If more people had the perspective that every day is new, that their lives are constantly changing, and that they themselves change throughout their lifetimes, there would be less cynicism, hopefully, about the idea that two people can be happy together over a shared lifetime. For myself, I love the idea of watching someone change over a lifetime, and to support them in those changes. Instead we believe ourselves to be unchanging entities. The way someone hurt us in the past will be the way they hurt us in the future. 

At the same time we expect active work on ‘self-improvement’ both for ourselves and others. We are made skeptical of long-lasting love by witnessing the dissolution of our parents marriages. How often though do we consider the growing social and financial pressures on love and marriage? The idea that we can find true love and live happily ever after is a very new idea in human history. The traditional marriage vows acknowledge that this isn’t the case. 

There is also a very new expectation to be always happy. Your person is supposed to be everything you need: lover, best friend, co-parent, roommate, business partner. As we become more isolated as a society, the pressure for our partners to supply all our emotional needs increases. All this while financial stability decreases for large sectors of society, our attention spans are eradicated, social media taunts us with alternate lives, and a climate catastrophe seems increasingly inevitable. 

Even as people get married, they know they can get divorced. What is the purpose of marriage then? What is the purpose of any relationship? To have fun and perhaps security for a while, before going through a painful breakup and then having fun and security for a while with someone else? The most interesting person in the world is going to sometimes be boring. If you’ve told someone all your interesting stories, why not make new stories together with them?