About

Most people’s marriages get worse over time. They argue more. They laugh less. They are more easily annoyed with each other. Their sex life suffers. And they gradually reach a point of status-quo. They know that their marriage isn’t great, but it’s comfortable and predictable enough that they refuse to upset things. And weirdly, there’s a law of thermodynamics that can explain why this pattern happens. It’s called The Law of Entropy. Essentially, the Law of Entropy states that everything in the universe is gradually moving towards a state of disorder. Regardless of how well you clean your room, it will always get dirty again. And if you park a car in a driveway for long enough, it will eventually become undrivable. And even the oldest redwood tree will eventually die and decompose. Carl Jung, one of the most influential psychologists of all time, noticed this same principle in play out in our minds and relationships. He called it psychological entropy. The idea is that, if not maintained, our relationships, our happiness, our sense of purpose will degrade over time. Our fears, worries, and anxieties can get the best of us if we let them go unchecked for too long. So, our relationships require constant maintenance to combat the unstoppable force of entropy. It’s kind of like nature’s game. If you value something, you need to regularly expend more energy and attention on that thing in order to prevent entropy from degrading it to the point that it becomes useless or lifeless. Nothing self-maintains. Your marriage cannot survive on yesterday’s love. You have to combat the entropy with things like date nights, compliments, spending meaningful time together, making out, holding hands, giving each other thoughtful gifts… Doing the things that keep your love-tank full. Because if you let entropy work on your marriage for too long, you will lose it.