Episode 13: How to Identify Your Deal Breakers

Speaker 1: 0:00
Assalamu alaikum, I’m Hiba. And I’m Zaid, you’re listening to Diary of a Matchmaker.

Speaker 2: 0:05
A podcast that will take you into our world as matchmakers.

Speaker 1: 0:09
We’ll share our experiences and offer advice for the single Muslim.

Speaker 2: 0:12
So let’s dive in. Bismillah, assalamu alaikum everyone, welcome to another episode. My name is Zaid and on the other mic is my wife and co-host Hiba.

Speaker 1: 0:24
Assalamu alaikum, it is early morning here.

Speaker 2: 0:28
It is, and today’s topic is deal breakers. Yep, what are deal breakers? Why are they important? They were very important to me.

Speaker 2: 0:38
When I was talking to you back in November 2019, I was crystal clear about my number one deal breaker and that was or actually the term I like to use in non-negotiable.

Speaker 2: 0:52
It’s easier for me to think in terms of that, and my number one non-negotiable was that whoever I married had to be supportive, understanding and appreciative of the arts, specifically live theater, and the reason for that was because I had studied live theater for two years. I had done a lot of live theater during or actually post university, and it was something I was looking to pursue further on in my life in some capacity, and actually at one point, I had even done written and performed a one man show, which was really cool. So it was something that I valued, something that was a passion of mine, and over the years, during my search, I just came across so many girls that felt it was either haram or just didn’t show any sort of appreciation or support for it, and I knew that person that further down the line that that would create some conflict because it wasn’t something I was going to let go of. But how did you feel about that when I mentioned that as my deal breaker?

Speaker 1: 2:04
it was something very surprising, because I’ve never met somebody who was interested in live theater and who felt so strongly about it, right, and at the same time I didn’t understand why would somebody not be okay with it? I mean, we’re not talking about, like, doing porno movies or anything right it’s live theater, but uh, for I don’t know.

Speaker 2: 2:28
I was totally fine with that, but again, it depends on the content, what is being played, of course yeah, right, and any sort of halal content or halal endeavor can be pushed towards um haram, all right, towards haram boundaries, um. So I was totally aware of that. My number two deal breaker was somebody, um, or sorry. Non-negotiable was that whoever I married would have to be um, would have to put in effort in taking care of their health in some capacity or another uh, whether that’s going to the gym, eating, right. So at that time I was a certified yoga instructor. I’d even taught kids yoga for some time. So yoga was a big part of my life, and I still do it, and so I would go to the gym regularly. Now, of course, I’m not saying I’m some sort of athlete with a six-pack or anything like that, but I prioritized like that. But I prioritize my health and I needed somebody who felt the same way.

Speaker 1: 3:29
Yeah, I was lucky enough to be living in a building in Jordan that had a gym a woman only gym in the same building. All I had to do was just take an elevator two floors down and I’ll be there, and it was fun. So it was also fun for me to know that you’re also interested in health and fitness all of that.

Speaker 2: 3:51
Yeah, and what was your number one deal breaker?

Speaker 1: 3:54
Materialism. Materialism I can never tolerate and it’s just doesn’t go in line with how I envision my life, the lifestyle I want to have, and I also feel materialism is very linked to big ego yeah and that’s another thing.

Speaker 2: 4:15
I can’t tolerate ego, somebody who’s just always talking about themselves, things too much of themselves, boastful, all of that and this is something that’s very, very easy to spot from the first conversation probably yeah, and it showed up when, when we were discussing meher, when we’re discussing lifestyle, that you envisioned a very simplistic lifestyle and that that deal breaker actually carried over into our conversations about minimalism oh, yeah, yeah I remember that. And what was your number two?

Speaker 1: 4:44
my number. So the first one materialism. Second one is egotistic. Somebody who’s egotistic, like I said, right right yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 4:52
So what’s cool is that when I hear your deal breakers and when I talk about my own deal breakers, it’s clear that they were rooted in values, um, that we were crystal clear about our values and we were clear about how we envisioned our life, what we needed for a meaningful, fulfilling relationship. So when we formulated our deal breakers, it was coming from a place that was. It was coming from our values, essentially. And when we look at our intake form for both guys and girls, it’s kind of funny because in the beginning, when we first had our intake form, the question was for all of our clients what are your top three deal breakers and what would be the answers we would always get.

Speaker 1: 5:41
All haram things, all sins. Somebody who drinks, somebody who I don’t know goes to nightclubs, uses foul language, all of that.

Speaker 2: 5:51
Yeah, and it was just so frustrating to us because we kept thinking, okay, I can’t think of a single Muslim that would be okay with any of these things.

Speaker 1: 5:58
I mean, we’re talking to Muslims at the end of the day, right?

Speaker 2: 6:00
Obviously. So then we had to change the question and say in capital letters what are your top three in capital letters? Non-haram deal breakers and still we get what? Somebody who’s abusive, abusive somebody who drinks doesn’t pray, all of that, yeah, um, and the. What this goes to show is that when people are putting these answers, not only, of course, are they generic, general answers, but they’re not reflective of who they are, of what their values are, what their goals are, things like that.

Speaker 1: 6:35
And so when we ask these questions on our forum, if we want to know what you’re, we want to see things that are revealing of your character and your personality it just goes to show that people hasn’t haven’t done the legwork, they haven’t thought deeply about themselves, their values, their goals, all of that, and they’re jumping in without doing all that legwork yeah.

Speaker 2: 7:03
So it’s important um, to first think deeply about those things and then, when you are crystal clear about those things, then your um, your deal breakers, will just naturally formulate on their own.

Speaker 1: 7:16
The prophet alayhi salam said in a hadith if somebody with a character and dean you’re pleased with, uh proposes, then marry them. Then the key word here is pleased with, because what you’re pleased with might look different from what somebody else is pleased with, like the prophet could have just said if somebody who prays and fasts and is respectful to their parents and all of that, proposes, they marry them. But no, he didn’t say that. He said said you’re pleased with. So it’s important to know what you’re pleased with, what will help you to grow spiritually, mentally, emotionally, financially, what you need.

Speaker 2: 8:05
So how can you formulate your own deal breakers?

Speaker 1: 8:09
That’s a good question.

Speaker 2: 8:10
One reflecting upon your values. So we will have another episode about values and with values.

Speaker 1: 8:18
here we mean core values. They’re not superficial things. It’s not that the girl knows how to make good biryani or he knows I don’t know he drives this kind of car. Values are something that’s very rooted in just who you are, and there are fun ways to help you formulate your values, and we’ll talk about that Next episode inshallah.

Speaker 2: 8:40
Yeah, and when I talk about values, just remembering that you are much more than your career, your income, your education, your physical beauty. There is much more to you than that. But, like I said, we’ll get into that in the next episode. Number two being crystal clear about your goals. You know, are you a very career-oriented person? Are you somebody who is very much looking to climb up the corporate ladder? Is your goal to pursue an entrepreneurial path? And, of course, if that is something important to you, then you need somebody that’s going to be supportive of that, exactly so.

Speaker 1: 9:26
For example, if you’re looking to start a business in the future, then a good deal-breaker would be somebody who is risk-averse, right? Yeah? Um, if you’re a woman and you’re looking to homeschool your children you’re clear about that then a deal breaker would be somebody who’s looking for a career-oriented woman. So it’s very important to know the aspirations you have for the future, the kind of lifestyle you want to have, and when we’re saying goals, we’re not saying about, oh I’m, I’m interested in, I don’t know, picking up this hobby, ice skating or something. So we said values and we said the goals and aspirations.

Speaker 2: 10:07
The third one would be habits habits yes, um, we all have certain habits. Nobody is perfect. Hiba has certain habits. I have certain habits. She doesn’t?

Speaker 1: 10:17
my habits are all good all right, um?

Speaker 2: 10:20
so the goal is not to seek perfection or to look for perfection, um, the goal is to understand what habits you can tolerate, what habits you cannot tolerate, because we all have certain habits that we cannot tolerate in a potential spouse, right? Because, of course, we’re waking up next to this person, we’re sleeping next to this person. So, taking the time to be very crystal clear about what those intolerable habits are.

Speaker 1: 10:47
A very common one for girls is hygiene. Somebody who’s unhygienic is something that they cannot tolerate. Another one for guys somebody with a loud voice. Another one would be um, I don’t know somebody who’s a morning person, always energetic, waking up at six, going out for jogging, and he wants somebody who’s like that. So a deal breaker would be somebody who, I don’t know, wakes up at noon and is not a morning person. So reflect on those things that are important to you. We have we mentioned it before we have our ebook, the compatibility challenge, and one of the games is actually formed about, uh, formed around this topic of tolerables and intolerables, and you can check it out on our website. But, uh, what else can else can you say about this topic?

Speaker 2: 11:40
well before we move ahead. The important thing to note is that oftentimes your intolerables will be different from the next person’s intolerables, so you want to avoid the generic answers, like we mentioned before, that we constantly keep seeing on our intake forms. We take the time to deeply reflect on your intolerables, because yours are. Your intolerables are going to be very specific to who you are and when you share those things. They’re going to be a reflection of your character and personality exactly.

Speaker 1: 12:09
We keep seeing this over and over again and our on our intake forms. For example, we had a client, former client, who I mentioned, a few deal breakers, and when we saw those deal breakers we were able to recognize the kind of personality and character he has. So what was that on that form?

Speaker 2: 12:28
Zaid. A deal breaker for him was somebody who is not submissive. Yeah, and those words, those specific words somebody who is not agreeable um and uh you know, somebody who’s argumentative.

Speaker 2: 12:45
Somebody who’s argumentative, um. So of course, we’re not trying to pass any judgments here. People are what they are, um. But the the cool thing was that he clearly revealed the kind of person he was and the kind of person he was looking for, and unfortunately we didn’t have anybody in our database that fitted that profile, and so we had to refund him and discontinue our service with him yeah.

Speaker 1: 13:10
So deal breakers are important because, first of all, they will help you identify compatibility if this person is compatible with you or not, and they will help you learn about your personality and their personality. So they will reveal a lot of things about the person, and there are no right or wrong deal breakers, it’s just they’re specific to who you are when formulating your deal breakers.

Speaker 2: 13:34
um, just keep these three things in mind, as we mentioned values, goals and aspirations and habits and hopefully you know the what we shared here will help you in your journey and help save you a lot of time and headache. Inshallah inshallah, a new feature we have is called fan mail.

Speaker 1: 13:53
So if you have any question, any I don’t know observations or anything you’d like to share with us privately, then you can click on the link under each episode fan mail. Send a fan mail, let’s chat, something like that, and we would get a private message and we’d love to connect with you. If you have any questions, we’d love to answer them until next time. Assalamualaikum.