Jun 28 Sat
What do I do when boredom creeps in?
It’s not difficult to find couples who, after a period of marriage, tell you that theirs is boring. It’s like sharing an apartment, without any motivation or expectation of change for the better.
Indeed, that’s true. Routine, boredom, is a listlessness that creeps into the heart little by little. Total dedication to God becomes boring, and, in matrimony, one loses the hopes that led one to share life with that person.
This doesn’t only occur in human love; it also happens at work, where the phenomenon of burnout is evident, and in spiritual life, where it is referred to as lukewarmness or tepidity.
It occurs in all those loves that can be lost if we don’t nurture them. These loves, as we know, are, in essence, exclusive love of God, love of one’s partner, and love of work.
Love for God, dedicated and exclusive, is replaced by some other, less demanding belief, that relieves the human person’s need to love and believe. These can be fortune-tellers, horoscope readers, or even worse.
In matrimony, love for one’s partner is replaced by another person, and thus one tries to rebuild one’s life. Which is self-deception.
In marriage, as in total and exclusive commitment to God, life must be rebuilt every day with the person one is with.
And love for work is often replaced by meeting minimum standards and thus avoiding the possibility of being sanctioned or expelled from the company where one works.
Avoiding this situation, or correcting it if it has already occurred, means beginning to love again, starting with small acts of love, thinking of others, being gentler, and doing small, pleasant things. All of this will help the relationship gain some strength, especially if done over time, with patience, without rushing, but also without pausing.
It’s a crisis, but this word shouldn’t scare us. It means that God is asking for more, and that we’ve reached a point where our love must be deeper than it was. What we had must be revived. We have to delve deeper into love. If it’s not caught in time, we can reach the boredom we’ve been talking about. But we have to know that boredom is not wanting, not loving. When you make an effort to love, you’re already loving. Even if you don’t realize it.
We must try to remedy it when we suspect we’re in this situation. Getting out isn’t easy, but if one, or better yet, both, tries, it’s possible. It’s a matter of wanting and putting in the necessary resources.
The trap is that in this situation, even though it may seem unbelievable, the person finds a certain comfort. He develops a feeling of being a victim, which ultimately brings a certain reward, given the admiration or pity he perceives from others, and that reward is enough to keep moving forward without doing anything to improve.
My experience over many years is that, sooner or later, those who believe themselves victims fail, and cause others to fail.
Let’s not forget that when you want to love, you’re already loving. Wanting to love is already loving.