“We met each other on the dating app ‘Her’ on the 10th of January 2021. We spoke every single day and had our first date on Zoom due to Covid times.
We’d planned it for a Saturday evening and had a drink together. We listened to dirty dancing and ended the call at 4 a.m., dancing and singing together. It was the best date despite the circumstances. Even then, we knew how much we liked each other already. It grew organically, with ease, and beautifully blossomed into where we are today.
When I first saw Gem on the app, I thought she was beautiful, and I especially liked her eyes.
Gem said she thought I was gorgeous, she always had an age range she stuck to but chose to swipe right even though I was younger and never knew why, very quickly realized I was not a stereotypical 25-year-old.
I was in a healing process and had joined the app to build friendships and make conversation and Gem had been on there for a while, having conversations but nothing had blossomed.
We bonded over our passion for goal setting, personal development, and drive for life which is something that we just never believed we were going to find in a relationship. Very quickly we realized just how much we had in common—our pasts, our future, our beliefs, and our values all aligned with each other.
There was always trust right from the beginning from both of us that we’d be together. Instead of ‘if’ it’d always be ‘when.’
I had just been working with a counselor for the past year to work on myself, I had a lot of unhealed trauma, and just the year before meeting Gem, I started my personal development journey and was on the path to creating a better relationship with myself and with my life.
Gem is originally from Scotland, and she’d moved to England for work. Originally Gem lived in Oxford, then moved to Hertfordshire, and she had been on a personal development journey for a couple of years before we’d met.
We quickly realized that we were glad we met when we did because if we’d have met before that point, we wouldn’t have been ready for each other. Personal development meant we both grew into the people that we are today—we both learned so much about ourselves that changed who we were completed.
We’d learned patience, good communication, boundaries, and how to love ourselves first.
The first time we met in person was the perfect combination of euphoria and being grounded like we’d never experienced before. I knew before we’d even met that Gem was something special; I always had that good feeling even from the first day we’d met. I kissed Gem as soon as I got in her car, we went for a walk around a nearby field then sat in the car and listened to a playlist we’d made together for each other. That first face-to-face date only confirmed for me the good feelings I already had and only made me want to know Gem more!
We just made sense.
When I (Liv) worked with my counselor, she’d asked me to build my ideal partner on paper, and when I met Gem I felt like my ideal partner had been built for me.
‘We shouldn’t have worked.’
There are so many reasons why we could have not worked.
I worked shift work including weekends as I worked as a deputy manager for a residential care home at the time, and Gem worked shifts during the week as well as running an online business, so seeing each other was very difficult at times.
Gem was supposed to be moving back to Scotland in April 2021.
Gem did call it off after the second or third time that we met. This absolutely broke me, which felt silly after such a short period of time, but Gem meant something to me almost immediately, and I didn’t want to lose her before I even had her.
We continued to talk because we didn’t want to lose each other, but it never really changed. Gem’s plans were still to move back to Scotland, and with it being so early on, it didn’t make sense to do a long-distance relationship, but we never stopped talking, and thankfully, a week later, we decided to not give up.
We moved in quite quickly, and we did have trouble in the first place we lived, but thankfully we found the most beautiful house in a beautiful little village. We choose to see every moment that didn’t go as expected as the universe just taking us in another direction, and we love where we’ve ended up.
Not only do we have our beautiful little home, but we’ve also succeeded not only in our careers and two businesses on the side of that.
I decided to become a life coach: I did my certification and accreditation, and now I am a Genuine Happiness Coach as well as running my own residential care service.
Gem is working as an electric technician for an amazing company, and together we run our own online business helping others create the lives that they deserve.
We’ve grown, succeeded, and become the couple that we are today thanks to our personal development journeys—we’ve supported each other into the people we are today.
We work very hard at work and on business but make sure to make time for fun too.
Our future includes leaving our full-time jobs and working full time on our businesses, which is looking like it’ll be very soon!
We also have plans to move to Bali and travel the world!
Personal development not only changed our lives, made us happier but also bought us together.
Our relationship was just another part of our personal development journey, not only did we learn to see the world as a more beautiful place, we were able to bring our healing, love, and strength to each other and grow into a peaceful, happy, healthy and loving relationship.
Loving Gem has just been another part of my healing process and Gem loving me was another part of hers.
We lift each other.
We empower each other.
We motivate each other.
And loving each other is one of my strongest gratitudes.
Being with Gem, I’ve learned real love, patience, strength, willingness, and courage.
‘I’m eternally grateful for you, your heart, your soul, and your smile.’ – Liv”
This story was submitted to Love What Matters by Liv and Gem from Hertfordshire, England. You can follow their journey on Instagram accounts: Liv, Gem, and their business. Submit your own story here and be sure to subscribe to our free email newsletter for our best stories, and YouTube for our best videos.
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