The Dating Advice Making Us Worse at Love with Relationship Expert Amy Chan

September 15, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

The Problem with “Know Your Type” and Other Dating Advice

When Amy Chan’s relationship fell apart—her boyfriend cheated on her with a former coworker—she spent two and a half years stuck in resentment, replaying the story of what a victim she was and what a villain he had been. It took a friend asking a simple question to shift something: “Does his story serve you?” Chan realized it didn’t. She went home, wrote a forgiveness letter, and the resentment finally lifted. That experience became the seed of an accidental career. After testing what actually helped her heal—cognitive behavioral therapy, somatic work, expert-curated tools—she started running small workshops in her living room with seven people, half of them friends. Nearly two decades later, she runs Renew Breakup Bootcamp and has become a sharp critic of the dating advice that she says is making people worse at love.

Why Dating Apps Change How We See People

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What you'll learn

1 (00:00) **The "Do the Work" Mindset** - The host introduces the central problem: popular dating advice might actually be making us worse at love. Amy Chan explains that the best couples all say the same thing about their secret—they "do the work."
2 (02:30) **Amy's Origin Story: From Heartbreak to Helping Others** - Amy shares the personal betrayal that led her to create Renew Breakup Bootcamp.
3 (08:42) **The Overemphasis on Romantic Relationships** - The host and Amy discuss how society's pressure to find a partner can be counterproductive.
4 (10:06) **Why Dating Feels Harder Today** - Amy diagnoses the core problem: dating apps have changed how we think about people, not just how we meet them.
5 (13:38) **The First Date is a Vibe Check, Not a Future-Trap** - Amy gives practical advice on how to approach early dating without overthinking.
6 (15:55) **The Cure for Avoidance: Tolerate the Discomfort** - Amy explains that avoidant tendencies are not a fixed identity and can be worked through.
7 (18:13) **The Host's Personal Breakthrough: Radical Accountability** - The host shares a powerful real-life example of how he used Amy's framework in his own dating life.

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Show Notes

The internet is flooded with advice for dating in the smartphone age: know your type, trust the spark, watch for red flags, protect your peace, never settle.

It sounds like self-respect, but relationship expert Amy Chan thinks it’s a big reason dating feels impossible right now.

Her argument: we need to correct the lessons we’ve learned when it comes to dating. The person who’s great on a first date isn’t necessarily great at a relationship. Instant chemistry isn’t always a good sign. A red flag could just be an imperfection. And keeping our options open has made a lot of us genuinely bad at choosing someone.

Amy is the founder of Renew Breakup Bootcamp and the author of Unsingle: How to Date Smarter and Create Love That Lasts. For nearly two decades she’s looked at dating through psychology and neuroscience — why we’re drawn to certain people, why relationships fall apart, and what actually predicts whether one lasts. She started her career helping people end relationships… Now, she teaches them how to build one.

In this episode you'll learn:
➡️ Why “instant chemistry” is one of the worst predictors of a lasting relationship
➡️ The quiet qualities research says actually predict a happy partnership
➡️ Why dating skills and relationship skills are two completely different skill sets
➡️ How the algorithm rewards red-flag advice 10X over green-flag advice (and what that’s doing to you)
➡️ Situationships: why the breakup hurts more when there was never a breakup
➡️ “Leaky energy,” micro-cheating, and the honest test for both
➡️ The 9-date experiment Amy gives clients who are stuck dating the same person
➡️ How the right relationship shrinks old wounds

➡️ Why discomfort is a critical skill dating requires

Amy’s advice isn’t about finding a better person. It’s about becoming someone better at love. And that’s advice all of us could use!

This… is A Bit of Optimism.

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This episode is brought to you by SAP. Bring it with SAP GROW. The AI Cloud ERP for any size business. Learn more at https://SAP.com/GROW

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To get a copy of Amy's book, Unsingle: How to Date Smarter and Create Love That Lasts, head to: https://missamychan.com/#books