We teach our children how to read and write. We teach math, science and history. We prepare them for careers and the practical demands of adult life.
But there is one of the most important life skills almost none of us were ever taught: how to create love that actually lasts.
Not the feeling of love ... we know that part well. The butterflies, the excitement, the sense that you´ve found your person. What we were never taught are the skills required to sustain love once real life begins. I call this Love Literacy. And like many people, I entered marriage without it.
When I first fell in love as a teenager, it felt magical. I met my first husband while working in my father´s deli. There was instant attraction, excitement, and a sense that this love story was meant to be. We married, built a life, and had two beautiful children. From the outside, everything looked right. But over time, something changed. The feeling of love didn´t disappear overnight ... it faded slowly, quietly. And I began to wonder what so many people wonder: maybe I chose the wrong person. So I made a decision that changed many lives. I left.
Years later, I see our story differently. What I thought was the loss of love was actually the absence of skills. No one had taught us how to regulate emotions in conflict, repair after hurting each other, or stay curious instead of defensive. We knew how to fall in love. We just didn´t know how to sustain it. And we are not alone. Divorce rates remain high, and even increase with second and third marriages. It´s not because people don´t care, but because most of us were never taught that love is a decision supported by skills.
Imagine if we taught love the way we teach reading. We don´t hand a child a novel and say, "Good luck." We teach letters, then words, then sentences. Love works the same way. Healthy relationships require love literacy: emotional regulation, communication, conflict repair, and personal responsibility. Skills that can be learned, practiced and applied.
When couples learn them, something shifts. Love stops feeling fragile. It becomes something they can return to. Yes, even after conflict, even after distance. Because love is not something we simply feel. It is something we learn to do. And when we do, we gain something extraordinary: the ability to choose love again and again ... especially in the moments when it would be easier not to. Because those are the moments that define a life ... and a love ... worth keeping.