Why do people “fall out of love”?

“I just don’t love them no more,” is the saddest phrase I hear people say when they no longer want to be married. It’s one of the greatest tragedies when love has left the building. But here’s the thing: love is not just a feeling. It might start that way, but that is love at its baby stage. When love grows up it shows through its actions and decisions that it is love. The most mature and godly version of love is one that doesn’t need to be reciprocated in order to stick around. That being said, I don’t believe that couples who are truly in love can fall out of it. I would propose that your love is being “blocked”. Let me share some LOVE BLOCKERS that affect your decision to love that person or not.

LOVE BLOCKER #1: You have some secret sin you haven’t addressed. When someone is struggling with some shameful sin, they do everything they can to keep it covered up. What they don’t understand is that this sin doesn’t stay in that one area of their lives. It begins to take over. You would think fantasizing over explicit photos of other people on Instagram is innocent enough. While the Bible would call it lust, coveting, or adultery, and consider it sin, you might call it “browsing a feed.” Feeding off sin of any type seeps its way into your heart and begins to attack your relationships. Exposing that sin is the only sure way to root it out before it can take over and block real intimacy.

LOVE BLOCKER #2: Unwillingness to do the work that would make the marriage work. I know the last thing we need is another project. We wonder, “Why can’t marriage just work?” Marriage, just like every other worthwhile thing in your life, is going to take work. Whatever we choose not to work on will degrade into chaos and decay. Our houses get dusty if we don’t clean them. Our hair gets nappy if we don’t wash it. Our bodies shrivel up if we don’t feed them. We work on what we deem to be worth our time, and in time we will see the benefits of that work carried over into marriage.

LOVER BLOCKER #3: You start to believe you need to be freed up to pursue something more attractive or attentive to your needs. The selfishness of a person who feels neglected is a powerful thing. They feel entitled to certain needs being met. They are convinced they are too attractive to be settling for someone who can’t appreciate their looks. They are too smart to settle for someone who treats them like they are ignorant. They work too hard for someone who doesn’t do anything all day. Bottom line, they think love should work like an amusement park. The selfish person is the amusement park that gets all the attention, wanting people to go out of their way to be there. They don’t go anywhere or do anything; they are there to be marveled at and touted over.  

LOVE BLOCKER #4: You don’t love yourself. When you are insecure or dislike yourself, it will sabotage your relationships before they have a chance to grow. The love you may not receive in return for your own stems from a failure to open the door of your heart. You may feel that door has been taped off for reconstruction, but how often do you get to it? You have come to believe you are damaged goods. On top of that, you are too ashamed to consider how wonderfully you’ve been made. When hardship shows up in your marriage, it reinforces the internal story you’ve been telling yourself about being unworthy of love.This handicap will begin to dismantle the relationship as you perceive your spouse to be turning on you. It is just your way of controlling things. Usually, the spouse is looking to come to an understanding. But to the person who feels unlovable, they don’t recognize the opportunities they have for love to be reinforced. They actually refuse to open up when it’s knocking at the door.

So how do you get the love back into your marriage? You deal with the blockers of love. These are real conversations to be had and actions to take to aggressively remove these blockers. After these mature actions are taken, the feelings will come crawling back. When people say they have fallen out of love, they are really just experiencing things that block love. Love is not something you fall in and out of it. Love is a decision. Being wise in how you enter marriage shows you are ready to be on the journey of love for the long haul. I hope these have been helpful things to think of before you open up your heart to the greatest decision of your life.