Souls we were meant to find
the end of us, after seven years
A month ago, my seven-year relationship ended. I still have a persistent cough from blowing out my vocal cords while crying. Cute, I know. Some people process heartbreak in silence. I prefer clumsily broadcasting mine to the Internet (I was raised by celebrity post-breakup Twitter wars, what can I say? Ariana and Pete especially live in my head rent-free).
I’ve cycled through every stage of grief like it’s a spin class playlist. Anger is overstaying its welcome, which I’m blaming on the Prednisone I’m taking for the cough. (A week into steroids and I now get why WWE wrestlers body-slam each other for fun. Thankfully, as a woman, I’m channeling the rage gracefully: punching my decorative pillow).
I recently rewatched Celine Song’s Past Lives, and this time, it hit in a way it hadn’t before. The Korean concept of “In-Yun,” or fate, is beautifully captured by Greta Lee’s Nora Moon:
“It’s an In-Yun if two strangers even walk by each other in the street and their clothes accidentally brush. Because it means there must have been something between them in their past lives. If two people get married, they say it’s because there have been 8,000 layers of In-Yun over 8,000 lifetimes.”
J and I met in college and went from strangers to something resembling soulmates in less than two weeks. There was an end-of-semester celebration neither of us originally intended to go to, and without it, our paths likely never would’ve crossed on campus. One minute, we were making eye contact like the protagonists of a coming-of-age montage set to a Phoebe Bridgers song. The next, he was walking over – bold, sure of himself, but not in an arrogant way. I didn’t expect anything, but I leaned in anyway, like some part of me had been waiting to be invited. He was the steady confidence to my restless wonder, and I always admired that about our dynamic.
J was my first healthy relationship and I was his first real one, period. On paper, we made zero sense. He was a Pacific Northwest guy and an omniscient, straight-man encyclopedia: sports teams, stocks, and the strongest fertilizer. My YouTube algorithm was a chaotic blend of GRWM storytimes and soft girls journaling; his was ASMR of beavers dam-building and men restoring vintage cars. And yet, we stayed curious – genuinely, endlessly curious. We made each other’s worlds feel worth exploring.
I told J everything. Every random thought, irrational fear, and breakdown disguised as a “quick update.” He’d listen patiently, until I’d veer into emotionally dangerous territory. That’s when he would sometimes go full football-coach and say, “Okay, let’s reset. Maybe we get you some help.”
Naturally, I’d take that super well by swearing to never tell him anything again. “You’re not hearing me,” I’d say, eyes narrowing like he’d just told me I’d be prettier if I smiled.
He’d sigh: “So… you just want me to sit here and do nothing while you spiral?”
Yes. Obviously. People don’t ask “Can I vent?” because they’re looking for advice. They do so because “Please validate me and tell me I’m hot” isn’t socially acceptable. (After we broke up, I finally started therapy, so maybe he was onto something.)
J was unflinchingly blunt. If we were already seated at a restaurant and realized the menu was a bust, I’d opt to whisper “I’m fine,” order the least offensive item and force it down like a moral duty. J, on the other hand, would flag down the waiter with a disarming smile and charm us into a graceful exit. We’d end up at an amazing spot after that made me remember I have free will and should exercise it more often. He had the balls to say exactly what was on his mind, regardless of how inconvenient or unpopular it was. Bad news didn’t faze him. He switched jobs every other year because he was honest with himself. I, meanwhile, feel like changing shampoo is too big a risk, even if mine dries out my scalp.
I was the self-proclaimed movie buff, but somehow, J was better at actually watching them. He’d absorb movies on a cellular level, spotting details in scenes I’d completely miss. His attention span was long and lingering, a cat sunbathing. Mine was a squirrel with twenty tabs open.
“Did you catch that? The villain said that same line earlier – they’re definitely connected,” he’d whisper during some intergalactic-superhero-heist-blockbuster.
“What line?” I’d ask, as he’d already be rewinding, incredulous. Then, he’d watch me, excited, as I pieced it together in real time. (And I did love a good callback).
To that end, J was better at just… being. I loved how he could pause at the sky or a stretch of beach, and take it all in, like an enlightened retiree. He’s the only Gen Zer I know who’s never downloaded TikTok. He treats Instagram as if it’s a time capsule, posting one grainy photo every few years. One time, we vacationed in Arizona, and he said, completely seriously, that he could see himself living there (no shade to Arizona, but, like, there’s literally no shade?). I nodded politely while wondering if I could survive more than a week with the extreme heat and no pistachio milk. I always felt difficult – the greedy, overstimulated kid who kept clamoring for more.
We started dating at a time when questions like “Do you want kids?” or “Where do you see yourself in ten years?” felt like distant hypotheticals – things you’d answer on a college survey, not actual decisions to build a life around. But those questions have a way of catching up to you, usually around the perplexing age of your mid-20s, when suddenly everyone around you is either moving in with their partner or across the country for grad school, and the future stops being abstract; it starts knocking.
Looking back, I can see that we were always fundamentally different people. But instead of accepting that, we both tried, silently, subconsciously, to mold ourselves into the versions we thought the other person wanted. Because we so badly wanted it to work.
We didn’t fight much in the last year. For a while, I thought that was a good sign. But eventually, I realized that no conflict often just means no real conversations. We’d slipped into autopilot, roleplaying “happy partner” while suppressing the parts of ourselves that didn’t fit the script. We built up resentment the way people amass clutter in a house, slowly, then all at once. A relationship isn’t supposed to feel like you’re swallowing yourself so much to keep the other person whole. I kept my own feelings at an arm’s length, avoiding the questions I didn’t feel ready to answer. Being with him was an escape from having to truly meet myself, and ask: What do I want out of life?
The thing is, when there’s distance between you and your inner world, there’s inevitably distance between you and those you love. Mine had grown into a chasm. I told myself that if I loved him, then maybe that would be enough to quiet the parts of me I didn’t yet know how to care for. So we held on, like two boats tethered, steadily pulled by opposite tides, because losing each other would’ve meant admitting something scarier: that we’d already lost ourselves.
Somewhere along the way, we fell out of love. It wasn’t loud. It didn’t announce itself. It was the imperceptible ache of things left unsaid, of needs unmet, of ordinary days that started to feel heavy. I’ve come to understand that growing up with someone doesn’t always mean growing together. (When you do find those who still feel like home after the drift of time, hold onto them with both hands. They’re rarer than you think.)
I’ve been seeing edits to Charli XCX’s “party 4 u,” where two people, heartbreakingly close to ending up together, share a final, longing look, the kind that says: “We won’t have the life we imagined, but I still hope everything beautiful finds you.” There’s something tender about how people who never speak again still vow to root for each other from afar.
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And since I can’t resist a callback, here’s one last Past Lives reference to close us out.
I told J in one of our last conversations: “If this, too, becomes a past life, I hope I get to find you again in the next one.”
In this life, I hope we all find the people we’re meant to become, and the ones we’re meant to become that with.
I would also highly recommend the movie Someone Great (2019), it touches on a similar theme albeit with a cliche screenplay. I have only ever watched it thrice, it is my ritual breakup movie.
Felt like you took us on a journey of your relationship and it was heartbreaking and beautiful!
🌻