And then I've had boyfriends where I really didn't mm-hmm. , and I was dating them for other things, and the sex was there and it was fine, but it was not something that I was going to be, you know, asking for a lot more of.
And then I've had partners where it's like, they just walk in the room and I'm like, woo. And so for the same reason that I talk about two people having an organic dynamic thing, I don't really feel that the conversation is my, it's a not my business. But beyond that, I'm not sure it's the truth. I can't guarantee that it's the truth. But sometimes I do get people coming to me and they'll say something like, I have a very high libido and I need to be with somebody else that has a very high libido. And so I will maybe include something like that as I'm out searching mm-hmm. . But that's pretty much as interesting as deep as I will go.
00:38:23
Raquel Baldelomar
Really. So in as, as a matchmaker for heterosexual couples Yeah. That's about the maximum you will do in terms of like, and that people come to you and say they, that they just say, I have a very high libido, so I wanna be with somebody who also is willing to do something like that. You know, that's, they're not, they're not coming to you with like, these are my kinks or anything like that. Right. Okay.
00:38:44
Gabriella Aratow
That if, if they did, and I've certainly had been approached with a little bit of that kind of thing. Occasionally I'm, that's probably not a good client for my business. Mm-hmm.
. I, I mean, I had somebody come to me asking for things sexually that I thought were, th this one particular man came to me and he wanted to have a girlfriend wherein she would have intercourse with other men, and then he would give her oral right afterwards.
00:39:16
Raquel Baldelomar
Oh wow. .
00:39:20
Gabriella Aratow
Oh my Lord. Wow. Oh my lord. And my thought about a guy like that is, I'm like, you know, if you want to go out and do whatever you wanna do, it's a free world. If you wanna do what you do, there is no way I would take a client like that mm-hmm.
. And there is no way that I would spend my life and my time seeking that out for somebody. That's just not a fit for me. I think as a small business owner, one of the most important things you can do as a small business owner is know who, where your boundaries are and who's good for you. Because the most important thing for me is that I'd be able to continue to offer this service to people. Right. And I don't wanna put myself in situations where I have to end my service, not just maybe legally, which certainly could be a case, but also psychologically that doing that would make me hate this job. Right. And I would rather go sell cars.
00:40:15
Raquel Baldelomar
Right.
00:40:16
Gabriella Aratow
So so that's about as deep as I go. My feeling is, you know, I I I create opportunities and when you are out on a dinner together, or two, you can ask each other those questions in the ways that don't
00:40:29
Raquel Baldelomar
Need you would, you don't
00:40:30
Gabriella Aratow
Need to get involved. I don't need to get involved with that. That's my feeling. What is,
00:40:34
Raquel Baldelomar
You say you only match heterosexual couples. H how, what is different about matching L G B T Q
00:40:42
Gabriella Aratow
From the people that work with me in that world are, are colleagues that I know mm-hmm.
who specialize in that. There, there's just what I would call kind of categorizations that are beyond my knowledge that go deep into that, that kind of world. That is a lingo and a way of seeing things and classifying things that I just don't have a ton of experience with. I do think that I could take on clients who were not heterosexuals, but only if I had a conversation with them where I felt like what I was able to provide them with would be within my, the scope of the, the conversations I could have and the scope within my knowledge. Mm-hmm. . and I actually think that that would be really lovely and fun for me. But in general, I usually you know, refer them out to,
00:41:38
Raquel Baldelomar
There's so many heterosexual couples. I mean, there's so much of that to do. Yes. So, I mean, and I'm, there's other people who are, you know, much more ingrained in the, in the L G B T Q community. Correct. You know, so I think that's just, I mean it's, I've always said, like, and like, make sure you understand you're lane really,
00:41:55
Gabriella Aratow
Really well first. Right? Yes.
00:41:57
Raquel Baldelomar
Before you can kind of go into,
00:41:58
Gabriella Aratow
There's one lady, her name is Tammy, and she is straight, but she is like one of the biggest gay matchmakers in America. Mm-hmm.
. She just considers herself an ally and she doesn't take anybody straight. She runs a fully, you know gay matchmaking service. Yeah. So. Well,
00:42:19
Raquel Baldelomar
And even gay, you recently on that show I am Shauna Ray. Yeah. You, you matched a woman with a disability.
00:42:25
Gabriella Aratow
I did. I took, so I wouldn't say that somebody coming to me with a disability is my usual wheelhouse. My usual wheelhouse are white collar professionals in their thirties, forties, fifties, and sixties. Mm-hmm.
, largely my client list are men in their forties and fifties who have been very successful. and occasionally I take on female clients as well. Though my client list is almost always largely male. But I did get an opportunity to go onto the learning channel and work with a woman who has a disability. So her name is Shauna she's lovely. And she's 22 years old. So at 22, you know, you're, you're ready to go out mm-hmm. and date mm-hmm. . And she likes to have a drink, which she can legally do. And she's gotten a couple tattoos, which is to perfectly legal. And she wants to be exploring her, you know, sexual feelings, which all 22 year old girls too. 22 year old women. And but there's one thing about her, which is that she had cancer as a child, and the treatments for her childhood cancer stunted her growth. And she never grew past three feet, 10. So if you saw her in a grocery store or walking down a street, you would be certain that you were laying eyes on an eight year old. Hmm. So she's a woman, she's
00:43:52
Raquel Baldelomar
A 22 year
00:43:52
Gabriella Aratow
Old. She's a 22 year old woman in the body of an eight year old child, which brings up a lot of issues around her dating life. And so I was brought on the show to try to help find her some dates to go on.
00:44:09
Raquel Baldelomar
Wow. And I'm sure that went really well,
00:44:12
Gabriella Aratow
. It did, it did go well. so in, they just got picked up for season two. So in season one, you see a date that I picked for her mm-hmm. people say, you know, she, she was, he was six two. Mm-hmm. , he was from a different race. he lived a couple hours away, but he was very much what she had initially described to me in what she thought she would be very attracted to. I also, during the time that I was working with her, found somebody who had had her exact scenario. Oh wow. He had had childhood cancer. He had had this same treatment. His growth had been stunted, and he had never reached beyond four feet, 10 inches. So he's a foot taller than she is, but still a very, very short male, I mean, under five feet tall. And I decided to put them out on a date as well, which is going to be part of season two. So I'm gonna tell you, I don't know how that date went, because I haven't spoken to the producer since the date was filmed.
00:45:21
Raquel Baldelomar
Well, you have to watch, I am Shauna Ray , find out. Yeah. But you also, I'm sure had to go through all the people who had weird, creepy sort of fetishes for being with somebody that short. I'm sure there's very strange men who actually had those weird sort of the
00:45:39
Gabriella Aratow
Morning after. So I, I'm on episodes two in episode six of season one. So the morning after episode two aired and it showed that Shauna Ray had enlisted a matchmaker and that she, you know, and my name comes on the screen and you can, you know, find me, I woke up to a barrage of emails, really a barrage of emails from what I would call highly inappropriate matches for her. Wow. First of all, among other things, Shauna's 22 and she wanted to cap her age limit at about 30 max. Mm-hmm.
. So I was looking for guys 21 2, 29 roughly for her mm-hmm. , which I think is a
00:46:22
Raquel Baldelomar
Very reasonable,
00:46:23
Gabriella Aratow
Very reasonable, as you can imagine, as we've discussed previously, many times, a lot of these emails were from men way, way older. So not only were they looking to date a 22 year old, but they were looking to date a 22 year old who looks like a child. Yeah. They did not,
00:46:46
Raquel Baldelomar
They did not, they
00:46:48
Gabriella Aratow
Did not get their opportunity through me. No. I think I wrote a few of them back.
00:46:51
Raquel Baldelomar
That's good. That's good. You mentioned that your clients are mostly male. Mm-hmm.
. So to people who might be interested in your services, where, you know, to either get on your database, like, or just what's an average price range of just what your services could cost. I'm sure it's for different, there's a lot of different levels. Yeah. Different tiers. Just give a range of what that
00:47:14
Gabriella Aratow
Would mean. So first of all, it is totally free just to be in my database. I, I
00:47:19
Raquel Baldelomar
And how do people get on your
00:47:21
Gabriella Aratow
Database? So you get into my database through my website, which is, I, my company's called Kiss Keeper Introduction Services Kiss. But my, my, my website is keeper intros.com. Like you're my keeper. Our keeper introductions.com will bring you there too. But keeper intros.com, and then there's a little button that says like, join our free database or enter here. It is a hundred percent free to go into my database. Here's what you get. If you come into my database, here's what will happen. Not a lot of people, it's not public facing, like match.com. It's not like anybody can see this. The people who can see this are me. The people who could see this are the engineers who run the database. They're in the Ukraine, and they've got other things to be thinking about right now. Anyway. or I might take your profile and I might submit it to a client who's pegging me, and I might take your profile and I might submit it to another matchmaker who I know is looking for someone and has come to me asking for help that matchmaker might show your profile to a client.
So I tell people, let's just say if you enter my database, it's possible that 10 to 20 people will see that profile. That's it. It's not gonna be a public facing thing. And it's within a pretty small inner circle. It's completely free to do that. And if my client says, yeah, I I like that profile, I'd like to meet them, I will call you up. And if another matchmaker says, Ooh, that person, your database, yeah. I'd like to introduce my client to them, you'll get an email from me that says, I took the liberty to show your profile to a matchmaker that I work with, and they would like to contact you. May I send your telephone number or your email to them so I make sure that everything's comfortable and good first. And then I will call up that person mm-hmm.
and say, if it's my client, I will say, you know, I have this client.
Let me give you a, a description of the who this person is. And I expect my matchmaking colleague to do the same. So nobody's going out on dates that they don't want to be on and have haven't agreed to. And all of this costs $0. Mm-hmm. just to be in my database for somebody who wants to hire me, and therefore I am working on their behalf as their matchmaker, which means that I am guaranteeing that I'm going to be seeking for them, working for them and sending them on dates. It is quite a range that range has to do with our contract, whether it's temporal, so by the month or whether it's by the date. And largely that is a distinguish a distinguishment I make with people who come to me based around their net worth. Mm-hmm. So I tend to try to work with people in their net worth in something that's workable for them with me.
So somebody who's got 200 million is not going to be paying me the same as somebody who has 2 million. And so I asked for a lot of financial transparency so that I can work in, in with a contract with somebody. The other way that that contract could be different has to do with things like age, gender, expectations, and also just my own personal network. So if a fabulously gorgeous 35 year old man comes to me who was an ex model and now runs a digital agency and makes 2 million a year, and he says, Gabby, I'd love to meet someone I'm willing to date up to 37, that is probably going to be a very easy client for me to start to find really good matches for because of the database that I already have, because of the people that I've already worked with in the past.
Because maybe he looks a lot like a client that I had a few months ago who was asking for a lot of the same kinds of things. That person is not gonna pay me the same as, let's just say for example, an 82 year old woman who comes to me and says, my husband of 50 years, you know, has passed away and I think I'm gonna live another at least 10 years, and I'm used to having a partner and I'd like to see if there's somebody else that's probably gonna be a harder match for me. And so that person's gonna be probably paying me more somewhat, because when people pay me and the fee that they pay me, I also pay fees out on that in order to go networking with all of the other boutique matchmakers around the world that I trust and respect. And we have a fee system. That's true. And so I have to wor I have to, I have to claim a number upfront with a client that allows me to be paid for my time, but also allows me to have the fees that I know I'll need need. And I never tell them what those fees are.
00:52:25
Raquel Baldelomar
But that's also so that you can go and then pay your network of other matchmakers and people that you know who, who are giving you, you know, just the, the, the information on people.
00:52:36
Gabriella Aratow
That's right. And I don't wanna say, I don't say to one client, oh, you know, I had to offer this other matchmaker that I knew would have good matches for you, X amount of dollars. And my other clients, I only have to offer X amount of dollars. None of that's their business. Right. That's my business. Right. You don't worry about that. You don't think about that. Right. You worry about me and I'll worry about you. So in that regard, there can be quite a range, but you know, my lowest price points typically are starting around eight or $9,000. And my highest price point is typically running around 45 or $50,000. So it's a big range. Mm-hmm.
, depending on lots of different factors. Yeah. But I want to be able to offer my service to people and to people I know that I can serve. So we just start there with, am I a good matchmaker for you? Can I get you what you want? Do I believe in my ability to match you?
00:53:35
Raquel Baldelomar
I feel like a lot of people come to you after they've had some negative experiences on match.com and all, you know, pinch Bumble, all these different dating apps. Yes. What has been your ex, you know, you're, you're dealing with just the personal, the one-on-one. I mean, it's very personal, very hands-on. Yeah. Whereas I, when I, my experience with just these dating apps I mean there's so many. I think it's really, in many ways it's changed the culture of dating. But I think one of the biggest flaws that I've seen with it is that, is that you, you know, you can filter based on just these very strict categories, you know, age and religion and height. Height. And you might miss somebody that, that actually, you know, is, is you would've had a connection, but they, they were not, they did not fit. Meet your filters. Yeah. You know, I, I remember I've, there's times where it's like, I met a man who I thought was just like really interesting, but he just did not, he didn't he would not have fit mi fit my filter. That's
00:54:42
Gabriella Aratow
Right. He wouldn't have come up in your search. Yeah. Right. He wouldn't have come up in your
00:54:45
Raquel Baldelomar
Search. Right. Yeah. And I probably wouldn't have come up in his search. Maybe not. And but so, so it just, but it's, I think it's I mean there obviously has to be a way you filter. Yes. But is there it's, I think it's a flaw.
00:54:59
Gabriella Aratow
I do too. Which is why I always tell people too, who are working with me, I say, work with a matchmaker, be on the apps and go to parties, go to events. Mm-hmm.
get involved with charities because people talk in finance about multiple streams of income. Mm-hmm. , I like to talk about multiple streams of dates. I agree with you. I think the apps have a limit. There's a lot of limitations with the apps, and then there's gonna be potentially limitations with me. Mm-hmm. . And then there might be limitations with the charity that you decide you're gonna go get involved with, but hopefully the right person walks through one of these doors. Right. And I do think that when you work with a matchmaker, you suddenly do sort of bring your a game. I cannot tell you how many times this strange phenomenon has happened. So, for example, a few months ago, someone came to me, an anesthesiologist who had been on match.com for 12 years, a divorced anesthesiology anesthesiologist.
He said, I have been on match.com for so many years. It is the worst. I never meet anybody. I've never had a decent date. It's been 12 years of suck. Hmm. So I think it's time for me to hire a matchmaker. I say, okay. He hires me. I, you know, give him a little, couple little pep talks. And then I say, but don't cancel your match yet. You've paid for the month. Might as well keep it open. Well, lo and behold, he met someone on Match like five days after he hired me. Me, . Yeah. They're engaged now. Oh, wow. And I say, you know, I'm not gonna take total credit mm-hmm. , but I'm gonna take a little credit. Right. Because I do think that his energy shifted. Right. And there was something in the shift of the energy that maybe allowed an opening or an access that hadn't been there for him before. So it is a phenomenon that like, it's like you suddenly decide you're gonna put your money where your mouth is, you're gonna bring your A game and then you're, it feels different. Mm-hmm. , it feels different to even go on a date. I think going on a date through a matchmaker or after you've hired a matchmaker does not feel like other dates you have been on.
00:57:12
Raquel Baldelomar
And I also think part of the reason you talk about that energy shift is because I think just the gamification of the dating apps Yep. Has almost elongated the, the process of like casual dating. There is no, the, the end goal isn't necessarily to have a serious relationship or have a have get married. I think that it's, in many ways it's just to go on as many dates as you can. So it's, when someone decides to hire a matchmaker, I feel like there's usually a little bit more the end goal. Like what is the end goal I want?
00:57:48
Gabriella Aratow
Right. So I'll tell you with the apps, they are, they are media companies. And by media companies, I mean that their goal is to sell advertising space. The way that you get the highest price for advertising space is to have the most eyeballs. Mm-hmm.
. So every time you get off the app, the app doesn't like it. The people who run these apps, they don't want you leaving the app. When you look at the business plans and the prospectus of, of these companies, they never use the word marriage. They never use the word relationship. They're not interested in marriage and relationships. However, you will die in the world of matchmaking if you don't have success stories. Success stories and word of mouth are my lifeblood. So people sometimes say, well, don't you want everyone to fail? And then the hire you again, and I say, I would've been out of the business years ago. Mm-hmm. , it's much more important to me that I can show pictures of the wedding, the beautiful wedding that took place, the baby that just got born, the the big beautiful ring that somebody just got, you know, proposed to. Right. That's important to my business. That is not important to Tinder.
00:59:06
Raquel Baldelomar
Right. The goals are totally not
00:59:08
Gabriella Aratow
Align. They are, they're totally different. Yeah. They're totally different. Plus I say to people all the time, I'm spending my life doing this work. I have a lot of opportunity to go spend my life and do something else. Mm-hmm.
. So I wouldn't be devoting my life blood to work that didn't have success for me. I wouldn't want to stay in this business. I'd go sell cars. Right. again, I'm like, I could go sell cars. Do
00:59:38
Raquel Baldelomar
You think that the culture of dating overall has shifted? I mean, you're in the business of trying to get people to get married Yes. At long-term relationships, but yes. Broader, beyond. I mean, just taking, stepping outside of that and looking at just the cul the just the culture of dating and marriages. We have less marriages happening now. Many less. And is it because you think of just more and more people are connecting on apps and it's, I it's it's changing the culture of what, of, of dating, what the end goal is.
01:00:10
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. I think a few things are at play in the fact that we're seeing a large drop off in not just marriages, but relationships in general. We have more single people in America right now than in the history of the nation. We are, I believe at this point it might even be a majority of adults, which that's never happened before. So I think a few things. First, I think it has to do with the fact that women for a long time we're very dependent on marriage. And now we have a world where we are seeing more women coming out of medical school, more women coming out of law school, more women going into MBA programs, more women who are small business owners. The truth of the matter is a woman, maybe today, maybe she would've accepted a marriage 30 years ago that she didn't really want mm-hmm.
Just because that was gonna provide her with shelter and food. And she just doesn't have to do that anymore. I also think there is something in the swiping culture where there's, we're, we're disposable. Now, you know, for centuries, you, your choice in marriage was sort of limited. There was the farm, there was the next farm over and the next farm after that. And there were the five people within a certain radius. By the time you were, you were considered too old, which probably would've been like 22 or 23 you had to pick. Right. And you didn't have a lot of choice.
01:01:35
Raquel Baldelomar
We have a problem of optionality now. It's
01:01:37
Gabriella Aratow
Too much choice. It's endless choice. And it's the illusion that you can get whatever you want as long as you have all of this choice. But it's an illusion you can't get anything you want just because you, you're seeing all of these people out on Bumble. Right. So I think that it, that the dating swiping culture has largely changed it.
01:01:58
Raquel Baldelomar
And I also think just what I personally have seen is that when there are problems, you start to date somebody and you start to get to know somebody. And there's, you know, there's tension, there's differences that, that come about from just getting to know each other is that rather than working through it, it's much more conversa. Yep. This is not gonna work out. They don't fit exactly what I'm looking for. Yeah. And they're like, I'll just go online and find somebody else. Right. So, so there's, there's less of an interest in trying to work through problems with the person you're, you're dating. Yeah. And it's much easier to think that you can just go find somebody else. And
01:02:36
Gabriella Aratow
It's part of modern culture in general. We used to live in a world where 50 years ago you went to work for a company, you worked at that company for 50 years, they gave you a gold watch and that was your life. Mm-hmm.
. And, and now I think people are at jobs for something like less than two and a half years. Most jobs, your whole goal of a job is to use that job as a stepping stone to another and another. And back in the day, your work family was really like your family. And now you don't really wanna bother getting to know the names of your coworkers because you are gonna be moving on to something as soon as you can. So we're just living right now in a culture that's less committed. Right. In general.
01:03:19
Raquel Baldelomar
And part of that commitment, you know, just from what I've seen from other friends who've complained about dating and is, is this this concept of how ghosting is becoming a lot more prevalent and it's almost becoming an acceptable form Yeah. Of just ending relationships. And what I've also seen is that it's like there's, because there's less, less marriages. Yeah. There are more breakups happening, there's more breakups and more, and in the way that's happening, it's just ghosting or the slow fizzle Yeah. Is becoming just a much more common form, acceptable form.
01:03:51
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. I mean, my personal feeling about ghosting is that it's acceptable under certain circumstances. I don't think you should ever ghost someone you've been intimate with. I don't think you should ever ghost someone that you have future plans with. Mm-hmm.
. But if you've gone on two dates with somebody and you've had dinner and it, it hasn't moved into anything physical and you have come after two dates to the conclusion that you are not interested, do I think you necessarily owe them a breakup text or a breakup call? Not necessarily. Mm-hmm. . So for me, ghosting is an okay way to step back in early stages. And when there's been, you know a still an a certain amount of distance kept mm-hmm. in some ways, I actually think that it's merciful rather than, Hey, we had two dinners together and I've thought about it and I'm not that interested. Right. And I think most people who ghost, hopefully there might some people who ghost might be trying to be merciful, others might just be cowards. Sometimes
01:04:59
Raquel Baldelomar
You just don't wanna tell you, you know, you don't wanna tell somebody you're short, fat and
01:05:04
Gabriella Aratow
Ugly. Right.
01:05:05
Raquel Baldelomar
I mean,
01:05:06
Gabriella Aratow
You don't wanna say that. Right. Or you just so, or you just, you know, the bottom line is you just don't want, you don't wanna bring them a bad, sad experience. Right. And somewhere in your gut you're like, it's just not my person. Yeah. And so I think ghosting is okay, but I'll tell you, if you, if you ghost somebody, cuz you've been on two dates with them and you've decided you don't want a third date and you've decided you don't need to actually like break up with them because there's nothing to break up. You've had a couple of dinners, if they contact you, I think you owe them a response. Mm-hmm.
. But my feeling is they probably will get the picture. Yeah. Especially if you've been in the habit of initiating the contact. But if you hear from them and they say, I haven't heard from you, did something happen, then you really need to write them back. Mm-hmm. That is the moral and ethical way to handle it. But I think ghosting is okay sometimes.
01:06:05
Raquel Baldelomar
And your goal as a matchmaker is always marriages I
01:06:10
Gabriella Aratow
Or long-term relationships.
01:06:11
Raquel Baldelomar
Some
01:06:12
Gabriella Aratow
People don't wanna get married again. Some people don't wanna get married at all.
01:06:14
Raquel Baldelomar
That's that's very true. Yeah. what do you think has made you such just successful matchmaker in terms of marriages and long-term relationships? Because you have that, I mean, that's a great honor and you can, I mean, and I see on your post on Facebook, all the people you are, you know, continually getting married. Yeah. What do you think makes you successful in, in, in that? Cuz that's a huge, huge goal.
01:06:40
Gabriella Aratow
Well, I listen to what people want mm-hmm.
. So being able to really hear people, but I also am good at at understanding what might be a good match for them that they themselves may not understand. Mm. I'm also very good at seeking, I mean, I, my my motto of my company is it's called Keeper Introduction Services. And my motto is we find, we, we, we, how do I say it? I imagine usually have it in front of me. I fi we find you keep,
01:07:17
Raquel Baldelomar
We find you keep I love that we,
01:07:19
Gabriella Aratow
That's my motto and that's, it says it on all my, like business cards and stuff. Mm-hmm.
, that's what, you know, my motto we find you keep mm-hmm. , and I'm very specific to use that motto because I can't do the keeping mm-hmm. , you have to do the keeping. I do the finding and I'm good at the finding so that some people just aren't good at seeking candidates and that takes a certain skillset. So I listen to people, I seek candidates. I have now, at this point in this business, years and years of understanding how to maybe unearth a bunch of hidden candidates that would've been, could candidates for that person that they might not have thought about. And I'm good at correcting pe what I think are people's misguided ways of thinking that are allowing them, not allowing them to have the right match come in. So it's all of these kinds of factors.
01:08:14
Raquel Baldelomar
Do you ever keep, do you keep track of the marriages that you put together and then the
01:08:20
Gabriella Aratow
Divorce that I haven't had a divorce
01:08:23
Raquel Baldelomar
Yet. No way. That's,
01:08:24
Gabriella Aratow
I feel very proud of, of that. But I also will say thank you. I also will say that it's probably inevitable of course, that eventually one happens, but all of my marriages are still together. And it's been a
01:08:36
Raquel Baldelomar
Lot. I think it's really interesting what you said about how you, in your opinion, there's less and less marriages happening because women necessarily, you know, they can be lawyers, doctors, they can be gainfully employed and they don't need to be like married to to for that anymore. Do you think by that there's been this whole shift in like what it, what masculinity means? Yep. What femininity means? Yes. And it's also affected dating life. It's the polarity. Very much of all of that Yes. Has affected all of that. Yes. it's such an, I mean, I just, even myself, like I know I can, I can be a very strong just, I mean, I run two businesses. I have a very, like, I have masculine traits in terms of just like my leadership and just like, you know, very competitive. But then there's the polarity of the, the very feminine, soft maternal side. Yeah. So it is something that I think women and men are also having to just really grapple with very
01:09:43
Gabriella Aratow
Much. I think. So men complain a lot these days about the fact that the women aren't women anymore. Women complain a lot these days that the men aren't men anymore. We, we have to, we have to reformulate some things, but I think that all people possess masculine and feminine energy. And I think it's important to understand when you're in your masculine and when you're in your feminine, and to be able to harness those powers for your own benefit mm-hmm.
. So I don't think that the same traits that got you success in one realm are going to necessarily get you success in the other. You have to learn how to change hats mm-hmm. . And you have to learn how to allow your femininity and your masculinity to power each other in the correct ways and in the correct places. And I would say I see this going both ways.
I think that there are a lot of women who are taking on too many of the masculine roles, and it's really wigging men out. And I also think that a lot of men in their attempts to be more woke or sensitive, have sort of embraced this sort of vulnerability of their very feminine sides. And I think it's wigging the women out mm-hmm. . So, you know, it's, it's a funny time we're in where we have to both retain some of what makes us attractive to each other as different genders and be in the modern world
01:11:24
Raquel Baldelomar
As a heterosexual woman. For me, that polarity of that sexual polarity is really like important. Like I am, I have the, you know, I can have strong masculine just energies when it comes to work, but I am, you know, I'm ultra feminine, very, I'm very girly girl and I am very attracted to that polarity of just what a ma the masculine male is. Right. And I am noticing and that's not for, that's, you know, women, all women are different, but it, it, I there's definitely somewhat that de polarization Right. That is happening. Yeah. And I think that depolarization creates sexual tension. I do think that p sexual polarity dri it may not drive love, but it does drive desire.
01:12:11
Gabriella Aratow
I, I agree with you. And I do, sometimes I'm surprised too, like Aca, I don't love The Bachelor and the Bachelorette, but every now and then I'll turn it on. And I remember watching this episode a year or two ago and the woman was complaining that the guy didn't talk enough about his feelings on the date. And for me, this was a little bit of a head scratcher. Mm-hmm.
, I'm sort of like, you know, that's not really, in my opinion, his job on the date. That's, that you may want him to talk about his feelings, but then you're acting as if he's let you down because he didn't talk about his feelings. That's not his, that wasn't his role on the date, in my opinion. Mm-hmm. , that's, I found some of, sometimes I look and I'm like, wow, people have some weird expectations of each other these days. Well,
01:13:05
Raquel Baldelomar
It's, it's an interest. It's the neutralization, you know, of trying to become both like, you know, both, you know, male and female Yeah. And just become neutral, becoming politically correct. That might be politically correct, but is that gonna fuel desires? Right. That gonna fuel attraction. Right. And I don't think, I don't think it does. Yeah.
01:13:24
Gabriella Aratow
I think most men are attracted to feminine energies, and by that I do not mean makeup and, and, and, and high heels. Mm-hmm.
, although those things can be very attractive to some men mm-hmm. , but feminine energies are energies such as receiving emoting masculine energies are energies such as planning. trying to think like organizing mm-hmm. , now we all emote and we all organize, but I sometimes do watch relationships kind of fall apart because the man and the woman have completely dropped their energy. So a man who expects to receive all the time and expects her to plan the dates
01:14:17
Raquel Baldelomar
01:14:19
Gabriella Aratow
I don't know. That may not be the best, most effective method to be getting what you want. or a woman who's constantly initiating everything that might, he may not even really understand how to put it into words. But if you are the one doing a lot of initiating everything and getting things going and planning things and organizing things and starting, you know, starting things off in these kind of more traditionally masculine ways, on some level he might enjoy the ego stroke mm-hmm.
. And on some level he might enjoy being able to kick back and go for the ride without the work that he's usually done. But I honestly think that somewhere on some level, for him, that might be more of a turnoff that he's able to really put into words. Mm-hmm. . So it is important to understand when you're being in your masculine, when you're being in your feminine, and if it's going well for the
01:15:15
Raquel Baldelomar
Partner. Yeah. No, and it, it, it's all about balance. I mean, that's what this whole podcast is about balance. And that is something that I personally have had to really work on just attaining my own balance. Cuz I, you know, have through what I have to do in building just my projects, my companies, like, I have to take on more those masculine roles mm-hmm.
and it's, I enjoy it. I the comp, you know, the competitiveness, the you know, even like the poker playing, like there's a, you know, the all of that is, is, is there's masculine sort of energy there, but there's, then I have to counterbalance it with the other things like cooking mm-hmm. and gardening and watching love stories and, you know, talking to you about relationships, Yeah. And you know what I mean? So, and, and feelings and all of that.
Yeah. So, so it is a balance between recognizing your masculine energy and your feminine energy. And then what is that balance between the two and what, for you, what's healthy for you and the people. And that's where it's so unique. It's so personal. Yeah. Everyone has their unique, that pendulum of where, what fits for them, the masculine and the feminine. Right. But it is, I think, really important for people to, to recognize the two and, and honestly like, you know, I don't, I wouldn't, I, I know I personally wouldn't be so attracted to a man that was so, like, sensitive and woken all of that. I mean, just who was so in touch with this s inside if he didn't really have some very, very strong masculine, you know, to bounce it out. Yeah. Yeah. Go play football or something like that if you're gonna, if you're gonna talk about your feelings Right. Do something super masculine. Right. It would, I would, I wouldn't be attractive.
01:16:59
Gabriella Aratow
Right. And I tell by the way too, I do think sometimes women do expect men to be their girlfriends. And I'm sort
01:17:07
Raquel Baldelomar
Of like, they're
01:17:08
Gabriella Aratow
Not, he's not, not your girlfriend. You go do girlfriend stuff with your girlfriends. Yeah. He's not your girlfriend and you shouldn't ask him to be your girlfriend. Yeah. It's not gonna be good. But I'll tell you, sometimes it's just the most subtle word, changes in the way that you're communicating with your partner. So for example, let's say let's say there was a couple and the man comes home really late one night mm-hmm. And she's upset about it a way that something she could say is something like, don't ever go out late again. Mm-hmm. Another thing she could say is, when I was waiting for you and you came home late, I felt so sad. I felt so sad to me, one of those ways of expressing what you want is masculine. And one of those ways of expressing what you want is more feminine. Mm-hmm.
. And it's kind of amazing the miracles that you can see in relating to other people if you are aware of whether you're in your masculine or you're feminine mm-hmm. while you're communicating your needs mm-hmm. . And it can be revolutionary for relationships. It really can.
01:18:22
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. Another thing that I found found really interesting is that dichotomy between love and desire. Mm. You know, and I, Esther Perel, I'm sure you know, she's, I think she's amazing. I wanna, she's
01:18:35
Gabriella Aratow
Fantastic.
01:18:36
Raquel Baldelomar
I wanna have her on the podcast. Esther, if you're
01:18:38
Gabriella Aratow
Watching, I love her
01:18:39
Raquel Baldelomar
Too. My, she's amazing. I love her too. But in, you know, reading her book Mat in Captivity, yes. I mean, she, I've really just, she understood, broke down really that paradox between love and desire.
01:18:49
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. I mean, I've read Mat in Captivity several times. I love the book. And you know, for me, what she's basically saying on some level is you can't get too comfortable mm-hmm.
and still have the spark. You want lots of nights in watching Netflix in your pajamas and sharing a bucket of, of you know, candy is comfortable, but ultimately that may not be fueling the flames of desire. Right. And so she really talks a lot about comfort and desire, and that you have to be kind of holding some distance mm-hmm. away from what might be the most comfortable thing you desire. Needs
01:19:33
Raquel Baldelomar
Do
Distance. Yes. Desire, needs distance. Yes. Where love needs safety. Yeah. And communication and security. Yes. And again, it's the balance, like, just like the masculine and the feminine. It's a balance. It is a balance between just the desire and, and and desire and the closeness, you know, the distance and the closeness that, that's right. And I mean, I know that just when you get into relationships, like you don't really want somebody who's like with you all the time, who's always like one who's living. I mean, you want somebody who has their own individual life. That's what got you attracted to them in the first place.
01:20:03
Gabriella Aratow
Right? That's right. it's funny, so many people do that, that they, they attract someone with the dynamic interesting life that they're leading. And then as soon as this partner comes into their life, they suddenly stop. Don't stop.
, don't stop. I, I also, and some of this, by the way, some people do like more independence than others. And some people like more alone time. My mother met someone on match.com in her seventies. And my mother, he likes to be with her all of the time. Mm-hmm. , my mother would prefer a lot more alone time. They're still, they're to, they've been together six years now. They moved in together two months after they met on Match under sort of this, they were sort of under this umbrella where they were like, we're old, we're gonna die. Let's not wait. Let's just get our, our new life off.
Which by the way, I think is a good attitude. Mm-hmm. , you know, it's kind of a good attitude no matter what age you are. But all of this is to say, my mother and her boyfriend moved in together after a couple months. They've been together six years now. They are crazy about each other, but they have an imbalance in terms of how much time alone they would like to spend. And they work it out. They work it out. He finds his ability to give her her space when he would maybe prefer to come along to lunch with, with me, or, and then she also goes, well, you know, I probably wouldn't mind a few more hours of going to the library and doing some research for something that I'm looking into, but I think he spent a few hours already alone today, and he'd probably like me to come back and bring some dinner too. So that's what good relationships are. You're never gonna find that exact mirror of yourself and nor would you want to.
01:21:49
Raquel Baldelomar
This whole podcast is about balance. And I wanna get into a little bit about just how you manage just your professional life as a famous matchmaker, very successful matchmaker, but then you also have your own personal life and your own romantic life and dating life and your own health and fitness. So first of all, like how do you keep, make sure that the, the drama, like you deal with, I'm sure a lot of just the dating drama of people and that, that all these people are coming to you and telling you what they want. This and this. How do you keep that from affecting your own personal life and your own outlook of dating and relationships? I
01:22:28
Gabriella Aratow
Can't say it hasn't affected me. I actually think I'm quite osmotic and I, I think that it does affect me and I think that it does shape my worldview mm-hmm.
sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. But mostly I, I'm trying with my clients to care tremendously about something really important to them. And I'm really honored. I have people come to me who run companies of hundreds of people who are really big shots in their world, and they come and ask me mm-hmm. to, they put the most important thing in their life in my hands. So I am really sensitive and compassionate to what they're going through, but I also have my own little existence. And I'm the own, I'm the star of my own show, of my own life. Like we all are too. And I do have to sort of try to find that, that space where whatever I saw all day in my business, I, I might have a date that night and I don't want to bring it into my date that night. Mm-hmm. , I want to go out on my date that night and, and be my authentic self and feeling and feeling free and liberated from
01:23:50
Raquel Baldelomar
These things. How do you, let's say if you go on a date that night Yeah. You go, you go on a date that night. How, what do you do to try to separate yourself from just like, this is the, the world. This is my business. Dating is my business.
01:24:02
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. Well, I'm a big believer in small rituals. there's this doctor named Andrew Weyle who teaches this particular breath work. 4, 7, 8. It's, it's four counts in hold for seven, breathe out for eight. you do that. Oh, that's great. Four times in a row. Okay. And you can repeat that twice. Great. But never more so a full SumTotal of either four breaths or eight breaths breathed in this way, which I have sometimes heard as as threshold breathing. Mm-hmm.
, I have been a 4, 7, 8 breather for 15 years. I probably do it at least, at least five times a day every day. Almost. I do it sometimes I forget every now and then I'll do it like one early in the morning and one late
01:24:47
Raquel Baldelomar
At night. Okay. Describe how does it go? How does it, what
01:24:49
Gabriella Aratow
Do we do? Okay. So what you do is you, you first you take your tongue. Okay. Okay. And you put it kind of in the back of your teeth. Okay. Kind of on the roof of your mouth like that. It's like there, okay. Now you take in a breath and you count for four. Okay. So breathe in four counts, and then you hold for seven. And for me, this seven, this holding of seven is like where the magic is. I can almost feel the, the breath inside of me becomes expansive. Wow. It's expansive through my whole body. And I imagine it as the expansion of the universe itself. Wow. And it's like, I almost leave earth for this, these seven counts. And I go into this infinite space, and then you breathe out for eight counts Wow. Through the mouth. So it goes 1, 2, 3, 4 through the nose mm-hmm.
hold for seven. And for me, I really just relax into this hold. And then you breathe out. I see through the mouth, do it four times. And I will tell you, if you do this breath work for three or four weeks in a row daily, the four counts or the eight counts, your life is gonna change.
01:26:06
Raquel Baldelomar
I, I had a meditation teacher. I mean, I have a meditation teacher that I see, I try to see weekly. and, and I've, I do like morning meditations now. And he talks about this breath work, how important it is, how like, as he says, your life will change if you do this, but yes, you will get luckier. Raquel is what he says. And it's, it's, and what he talks about is just breathing all the way down until your, your belly, like your stomach just really just expanding and relaxing.
01:26:35
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. It's working. You, you do expand the capacity in your lungs for it to take in oxygen. Your anxiety will go down, you'll sleep better. Mm-hmm. But you have to be consistent about it, like as if you were taking a medication. Yeah. You know, you can't take your medication when you feel like it. But all of this is to say that a small thing, like a 4 78 breath work can completely Yeah. Get me from one place to another. Or I'm, I've just published an article in which I talk about some mantras, some dating mantras, and I say, you could get a candle and a dating mantra that I use is something like May, may the may the goodness in me and the peace in me tonight meet the goodness and peace in Ralph. Yeah. Or, you know, so I will sometimes use my name and their name and I'll just do, and what I like about these kinds of rituals is they're quick mm-hmm.
Sometimes it can also just be a shower and, you know, you get your favorite hair conditioner that has your favorite smell and as you comb your hair out and whatever and put on your makeup and put on your dress. Oh, yeah. You let that workday slide. But I am a big, big believer in small rituals, rituals and a c tea. Herbal tea is a miraculous thing. Yeah. I love herbal tea. I just ordered some new one. It's called like blue, blue tea flour or something. It's blue tea from a blue flower. It's herbal and it's beautiful. And it makes this cup of blue liquid that's got, you know, no sugar, no calories, good benefits. I think, you know, a cup of tea
01:28:17
Raquel Baldelomar
Could do it. I, I mean, and I, I love the ideas, like these little small rituals, but I even feel like doing something for me, like to, to, to move away from like my, where like that masculine energy where I'm having to just be a boss Yeah. And like, tell people what to do and kind of be a little bit just cold and direct and just like, get things done. Yeah. I mean, I'm getting things done, but I'm, it's, and you know, by being efficient, I'm being a little bit just cold and direct, you
01:28:46
Gabriella Aratow
Know. Yeah.
01:28:46
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. For me, like to get to my more maternal, my feminine, my soft, like my more, much more girly self. Yeah. I've discovered like just a workout, like going to the gym or doing a mat workout or going on a five mile run. Like that's something for me that hour. Yeah. Of just like physical exercise. Yeah. It helps me very quickly switch, you know, from just like the boss Raquel, you know? Yeah. To like the, just the feminine Raquel and I, and I'm not saying that it's not all, and I think I also think it's like I've been, be, been a lot better at just not separating those two sides of me mm-hmm.
, but, you know, in integrating it more just throughout, just, you know, between, between, you know, the party girl, Raquel side of me to the business side, Raquel side of me. But I do think also like, you know, a workout for me has been really good. Yeah. So finding, like, I think that's part of the balance that people need to find if they need, you know, whether it's meditation or tea or me mantras, it's Yeah. Find something that really can help you shift those energy because it, at the end of the day, it's a sh it's an energy shift that you have to, you have to consciously make that energy shift. Yeah.
01:29:58
Gabriella Aratow
I think one of the most important things women can do to get more in touch with their feminine energy is to, and this sounds shockingly simple, the way meditation sounds, shock shockingly simple, but turns out to be quite challenging when you get into it. Mm-hmm.
. Yeah. Is to get in, is to start to get back in touch with your feelings. Yeah. We live in a society that demands us to be removed from our feelings. That's so true. All of the time. True. So true.
01:30:24
Raquel Baldelomar
And especially with work.
01:30:25
Gabriella Aratow
Especially with work. Yeah. And just
01:30:28
Raquel Baldelomar
With don't take it personally. Yeah. It's just business. Yes. But then, but then you're like, actually like, this sucked. Like, I'm sad today. Right. I just, I'm, I'm a little melancholic when, you know, so, or
01:30:38
Gabriella Aratow
Watching the news. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, you almost, you almost have to be unfeeling to exist in society. Mm-hmm.
, you have to shut down. And one thing that has happened with all of this shutting down is that we have forgotten how to feel our feelings. Mm-hmm. and feeling your feelings is a very feminine thing to do. I think a lot of women think men are afraid of their feelings, and they're like, well, I, I don't wanna show him my, my happiness. I don't wanna show him my sadness. He can't see me cry. I have to be like, yeah, whatever, dude, fine. I fully disagree. I think that being in touch with your feelings is very feminine and very becoming to men because it, what it allows them to do is to know on some level you are granting them a permissiveness, that they then know that it's okay for them to be them.
If it's okay for you to be you. You've just told them subliminally, it's okay for them to be them, and then suddenly they're going to really like being around you. But the first part about all of this is getting in touch with your own feelings again. Yeah. And I think that's hard to do. You really have to think about it. So I have this vision in my mind, it's almost like my heart is like a racing horse, and the, and the the reigns of the horse are like my vocal chord. So what I'll sort of do is I'll be like, Hmm, sad, I'll allow, I'll allow the feeling to come up through my vocal chord. Like rains on a running, a running horse of my feelings.
01:32:30
Raquel Baldelomar
The feelings are just like coming up, whatever it is. They're just like the, and it's just the vocal chords are pulling
01:32:35
Gabriella Aratow
It up. Yeah. I'll just be like, Ooh, sad. Ooh, scared. Oh. And you know, I'll tell you whatever works for you. Maybe it's your own image that you create, or maybe it's your own, maybe it's journaling or something, but to get back in touch. So a lot of women will say to me things like, they sort of feel like they can't be authentic around men. And I say, you know, have you ever tried the exact opposite? Have you ever tried to actually become more who you are and express it? Because you might be surprised that what you think is turning him off is the fact that you are shut down to yourself. Similarly for men, I think that there are ways that men can tap into their masculine energy that maybe they haven't done for a really long time. And maybe that is going to be part of what allows them to catalyze success again. So these things are, they're tools, by the way, and it's very hard to master. Just, there's no, there's no like, oh, I got it now. Like, oh, check this box. This is something you're at work at all of the time, getting better at working on, and that you are going to fall in, falter in sometimes.
01:33:51
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. No, and I remember when I first started meditating, like I could barely meditate five minutes. And now Yeah. I try, like if, if I, if I have a meditation for 30 minutes now I'm like, wonderful. And then sometimes when I am feeling those feelings, I'm just, I'm, I'm confused. Maybe I'm sad, I'm melancholic. I'm, I'm, there's something that's bugging me. Like I wanna meditate for like an hour. Yeah. Just to try to kind of like get, and I love what you said about just the, the fe the it's connecting the words. Yeah. For me, it's not the words. I just like, I think of it as connecting my brain with my body. Yeah. And I'm trying to just see what is my body telling my brain. Yeah. And just kind of sit with that. Yeah. Yeah. You know,
01:34:31
Gabriella Aratow
So Yeah.
01:34:32
Raquel Baldelomar
I feel like that's, that's so important. Yeah.
01:34:35
Gabriella Aratow
I think, you know, it, it's, it's, and then I, I think on some level too, we live in perplexing times and life itself is perplexing. Yeah. And it's okay just to come down to the fundamental understanding that you just maybe sometimes don't know.
01:34:53
Raquel Baldelomar
And you have to, before, I think too is just the idea of before you can love anybody else, be ready to love anybody else Yeah. Or date anybody else. Yeah. You gotta love yourself. Yeah. Like, you got, and it, it's never, I mean, it's a constant agreement. You know, you're, you're constantly rediscovering yourself. That's right. And, but you have to start with there and really honoring who you are, even your flaws, you know, and, and, and, and loving yourself. Yeah. I think only, and, and realizing that it is up to you to seek happiness. Yeah. Like nobody, you know, you might meet the most amazing man in the world. I might meet the most amazing man in the world that I wanna marry. And, but then he is, it's not his job to make me happy. No, it isn't. He's not gonna make me happy.
01:35:42
Gabriella Aratow
He might, he might, he might think of it as his job and he might genuinely be trying to make you happy mm-hmm.
. But at the end of the day, you are, it is up to you to feel satisfaction in your own life. Right. It, it really is. And and I do think so much, like, let's say somebody's overweight mm-hmm. , and they come to me and they say, I'm, I'm 40 pounds overweight. Should I even bother dating? I say, you know, I don't think you need to be at your perfect weight to meet somebody, even though weight tends to be very important in dating for men and for women. But I think you should be at work on the way towards your goal because you will be feeling better in your skin if you are toward working towards your goal. Similarly to loving yourself. I think it is unrealistic to tell a human being that they are going to love every aspect about themselves.
A hundred percent of the time, that's just not going to happen. That's just not the way humans work. Mm-hmm. , unless they maybe have like a narcissistic disorder, right? Mm-hmm. . But the truth of the matter is we sometimes think we're awesome and sometimes we feel ashamed and sometimes we wonder if we're, you know, if we're misfits. And I think that that's normal. But I think that you should be at work all of the time in the process of self-love mm-hmm. . Because if you're not at work at it, you don't have, you're not putting out the right positive energy the same way you're not putting out the right positive energy if you're 40 pounds and you know you're gonna be, you're going to just gain weight that week as opposed to being at work on your health. The, the right person will feel that you are moving in the appropriate and positive directions. They will. And sometimes that's enough.
01:37:36
Raquel Baldelomar
They will. And you will feel it too on the other person, like if, if they are, if they've done the work Yeah. You know, to where they are and that it goes back. I think, you know, timing, you know, timing is like one of the most important. It is things, and really it's not just about chemistry. Timing is so important.
01:37:52
Gabriella Aratow
Timing is important. Timing's important. Place is important. Place in your life is important. Yeah. You know, you could be feeling very differently divorced with two kids than you felt before you ever had children. You could be feeling very differently now that you live in Topeka, Kansas for a job when before you lived in Miami. Right. You, there's, there's so many. But it all, that's why to me, relationships are miracles. Like a lot
01:38:15
Raquel Baldelomar
Has to come
01:38:17
Gabriella Aratow
Together to work
01:38:17
Raquel Baldelomar
Out. That's where the magic just happens. It is, yeah. There's an element of magic in it.
01:38:22
Gabriella Aratow
There is,
01:38:23
Raquel Baldelomar
Do you ever find that people, when you're going out on dates, the men, do they find it intimidating that you're a matchmaker and like you're al do they feel like you're being, like you're judging them, or I'm sure you've got, you've
01:38:36
Gabriella Aratow
Had some Yeah, I think sometimes they've expressed to me, they're like, whoa. You know, but then sometimes they're intrigued. I think my biggest problem, and it's my problem, is that I'm so used to the mode and the method mm-hmm.
of like, being like, oh, well what are you looking for? And who do you wanna date?
01:38:51
Raquel Baldelomar
I see. I have to be, you're bringing your work into the i
01:38:55
Gabriella Aratow
I will find myself starting to cliente them. Yeah. And I have to remember, so
01:39:01
Raquel Baldelomar
That's part of the boundaries.
01:39:02
Gabriella Aratow
I'm on a date. Yeah. I'm not client them. Yeah. But it's almost like we do get into sort
01:39:08
Raquel Baldelomar
Of That's really interesting. You
01:39:10
Gabriella Aratow
Know? Yeah. So it's, for me, I think the biggest issue isn't coming from them where they're saying, I'm intimidating. I think women very much overestimate how much they're intimidating. Men, women are always saying to me, I'm so intimidating. I'm so intimidating. And I'm thinking to myself, I don't think you are as intimidating as you think you are. But I think by telling yourself all the time that you problem is you, that you're intimidating men, you almost start to create this weird distance between you and a man. Mm-hmm.
. So for me, it's not his problem, you know, about Yeah. Or his reaction. For me, I have to own my own reactions Yeah. To being able to do this, to being able to leave my work at home.
01:39:54
Raquel Baldelomar
So it's, it's really a big boundary. You know, you're having to establish the boundaries where you don't wanna clientele
01:40:00
Gabriella Aratow
Somebody. Yeah. I don't, yeah. Because that's, that's, that's not the energy that I want to be in on a date. Mm-hmm.
. Mm-hmm. , I'm, I'm much more interested in talking about our passions, our mutual passions, places we wanna go, things we wanna experience. You know, the, the dream what ex which gets me excited on a date, is like a sense of like a dream we could dream together. Mm-hmm. , that is my almost driving force. And if I'm sitting there, client izing somebody. Right. I'm not in that dreamy mode that feels romantic and enchanting to me.
01:40:34
Raquel Baldelomar
And how do you make sure to keep that magic for yourself? Cuz like, you know, it's, it's the, the shoemakers don't have, you know, the shoe, the, the, the sh the people who make the shoes don't, the sh the kids don't have the shoes like they but shoemaker. Exactly. Yeah. How do you make sure that you keep that magic of romance and hope alive for your own self?
01:40:56
Gabriella Aratow
Because, you know, that's a really good question and it's something I ask myself. I dunno if you remember the movie, the Never Ending Story, but there's like the little, she holds out in her palm, one little tiny piece of the kingdom, and it's this one little glowing grain. And I sometimes am like, you know, all it takes Yes. All it takes for the whole kingdom to start again. Yeah. Is my one glowing grain of hope. And the truth of the matter is, I don't think we ever really lose our seed of enchantment and romance. Mm-hmm. But it, you can get jaded out there and you can get cynical out there. You can, you just have to remember that all it takes, it just, yeah. It just takes one tiny little glow. It does for it to start to grow again, for it to start to expand again. So sometimes I remember that's, it's alive within me and it's alive within everybody.
01:41:49
Raquel Baldelomar
That's so true. And I think people who need, I mean, I hear people over and over say, oh, I can't find somebody. Or Dating is so hard. Dating in LA is so, so hard. They get jaded, they get ghosted. But I think it's really important to remind people that you can't lose. You can't get bitter. You can't get jaded because it just takes that one seed, that one connection, that one spark with somebody that is, you know, you're attracted to who has their, the timing is right for both of you that you have the same values. Right. You have the same goals in life. You're in a similar sort of professional place in life. It just takes one person where that spark can happen. Right.
01:42:32
Gabriella Aratow
And for me, my, the book that I'm, I'm working on yes. I don't, I haven't, yeah. I've got, I've got a literary agent in New York who's representing me on a book that I am writing. And my book is a process that I have created to take people who are feeling despair and jaded and that they're over it and all of those feelings, which I think are really natural feelings. If you've gone through some big disappointments and challenges in dating, I, I take a process where I sort of work them through a method where they come out the other end and, and I know that you can, I know that you can go from I f in hate women, I f in hate men. They just want my money. All those gold diggers mm-hmm.
, those men, they're just non-committal jerks. I mean, all of those things that we can feel or just all of the, all of the narratives that we tell ourselves, there is a way to be beyond this and to actually approach yourself and dating in, in ways that, that was just part of a, of a learning cycle for you. And that was just part of a, a growth process for you.
01:43:52
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. No, well, when that book comes out, I want you to come back here, we're gonna do another session and you're gonna talk about that process. Yeah. Cause I know a lot of people, they need to hear that. They need to hear that. Yes. It's so, I mean, it's so critical. And I think that's, if you are single, that is part of the meditation you have to do every day is, is make sure that when you do, cuz part of being single means that if you're trying to have relationships, they're gonna have failed relationships. Yeah. You know, and if you're, and it might hurt. You're right. It might. Absolutely. And now if you're married, it's gonna hurt. It's a different, it's a different kind of hurt. I mean Yeah. Going through divorces and all of that, but, but it's really important for people who are single to not lose that hope. Yeah. And not, and, and, and not feel so despaired Yeah. That it's just like, it's not for them.
01:44:39
Gabriella Aratow
Right. Right. I know there are people, and I can understand the, the people who, there are people who go into suicide ideation mm-hmm.
after breakups. There are people who want to give up forever. Yeah. The whole concept of partnership, I get, I understand those stories
01:44:53
Raquel Baldelomar
And it's partnership is so important. I mean, I, I, one of my dearest friends is this guy named Howard. He's about 80 years old. And he said, you know, he's l now he said, Raquel, there's really, you know, we want th boil it down to three things in life. You wanna be able, you know, to be happy, you wanna be able to, you know, love the place you live. Mm-hmm.
love what you do. Mm-hmm. and love who you lay next to at night. Mm-hmm.
01:45:20
Gabriella Aratow
01:45:20
Raquel Baldelomar
. And I think that third part, like who you lay next to at night, whether it's somebody you're married to, somebody you're, you know, you, you're seeing in, I mean I think we as humans, like we, we do want that companionship. We might tell, you know, we might not have that at a time. Right. But then we seek it out. It's our core. We are, we need just, we're not necessarily meant to be alone. Yeah. I mean we were meant to be with with other people.
01:45:44
Gabriella Aratow
We are, we are. And I think friendship is really important. I think everybody should have lots of friends, but it's okay. I think some people almost feel guilty about desiring partnership. It's okay to have, this is a fundamental elemental thing. Right. Right. This is how the, we have procreated Absolutely. Move
01:46:03
Raquel Baldelomar
Forward evolutionary
01:46:04
Gabriella Aratow
And socialized and become the extraordinary human beings who exist in the world today with our magnificent things. We're able to invent and create it. We need each other and everywhere we are, we, you know, we rely on each other in all kinds of ways. And I think it's o okay to want that and to not feel badly about wanting that. So mm-hmm.
yeah. It's it's, it's, it's, but I, I do feel that people that they, there is something childlike in, in us in the ways that we see the wonder in the world that is similar to the ways that we dream about love. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. . And that those things should never die.
01:46:49
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. That childlike wonder of joy of, of wanting to give and receive
01:46:55
Gabriella Aratow
Love. Yeah.
01:46:56
Raquel Baldelomar
I think should never die.
01:46:57
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah.
01:46:57
Raquel Baldelomar
I love that. So I wanna end with just some questions that we ask all of our guests about balance. Okay. So first is, what are your top three healthiest habits?
01:47:09
Gabriella Aratow
I get a great night's sleep.
01:47:10
Raquel Baldelomar
Great. I'm important. A good, I'm a champion sleeper. How many hours of sleep do you sleep
01:47:14
Gabriella Aratow
At night? Eight tonight? Yes. I mean, I'm really good. Need nine sleeper. You
01:47:18
Raquel Baldelomar
Need nine. I I need nine. Yeah. If I'm having, like, if I did a lot of work then I need in my brain it, sometimes I'll take 10, but ten nine is skipping. I agree with you. Yeah.
01:47:26
Gabriella Aratow
Eight. I probably typically get eight and I don't know what I would do without it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm so lo I feel it's really a blessing to be able to sleep well. Yes.
01:47:33
Raquel Baldelomar
Yes.
01:47:34
Gabriella Aratow
I think a
01:47:34
Raquel Baldelomar
Lot of people, they, they have, they suffer from insomnia. They do. And they get, you know,
01:47:39
Gabriella Aratow
It affects
01:47:39
Raquel Baldelomar
Their whole life. I, I will say there's times where it's like I get up, I, I I I, I have to get up and I read for like an hour. Me too. Or I journal or what I mean, but me too. But I have to just do that cuz I'm, my, my body can't sleep, but yeah. Yeah. So I think sleep is really important. That's great.
01:47:53
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And similar to not feeling badly about things on the occasional night where I can't sleep instead of feeling terribly about it or having anxiety about it. Yeah. I just remember that for many years, all over the, the world that was natural human beings were up some during the night and up some during the day and not to stress out about it. You don't want that additional runoff. Yeah. You just wanna be able to say, okay, you know, so this is the way it's gonna be tonight. You read Bodies are bodies. Yeah. You do. I do a lot of, like, I love, I love podcasts. Like,
01:48:23
Raquel Baldelomar
So you do podcasts when you can't
01:48:24
Gabriella Aratow
See, I like, I love Malcolm Gladwell. I like, I love listening to him and some other ones. So sit, see my other other healthiest habits. I'm definitely and always have been a big exerciser. Good. So, you know, Neri really a day goes by that I don't do.
01:48:40
Raquel Baldelomar
And you do a lot of hiking?
01:48:41
Gabriella Aratow
I do a lot of hiking. I got a stationary bike now, not a Peloton, but just like a little stationary bike. And I hadn't had television in decades and I decided to finally get television, but I told myself if I'm gonna get a television and hook up to Hulu, I'm gonna buy a stationary bike. And if I'm watching TV I have to be pedaling. I think I've pedaled across America and back like several times at this point. That's, so I pedaled in front of this TV shows that I like. I'm pedaling.
01:49:09
Raquel Baldelomar
Well you also, you live in Aspen now. Yeah. So you get to now like go on amazing hikes in as
01:49:15
Gabriella Aratow
Aspen. I do. I do. I'm out. I'm outdoors a lot, you know, it's great. So let's see, other healthiest habits? I think the healthiest habit that I have, and I've gotten much better at it over the years, is I ground in gratitude. Mm-hmm. So when I'm beginning to feel distressed and upset or envious, cuz I can deal with envy and you know, especially in a lot of the circles I move in, there are people who have so much mm-hmm. You know, a lot of my clients, like, they're houses and they're things and, you know, I, I can get into env mode and I I am very good now at getting back into gratitude and grounding Yeah. Back into the moment in a space of gratitude. Yeah. That might be the, that's huge. The healthiest habit that I
01:50:02
Raquel Baldelomar
Have is huge and that I think that's so, so important. And some days, like, I also like to do that when I'm, let's say I had a bad day of work or just I lost a CL contract or just let's just, I mean, just some, you know, relationship, you know, ended or something like that. I then think about Raquel, like, you, you have like, you're an American citizen first of all. Like I grew up in a third world country. Yeah. I was born in a third world country. I think about just, just even how lucky I am to just live in the United States. Yeah. I think about just how lucky I am to have a roof over my head. Yeah. I mean, I think about how lucky that I, you know, I have a way to make a living. Yeah. I mean, I, I, so, so I think about these things of just these base like what, what am I, like, what am I really grateful for Yeah. That are just so base Yeah. That I sometimes just take for granted my health. Yeah. Like I take for, I take for, you know, I, I I really start to have gratitude for my health because I feel like a lot of people, like when you are not healthy, you can't really be focusing on all these other problems.
01:51:10
Gabriella Aratow
You can't. Yeah. You just have to focus on getting better. And I know you are a, something of a global traveler as I am. And I have around the world gone to many palaces of kings and queens and I will tell you most middle class Americans today Yeah. Live significantly better life mm-hmm.
than the royal families for centuries around the whole world. We have better health, we live longer lives, we have better nutrition. Mm-hmm. , we have more variety of nutrition. I mean, we really live good lives, but it's easy to start forgetting these things. Yeah. So I have gotten, for me the training back into grounding and gratitude's been really important and kept me, you know, keeps me Yeah.
01:51:57
Raquel Baldelomar
Healthy. And I think that's another just commonality that we share. And it's partly I think why, just why we became such great friends is because of just that love of travel and what travel teaches us. Yeah. And, and you know, growing up in a, not only a third world country for 10 years, but also just traveling the world and seeing how grateful people are who have so much less than what we have. Yes. Yes. And that reminds me is just to be like Raquel, just ch I mean there you have so much gratitude. Yeah.
01:52:27
Gabriella Aratow
Gratitude is a really good, healthy
01:52:29
Raquel Baldelomar
Habit. Yeah.
01:52:29
Gabriella Aratow
I love that. The more you can train yourself to be in gratitude, the better.
01:52:33
Raquel Baldelomar
So on the opposite of that, okay. I also have a principal that says you need to have some healthy vices. Okay. You need to have things that are not necessarily good for you. Okay. But that bring you, you great joy. Okay. So what are yours?
01:52:47
Gabriella Aratow
Cocktails. Cocktails. Absolutely.
01:52:49
Raquel Baldelomar
You're a drinker. I'm a foodie. Yeah. I always say like, poker and food are my, are my
01:52:53
Gabriella Aratow
Vices. Yeah. I love a cocktail. Okay. I really do.
and I try to be careful cuz like, it's like a lot of sugar, you know, but it's, but definitely for me, a beautiful cocktail's a beautiful thing. what are my other advices? Well, like I just said, I knew I hadn't gotten television in years because I like tv. I like tv like a little too much. , I definitely am a but it brings you a great choice. I'm subject to the kind of thing like binging something. Mm-hmm. . So that's part of why I did my, I'm like, I'm gonna get a tv, but I'm only allowing myself a TV if I get a stationary bike. Mm-hmm. , if the TV's on my, my rules to myself. If the TV's on, I've gotta be either pedaling or folding laundry. Mm-hmm. what I'm like, it's gotta be productive. So, but I will say TV's a little bit of a vice for me. There's just such great content out there. There
01:53:39
Raquel Baldelomar
Is, it's, they're really,
01:53:40
Gabriella Aratow
It's so good.
01:53:41
Raquel Baldelomar
And sometimes too I find that, you know, we have to be like, we are in our heads a lot. Yeah. Like, we're having to always be on and be, you know, use a lot of our intellectual horsepower that we just to do what we have to do. Yeah. Professionally. Yeah. Sometimes we just wanna turn our brain off.
01:53:58
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. Yes.
01:53:59
Raquel Baldelomar
And I think that's what TV is great. Is that allows it's a, he, it's a healthy way to just turn off your brain Yeah. And just be entertained and Yes. And great writing. Like I love great writing, so I Me
01:54:09
Gabriella Aratow
Too.
01:54:09
Raquel Baldelomar
Yes. I totally,
01:54:10
Gabriella Aratow
So I allow my brain to turn off, but I continue to make my legs move.
01:54:14
Raquel Baldelomar
That's good. .
01:54:14
Gabriella Aratow
So see it's not exactly advice. You're,
01:54:16
Raquel Baldelomar
You're
01:54:17
Gabriella Aratow
Mixing advice with the
01:54:18
Raquel Baldelomar
Healthy That's right. Healthy thing. we a we talk about a small thing you do every day to try to achieve balance. Well you talked about the breath work. Mm-hmm.
. I love that breath work. Yeah. How many times a day would you say you do it? Does
01:54:30
Gabriella Aratow
It start No more
01:54:30
Raquel Baldelomar
Than two. Okay. No more. Does it, and do you have like a routine? Do you wake up doing it? Do you just do it whenever you have, like, whenever you feel like
01:54:36
Gabriella Aratow
You I do it whenever. Really? A lot of times it's like we'll become sort of like late afternoon as I'm beginning to be in that sort of like mm-hmm.
, oh god, ooh, slump feeling mm-hmm. and then I'll, I'll just go and I'll do my breath work mm-hmm. and I will feel fully revitalized. Or if I need it as a ritual for something, if I need to calm down for something mm-hmm. , I'll do that. so those are what te tell me the question one more time.
01:55:00
Raquel Baldelomar
The the small things you do to every day to achieve balance. The
01:55:03
Gabriella Aratow
Small things I do every day. I, it's, it's very rare that a day goes by that I don't allow myself some kind of socialization that has nothing to do with progress or work or, or it might just be texting one friend some stupid bit emoji or going out to a local restaurant to have a salad where I know I might chat with somebody else there or I need some socialization every day a little
01:55:39
Raquel Baldelomar
Bit. That's great. Yeah. And that's great that you realize that. Yes. That's wonderful. Yeah. What does wealth mean to you?
01:55:47
Gabriella Aratow
What does wealth mean to me? on the bottom level it would, it, it would mean not worrying about money, not not having to do something like be up at night with, you may worry about the longer term or how you're gonna like make it all work and everything like that. But for me, I don't want to have to worry about making my bills and my mortgage and my car payment and maybe being able to go out to dinner or take an airplane flight or something like that. So on the base level, that's kind of wealth and that's of course completely financial. on other levels there's things like, I think wealth could be defined as something like knowing you are leading the life you are supposed to be leading. I think if you can get to that point and really maintain that mentality with a lot of frequency and a lot of duration, you've just kind of hashtag one life.
01:56:53
Raquel Baldelomar
Yeah. If you had to put a message on a billboard and it just was a short message, less than like 10 words, what would that message be?
01:57:07
Gabriella Aratow
Any message about anything?
01:57:09
Raquel Baldelomar
Anything. Yeah.
01:57:10
Gabriella Aratow
Hmm. That is such an interesting question. It might be something like sea beauty.
01:57:25
Raquel Baldelomar
Sea beauty,
01:57:25
Gabriella Aratow
You know, especially Yeah. Because I work in a world where there's a lot of rejection and a lot of saying no and a lot of judgment. And I think it's important to remember that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And if you look at somebody the way their loving mother looks at them, or you look at somebody the way their adoring dog looks at them, maybe your entire world will open up. And what if you looked at yourself the way your best friend looks at you?
01:57:59
Raquel Baldelomar
Mm-hmm.
01:58:00
Gabriella Aratow
. What about just seeing beauty? It's the filter in others, in yourself and
01:58:05
Raquel Baldelomar
Everywhere. It's the filter of how you look at the world. Yeah. When you look at the world through a filter of fear and anger and rejection and despair Yeah. That's what you're gonna see. But when you see it through the filter of the beauty.
01:58:18
Gabriella Aratow
Yeah. And I, I try to see beauty, like there are wild turkeys in my neighborhood mm-hmm.
and bunnies and deer and you know, I just all around me feel like I'm in this constant moving canvas that is beyond my ability to even grip. It's so magnificent and so big, but I can see in front of me. Mm-hmm. is the, is the layer of beauty that it's offering me right here. I was driving not so long ago near where I live outside of Aspen, Colorado, and I noticed this sort of shadow kind of by my car and I looked over and it was an eagle that had just caught a trout and this bald eagle was flying next to my car with a trout Wow. In its talent.
01:59:10
Raquel Baldelomar
Wow.
01:59:12
Gabriella Aratow
And I thought,
01:59:12
Raquel Baldelomar
Wow, that's
01:59:14
Gabriella Aratow
Am I so lucky
01:59:15
Raquel Baldelomar
To see that, to see this, to see that how he's,
01:59:18
Gabriella Aratow
But you could almost see something like that every day. You may not need a bald eagle that just caught a trout mm-hmm.
, but something happened today in your day worthy of poetry. Yeah. Do you have the ability to open your eyes and as a matchmaker, do you have the ability to start seeing other people as that miracle?
01:59:44
Raquel Baldelomar
Love that, Gabby, thank you so much. Where can people find you and how can people get on your database? Again, tell them
01:59:51
Gabriella Aratow
You can get into my database@keeperintros.com. You could email me at gabby g a y keeper intros.com. Those are probably your two best ways to reach me. yeah. Email and my website, which also allows you to use And on
02:00:08
Raquel Baldelomar
Social, where can people find you on social media?
02:00:10
Gabriella Aratow
So I have an Instagram that I should post a lot more on it's keeper intros. I've really li like it's been months, I gotta get to it. I'm so, my brain is so n my brain is in eagles and flying and, and fish in the poetry. It's
02:00:24
Raquel Baldelomar
In finding the poetry
02:00:24
Gabriella Aratow
Of the life. That's right. My, my brain is in the poetry of life and has not been nearly enough on Instagram, although I actually find that there's a lot of the poetry in life on Instagram. But my Instagram is keeper intros. I'm also on LinkedIn under both Gabriela Rito, which is my name. And then sometimes people just reach out to me on Facebook. you can message me on Facebook. I'm, I'm Gabriela ATO on Facebook. I don't have the business account set up, but a lot of people do come to me and I do write a lot on my Facebook page and do a lot of seeking of, of candidates for clients on my Facebook page. So Gabriela ato, feel free to reach out to me and send me a note.
02:01:01
Raquel Baldelomar
Well, thank you so much Gabby for being here. I'm so excited that we were able to chat with everyone, with everyone watching. And thank you all for watching. If you like this podcast, please click the like and subscribe button. The YouTube overlords like it, and it helps this podcast be found to other people like you and to my fans. I love you. I love you so much. Thank you for watching. Thank you for your support and until next time, bye.