Stay or go?

[avacado]

I haven't written anything to myself in years, but felt driven to it tonight. I'm not looking for specific guidance, no one here can tell me what's best. I just wanted to get it out.

 

 

It’s been awhile. A lot has changed. I’ve been working at a respectable job for more than a year now. I have an advanced degree. I have a house. I have three suits and can tie a tie without the Internet. These are the things that I wanted so badly and now I have them. I’ve thrown away naïve notions of doing “meaningful” work, if that definition allows for only what young people fantasize about. I realize that I’m fulfilled by a larger array of ostensibly mundane work, and there’s a calming power in that. But I’m unsettled. It underlies my every move and thought. It’s not unfamiliar; I’ve never really been settled. The lack of certainty offered by the path has always left me unsure what to do. Who am I? Where do I go in life? What risks will I regret, and how do I decide a course of action? So let’s get to this specific, familiar riddle. Do I marry this woman?

 

 

She wants to move away. She doesn’t like it in the place that I love. She hates her job, and she can’t stay in this country if she leaves it or doesn’t make the proper arrangement in another city. And where might that city be? New York? San Francisco? DC? Places, she might realize, are far too expensive to live properly. She’d have to leave for Europe, Asia, who knows? Will I find work there? Good work, in my field? Will she make us move in a year or two or three, again forcing me to break the connections I’ve forged? Will I realize in years that I’ve made a great error in judgement and move back to my home, alone and older, less employable and full of regret?

 

 

I have for years now tried to turn away from commitments or even serious discussions. I quickly change the subject and crawl back into the warmth of contentment, a holding pattern that has become more difficult to maintain. She wants to leave, and soon I will need to decide. Will I decide on a whim? Will I decide from fear? From great aspiration of a long, full life lived abroad with the woman who I love? Eventually equating my decision to choose the harder path like the time I almost swerved into a ditch?

Edited March 30, 2016 by avacado

[strawberryshortstack]

I haven't written anything to myself in years, but felt driven to it tonight. I'm not looking for specific guidance, no one here can tell me what's best. I just wanted to get it out.

 

 

It’s been awhile. A lot has changed. I’ve been working at a respectable job for more than a year now. I have an advanced degree. I have a house. I have three suits and can tie a tie without the Internet. These are the things that I wanted so badly and now I have them. I’ve thrown away naïve notions of doing “meaningful” work, if that definition allows for only what young people fantasize about. I realize that I’m fulfilled by a larger array of ostensibly mundane work, and there’s a calming power in that. But I’m unsettled. It underlies my every move and thought. It’s not unfamiliar; I’ve never really been settled. The lack of certainty offered by the path has always left me unsure what to do. Who am I? Where do I go in life? What risks will I regret, and how do I decide a course of action? So let’s get to this specific, familiar riddle. Do I marry this woman?

 

 

She wants to move away. She doesn’t like it in the place that I love. She hates her job, and she can’t stay in this country if she leaves it or doesn’t make the proper arrangement in another city. And where might that city be? New York? San Francisco? DC? Places, she might realize, are far too expensive to live properly. She’d have to leave for Europe, Asia, who knows? Will I find work there? Good work, in my field? Will she make us move in a year or two or three, again forcing me to break the connections I’ve forged? Will I realize in years that I’ve made a great error in judgement and move back to my home, alone and older, less employable and full of regret?

 

 

I have for years now tried to turn away from commitments or even serious discussions. I quickly change the subject and crawl back into the warmth of contentment, a holding pattern that has become more difficult to maintain. She wants to leave, and soon I will need to decide. Will I decide on a whim? Will I decide from fear? From great aspiration of a long, full life lived abroad with the woman who I love? Eventually equating my decision to choose the harder path like the time I almost swerved into a ditch?

 

I know this isn't much of an answer, but you have to make YOU happy. Do whatever will get you there, or keep you there.

[neowulf]

Jobs come and go. Homes sold. Assets seized. Success itself is fluid.

 

The question is, if you give her up, do you really believe any of those other components of your life will console you?

 

Perhaps you find others to love easy?

 

I never have.

 

Finding that one person, above all others to be yours, to call your own. To share a life with.

 

Only you know what she means to you. Perhaps you should encourage her to make the move without you first. Some distance is often good for couples. It makes them reevaluate what really matters.

[Jersey born raised]

Does she know the implications of what she is asking? The risk for both you and the relationship if you agree to move. Will she be all right if you have to accept a lesser job?

 

Couples use to court each other. Courting functioned as pre-marital MC and like MC involved working with a councilor. In many ways it was far more intense then MC for married couples. The marriage Often the biggest killer of marriages are hidden assumptions.

 

Look into it. It may be a way to create a win win situation regardless of outcome.