Sometimes I feel that, for many, marriage is no longer that deep covenant which changes the very shape of life. I think it has become a social milestone added to the string of achievements, photographs and posts. Two people enter one house, yet each carries their own closed world along, keeping its secret keys, its habits, its individual priorities — as though marriage were never a passage from "I" to "we," but merely a shared residence between two separate persons.
And here the silent tragedy begins.
For true marriage is not a party, nor a ring, nor dazzling photographs under the lights. Marriage, in its essence, is a voluntary death of a part of the self-centredness within us. Not the death of the personality — no, a thousand times no. It is the death of self-absorption. When two people decide to walk the road together, it means that every decision is no longer individual, every weariness no longer private, and every dream no longer the property of one person.
But what is happening today?
Why do some live, after marriage, as though nothing had changed?
He still sees himself free of any emotional or family commitment, and she still deals with life by the logic of "my life first." Each wants a partner who will give them love, care and sacrifice, without offering anything real of themselves in return. They want the fruits of marriage without bearing responsibility for its roots.
For some, the word "freedom" has become a synonym for escaping responsibility. Sacrifice is looked upon as weakness, when in truth it is the highest degree of maturity. For love does not mean finding someone who applauds you just as you are. That is a grave error. Love is learning together how to refine yourself, how to defer your desires at times, and how to make room for another heart within the details of your day.
The problem is that many enter marriage with the mindset of a consumer rather than that of a builder. They ask:
What will I get out of this marriage?
and never ask: What will I add? What will I carry? What — and whom — will I protect?
This is why relationships collapse with frightening speed. Because when the "I" remains alive within marriage, life turns into a hidden struggle over power, comfort and attention. Every disagreement becomes a battle of pride, every shortcoming a personal insult, and every sacrifice a loss that must be repaid.
The "we," however, is something else entirely.
"We" means to suffer when your partner suffers, even if you disagree with them.
To succeed together, or to stumble together.
For the home to become the project of two souls.
For each to realise that marriage is not a space for receiving love only, but for making it every day, with patience, respect, awareness and self-surrender.
Perhaps the most dangerous thing we live today is the trivialising of commitment. The world promotes the idea that a person must always choose themselves, flee at once from any hardship, and change relationships as they change their mood. But deep relationships are not built with such lightness. Marriage needs people who know that endurance is a daily heroism.
To those about to marry I say: do not enter this relationship seeking only someone to love you. Enter it ready to be worthy of love itself. Learn that marriage is not a space for proving the self; it is a space for widening it until it can hold two.
For the most beautiful marriages are not those whose road is free of conflict — no. The most beautiful are those in which the "we" triumphs over the "I" every single time.