Valentine’s day reminds me of something I've been thinking about for a while now; how human beings are so talented at turning simple, beautiful things into full-time problems.

It normally feels like life is full of problems, but sometimes I wonder if they’re really that many or if we’re just constantly creating more. We take something good, simple, complicate it, and then begin to complain. Before you know it, there are talk shows, podcasts, panel discussions, people building serious careers around fixing things that common sense and a little honesty could have solved.

Communication for example; God gifted us with the ability to communicate in various forms what we want, what we don't want, what we feel, get a response, so we know how to proceed. We can create spaces that allow others to communicate, respond honestly as well, and then move on with life. Reactions may not always be positive, but clarity has a way of phasing things out.

Instead, we play games. We hold back information; rom-com style where one tiny omission creates chaos for years which could have been avoided with one honest sentence. Anyway, it is for the plot but I find it stupid. 😂
We create mountains out of small things, let people assume things about us, then get offended when they do, and still don't clarify. Now there are podcasts dedicated to decoding silence, late replies, and “good morning” texts. We even come up with personality types, disorders, and illnesses to describe someone who just won’t open their mouth to say yes or no.

This has gone to almost all areas of life. Eating became diets, detoxes, cheat days, and guilt. Rest turned into productivity anxiety. Friendship grouped into “low maintenance vs high maintenance.” Liking someone now requires strategy, timing, rules, and screenshots for group analysis. Everything is so technical, performative, tricky. So much work for lazy people like me. 😂

A lot of life could honestly be easier if we acted a little more like normal human beings and stopped trying to complicate things.
Which brings me back to Valentine’s day.

Human beings one day decided it would be a day for love. The same human beings turned it into a day of gift Olympics. Surprisingly, on this day of LOVE, all the talk about different “love languages” disappears, and everyone's language is now receiving gifts. 😭 Words of affirmation? Quality time? Acts of service? They all go on leave. Some people even buy gifts for themselves just to prove they were loved on this day. At this point, Valentine’s day is just another Boxing Day just with more pressure and fewer discounts.

What really annoys me isn’t the gifts themselves, I don't mind them, but the noise around them. The podcast seatings, the subtle announcements of expectations, the trends everyone feels pressured to follow, and the endless arguments about which gifts are acceptable and which ones are “an insult

Then the negative atmosphere that arises in relationships; silent treatment because the gift wasn’t a surprise enough, fights over budgets that were never discussed, comparison with what “other people’s partners” did, fear of being cheated on, emotional and financial pressure disguised as jokes, and relationships straining or even breaking over expectations that were never clearly communicated.
And oh, the complaints! "Why do I have to buy gifts?"
"If he doesn’t buy you an iphone, he doesn’t love you."
Memes on how to dodge spending Valentine's with your partner...
All this because of a day we created ourselves to trap us in cycles of disappointment.

Sometimes the debates around Valentine’s get so loud that I think if I were in a relationship and there was that much bargaining, policing, and pricing around me receiving a gift, I wouldn’t want one anymore.