I just had conversation about this with Lauren when we were in Yosemite and it was a magical conversation. It was not about this exact question, but a series of questions that can help me answer this from my standpoint. 

The core of our relationship is, without a doubt, love, as all relationships and everything in this life is derived from, but it goes much deeper than just saying love. In our relationship there is so much that feeds into the core of love. Like I think a root in our relationship is play, which is this childlike energy filled with curiosity and imagination. Together we tend to gravitate towards nature and experience the world around us, while acting like ourselves as if we were kids, like laughing just being in complete awe when we see things we have never seen before, being present and using our imaginations.

Acceptance is at the core of our relationship. I accept Lauren for who she is and nothing less. I love her for her and hold so much appreciation for her. I accept that we are individuals and hold space for her to do the things that she loves and she does the same for me. I really have discovered that we compliment each other in all the right aspects of life. Like she tends to move a bit slower in life and I tend to move a tad faster, so she reminds me to slow down and enjoy every moment. Along with that she goes with the flow of life with little to no planning and I tend to like a little structure so she reminds me to let things flow from time to time and I remind her to make a list of things she needs to get done, every now and then. The contrast is even down to the flavors of sour patch kids we eat, where she does not like the red and I don’t like the orange, but the opposite is our favorite. 

Communication feeds into love. We communicate so well with one another, yet there are times where we misunderstand or under communicate to another, but we recognize when this happens and work through it. We ask each other the questions and wait patiently for the response, to understand the root of the misunderstanding. I make it known when I get upset about something or am not a fan of something. I know I tend to sometimes get locked into my viewpoint, so Lauren makes it known to me what her viewpoint is. 

By no means do I think I have a perfect core of my relationship with her because we are constantly growing and encouraging one another to grow and evolve which means our core is constantly growing and evolving with us. But I’d like to say it is perfectly imperfect.

I think just the willingness to do anything to add to each other’s happiness, while recognizing when to fill our own cups up first, is the core of our relationship. This is a question that I can’t just create a simple answer to because the core of our relationship is so complex, yet so beautiful and two sided. This is just a few things I think are at the core, but Lauren probably views the core differently in some way or another. Maybe I should have her share her thoughts here?

xoxo reggie