The murderous routine
Author: Francisco Peralta Dávalos | Source: Catholic.Net

For many, the worst diseases are asymptomatic, in which there are no symptoms or obvious signs that demonstrate disease and end the life silently, stealthily, until suddenly at some unexpected moment, the person dies or is informed that it’s in a terminal phase and with little time to live. That's the routine in relationships, silent ... murderous.
The routine is so harmful to the relationship that it seems to be a kind of antithesis to love and much more than love. The infatuation is almost a roller coaster of emotions where a feeling of happiness and wellbeing predominates. The routine is flat, gray, and does not usually carry many emotions with it. Love is a decision taken consciously by means of the will, of staying next to a person because we want good for them, the routine seems more like a "I'm by your side because I got used to it" .
The biggest risk of the routine is not that it is repetitive, there are even things for which some repetition is required and they are positive; in the discipline and to develop virtues, for example, but in this case, something good is intentionally sought. The routine is dangerous when there’s monotony, when it only becomes a systematic repetition of tasks or activities that seem to have no transcendental meaning and that do not take us anywhere in particular. But the biggest risk of routine is not realizing that we have fallen into it.
It will be important that the couple have a level of self-knowledge important to know how to identify when they are entering a routine with harmful dynamics. There will always be activities that we will have to carry out on a daily basis, such as fulfilling tasks or duties, personal, domestic or family, but that is the challenge, not to fall into routine in a world that tends to the routine.
When a marriage is able to recognize that it is engaged in the "logistics" of a day to day routine, it will have to put the means to renew and do different things, new things that break the routine and contribute to having moments of communication of greater quality, to share space and time as a couple. Interestingly, for most couples this "break" or "get out of the routine" does not require surprising or extraordinary things, but more ordinary than we imagine. For example, going to the movies, having a dinner, a conversation in a nice place or a small trip in most occasions is enough, this will depend on the characteristics of each couple so that it is benefited.
It can be complicated to imagine how not to fall into the routine with a person with whom we live and we spend practically the 365 days of the year; that is part of the responsibility that we have when we commit ourselves to our partner.
Love must be worked on.