Fifteen years ago today, on Valentine’s Day of 2006, I launched this blog to share some thoughts on marriage. I am so proud of the body of work that has followed. To see all of the posts, I hope you will visit the Archives. My very first post, so that I could link to it in the sidebar ever since, was Don’t Pretend Love You Assume Love when you take a second look at what your spouse or...
A big part of why people feel the desire to get married and remain married is the very pleasant boost of the neurotransmitter dopamine. New experiences, different from those we’ve previously experienced, and the anticipation of such new experiences both cause the release of dopamine in our brains. Over time, even an enjoyable activity loses its ability to produce dopamine. This is why...
Whether it’s because you’re recently retired or laid off or working from home during a pandemic, it’s possible to find yourself suddenly spending a lot more time with your spouse. And at some point, it will stop feeling like a vacation. What can you do about this? First, remember that most of us need some quality time together, one of Gary Chapman’s Five Love Languages. It...
It’s so good to back online. I was starting to think the blog would never work again. Since the end of January, comments and adding new posts has not worked. After a lot of wrong turns throughout a very busy year, it’s great to be back! I thought I would resume by telling you why I have been writing this blog for 13 years. And it’s the same reason I wore an Urban League...
The human body is well-designed for two functions much needed in our evolutionary past. The first is self-preservation: fight, flee, or freeze. We could be attacked at almost any moment, and only those who survived passed down their genes. The second is tend and befriend. To survive as a human, our ancestors had to cooperate with other humans to eat, to clothe themselves, to build homes, and to...
