Should you engage in long distance relationships?

Episode 37 June 30, 2019 00:30:56
Should you engage in long distance relationships?
Closeness
Should you engage in long distance relationships?

Jun 30 2019 | 00:30:56

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Hosted By

Tari Mannello

Show Notes

We all have the potential to make relationships thrive, but are long-distance relationships truly worth the effort? If you’ve experienced one or are navigating one now, you already understand the unique challenges: the lack of regular visits, the absence of physical connection, and the emotional strain that comes with prolonged separation.

In this episode, we delve into the many drawbacks of long-distance relationships and explore why they may not be suitable for everyone. How long can you sustain a relationship without intimacy, touch, or the comforting presence of your partner?

This concise, thought-provoking episode is designed for listeners on the go—perfect for your commute or when you’re seeking a quick but meaningful perspective.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 0 00:00 Welcome to the closeness podcast. The following is based on both personal experiences and wisdom as well as personal experiences that have been contributed to us. Generalizations are sometimes made for the sake of brevity but are never meant to exclude or offend. You can support these podcasts by donating to our [email protected] forward slash closeness for individual and partner coaching in person or online. Please visit, get closeness.com now, are you ready to come closer? Let's get started. How do you define a long distance relationship? In my opinion, they fall into two categories, long distance that you can comfortably drive to and home from in the same day or the next day or over the weekend, so it's an easy place to get to. I would call that one or two or maybe three hours away driving and then there's long distance that requires a serious time investment, a big airplane ticket, or even if the flight's an hour, it's still getting up there and prepared and packing and taking care of the cat or dog and what have you. Speaker 0 01:08 To be able to go see your partner. Should you engage in the kind of longterm relationships that you can access your partner within the day? Absolutely. Should you engage in longterm relationships that are indefinite and you have no idea when you're going to see the prison next and you really have no way of getting to them. I would say absolutely not. Now let's get into this. If you haven't already noticed and if you haven't already been exasperated by it in today's world, no matter what you think, no matter what you believe in, and no matter what opinion you have about whether something is good or bad, right or wrong, there are endless amounts of people who would love to prove you wrong and endless amounts of people who would love to demonstrate why everybody should just do whatever they want and everything is okay and everything is fine. Speaker 0 01:57 And usually this is accompanied by some pseudo spiritual words of wisdom. The same words of wisdom that are rattled off at a random yoga class and usually the mutterings of someone's mind based on the week they've been having or the book that they've read so often I'm in some sort of classroom setting and the teacher has had a bad week or she's feeling triggered or something emotional is happening for her and she doesn't respond well to it. So then she begins to teach the class how we should handle it and what we could do and how if we just take a deep breath here and there and we just come back to our center that everything will be fine. So when we take large topics, topics that we are all in a position to have an opinion about an experience for ourselves, like do longterm relationships work? Yes, of course everyone can have their opinion and of course there are going to be people who make it work. Speaker 0 02:48 It's possible to make almost anything work in any relationship and to be fair I want to exclude a certain percentage of the population. For example, people who have children obviously can't put your own selfishness before them. When it comes to making choices about your relationship, especially if you're in a healthy one. People who own property together, people where circumstances are far greater than just whether you want to stay with someone or not, or have some fun while you're traveling internationally or be restricted when you're having different experiences when your partner isn't around. But all of those things aside, my stance on whether long distance relationships work or not is absolutely not. They do not work well. But of course there are many caveats to that. You might have heard before, it takes 21 days to establish a habit. And human beings like routine, we can get used to almost anything. Speaker 0 03:41 So once you start the first two, three, four weeks of something, it becomes gradually easier and easier and habitual to do and engage in. So two is the case with relationships. In today's world, you can schedule calls together, you can video chat, you can talk one or 10 or 50 times a day. You can send text messages to each other all day long. It's almost as if that person is right here, but they're not. And the calls can be very inviting, very stimulating, very fulfilling, but there's something about getting off those calls, something about sitting quietly. Once you've released the call where the satisfaction begins to wane. Some loneliness kicks in or missing the person kicks in, especially if you're the person who's been left behind and that becomes increasingly difficult. I certainly do believe that a long distance relationship can work if it's short term and for a very finite defined period of time, someone is going away for a short period of time, a few weeks, a few months, something like that. Speaker 0 04:46 Something where you've really established trust and communication and intimacy in your core relationship and then if someone has to leave for work or a vacation or an experience and you have trust and faith in your relationship, absolutely I would hope your relationship can withstand or whether a few weeks or a few months. However, the case I would like to make against longterm relationships for indefinite periods of time or periods of time, say over a handful of months, especially if you are a person who enjoys intimacy or whose love language is certainly touch but also quality time, you are going to be in a world of hurt and there's a few reasons for that. Let's say traditionally you're in a committed monogamous relationship and you or your partner leaves the country so you're not able to go drive to each other or visit each other, but for once every six months or some very distant time in the future, that means you are expected to not flirt with, engage with, take phone numbers from kiss, make out with, have sex with, get dirty, with get nasty with be playful, engage in orgies or any such sexual behavior of any kind while you are away. Speaker 0 06:02 Everything. Just like in a traditional relationship, if you are in a monogamous conventional relationship is forbidden. What else is true? You also can't have sex with your own partner and you can't get intimacy and quality time and wheel one on one companionship with your partner. Now, as someone myself who adores video chatting and voice messaging and I use as much present moment ways of communicating, I mean I use FaceTime as much as I possibly can. I do it with my family. I do with people I care about. I send voice texts to people who I've only met just once or twice because I want to communicate more than just a few words and I don't want my meaning to be lost in text. Texting's incredibly useful. It's incredibly useful for quick questions or things that you just want to find out, but when it comes to maintaining a long distance relationship, it's very different. Speaker 0 06:57 The other interesting thing about being in a long distance relationship if someone is traveling is the person who gets left behind. In other words, the person who stays at home or in the hometown or holds down the Fort is often left to feel like they're missing out. A lot more sadness is involved a lot more feelings of hopelessness. Sometimes or why am I doing this? Or is he or she cheating on me? Why am I staying with this person who knows what they could be doing in another country or another place or another dimension? It feels as though you're missing out on an enormous amount of fun and that's no fun at all. So if you're a person who suffers from anxiety or control issues or needing to know where your partner is and what they're doing at all times, this one will be a really interesting challenging lesson for you. Speaker 0 07:45 And if you're someone who suffers from FOMO and you feel like you're always missing out, this will be an interesting, excruciating experience for you and for the person traveling. Incidentally, it often is true that you're having more fun because there are so many more things going on than the normal comfortable routine you usually have going on in your hometown. The world literally becomes your oyster. Another way to say this, and it's a personally strong opinion of mine. When you're traveling the universe, the world, God, whatever you want to call it, just cracks open the world for you because you break out of your routine, you break out of your regular thinking habits, you're in a different flow, in a different mindset. So doors open for you where they wouldn't have before and invitations and things and events come about that you might not have said yes to. Speaker 0 08:33 And if you're a woman who's traveling, who do you think is inviting you to all these special events? Men come to my concert, my club, my nightclub, this event I'm holding the special thing. You could even stay with me if you'd like. I have a guest pass just for you. Only one unless your girlfriend's coming, but if your boyfriend's coming, it's just one guest pass. Come visit me in Germany or Sweden, Morocco or wherever. Come stay with me. Come be with me and I will take care of the rest. This is something inevitably that women run into all the time when they travel. Not so much for men where just some random girl says to you, Hey, what are you doing this weekend? Oh, you're visiting from America, come spend the weekend with me, I'm happy to host you. It happens and it's even happened to me, but it's not common. Speaker 0 09:17 So if you are the person who's traveling, especially to multiple places, you have all this newness and excitement. Furthermore, what also happens is you grow and you expand and you actually become someone else. And when that happens you often don't have need for or desire for or crave the same level of companionship or relationship that you did before you left. You know, on the tails of this, I often find couples who go through a big move together, they actually decide to move out to, for instance, California, San Diego, Los Angeles, what have you, and on the process of coming over here, their vibration, their energy, their being has shifted so much that they wind up immediately breaking up. And some people have made these choices as a result of doing it for their girlfriend or doing it for their boyfriend or someone got a job or someone got a career opportunity and so the other person followed them out, but the relationship wasn't strong. Speaker 0 10:19 Then once they're here, once they're living together, the sexual attraction, Wayne's advantages at dissipates and now you're left living with a roommate who theoretically is your boyfriend or girlfriend who you're not having sex with and the whole thing becomes a mess. So now you're technically broken up and it feels like you're sneaking around cause you can't bring anyone else home. So you're always going to see people elsewhere. Also, this becomes very difficult. I strongly recommend to anyone just since we're talking about distance and long distance, who's considering making a move with someone to really evaluate how much you love and care for that person and how much they love and care for you. Do you feel rock solid in it? Are you both 100% committed to each other or is it just a fun thing or just a person who you like right now, just ask anyone who has moved to Dubai as a couple, how long the relationship lasted once they moved there. Speaker 0 11:10 Ask several people about it. I've often said even from a very young age, even though I'm a strong believer in love, I value love. It's one of my highest values is love and healthy relationship. I would place growth and expansion over a relationship that isn't a hundred percent just rock solid. And of course you never know where it's going to go or what's happening. But you know the difference between feeling secure, you guys can't get enough of each other. You love each other so much and something that's going to come quickly to an end. Okay. So getting back to long distance relationships on top of the expectation in committed monogamous relationships of not being able to touch, kiss, tease, play with flirt, engage, spend the night with interact with whatever, anyone and this wreck and by the sheer nature of your latitude and all longitudinal coordinates, you can't do it with each other. Speaker 0 12:03 At best you can have phone, sex, maybe just close your eyes and imagine my tongue in between your thighs. It can be really great and powerful a handful of times, but nothing takes the place of real time in person. Intimate attention, presence and communication regardless of what type of love language you have. So I am not a big fan of long distance relationships. I don't think they can work longterm and I don't think they can stand the test of time. If you have a strong need for connection and if you have a strong sexual appetite, if you totally enjoy celibacy, if you are polyamorous or you have an open relationship or you're allowed to see and spend time with whoever, then of course you can have someone in one country and another and another. And another and so on and so forth. But in these traditional relationships, it becomes very difficult. Speaker 0 12:53 People who are in their feminine, especially women want to be seen and they identify with light. A woman wants to be chosen and celebrated. Feminine energy wants to surrender and relax into the energy of a trustworthy man. She wants to move with someone who's directional, who can make choices and decisions. It's extremely difficult to do that when the most you can do is sit on the phone with someone and you really have no idea what's going on in their world for the entire rest of the time. Now maybe you're just happy for them. Maybe you're hoping they have a wonderful experience and if and when they choose to come back to you, then so be it and you'll be there. So here are a few tips if you are in a traditional relationship of how to help Assagioli the problems that come with long distance and soften the edges around it. Speaker 0 13:45 There's nothing I like less than people who espouse communication and simply use that as their end all be all answer to everything. You just have to communicate. Absolutely not. You just have to communicate how, what's your tone is one of you raise to be a really blunt, callous, cold hearted person, but you say what you mean and as the other hiding behind hidden messages and shy and doesn't know how to express how they feel and how do you communicate and which way is best in what the heck do we even say to each other? What are you going to talk about? So closeness is always about how do you do the thing that everybody's talking about doing? How do you have incredible sex? How do you create great chemistry? How do you communicate about what's going to happen? Well, you have to directly raise the subject. Speaker 0 14:28 What are the ground rules? Are you going to stay in a committed monogamous relationship? And if so, what does that mean? What are the partners allowed to do when the totally unexpected, the totally unanticipated and the totally took me by surprise. Magical man shows up and flirts with your wife or girlfriend and she thinks it's okay to go have a few drinks together. What possible harm can just a few drinks late night in Venice in a bar possibly have on the relationship. She knows where she stands. She thinks she's not going to cheat. She thinks that nothing is going to happen. How bad can it be? You'll often hear things like this with people in relationship like, do you trust me? I'm not going to do anything. Should I not have any fun? How else can I go out with people and socialize? So what is okay and what's not? Speaker 0 15:13 Where do you draw the line between what's appropriate and what isn't? And once you start drawing the line where sexuality comes in, it becomes extremely difficult because as adults, very few people are just going to have a nice makeout session that doesn't also involve touching and fondling. That doesn't also involve caressing and using your tongue. That doesn't often involve heavy eye contact or touching boobs and butts and everything in between or fingering and stroking. And if it stops there, why are you stopping there? What does stopping there but not following through with the rest do for you? Are you allowed to have oral sex or not? If you do, how on earth would you possibly know if the person really stopped there? Was it just the tip? Was it only for a few minutes? Were they really honest about the choices that they made? Can you even stop? Speaker 0 16:04 Do you have control to stop? Do you have self control and let's just say that you do. Let's say you are the embodiment of restraint and self control. Why are you the embodiment of restraint and self control? Why are you in a position of high sexual tension and demand naked with another person, with them eating you out or going down on you, but you're exhibiting some form of self control because Hey, you're not going all the way. Why do you want that in your life? Why have you invited all of this attention and sexuality into your life that it's stopping at a certain point in case you haven't found out about yourself yet when you're highly, highly aroused in a peak state of excitement and really turned on, it's a bit like being intoxicated, drunk on drugs or what have you. You're not thinking straight, whether you're a man or a woman. Speaker 0 16:53 That level of arousal is extremely, extremely powerful. So the more that you push the envelope of what you can and can't do, and the more sexual it is, the more difficult it becomes to actually adhere to those rules. Now granted, I know some people are outstanding communicators. They're upfront from the very start. They lay it all out, and perhaps this episode isn't for you, but for most of us, it's an extremely challenging task. What about flirting and how do you define flirting? Are you allowed to touch other people when you flirt? Are you allowed to kiss other people on the cheeks or on the mouth or spend time alone with someone that you're sexually attracted to? You're allowed to do whatever you want to do in the end of the day, but in the nature of your relationship, is it okay for you to be alone in a room with someone who you're very attracted to? Speaker 0 17:46 And what about if you're not attracted to them, but they're very attracted to you? Can you be alone in a room together, a bedroom, a hotel room, a ballroom, go dancing. What about drinking and drugs and how do you become, do you get wetter, harder, more excited when you're on drugs and or alcohol? Do you make the wrong choices? Do you care? Are you going to cheat and not talk about it? Are you going to lie? All of these things come up and the truth is for the most part, especially if you're in another city or another country, you really only have your word. Your word defines who you are and it's either going to be a very good choice or a very bad choice. Let's also not forget, just like traditional, committed monogamous relationships that often people make bad choices. We don't have to call them the wrong choice, although sometimes it seems pretty obvious than it is, but we don't make the best choices, especially under stress arousal or under the influence of alcohol and drugs. Speaker 0 18:43 Oftentimes people convince themselves that something is a wonderful idea, like buying another pair of shoes or another car or taking a trip somewhere or gambling a little bit longer or staying at this casino a little bit longer. Once again, I want to circle back to if you have a female partner who's traveling and it's just such, it's extremely important to remember that it's such a different experience for a woman. It's also a very different experience when you're traveling as a couple versus traveling alone. Many, many people would gladly host you as one person in their guest room or one person in their bed or one person on their couch. When you're traveling as a couple, that becomes very different. Your susceptible to your dynamic, whether you're getting along or not, and also if people are helping you out or doing favors for you or allowing you to stay with them, it's not exactly conducive to having great sex on their couch or in their guest room or that sort of thing. Speaker 0 19:40 So a lot of times your own intimacy, unless you are staying in your own hotels doing your own thing, your own intimacy. It gets affected when you're traveling as a couple. If you're human being, doors are going to open for you as soon as you start traveling. Some people as soon as they take off for the airport, including for myself, certain opportunities and things just happen that make life easier and more fun. I think it's what makes people say, I love to travel and traveling is amazing and everyone should travel and blah blah blah blah blah. But if you are a woman, you are going to get endless amounts of offers and attention, especially if you're open to it, especially if you have that need for attention, especially if you have that receptivity or you just want to have some fun or you have a mentality about just going out and making yourself look wonderful everywhere you go. Speaker 0 20:27 And especially if you've got dreams of being in Paris or Italy or some very romantic location. You've got certain outfits and heals and the things that you're going to wear and put on so that you feel beautiful and you are going to suck a lot and a lot, a lot, a lot of attention to yourself and just because you think that you are in control of what happens to you and what you do and the choices you make. Absolutely. But that doesn't mean that an enormous amount of men are going to want to do things for you into you, offer you favors, take you places and help you out just because, and even under the guise of just being friendly. So those are some things to consider. We've covered communication and what is permitted within the relationship, within the confines of your relationship. Are you going to open it up? Speaker 0 21:15 Are you going to have a don't kiss, don't tell. Are you going to be able to be sexual and intimate with people but not talk about it or tell each other per your decision, are you going to be celibate for several months or years? How often are you going to see each other and how often do you want to talk? Really, once again, someone who's in the routine from home, taking care of the family, doing dishes, doing laundry, doing errands, getting things done, living life, going to work, coming home is going to have a very, very different experience and desire in terms of how often you'd like to talk to and hear from you than if you're go, go, go, go, go all over the planet and everything you do is something exciting and new you're not. It's very common to not miss the person who's at home as much or as intensely because your mind is being occupied by other things and if you're really honest with yourself, this plays itself out in all kinds of relationships. Speaker 0 22:12 When you're interested in one person and maybe not another when you're debating whether to stay with someone or not, when you're thinking about breaking up, when someone hits on you and you're really hoping it works out with someone else, you're constantly weighing the pros and cons of how someone treats you and if that person says yes to your invitations, if that person wants to spend time with you, if you have things to do and places to go, you are mentally distracted, your engaged with other stuff and hopefully you're in the present moment with other people, sexual or not. That makes it far less likely and less desirable for you to call your person at home, spend time talking, connect because you want to go experience as much as you can and that person probably wants you to go experience as much as you can. Another challenging situation is when you have a friend in another country, a friend who for you is truly a platonic friend. Speaker 0 23:07 You're not attracted to them. You don't think they're attracted to you. You've known each other for awhile but your partner does not know them or doesn't have a lot of experience with them, so maybe this is who you attach yourself to. You spend nights there with them, you go out to dinners, you cook dinner together, you have fun. Suddenly you're in a partnership and it doesn't matter if that friend has a boyfriend or girlfriend or if they live together. If your spending a lot of one on one time with someone who you have the potential to have sex with, even if you can swear nothing's there, that puts a lot of strain on the relationship at home because that person doesn't know what know they can trust you. They can believe what you say but it can still hurt and affect them very strongly. And I do have one more intense thought about situations like this and that is I think it's more acceptable in a committed monogamous relationship that you've decided to make long distance or local for that matter, for people to visit old friends, not necessarily old lovers or old flames or people who they have wonderful chemistry with intimately, but you certainly could have a friend who you used to have sex with and now absolutely nothing is there anymore. Speaker 0 24:20 That is a possibility. It's just hard for most people to grasp that concept. And it's hard for most people to trust that one or both or the other partner will want to not pursue something. But when it comes to these old friends people who you've known a long time and you've generally never had sex with, there's a little bit more understanding and momentum and I personally am less okay with new friends, meaning your partner flies to a different country or city or state and suddenly meets a member, a member of the opposite sex. Of course they do. Who else would it be? And he or she is also handsome or beautiful and super accommodating. And resourceful possibly in ways that you aren't who you do not know you've never heard of and you know darn well they are entirely sexually interested in them despite whatever your partner might say. Speaker 0 25:14 What's that? Your partner doesn't pick up the phone late at night when they're out with them. Really, you had no reception on the night that you spent time with this person? Hmm, what's that? Suddenly their battery died or their phone was on airplane mode or they were just caught up in a moment and just enjoying themselves having a nice night. Why are you acting so jealous? Your partner is receiving everything that you're not, all of that attention, all of that care, all of that connection, all of that one on one time and fulfilling a need that you can't. And again, that's why I always say, is that going to be okay? Talk about that before you engage in having a long distance relationship because it could work. If both of you are open to having a situation like that where someone else can take your place and you can have fun and connection and wonderful evenings out and you're super happy about having your partner feel satisfied and fulfilled with someone else who's not you, then by all means of course you can also have the experience where you are lonely and longing for your partner to be there with you during all the traveling and the experiences or even the work that you're out there for your in several romantic places or some great spots and you're tasting something that you wish your partner could enjoy and you wish they were there to savor it with you and it's a very bittersweet moment because you can enjoy it by yourself or you can have a FaceTime or a video chat conversation or you can actually do it with your partner. Speaker 0 26:31 All things have pros and cons. Another thing that can come up is not understanding how much women analyze what men say. When you're in the habit of quickly communicating or texting or sending little voice notes here and there or you're having your daily talk. If you decide to talk daily and you're just sort of going on and on with words, it's very, very easy for either person to slip up and say something mean or cruel or joke about something that isn't funny or make a comment that the person doesn't understand because words start to take on more meaning and more value there. What you have to hold onto and what you believe in. You are effectively living a relationship through words, not presence, not company, not care and adoration and of course you can feel someone's love through the phone. Of course you can say, I love you and this and that, and give someone the feeling. Speaker 0 27:21 It's a relationship driven by words. Lastly, what kind of sacrifices are you willing to make for your partner? I mean, this is a big one. No matter what type of relationship you're looking at, do you feel safe and strong enough to say, babe, if you want to have some sort of experience or indiscretion or wild adventure, I don't want to hear about it or just tell me about it. If you do or if you do, we're going to break up or I want you to have fun. I want the best for you. I hope you have a great time. Just enjoy yourself and are you going to regret that when this person isn't daily in your life, living with you or calling you or spending time with you when that finally happens. So it's not a doom and gloom episode, but there are many things to think about when you're in a long distance relationship. Speaker 0 28:03 As you can see from the tone. It's not really something that I advocate or I think is healthy for the relationship, especially if it's happening over and over again. Or if two of you live in different countries and different locations, but hope to see each other here and there. You're really forcing both parties to miss out on some incredible opportunities and adventures. And I don't necessarily mean sex, but what I really mean is when you're really committed to someone, when you really love them, you often say no to many things that you would not want them to do to you. Late night dinners, an evening out with one person rather than a group being at a bar or club dancing late at night in a bar or club, taking the opportunity to say yes if someone wants to take you on a boat or a helicopter or a roller coaster or what have you. Speaker 0 28:49 There's a lot that you say no to because of the relationship and so not only does it take, I mean some people travel once in a lifetime. Some people go to one place and they only ever go to that place. They don't see the rest of the world. If someone is in another part of the world having all these experiences and it feels completely hindered because of the relationship not enhanced by the relationship, what are you doing? This person might only have that opportunity to see this thing or experienced this thing once and maybe it's someone of the opposite sex or same sex who offers to take you to that sin that day or that incredible mountain cliff or to go see Montblanc. I'm not saying if you've been involved with someone for years and years at, the first thing you should do should be break up if you decide to get involved in a long distance relationship, but you really want to weigh your options and examine what you can handle really, really inside and ask yourself. Speaker 0 29:42 I hope that helps for anyone who has considered this. I now have a strong stance and I'm sure many people have made this work. I'm certain if you're in any kind of open or polyamorous relationship that it's been infinitely easier to make something like this work. I'm sure many people have done it for years and it's been fine. But I really do believe that has to do with your comfort level around jealousy, around loneliness, around being able to handle other people, pleasuring your partner or making your partner feel happy in an intimate way, your level of sexuality, and also your need for companionship. Perhaps you're more on the super independent scale. Perhaps you value a relationship where you have total freedom and you're only just checking in once every few days or once a week. So for a certain type of person, I'm sure it's great, but for those of us who love to cuddle, for those of us who love coziness, for those of us who value monogamy, for those of us who love to be able to come home and see your partner, look him in the eye, I strongly recommend keeping it local. Speaker 0 30:40 Thank you for listening. We hope you've enjoyed this immensely. To learn more about what we do, visit, get closeness.com and to donate to our Patrion or have one of your questions answered on the closeness podcast. Visit patrion.com forward slash closeness and remember, stay close.

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