If you’re new here Think of me as your personal dating and relationship coach — and this Substack as your playbook. Every single week I give you one play to run in your life. Real strategy. Real talk. No fluff. I’m Amanda Carroll — dating strategist, former national radio host, and the woman who is going to help you win at love the same way a great coach helps you win on the field. You study the plays. You run them. You win. Welcome to the playbook.
Here’s the thing nobody tells you about staying with the wrong person — or going back to them.
It feels good at first. Being wanted feels good. Being chosen feels good. And that feeling — that rush of being pursued — can make you forget for a moment that being wanted is not the same as being valued.
I learned this the hard way. Not in a relationship. In my career.
Being wanted is not the same as being valued. Don’t ever let the feeling of being chosen make you forget what you’re actually worth.
A door opened recently from my past. A friend introduced me to a contemporary Christian radio station in Florida. On-air talent. A platform. A regular paycheck.
And for a split second — I felt it. That old feeling. Being wanted. Being seen. A world I used to belong to reaching back out and saying come home.
Then they told me the number. Fifty dollars a show. One thousand dollars a month. For a woman with a national show on her resume.
Laughable. Insulting. And completely on brand for an industry that never once paid me my market rate — and never will.
But here’s the part I want you to sit with: I almost let the feeling of being wanted cloud what I knew my worth was. My ego almost said yes before the number came in. And that is exactly what happens in relationships every single day.
He comes back. He says the right things. He makes you feel chosen again. And your ego — that part of you that just wants to be wanted — starts negotiating with your standards.
Don’t negotiate. Know your worth. And never accept less than it just because someone finally decided to show up.
I walked away from Evangelicalism and Christian Nationalism and I am not apologizing for it. The conditional love broke me. The theology used as a weapon broke me. The gatekeeping of who deserves grace broke me. So I left. And I rebuilt my faith without them.
I still believe in the way of Jesus. I just refuse to let an institution that has forgotten what love means put words in my mouth — or my voice on their radio station.
I am not going back. Not for a platform. Not for a paycheck. Not for the feeling of being wanted by a world that never fully valued me.
Deconstruction is not a crisis. It is not a phase. It is the bravest thing you will ever do. Don’t undo it for anyone.
Where this play was born
The first time I ran this “Never Ever Go Back” play I had three babies and no warning.
My ex left in the middle of the night. Gone. And I was standing there with a four year old, a 19 month old, and an eight week old baby — alone in a way I had never been alone before.
My family said come home. Move back. Let us take care of you. And I understood why they said it. It came from love. But I stood there and I knew — I do not go backward. Not in life. Not ever.
So I packed up my three babies and I moved across the country by myself for a national radio show. Was the job perfect? No. K-LOVE was its own kind of toxic. But it was forward. It was mine. And it was the best decision I ever made for my children and for me.
We did not go back. We started over. And starting over — as terrifying as it was — gave us everything.
Always always move forward. That is the only direction that leads anywhere worth going.
This week’s play
Never Ever Go Back! Like Ever…
Hire yourself as the CEO of your love life.
Slow to hire. Fast to fire. And never ever rehire. (Or go back to an industry that didn’t value you).
A great CEO does not bring back an employee who underperformed just because they miss the company. She does not renegotiate her salary downward because someone finally noticed her. She knows what the role requires. She knows what she’s worth. And she does not fill the seat with someone who can’t meet that standard just to stop the loneliness of having an empty chair.
Your love life deserves that same standard.
Before you go back — to the ex, the situationship, the person who almost worked — run these three questions:
Has it actually changed — or does it just miss what it got from you?
Does it meet your standard — or are you shrinking your standard to meet it?
Am I saying yes because it’s right — or because being wanted feels better than being alone?
Being alone is not the worst thing. Spending your life with someone who undervalues you is.
I said no to that radio station. I said no to the low ball offer. I said no to the world that never paid me what I was worth and called it an opportunity. And I would do it again tomorrow.
Know your worth. In the boardroom. In the bedroom. In every room.
Never go back. Never rehire. And never ever accept less than you deserve just because someone finally decided you were worth wanting.
That’s the play. Run it.
Ready to stop going back and start winning?
You just read the play. Now imagine having a coach who runs it with you personally.
Every week. For your exact situation, your exact patterns, your exact love life. No group calls where you have to share your heartbreak with strangers. Just you, me, and a strategy built entirely around you.
The women who book this call do not regret it. The women who don’t always wish they had.
Book your free Dating Strategy Call now. Do it today — not tomorrow, not after one more situationship, not when you feel more ready. Today.
Book Your Free Dating Strategy Call →
Share this with someone who needs to hear it today.
— Amanda Carroll