Higgins sees some of the disconnect he's experienced in one of the Bachelorette's relationships.
Ben Higgins sees some of his relationship with Lauren Bushnell in Bachelorette Hannah Brown's romance with controversial contestant Luke Parker.
The former Bachelor made the connection on Tuesday's episode of his and Ashley Iaconetti's Almost Famous podcast. He and Iaconetti first discussed Brown's confrontation with Parker on Monday night's episode of The Bachelorette, during which Parker freaked out over Brown going bungee jumping naked with another contestant. The Gainesville, Georgia, native called the date a "boneheaded" move and said it felt like a "slap in the face."
"Not every person that has a moral compass feels this way or would communicate it in this way," Higgins shared.
"Luke keeps telling Hannah, 'You're perfect. You're the girl I wanna marry.' But he's just saying those things, because... he just doesn't know her," Iaconetti chimed in. "She's maybe probably proving that she's less conservative than he'd want a girl to be. And yet, he, of course, keeps saying things like, 'I wanna marry you, you're my perfect girl.' I think she's proving that she's not your 'perfect girl.'"
Higgins focused on the disconnect between Brown and Parker, likening it to the detachment he and his ex, Lauren Bushnell, felt before their breakup. The pair split in May 2017, a year and a half after he proposed to her on season 20 of The Bachelor.
"Let's go to Lauren and I for a second, somebody that -- I think we both had a mutual love for each other, and a mutual respect for each other," Higgins said. "Now, we were not Luke and Hannah, we got along, for the most part, right? But there was a time in our relationship towards the end... and it wasn't even lifestyle choices, it wasn't decisions that we were making, we could just tell that we weren't clicking."
"We weren't the right partners for each other," he added, pointing at a "lack of compatibility." "We weren't bringing out the best in each other. Our relationship was more frustrating than it was uplifting."
"That's exactly what we're seeing between Hannah and Luke, on a smaller scale," Iaconetti offered.
"On a smaller scale, now I don't want to compare Lauren and I to Hannah and Luke," Ben said, noting that he and Bushnell had "a lot healthier" of a relationship. "But I think all of our listeners out there could say, if they've been in a few relationships... could say, 'Hey, I've been in a relationship that, we wanted it to work, that everything aligned for it to work. But at the end of the day, we were not compatible, that our conversations ended up in frustrations as much as we didn't want them to be.'"
Bushnell recently got engaged to country singer Chris Lane, while Higgins debuted his new relationship to Jessica Clarke in January. Higgins reacted to Bushnell's engagement on his podcast last week, offering a message to his ex.
"You found a man that you love without any pressure and… I could not be more excited for you," he said. "My hope for Lauren and myself is that my life isn’t as closely tied to Lauren anymore. I hope that this separates us. I think that it’s great… Lauren has found an amazing man to spend her life with and we’re gonna move on and it’s good for all."
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