Long-distance relationships require clear progression and mutual intentionality to be worth the significant investment of time and energy.

“If there's a sense of progression in the relationship, like if you actually feel like things are gathering momentum, if they're going somewhere. Um, if there's mutual intentionality, you actually feel like both of you are being intentional about wanting a real relationship.”

Starting a relationship long-distance makes it difficult to test how well two people function in daily life together.

“I think the difficulty is if you start long distance, you you don't have that time initially to really test how it is being together dayto-day.”