14/02/2024
Truth behind Valentine’s Day and love
In my search to find the truth behind Valentine’s Day I came across the following about the history of Valentine's Day:
* Roman Emperor Claudius II executed two men; both named Valentine, on Feb. 14 of different years in the 3rd century A.D. and the Catholic Church honored their death with the celebration of St. Valentine’s Day.
* From Feb. 13-15, the Romans celebrated the feast of Lupercalia, an annual festival in the month of February that was celebrated to avert evil spirits and purify the city, releasing health and fertility. The men sacrificed a goat and a dog, and then whipped women with the hides of the animals they had just slain.
* "The priests would sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification. They would then strip the goat’s hide into strips, dip them into the sacrificial blood and take to the streets, gently slapping both women and crop fields with the goat hide. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed the touch of the hides because it was believed to make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city’s bachelors would each choose a name and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage."
* Later, Roman Pope Gelasius I mixed things up in the 5th century by combining St. Valentine's Day with Lupercalia to expel the pagan rituals.
* As time went on, famous writers and poets made this dark holiday a bit sweeter by romanticizing it in their work, resulting in the creation of handmade paper cards for the special day during the Middle Ages.
* The Industrial Revolution in the 19th century, combined with the popularity of this love holiday in the Western world, began the process of factory-made cards.
* In 1913, Hallmark Cards of Kansas City, Mo., began mass producing valentines.
* Today, Valentine’s Day brings in approximately $18 billion dollars per year in sales.
It is fair to suggest that Valentine’s Day celebration has nothing to do with Islam or love and in fact it has everything to do with pagan rituals confused into European Christian history and now commercialised as the symbol of love. In todays world many couples resort to fighting over their expectations of this day, they get disappointed that their spouse is not fussing over them on this day, they get upset that their spouse has not set brought them presents, taken them out or done something special. Some couples have embrace this say to symbolise and become the marker of their love.
Your love for your spouse is an organic, dynamic and growing emotion so reducing it to a materialistic expression does not make your love real and sustainable. At a time when people are desperately longing for love and human interactions investing in your marriage in the right way will help you flourish. You do not to just survive in a loving relationship, you want to thrive together.
Here are five mental attitude shifts that will help you grow love in your marriage:
1. Marriage is not a place of gender battles but gender love. It is not where you flex your fighting muscles, reinforce stereotypes or act the way you saw your parents act.
2. Marriage is not a daily battle against each other but a daily dose of love. It is a delicate and harmonious orchestra in which you synchronise with your spouse’s strengths and skills and create a loving way to work together and familiarise with his or her weaknesses or shortcomings so that you can learn to manage them.
3. Marriage is not the place to vent your frustration, unleash your anger and become your worst possible self but cherish a loving partner. Despite popular beliefs, one of the biggest culprits of marital breakdown is the breakdown of communication. Couples, instead of helping each other deal with their own individual issues, unleash anger and their negativity. You did not get married to be abuse or be abused.
4. Marriage is not a game but an adventure of two people. It is a sacred union in which you grow together while maintain each of your individual identities. You invest in your common space called marriage where your emotional, intellectual, physical, sexual, spiritual and economic needs are harnessed, potentials explored and benefits maximised. It is also a space where your individual growth is encouraged and nurtured.
5. Marriage is not a morbid institution but a dynamic, exciting, vibrant place to experience love, life, joy, sadness and everything in between. Those who marry thinking they will be forever riding the height of dopamine or euphoria of oxytocin, they will be disappointed. Marriage comes with high and low, with happiness and sadness. Together you learn to grow resilience and enhance your contentment regardless of your circumstances.
For all of the above and for love, we all need to do some work. So forget Valentine’s Day, love everyday!
Here is my book on marriage called 10 Steps to Getting and Staying Married, it will help those who are looking to get married and those already married stay married.
To help us donate 25% of the book price to Graham Layton Trust – a charity that helps blind people see please use the promo code: GLT21
