Stefanie O'Connell

Love is very expansive.

It can look like so much and in so many different formats.

And I love seeing people reimagine what that love can look like in ways that expand them instead of shrink them.

And so I have become a huge proponent, and this is true for people in relationships too, of really building your, not just your independent ambitions, but also the community that shows up for you and supports you and champions you.

And it might not be a romantic partner.

It might just be a group of really close friends and friends

family members and neighbors and i just think there are much better ways to structure our lives again whether or not we're in romantic partnership in in ways that really i think confront the idea that you know two people man and woman are like the ultimate model of achievement when it comes to relationships because you know i have to say like looking around at

the people I know who are in those relationships and who've been in those relationships for a long time, they're not very happy.

And I think it's not because there's something wrong with them.

I think it's something wrong with the model.

It's something wrong with the model of saying like, okay, this is where you get all of love and family.

And then like everything else is secondary.

I think it's just not sustainable.

It puts too much pressure on a single person.

It puts too much pressure on a couple.

It winds up reinforcing a lot of the negative dynamics of the culture that they live within, as we are speaking about here, like these expectations of provider protector, which are really expectations of inequality.

And so I think as much as we can, thinking more expansively about love and family and

And then if we do meet somebody, they will fit into that.

But we won't feel like we have to compromise ourselves when that happens because we are already so full.

And I know that's easier said than reckoned with and accepted.