The Bachelor alum Matt James has dished about where he sees his relationship with girlfriend Rachael Kirkconnell going and whether he'd like to get engaged and married to her.
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Now that it's been over a year since Matt's The Bachelor finale aired, fans are wondering if he has any plans to propose marriage to Rachael in the near future.
"Did Rachael tell you to ask that?" Matt, 30, joked on a recent episode of Us Weekly's "Here for the Right Reasons" podcast.
"I wouldn't be with someone that I wasn't considering marrying, especially at this point in my life. We've talked about living in the same city and what those next steps look like. Everything's on the table."
As far as living in the same city goes, Matt recently moved from New York City to Miami, FL.
"It's nice being down in Florida now. I think Rachael was [hesitant about] Miami before I moved down there because it's, like, the party connotation, but after spending a lot of time down there, [she's] warming up to the fact -- no pun intended -- of being down there," Matt shared of the Georgia native. "It's been a nice transition out of New York."
Matt suggested he's in no rush to tie the knot or please Bachelor Nation with a quick proposal.
"We're not putting our relationship up against somebody else. We're not doing these things to show that we're in a good space as a couple, like, we're just living our lives and just trying to be real with each other," Matt explained.
"And that's been our saving grace. It's just been doubling down on realness and leaving the phony stuff for other people to do."
He added, "It's really that simple and it's been so much fun to live life with Rachael -- that's my best friend now. It's fun and easy."
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Matt apparently needed time with Rachael away from cameras so they could truly get to know each other and develop deep, sincere feelings.
"When you're in that Bachelor bubble, like, it's such an intense experience that you don't know what is and isn't real because you've got all these girls saying they love you," Matt said.
"You've got the pressure to propose to someone. And all this, like, ancillary, 'Just like do this, do this, do this.' And then for everything to happen how it [did] it's, like, 'I know how I feel. I just need to validate that.' And I just needed to take a step back and make sure that those feelings were there and they were."
Matt and Rachael briefly split in February 2021 when racially-ignorant and racially-insensitive photos from Rachael's past resurfaced online, including a 2018 image of Rachael attending an antebellum-themed "Old South" party at her Georgia college with sorority sisters.
Rachael was initially silent as the scandal splashed across headlines, but she ultimately issued multiple apologies on social media.
Matt explained on The Bachelor: After the Final Rose in March 2021 that he wanted to give Rachael some time to educate herself on racism in society and gain awareness. He wanted to be sure that Rachael could understand his perspective as a Black man in America.
Matt recently admitted that -- although he talked to Rachael frequently following their After the Final Rose appearance -- he took advantage of being single during his time apart from Rachael. He was even caught trying to hook up with a woman named Grace in Miami in early April, only days before Rachael was set to visit him in New York.
However, the pair eventually reunited in Atlanta during an April 2021 weekend and got back together after Rachael gave him an ultimatum that he either needed to be with her -- and only her -- or they'd be finished.
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Matt said on Us' podcast, "Allowing ourselves to have a relationship outside of" Bachelor Nation was the "best thing" for them to do in order to grow stronger as a couple.
Still, Matt noted he and Rachael are still a work in progress after everything they've been through together.
"I'm working on the communication part. She's laughing," Matt said as Rachael listened in.
"It's brick by brick, you know, you gotta check things off as you go. I'm not a refined boyfriend yet, but I'm getting there. She's really good about expressing how she feels in the moment as opposed to harboring stuff."
Matt apparently has some regrets about how he had handled himself after his February split from Rachael, and he wrote about the difficult time in his new book, First Impressions, which is currently available for pre-order and hits shelves on May 3.
"I knew I had something special with Rachael and thought we might soon come back together," Matt writes in his book, according to Cosmopolitan.
"I wanted to make sure I didn't still have lingering feelings for others I'd known before taking that step. It was a mistake. Rachael got wind and was justifiably hurt and feeling betrayed."
Matt recalled Rachael giving him the following ultimatum: "[Rachael said], 'I know we're not together right now, but I thought we were building toward something. You need to decide if that is what you want or not. I won't be just another girl you're talking to.'"
"After that, there was silence. More painful silence. She stormed out of my life for the last time, I thought."
But Rachael ended up forgiving Matt once they talked "for four hours" in a parking garage while sitting in Rachael's car.
"We talked... about all of the issues that had kept us apart -- her mistakes, my mistakes, insecurities, family drama, public perception, and everything else under the sun," Matt reportedly reveals in the book.
"I decided to be better going forward. She had done self-work that I hadn't reciprocated. I promised her that I was all in. It was the best decision I could have made," he concluded.
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About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski
