Why Valentine’s Day is Bad for Your Relationship
I have to confess, I have grown to really dislike most holidays, at least the ones in the United States and I wonder if other countries have had their holidays turn into corporate money grabs that tug on our emotions. I’m sorry but so many holidays have just lost their meaning. As long as we try to force meaning and/or a perfect day, we’re never going to get the magic back. I feel like nearly all holidays have deteriorated in this fashion or they are just dumb and I’m baffled why we still recognize them. Groundhog day? Come on people, this is stupid. Can we seriously not?
But Valentine's day has become its own unique and special kind of awful and not just because we’ve got it drilled into us that engaging in this colossal waste of money is what loving people do and if you don’t participate, you must be unloving, but a myriad of others.
Worthless Merchandise
At least with Christmas we actually buy stuff for people that is useful or needed. Most of the crap that we buy for Valentine's day is attractive garbage. Red, heart-shaped mylar balloons, stuffed animals holding a heart and even flowers. It’s useless garbage and a lot of it is really bad for the environment. I’m a little bit of a tree hugger and those mylar balloons probably take centuries to naturally decompose. The only things that are worth buying are things that we can eat. Yes, chocolate is delicious, dipped strawberries are delicious but we can buy that stuff anytime during the year without the over inflated prices. And I’m sorry but if the only exchange of love in a relationship is worthless junk, your relationship has problems.
Showing Love for Our Partner on One Special Day
I’m sorry folks but you don’t need an overpriced holiday to show someone you love them. And if Valentine’s day is the only day out of the year where any semblance of love is shared between a couple, they have problems. The relationship that waits around for Valentine’s day for any affection to be shared is a relationship that is in trouble. Partners should be showing love throughout the entire year. Loving relationships take work and that work means going on dates during the year, buying gifts just because and so on.
One Way Street
Let’s face it, Valentine’s day heavily favors the feminine side of relationships. Guys aren’t getting gifts delivered to them at work. They aren’t the ones getting gifts. They are the ones racking up credit card debt. Go to the stores on Valentine’s day and pay attention. The vast majority of people buying the useless, over-priced junk are guys. It’s become so one-sided and it creates resentment in relationships. While I’m not at all opposed to guys doing nice things for their partners, it should go both ways. And I know, from personal experience, that when it’s a shared experience, Valentine’s day can actually be okay but that’s not where we are anymore. Ladies, do something nice in return. Buy a gift, say I love you. Good relationships have give and take, partners that express love for each other, not just a primarily giver and receiver relationship.
Required Generosity
Generosity is cancelled out when it’s required. Required generosity is an oxymoron. Guys are faced with two options on Valentine’s day. Open the wallet and dish it out or face at least two weeks of relationship turmoil. It’s a bit nauseating to watch women feign surprise on Valentine’s day when the vase of roses shows up at work. Really? You really had no idea this was going to happen? It’s so disingenuous. When you couple the required generosity with the generosity that only goes one way in the relationship what do you get? Resentment, that’s what. And resentment is the poison that slowly kills relationships.
Getting Stuff Delivered at Work
One company that sold either flowers or berries or something like that outted themselves in one of their commercials once by saying something like “all the other ladies at work will be so jealous when they see what he bought you…”
Valentine’s day: so you can make all the bitches at work jealous.
Seriously though, I can’t think of single other reason why we might do this, have stuff sent to her at work, other than to make other women jealous. Guys, if she really loves you, she won’t care if stuff doesn’t get delivered at work. Wait and hand it to her after work.
How About Instead…
We don’t need a calendar to tell us when to express love and appreciation and we definitely don’t need overpriced junk to do it. Learn the five love languages: quality time, gift giving, words of affirmation, acts of service and physical touch. Figure out which one is yours and figure out which one is your partners and make an effort to give it them their type of love all year long. How about we stop letting holidays tell us how to love each other and we ask our partners instead. How about we express love genuinely and altruistically instead of through this fake, contrived nonsense?
When you’re done reading this, get up and tell your partner that you love them and appreciate them. If they’re somewhere else, text them. Do it just because. You would appreciate it if they did that for you, so did it first. Say no to Valentine’s day. Save your money and plan a fun date the following week instead when it’s not crowded and when it’s affordable.
