“Stand together yet not too near together: for the pillars of the temple stand apart, and the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.” —Gibran, The Prophet (1976)

You and I will hold separate space in our togetherness. We will not stifle one another by growing so close they put roots become intertwined. I think that is what Jerry means by enmeshment. When it is no longer clear where you end and I begin, then it’s easy to lose yourself. When a cypress and an oak tree grow into one another, they can’t fully grow individually, parts of either tree die, and neither tree reaches its fullest potential.