Closer Apart

4 months ago

I used to think relationship problems could be fixed by adding more—more communication, more effort, more tools. Then I got into my dream PhD program 2,000 miles away from my partner’s dream job, and learned that sometimes maintaining love requires just the opposite: the courage to let go.

The Impossible Choice

Devon and I met in our 20s. She was living in a Vajrayana center. I was living in a Zen monastery. We had a romantic courtship in the mountains, spent six months in Asia studying with Tibetan monks, and then returned to the United States ready to build a life together.

In quick succession, we bought a house in Ashland, Oregon—devon’s hometown. She landed her dream job teaching at the high school where she’d been valedictorian. I started my master’s program in counseling psychology. We were establishing ourselves, putting down roots. Devon spent two years building her curriculum from scratch, teac...

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