The day I found out that my boyfriend got accepted into Singapore Management University, I was incredibly happy for him and couldn’t wait to celebrate his success. But the truth is, I was also sceptical about pursuing a long-distance relationship, as most people are. I’d often hear people talk about how it never works and eventually leads to heartbreak….CONTINUE READING HERE
“The love fizzles out.”
“It won’t work because of our careers.”
“What’s the point of being in a long-distance relationship?” they’d say.
But amidst all this noise, I met and listened to people who have successfully gotten through years of long distance and reaped the benefits of it.
It’s been three months since my boyfriend moved to another country and while that might not be a very long period of time, it has taught me quite a bit. So, If you are currently in a long-distance relationship, or if you’re standing at the edge of it, wondering if you should take the leap, this post is for you.
Here are five truths about LDR that will give you a sense of comfort –
Most people say, “It doesn’t work. It only causes pain. I’d rather break up than do long distance.”
In 1995, when my mother was pregnant with my brother, my father had to move to Japan for a year to head a project for his company. In 2012, my aunt relocated to India from the United States, but it took over a year for my uncle to wrap up and move back. Two people could be married and still end up in a long-distance relationship.
In our 20s, we’re flapping our wings for the first time; new opportunities come our way and building our careers is paramount.
In a post that I wrote 5 years ago, I said, “Your relationship should make you feel like you’re floating, it should never weigh you down.”
The most important part of a relationship is to support each other through milestones and tough times. If we call quits on every relationship when distance gets in the way, will we ever find our soulmate?
If you chose to do long distance, just know that you made a brave choice and did not run away.
Two days before my boyfriend moved away, one of my closest friends said, “Prar, don’t worry. LDR is the purest form of romantic love. You won’t be able to hold him through his tough times and there will be no physical intimacy between the two of you, yet, he will always choose you over someone who is next to him. If that isn’t love, what is?”
As human beings, we often want proof of everything. “You love me? Prove it.”
Your significant other choosing you, even if it’s just your voice through the phone, is proof enough that love is real and long-distance relationships work when two people are equally committed to it.
A couple that I absolutely adore once said, “We dated for 10 years before we got married and we’ve had to do quite a bit of long distance. But we chose it because what we have with each other, we can never find elsewhere. If you look at the big picture and the dreams y’all want to build together, you’ll realize that the years you spend doing long distance will be a very small fraction of the life you’ll get to spend together.”
You know what they say — “When you are in a long-distance relationship, the honeymoon phase never ends.”
The truth is, a long-distance relationship requires effort. Planning movie nights, cooking together or falling asleep on call after telling your significant other about your day. The little things make a big difference.
The Dependency Paradox is that the more fully we can depend on our partner and trust them as our secure base, the more independent we are able to be. One thing that I have noticed is that being in a long-distance relationship has driven me to work harder and achieve my goals quicker in order to materialize the future that my significant other and I have envisioned for ourselves….CONTINUE READING HERE
