Once you understand that there are infinite ways to be clever, you start noticing all those various manifestations in everyone you meet.

episode 2 of incognito tab, the podcast companion to twenty three tabs.

But the person with Chill is crucially missing these last ingredients because they are too far removed from anything that looks like intensity to have passions. Because Chill is the opposite of something else too: warmth. And kindness, and earnestness, and vulnerability. And we need just enough of those things to occasionally do something so remarkably unchill as fall in love.

Two exes give each other dating advice. What can possibly go wrong?

“The friends that I keep close make me the best version of myself, but I’ve never found that consistently in a romantic relationship. I’m growing to understand that romance and love are not rational (thank you, therapy?). Historically, I’ve looked at romantic relationships as a test of what I have to offer. Do you like me? What are the qualities about me that you like? You’re having fun, right? What I’m getting at is this — I know I’m a good friend. I can evaluate friendships rationally, articulately. But with relationships or dating there’s this factor of capital-F Feelings added to the picture. They’re weird and messy. The butterflies-in-your-chest feeling is foreign, like anxiety rather than attraction. I’m not comfortable with capital-F Feelings yet. Because most of my past relationships have been maybe not in the absence of Feelings, but not formed on them alone. So I’m working through these things.”