We come together in relationships to experience what’s impossible alone. Intimacy, understanding, love and touch. We want to be together.

Yet, when we look around, great relationships have space between each other. Space to be apart.

The bad news is, that there is no rule for the amount of closeness or separateness for each to thrive. And that begins the art.

The good news is once we see this paradox, our request (not demand) for space or connection becomes a generous act for the sake of thriving relationships.

That’s the dance of being close and separate, of attachment and authenticity.

As Esther Perel points out, “love rests on two pillars: surrender and autonomy” because “our need for togetherness exists alongside our need for separateness. But too much merging erases the separateness of two distinct individuals. Then there is nothing more to transcend, no bridge to walk on, no one to visit on the other side, no other internal world to enter. When people become fused — when two become one — connection can no longer happen. There is no one to connect with.”

We are quick to solve, dismiss and point out how the logic is flawed.

Only to find that people repeat themselves again and again. And it gets irritating.

It is perhaps faster to, first, understand in a way where people felt so.

We are not submitting to their views, values, and proposed action.

And when we feel understood, we stop needing to repeat ourselves.

Both parties are able to be present with full creativity capacity.

A fertile ground for resolutions.

Someone is screaming at you and your blood pressure spikes.

You bite your tongue, not wanting to start a fight.

He continues, thinking that more nagging would get you to understand.

You desperately want the person to stop. Eventually, it stops.

The hardest part, is when the same scenario comes back again.

I wonder if the scenario is recurring because of our righteous belief that we are right and they are wrong.

We wish people to act differently. And they wish the same. Round and round, the situation happens again.

And when we believe that, we skip the need to take responsibility for our own reality. We outsource our agency to be creative and shape our reality insisting on others to change.

Claiming back your agency and repeating issues are both painful.

Your choice.

If a situation is nagging at you, it’s probably a tricky one. If it were easy, you’d done it already.

You might want the benefits of the decision, at the same time, avoid the cost (time, attention, thought).

In every situation, there are 3 options. You can change it, accept it or ignore it.

What is not a good option is wishing you could change it, but not changing it. Wishing you could accept it, but not accepting it. Wishing you could ignore it, but not ignoring it.

Unless you’re a fan of nagging thoughts.

I hope we can all agree that it is impossible to make the sun rise an hour later. Or to walk through a wall.

These are situations and we work around them.

Problems, however, have solutions. We can change them with our will. Curtain and doors are solutions.

Mixing up situations with problems causes unnecessary pain or missed opportunities.

When we are stuck, it might be worth it to figure out if it’s first a problem or a situation.