“The pandemic has a strange way of pushing some people closer while pulling others apart.”

While this writer, in a recent Modern Love essay, is referring to herself and her husband who, when the pandemic hit, ended their long-distance marriage by gratefully sheltering together in place, her point that the pandemic forces a choice between “all-in” or “all-out” is true for couples across the globe as well as individuals and families.

Together with all the quiet and spaciousness, our relative isolation, our physical separation, or our radically increased togetherness surfaces what’s within and between us in ways that can be uncomfortable, maddening, or thrilling.

In my work as a coach, I can tell you that “Covid divorce” is a real phenomenon, and so is Relational Resonance and real intimacy. In stripping away so much of our normalcy–including our busyness, our healthy practices and our unhealthy distractions–the pandemic has forced an extraordinary amount of time *with ourselves.*

Anything that’s not been tended to, in our relationships with ourselves, with the people with whom we live or love, including those far apart from us, comes up. What had been there, issues, stresses accumulating or ignored for years, face us in their naked unavoidability. This unprecedented time heightens the sense–the conviction and the clarity–that life is short and precious. That how and *with whom* we spend it, matters.

All the couples I work with and conscious people everywhere are facing this. Some are straining “to get through.” Others are discovering one another anew and deeper, practicing kindness, grace, humor, mutual discovery & appreciation, and countless small & big supports and “touches” every day. Couples “stuck apart” are using imagination and communication to draw towards each other in intentional relating and sweet anticipation.

And many, many singles and couples are deepening meditation and mindful practices that bring us into recurrent calm presence with ourselves and thereby with those we love.

I’m finding that people need a lot of support in this time and my clients are benefitting tremendously from my work. My approach is distinctly holistic and I work virtually. Learn more and be well: https://foursiteleadership.com/coaching/