Arie Luyendyk Jr. is getting some advice from former The Bachelor star Ben Higgins.

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The finale of Arie's season is near and it promises to be the most dramatic one yet.

Arie already told two women, "I love you" on the show, and since Ben can relate, he's giving the pro racing driver some advice on how to handle the shocking ending to his season.

"He should own it. Ultimately he decided to do the things he did," Ben told Entertainment Tonight of Arie's final decisions.

"Even if it was wrong, we're entitled as humans to make incorrect decisions sometimes. That's okay, as long as we recognize that and move forward with that. To say, 'I messed up, I was wrong.'"

When Ben starred on The Bachelor's 20th season in 2016, he expressed his love to both Lauren Bushnell and JoJo Fletcher before proposing marriage to Lauren.

"I realized I'd told [JoJo] something that I did feel, but it was going to be a lot harder on her for me to break up with her the next day. And I realized then this might not have been the best decision," Ben said, adding that it was also "really hard" to explain to Lauren how he had handled things.

"I get why it was hard. It wasn't fair to [Lauren]. I don't think it's why things didn't work out. It played a part in those first weeks. Coming off the show, you're so confused about how you just ended up engaged off of a show, that any type of things that can add any reassurance or doubt really affect you."

Ben clearly understands how and why Arie was so torn on The Bachelor's 22nd season, which will air its "shocking" finale during a two-night event next week beginning on Monday, March 5.

And while Ben said he'll "never say I regret [confessing my love twice]," he told ET that Arie probably had "a pretty strong lean towards" one woman towards the end of the process.

"There isn't a lot of, especially towards the end, guidance. The one thing the producers become are friends, for good or bad. They become your confidantes and you try to process your thoughts and your feelings with them," Ben explained.

ABC allowed Ben to say whatever he wanted to his Final 2 bachelorettes, but they advised him to think things through before communicating his feelings.

"Honestly, maybe to my own lack of wisdom, I thought, 'Maybe the best way to tell JoJo exactly how I feel so she walks away from this knowing this was real is to tell her I love her.' Because I did. I cared about her a ton, loved her as a person and loved my time with her. But I just knew I couldn't, at the time, live without Lauren, and I loved her as my partner," Ben said.

Ben now realizes that he loved JoJo but he was "in love" with Lauren, which might be the same case for Arie.

So based on Ben's messy The Bachelor experience as a result of being so vulnerable and candid, he would advise future Bachelors to not say, "I love you," to two women when the plan is to get engaged at the end.

"I knew I was going to be engaged. I thought it was the right thing [to tell JoJo I loved her]. Sometimes in life you can really believe you're doing the right thing, and maybe you weren't. Saying it to two people is not smart for a relationship," Ben told ET.

"Even if you feel it, hold it in, because as soon as the cameras go down and you look at the person you proposed to, you realize this is a really real thing. You've called your families. They're excited for you. You realize very quickly that you don't want anybody else, you're very happy with where you're at and any emotions or feelings told to anybody but that woman are unfair to her."

As far as the ending of Arie's season goes -- which will reportedly be so controversial that the finale will change Bachelor Nation's outlook on the show forever -- Ben suggested fans should give Arie a break if he takes responsibility for his actions and behavior.

"As a fan of the show, I would forgive him and offer him grace," Ben noted. "Nothing looks worse than blaming everybody else for a decision that you made."

To read the spoilers for Arie's The Bachelor season, including which bachelorette won his heart and what happened once cameras stopped rolling, click here.
About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski

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