We recently connected with Luba Seleznova and have shared our conversation below.

Luba , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

I never planned to become a matchmaker. Seventeen years ago, when I was a university student in Ukraine studying economics, I just wanted to improve my English. Someone suggested I work at an international dating agency translating letters between Ukrainian women and Western men. It sounded like a good way to practice, so I took the job.

What I didn’t expect was what I would discover behind the scenes. The letters I was translating weren’t written by the women at all. They were written by the agency owner. Beautiful, emotional messages, carefully crafted to hook Western men looking for love and keep them paying. It broke my heart. The women didn’t know half of what was being said in their names. The men believed they were in a relationship. I realized I was witnessing something dishonest, even cruel.

It didn’t sit right with me, so I walked away. I took a job at a bank. It was stable, professional, and completely unfulfilling. But even while I was working there, I kept thinking about what could be. What if real love could come from international dating, if it were done the right way? The idea stayed with me.

Eventually, I left the bank to work for one of the biggest dating agencies in the country. But I made a deal with them: I would only work with in-person clients. No online letter writing, no illusions. I wanted to see people face to face, talk to them, and help them meet in real life.

And in 2012, something happened that confirmed I was on the right path. I met a man named Clifton. He had been caught up in the letter writing hamster wheel for years. I managed to convince him to stop, and I introduced him to a real woman named Svetlana. They fell in love. They got married. And they asked me to be the maid of honor at their wedding in Texas. For a young Ukrainian woman, standing in a church on the other side of the world, it was overwhelming. It was also the most meaningful confirmation I had ever had. This was what I was meant to do.

Over the years, I kept trying to build my own agency. But it was hard in an industry where profit came before people. I saw too much manipulation, too much heartbreak. Still, I kept learning. I kept helping where I could.

Then in 2019, everything changed.

Stryker, my future business partner, was visiting Ukraine on vacation when we met. He had recently gone through a difficult breakup back in New Zealand and had started a YouTube channel where he shared everything he was learning about breakups and relationships. The following year, he decided to come back to Ukraine and stay for a while. Men from all over the world who had gone through hard breakups were reaching out to him, and Stryker would spend hours helping them for free. I saw something rare, someone who genuinely cared.

He asked me to join him for an interview on his channel to talk about international relationships. The response was amazing. His audience was warm, curious, and open to learning. It gave us both the idea to create a course for those who wanted deeper guidance.

At the time, Stryker didn’t want to be involved in matchmaking. But that changed when a particular man reached out. He asked if we could help him get insurance to visit Ukraine. He was currently using a matchmaker, but they hadn’t wanted to help him with the request. Stryker sent him my way. I told him, “If you let me, I will find you a wife.” Less than three months later, I introduced him to Elena, a real woman, sincere and relationship minded. That man was Doug, from Texas. They fell in love, and they eventually got married.

That was the moment we realized what we could create together.

Around the same time, I received an offer to work in the UK as an assistant to the CEO of a corporation managing over 80 major brands. It was tempting. Financial stability, career growth. But I had a choice: chase corporate success or take a chance on building a company that helped people fall in love. Even if there was only a slim chance it would work, it was my dream.

I chose the dream.

Stryker and I launched Heart Rocket. But just six months in, COVID hit. Everything shut down. We could have quit, but instead, we adapted. We launched online speed dating events on Zoom, introducing Ukrainian women with men from the USA. Couples met online. Some of them eventually married after finally meeting in person post COVID. It was working. It was real.

I felt happy. Finally, everything was coming together.

Then came February 24, 2022.

I woke up to explosions. Russia was attacking my city, Odesa. It was the scariest moment of my life. Two days later, Stryker and I escaped Ukraine. What should have been a two hour drive to Moldova took over 50 hours. We ran out of gas, food, water, and it was subzero temperatures. At the border, soldiers pulled Stryker from the car and made me drive on without him. It was terrifying. But days later, we found each other again in Moldova. Together, we drove to Spain, where the government offered us temporary protection and visas.

At that point, we thought Heart Rocket was finished. We didn’t know what to do next. But one morning, Stryker looked at me and said, “Let’s keep going. What we have is too good to let go.”

So we began again. This time with a new vision.

We realized that no one was preparing people for international relationships. They were just being matched without the tools to make it work. So we created a coaching first model. We started helping men and women develop themselves, understand dating and relationships, and get emotionally ready for a serious relationship. Only then did we match them.

Since then, we have expanded Heart Rocket in ways we never imagined. We launched communities for both men and women. We attend relationship workshops and conferences around the world. I have hosted women only events here in Valencia, where I educate on relationships and how to attract and keep a man. We have written courses and upload weekly videos to YouTube offering advice on international dating and creating new ways for people to connect.

One of our proudest creations is Ignite, a four day experience in Valencia, Spain, where our matched couples meet in real life for the first time. Every moment is carefully designed to help them bond, from facing fears to sharing romantic sunsets. We use a science backed method we call the Ignite Algorithm to build shared emotional experiences such as trust, fear, excitement, surprise, and romance. And it works.

We even released our own couples game, 101 Questions to Fall in Love, a playful yet powerful tool to help new couples form deep connections.

Heart Rocket was never easy. It was born out of struggle, mine, Stryker’s, and the many people we have helped. But that struggle is what shaped it. That is what makes it real.

If there is one thing I have learned through all of this, it is that love, real love, is not a straight line. It is a winding path full of hard decisions, unexpected turns, and moments where you don’t know if it will work out.

But when it does, it is the most beautiful thing in the world.

That is what keeps me going.
That is why Heart Rocket exists.
And that is why we will never stop

How did you build your audience on social media?

Heart Rocket really began in 2017 when Stryker began vlogging on YouTube during what he described as “one of the lowest points in his life”. He was going through a long, painful, and expensive breakup that dragged on for over two years. One night, he recorded his first video, speaking honestly about what he was feeling. But the fear of what people might think got the better of him, and he deleted it.

The next day, he changed his mind. He reuploaded the video and just kept going. He made videos even when he didn’t feel like it. It wasn’t about trying to go viral or make money. The intention was simple: if he could help others who were going through the same thing, then maybe his own pain wouldn’t be for nothing. He also described it as an outlet.

Even in those early videos, Stryker found ways to joke around and keep things light, even while talking about heavy topics. He didn’t want it to be depressing or dramatic—he wanted to be real but also bring a bit of humour and hope.

When we did our first video together in 2020, we made it about the differences in dating culture. But we were both very serious in that one, and afterward, we realized—it wasn’t really us. It didn’t reflect our personalities at all. So we made a decision: if we were going to keep doing this, we had to be our real selves. That meant joking around, not taking ourselves too seriously, and bringing some fun and laughter into a topic that is usually presented in a very solemn and serious way.

I think that is why people connected with us. They didn’t just come for information; they came for the energy, the honesty, to have a laugh and the feeling that they were spending time with people who didn’t pretend to be perfect.

There is real power in letting people see the real you, especially in a world where so much of social media is fake or overly polished. Of course, some people judged or left rude comments. But those are often people going through their own struggles. And if you look at them the same way you’d look at someone experiencing trauma, it’s easier to feel empathy instead of anger. You just hope that maybe, by seeing someone else be honest and lighthearted, they’ll find the courage to face their own pain too.

If you’re just starting out, here’s our advice: be consistent and always be yourself. Some people won’t like you—and that’s okay. The ones who do like you are the ones who are like you. And those are the ones that count.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

“I think the most resilient story we have is when Stryker and I left everything behind and fled Ukraine with nothing but a backpack of clothes. We had just spent six months renovating our apartment, and it was officially finished, furnished and ready to move into less than one week before the war broke out. And then we had to leave it all behind, never knowing if we would ever set foot in it again. We had to start over completely, not just rebuilding our lives but also rebuilding the company from scratch in a country where we did not know anyone and could not speak the language. Even finding a place to stay was almost impossible because we did not have official documents at the time due to being on a protection visa. Most landlords did not want to rent to us because of our visa situation, which made everything even harder. It was incredibly frustrating, but we pushed through. We had so much support from our YouTube followers who were following our journey. That support definitely helped us through the most difficult parts.

We have a saying we use when times are a little bit tough — the good stuff comes after the hard stuff.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.heartrocket.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heartrocket_matchmakers?igsh=NWlqZXFnYnk3YXRk
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/heartrocketmatchmakers
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lubov-selezneva-27480458/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@heartrocket