Love isn’t always the dramatic, earth-shattering experience we see in movies. It’s not always the kind that leaves you breathless within the first few moments of meeting someone. Instead, real love—the kind that lasts—is often a slow burn. It’s not found in the whirlwind romances that start with intensity and fade just as quickly. It’s in the steady, growing connection with someone who has been in your life longer than you ever expected them to be.

It’s the friend you’ve always trusted but never noticed in that way before. It’s the coworker who was once just another face in the office but suddenly becomes the person you look forward to seeing every day. It’s the one you didn’t anticipate—the person who quietly became essential to your life, not because they swept you off your feet, but because they made you feel safe, understood, and at home.

Love is a Choice, Not Just a Feeling

The idea of "falling" in love suggests something passive—like love is something that just happens to us, beyond our control. But the deepest, most enduring love isn’t about falling at all. It’s about choosing.

Real love isn’t just about passion, chemistry, or grand gestures. It’s about waking up each day and choosing to care about this person, to invest in them, to prioritize them even when life gets busy. It’s about seeing their flaws and imperfections and deciding that they’re still the person you want by your side.

Relationships are complex, and deciding whether to stay or leave can be one of the most emotionally challenging choices you'll ever face. If you’ve been feeling uncertain about your relationship, it’s important to take a step back and reflect. Are you truly happy, or are you holding onto something that no longer serves you?

If you’re struggling with the question, “Should I end my relationship?” these seven steps can help you gain the clarity you need.

1. Get Clear About Your Feelings

Before making any major decisions, start by assessing your emotional state. Do you frequently feel unfulfilled, anxious, or downright miserable in your relationship? Maybe you feel more drained than uplifted, or you constantly second-guess your happiness.

Feeling occasionally upset or frustrated in a relationship is normal, but if these feelings dominate your daily life, it’s time to acknowledge them. Instead of brushing them aside, allow yourself to sit with them. Pay attention to patterns—are you consistently unhappy, or is this a temporary rough patch? Understanding your emotional baseline is crucial in determining whether staying or leaving is the right choice for you.

The political divide seems to grow wider with each election cycle, so the same differing viewpoints are bound to seep into personal relationships, especially romantic ones. In romantic relationships, shared beliefs can seem so critical to success as a couple. Sometimes, it can even take something like a major election or political event for differences in views and values to emerge.

You may learn through a heated political election, for example, that you and your partner have highly different viewpoints and ideas on life-related topics. You could easily conclude that these different viewpoints could affect your everyday life together, how you view your partner, and even how you raise a family or make financial decisions.

Can love truly conquer all political divides, or are these differences too fundamental to overlook? Take a closer look at how polarized political views can cause problems and how those problems can be addressed as a couple.

The Political Landscape at Home

Political debates are unavoidable in modern times. They bubble up on social media, in the workplace, and even with other family members. The possibility of coming home to your partner and facing more of the same at the dinner table is not just plausible, but a real problem for many couples.

You may never think of hurling a stick or stone at your partner, but make no mistake: words are dangerous. Even more important to recognize when in a relationship, we all tend to use words when we're hurt or angry. In fact, words are the most common weapon we reach for when emotions run high.

Due to the human nature of rapid-firing verbalized raw emotion, unfortunately, your partner can be on the receiving end of some really hard blows. Also unfortunate, sometimes, words can lead to distrust, harbored resentment, and even an irreparable rift or a breakup.

Wounding Words to Avoid in Heated Moments

Hurtful words sometimes slip out before you can catch them, but, usually, there is a slight moment of introspection between when you point and aim and the shot from your tongue. In these tiny moments, make sure you're checking your words for critical injury potential. Some phrases are extremely difficult to remedy after they've landed.

"You always ..." or "You never ..."

Generalizations can feel unfairly accusatory and highly dismissive. They make the other person feel misunderstood and judged, which can spark immediate defensiveness but also hinder open communication in the long term, ultimately damaging the relationship.

Establishing clear boundaries around privacy is crucial in any relationship. However, couples often struggle with how much privacy is logical, fair, or expected in a healthy relationship.

Should you have the password to your partner's phone? Are 'Find My Phone' and other location trackers thoughtful or invasive? Should you have privacy in a committed romantic relationship at all? These are all valid questions, and many couples struggle with seeing eye to eye when it comes to phone and privacy etiquette.

The spark and fire of new love can be nothing short of awe-inspiring. The passion and love can be intense—you can't get enough! As time slips by, though, the fiery spark can wane.

Sometimes, couples seem just as much in love and attracted to one another after many years as they were in the beginning. But ... other times, it can seem like the couple is more like two people who simply choose to live together than romantic partners. What does the former do differently than the latter to keep the fire burning?

It all comes down to several key differences in couples who burn bright despite their years together and ages. Get a closer look at how to stay in love and be physically attracted to your partner over the years.

1. Physical Appearance

Do you remember what it was like when you first met? You likely put effort into your outward appearance because you wanted the other person to see you as attractive. Couples with the power to maintain physical attraction to one another throughout the years tend to never stop trying to look pleasing to their significant other. This may mean something as simple as wearing a certain type of clothing because you know your partner enjoys it or something more committal, like striving to stay in shape.

Breaking up is like the grand finale of a big life event, complete with high-flying emotions and dramatic exits. But when the show’s over, and you’re left alone on the stage, it’s easy to get stuck obsessing over your ex like they’ll always be the star of the show.

Sometimes, getting over your ex can feel like trying to break free from a grip of emotional quicksand—seriously sticky stuff, especially if you weren’t the one to decide things were over. Unfortunately, getting over the overwhelming sense of longing for the person suddenly deleted from your life can feel a lot like an all-out addiction.

Where do these feelings stem from? Why is letting go so difficult? Take a closer look at why you may feel addicted to your ex.

April Eldemire of Couples Thrive was featured in this article from Business Insider. Article reposted with permission.

If your partner is mysteriously distant and checked out when you're together, there's a chance they might be quiet-quitting the relationship.

Just like quiet-quitting a job, quiet-quitting a partnership or marriage involves a person doing the bare minimum to coast in the relationship.

April Eldemire, a licensed marriage and family therapist practicing in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, told Business Insider that common signs include your partner "avoiding connection, avoiding conflict, not making an effort, and almost willing to let the relationship die."

Often, she said, a partner quiet-quitting might start after a major life event — or even several that happen all at once, like becoming new parents, one partner losing their job, or tending to a sick family member.

April Eldemire of Couples Thrive was featured in this article from Business Insider. Article reposted with permission.

Sometimes, the most emotionally mature-seeming partners might not be trustworthy.

April Eldemire, a licensed marriage and family therapist practicing in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, said there are overt red flags of untrustworthiness that many people know to spot already — like being secretive about social media or their phone.

But even if a person freely posts you on their grid and always shows up, there are still reasons you might not trust them or feel secure in the relationship, Eldemire told Business Insider.

“A person can show up and be engaged in your life, but not volunteer any of their own sense of selves,” she said.

Eldemire shared three subtle signs a partner is untrustworthy — even if they don’t mean to be.

Many of us have been there.

You bring up an issue with your partner, and you feel attacked by their response. You get defensive and return fire—only for them to do the same. It’s a battle that no one can win.

Thankfully, it doesn’t have to be this way.

Making small shifts to your mindset can work wonders in your relationship. Here, we’ll take a look at why negativity can ruin a relationship and explore small daily steps that you can take to help you and your partner move to a more positive headspace.