We had all the same interests.
We shared our hobbies and perspectives and questions about life.
We liked the same types of movies, books, shows, and were even interested in pursuing work in the same industry.
She was encouraging, receptive, and sweet. I did what all guys do when trying to woo a woman they met online and did my best to be funny, charming, and tried to not let on that I didn’t have my shit together as much as I wish I did.
Brick after brick of text was sent to one another as we each laid out as much about ourselves as we possibly could.
Yet, despite feeling as if she was checking every box on my unwritten list of potential partner qualifications, it still felt as if one or two huge boxes were left empty. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what they were at first, so to not feel as if I was being quick to judge or ungrateful, or like I had some sort of arbitrary and unknowable standards to meet, I let things continue to play out.
After a week or so of chatting over text and relating over nearly everything, I still felt as if something was absent from our interactions. As if the normal rapport two people might share over a drink at the bar still wasn’t showing up. I didn’t expect to experience the exact same sort of sparks you’d feel with an in-person conversation since we were strictly texting, but it still felt as if some chemical was missing from the chemistry.
I even said as much. At one point I said to her, “I feel like I know so many things ABOUT you, but it still doesn’t feel like I know YOU.”
She didn’t quite understand what I meant by that. In her mind, the things she did and the stuff she was interested in were who she was. She wasn’t grasping the idea that although two people might share sensibilities and enjoy all the same interests and endeavors that life has to offer, it still doesn’t account for who the people actually are. It doesn’t account for the unspoken understanding between two people who just get each other; the thing that connects people outside of merely shared hobbies or opinions or goals or experiences.
I felt this disconnect pretty early on but chalked it up to being nothing more than subtle differences in how we chose to communicate. I assumed that things would sync up a little better once we started seeing each other in person, and for a while, they did.
Deep down, my gut was telling me that there was something fundamentally off about us but I chose to ignore the memo. Knowing I had a bad habit of fixating on flaws and not wanting to throw away the list of things we did seem to connect on, I chose to not address the feeling right away.
I leaned into the commitment of our relationship and did what I thought was the opposite of what I was usually guilty of, which was to drag out my interest, keep my emotional distance, and basically end up feeling pressured into dating because I wasn’t fully invested in the first place. In the past, I had always been a coward who took the path of least resistance. I convinced myself this wasn’t the case this time.
No, this time I wanted to be mature about it. I wanted to commit myself to the relationship, shut out all other options or concerns, and do everything I could to make it work. I figured there were too many good things to say about her, too many little boxes checked that had to outweigh any nagging feeling that there were one or two huge boxes left empty. Never mind the fact they were probably the most important ones.
After a few months together, she got deployed for almost an entire year. We stuck it out and reverted back to our original bricks of text by emailing every other day. I didn’t address my ignored concerns because the long-distance dynamic made things too impersonal and things felt as good as they did when we first started talking. I’m guessing that’s because our entire relationship started through those same chunks of text.
Eventually, she comes back. The novelty of the separation was over and now the excitement of our reunion began. More immediate emotions acted as distractions for the thing that still bothered me about us. Not wanting to piss on the parade of us finally getting to be together after so long apart, I continued to lean forward instead of addressing what I thought was long behind me.
More months follow.
My commitment starts to wane.
I start feeling disconnected more often. We fight more frequently. I’ve now accepted that my original concerns about our lack of genuine chemistry aren’t going to be reconciled.
I start to see how that chemistry between two people isn’t something that’s created but is something inherent to the original dynamic.
Things continue like this until I reconnect with an old friend — an ex from ten years ago. Someone I hurt when I was young and dumb but who I had always thought of as one of my best friends. A relationship I never stopped feeling regret for, and one that had always made me feel the very thing I felt I was lacking in my current relationship.
It was a gut feeling of peace, of feeling settled, of feeling relaxed and content. It wasn’t a feeling of uncertainty or conflict. It wasn’t a feeling of doubt or concern. It was a feeling of simply being; a feeling of finding a hot spring in the middle of a frozen field. It was a feeling I had forgotten about, and one that my gut was trying to tell me hadn’t been there for two years.
After addressing the issue, talking for hours, arguing for more, a week break from each other here, and another one or two there, our relationship ended with me once again reaping what not listening to my gut sowed.
Things could have ended better between us, I admit that. Maybe they shouldn’t have gotten started in the first place. Perhaps if I had listened to my gut at the beginning, I wouldn’t have dragged out our mismatch for so long and I wouldn’t have hurt someone who didn’t deserve it.
I never intended to learn that lesson at someone else’s expense.
And for that, I’ll always be sorry.
…
These days, I’m trying my best to listen as closely as I can.
I understand now what most people know is the most fundamental part about listening to your gut — that it isn’t something you think about and analyze, it’s something you feel.
It’s a sliding scale from fear and apprehension to true contentment and genuine peace. I know now that when your gut is trying to tell you something is off, it’s best to listen to it right off the bat.
And when it instead fills you with the sort of peace and clarity you don’t realize you’ve been aching to feel for years, I’d take that as a sign that you’re finally doing something right.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: iStockPhoto.com
