People talk about compatibility as if it were a fixed property, revealed early and unchangeable. Long relationships suggest something closer to the opposite.
Early ease is not compatibility
At the start, differences are hidden by novelty and effort. What feels like a perfect match is often just not enough information yet.
The skill is negotiation, not matching
Couples who last are not the ones who wanted the same things. They are the ones who got good at handling the places they did not.
Some things genuinely do not bend
Children, geography, monogamy. Building works for preferences, not for fundamentals, and pretending otherwise wastes years.
Revisit it
What you each want at thirty is not what you wanted at twenty-two. Compatibility checked once is compatibility assumed.