For Malachi
First, living apart may be one way to enhance the novelty or excitement in a relationship. In the beginning, couples tend to engage in lots of novel and exciting activities together – what researchers call self-expanding activities.3 They dress up for dates, they explore new parts of the city, they try each other’s hobbies, and they have engaging discussions with each other. As time goes on, though, it can be easy for long-term couples to fall into such a routine that they stop doing fun new things together, leading to boredom.
By choosing not to live together, LAT couples may have found a way to help prevent their relationships from becoming monotonous. These couples have less time to spend together, so they have to actually plan or schedule their time. It is easy to see how this “opt-in” versus “opt-out” arrangement may encourage these couples to put more effort into dates, leading to more exciting, self-expanding activities that reduce boredom and increase satisfaction.3
for people who might be feeling unfulfilled in a relationship, living together can make them feel “stuck” because of the additional hassle of breaking up.5LAT couples do not have to contend with this. Breaking up would be much less of a hassle for them, so they can be more confident that they (and their partners) are staying in the relationship for the right reasons.- Samantha Joel M.A
Reasons I want to live apart but remain just as committed as we are when we live together:
1. We dont take advantage of each other if we dont spend all of our time together. It appears we enjoy our time we do get to spend together much more and we actually make plans to do "fun" and exciting things.
2. We get our own space. Having my own space is a comfort zone. It allows me to retreat whenever I might need it. It also allows me to maintain my self eestem because it gives me to solitude to focus on my own issues/self without our moods effecting each others. Living together-space/privacy is not a reliable option because we only have one room.
3. It allows me to remain independent and not so easily become dependent as I could living together. Reason being having my own space allows me to do what I want such as listening to loud music and dance. Gives me a place to safe spot to retreat to when we are having an arguement/fighting.
