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Jamie is the love of my life. She is my partner, friend, confidante. We’ve been married 34 years—more than half our lives. I can’t imagine my life without her.

I met Jamie at a Catholic retreat for college students called SEARCH. I thought she was cute with a petite French nose. She had a pleasant and sociable disposition. I didn’t know much about her but I felt attracted to her. I asked her for her address so I could write her (no emails or cell phones back then!)

Then I failed to write her.

Or so I’ve been told. I actually don’t remember asking Jamie for her address. But she most certainly remembers, and she never lets me forget it every time we tell the story of how we met. It does sound like me though. It was hard to put myself out there with girls, so follow-through wasn’t my strong suit.

She was a year older than me. (Still is. Always will be.) When she graduated college at the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss), she moved down to Jackson, Mississippi, near where I was still in college. She wanted to have a housewarming party and asked a friend (Claudia) to invite people. Claudia invited me, and—remembering how cute I thought Jamie was—I attended.

But she was dating someone else, somebody from her time at Ole Miss.

Another SEARCH retreat was scheduled shortly after the party. Somebody arranged to fill a car with Catholics and make the trek to Ole Miss from Jackson. I managed to snag a spot. I wanted to get to know this Jamie more than ever, and I wanted her to notice me. I figured a three hour drive each direction would be a great opportunity. Oh yeah, I also wanted to attend the retreat.

Jamie’s apartment was the gathering point. I managed to run a little late, so I sped along County Line Road toward her apartment. County Line Road crossed a double-line of railroad tracks. I was stopped by a train that was crawling by at a rate of one or two miles per hour.

Time passed. Five minutes. Ten. By the time the train cleared, another train was crossing the road on the other set of tracks going in the opposite direction. It too was going one or two miles per hour.

Did I mention there were no cell phones?

Finally, finally… the second train cleared, and I raced to Jamie’s apartment. No sign of anybody. I was left behind. I had missed my chance.

It turns out I was lucky not to have made the trip. That weekend Jamie’s boyfriend broke up with her, and apparently it wasn’t pretty. She still refers to him as “jerk-face.” She was so distraught during the ride home that I wouldn’t have been able to grow closer to her or get to know her as I’d like. She certainly wouldn’t have been interested in me. She still wonders whether we would have ever started dating if I was part of that whole scene.

But I felt cheated. So much so that I overcame my own shyness and asked her out after she got back. I invited her on a hayride. She said yes.

Our first date was on October 30, 1982. Problem was, she didn’t realize it was a date. She saw it more as hanging out with a group of people. Gradually she realized she was only talking to me.

I kissed her at the end of the date. I put my hand under her chin and lifted her lips to mine. I had never used this move before, or since. She still remembers how sweet it was, and I do too.

We dated regularly, but not exclusively. By this, I mean that she went on a date with another guy. She was reluctant to jump back into an exclusive relationship after just getting out of one. I had to be patient. But she came around, and we started dating regularly by around Christmas.

I would go to her apartment and we’d watch M*A*S*H on her tiny black and white TV and then make out during Johnny Carson. For once, I didn’t get stuck in the “friend zone.” It was my first long-term dating relationship. It would be the only one I ever needed.

Finally, I found somebody who loved me. I had two prior hard crushes where my attraction was not requited. After those devastating blows, Jamie’s love allowed me to finally understand that I was loveable, that somebody could find me attractive, special, The One. I was filled with gratitude.

I graduated in June and got a job in Virginia. I wasn’t ready to propose, so the relationship would have to go long-distance if it was to survive. Did I mention there was no email? The telephone company still charged by the minute for long-distance phone calls.

So Jamie wrote me a letter EVERY DAY. She also sent cookies and other treats through the mail. I knew the post office was running behind when I got three letters from her at once. I still have every letter she sent me.

I knew she wanted to get married, and by late fall I agreed. I wish I would have made a bigger deal proposing to her. It was more like “let’s do this.” I even had her find her own engagement ring and our wedding bands. I know, I was terrible. She married me anyway, despite my utter lack of sense when it came to romance.

We’ve had three wonderful, beautiful, capable, intelligent and mature children. It’s like she makes up for all of the faults I had as a parent, and vice-versa.

We’ve built a life together. I’ve felt completely secure in her devoted love. She’s told me that she couldn’t even imagine what it would be like to cheat on me. I completely believe her. She tells me she doesn’t think she’d remarry if I died first, that it would be “too much of a hassle.”

I’ve talked a lot about my own journey of personal growth. She’s done her own personal growth as well. It doesn’t look like mine. Hers looks more like the serenity prayer: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference.”

Her growth has made a huge difference in our relationship. Even though our marriage was very satisfying from the start, I feel so much more free and intimate with her compared to earlier in the marriage. The only thing that holds me back at this point is me and my fear of vulnerability.

She doesn’t guilt or shame me, a big deal because I grew up being guilted and shamed. Now, she simply asks if I want to do something and then accepts my answer. Usually. I allow for the occasional “silver bullets,” those things that are very important to her when she can simply say “I don’t care, you’re doing this.”

She no longer blames herself or tries to “save” me from my own depression. When I snap at her, she usually doesn’t snap back. She doesn’t try to change my behavior unless I ask for help. In short, she does a good job determining what belongs to her and what belongs to me. Then she gives what belongs to me back to me and doesn’t try to caretake me. This is such a gift!

Of course, 34 years of marriage doesn’t come easy. We’ve had our difficult times. I’ve written about the difference between true love and infatuation or “in love.” I believe the measure of our true love is the extent to which we’re willing to stick with each other through the hard times without losing who we are.

In this, we’ve been very successful. I’ve hurt Jamie deeply. She’s hurt me. We continue to love each other when it’s hard to love. Especially when it’s hard.

Unlike me, Jamie is very social. Facebook was created for her. She encourages me to spend more time at parties and dates with other couples. This is hard for me, but I know other people are my path to true happiness, so I appreciate her gentle nudges and I make an effort.

I’m a “deep diver” who loves to have profound conversations with a few close friends and talk about life and what really matters. Jamie is a “dancer” who maintains contact with everybody and is happy making others happy. So I’m a personal coach. She volunteers at the local soup kitchen. I schedule one-a-month calls and lunches with a few people. She’s texting or calling others most of the day.

I don’t know if this is a case of opposites attracting. What I do know is that there isn’t much overlap between our interests. So she does her thing and I do mine, and we admire each other for it. We complement each other.

Jamie, we’ve each done our own personal work, and as a result we’ve grown together as a couple. It’s hard to believe we’re only in the middle of that growth. When I married you I had little idea what true love would be and what it would involve. I am tremendously lucky that you picked me. It has made all the difference.

I love you, and I always will.

I’ve talked several times before about my journey of personal growth.  It started in 2003 and it continues today with my Six Months project and my ongoing involvement in Foundations Workshops. This letter is about the beginning of my journey.

I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on why I do the things I do, though I get hit by my blind spots from time to time. But when I first attended a personal growth program, my own self-awareness was mediocre, and I had very little idea what other people thought of themselves or me. I lacked a sense of empathy because I was self-absorbed in my own little cocoon of shame. (Shame is the feeling that results when one believes that they are inherently flawed and therefore unworthy of love and connection.) But the cocoon was warm and comfortable and I thought it was keeping me safe.

That all changed after I was jolted awake that weekend in 2003. Suddenly I was alive. I realized I needed other people. But there’s a saying that goes, “The curse of enlightenment is that you can never go back.” I had lost my warm, safe cocoon and I couldn’t return to it.

Being with a group of people with whom I could be completely myself was exhilarating, and it came with a downside. It would take only about an hour after I left a group of people before the exhilarating feeling was gone, replaced with a painful longing. It’s like the good feelings disappeared down a black hole in my soul. I couldn’t hang onto to them. I couldn’t savor them.

This is because I didn’t love myself. It didn’t matter how much other people loved me. If I couldn’t love myself, other people’s love was like trying to hold water in my hands.

Eventually I did learn to love myself. But it took years. In the meantime, I needed to find a way to cope.

From the very beginning of my personal growth journey, Carla was there. She was a person I could lean on; somebody I could fully trust with my pain.

As I write this, I wonder if other people know what I’m talking about when I say I was in pain. How can experiencing the love of other people be painful? Here’s my best explanation: I had spent most of my life numbing my negative emotions. The problem with numbing is that it also kept me from feeling positive emotions like joy and love. A person cannot selectively numb negative emotions.  Positive emotions get numbed too.

So when I suddenly found myself feeling good—even high—experiencing of the love of others, a side-effect is that I could no longer feel numb. So I also opened up a Pandora’s box of negative emotions, particularly shame. Shame told me I didn’t deserve the love of others. So the more love I felt one moment, the more desolation I felt the next.

I started serving on the presenting team for the personal growth program the very next workshop after I graduated from the program. Carla was an experienced and steady presence on the team. She could feel and zero in on anyone in the workshop who was in pain, and she knew how to be with them in a way that would help ease their pain.

If you think for just a moment about how she was able to do this, I bet you can guess the answer. Carla has experienced a lot of pain in her own life. She can recognize it and respond. I don’t know the full story behind her pain because I was in my own pain back then, and I took without much giving back. Carla tells me it’s because I didn’t have it to give.

There’s two reasons why I know that Carla’s pain is there, though. The first is because she’s told me she’s had a painful past. The second is because I can see a kindred spirit in her.

Carla taught me empathy. Empathy was a foreign concept to me. Empathy and compassion don’t just happen; they have to be learned through practice. I didn’t practice empathy growing up, like many people do. I was too lonely and alone. I didn’t practice empathy as an adult, like many people do. I found it safer to keep people at arms-length. I spent years actually believing I didn’t need other people.

So when I was cracked open, out came pain. Carla was there to catch me. She wasn’t uncomfortable being with my pain and she didn’t try to fix it. She simply stayed with me in empathy and compassion. I didn’t have to go through the pain alone.

Before the workshop, I didn’t know what other people felt inside, the things they tend to hide from others. During the workshop, I understood that everyone feels pain, and my pain connected with their pain and we were the same. With Carla’s help, I was able to starting using empathy and compassion as tools to connect with others as part of the presenting team.

It was awkward at first, because I could get overwhelmed. But Carla and I worked well as a team because we both engaged participants from a place of gentleness and sensitivity. I was definitely the junior partner. I slowly learned how to self-manage and help others through their pain without getting lost in my own. Sometimes. Then usually. Now almost always. Almost.

After a while, Carla reported that she had developed a serious illness. She told me, “I’m a nurse. When the doctors tell me ‘no treatment, no cure’ I know what that means.” She’s the closest friend I’ve ever had who’s gotten so near the limits of her own mortality.

The doctors put in nerve blocks to ease her pain. She moved to Columbus, Ohio to be with a close friend and continue to search for physical and spiritual healing. We stayed in contact for a few years, but we eventually lost contact. So when I pulled up an old email address, I had no idea whether or not she was still alive.

It turns out that ‘no treatment, no cure’ wasn’t necessarily a death sentence. She’s as engaged in life as ever. We have a lot to catch up on. We’ve already started.

In the workshop, each of us has what we call our ‘contract’ and ‘purpose’ statement. Briefly, it’s a unique statement about who a person is and what the person does to live out her/his life purpose. Here’s mine: “I am a free man letting go of the bullshit, connecting in vulnerability.”

Carla was my mentor, leading me away from the bullshit and teaching me how to truly and vulnerably connect with others. Carla deserves much of the credit for helping me discover who I’ve become and what I do (my purpose in life). I can think of no higher compliment.