A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always

When Mignon McLaughlin wrote, “A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person,” she revealed one of the quietest and deepest truths of the human heart. These words are not about the first fire of passion, but about the art of keeping that fire alive through the seasons of life. Love, as McLaughlin understood, is not a single moment — it is a rhythm, a renewal, a constant act of rediscovery. To be truly married, one must fall in love again and again, not because the other has changed, but because one learns to see them anew each time the world — and the self — changes.

In the style of the ancients, one might say that McLaughlin spoke of love as both a discipline and a miracle. The ancients knew that the greatest bonds of life are not forged once, but reforged daily — tempered like steel through fire, pressure, and time. So too, marriage is not a relic to be preserved but a living thing to be nurtured. To fall in love “many times” with the same soul is to understand that love is not a feeling that visits us; it is a choice we must summon, again and again, even when the bloom fades and the days grow heavy with familiarity. For only through renewal does love become eternal.

The origin of this quote lies in McLaughlin’s collection of insights known as The Neurotic’s Notebook, where she distilled the paradoxes of modern life with wit and tenderness. Though she wrote in the twentieth century, her words carry the wisdom of the ancients. She knew that passion may ignite love, but it is perseverance, humility, and imagination that sustain it. Her reflection was not born from youthful illusion, but from a mature understanding of how love must evolve. Each stage of marriage demands a new kind of love: gentler, wiser, sometimes quieter — but no less profound.

Consider the story of John and Abigail Adams, whose marriage endured separation, hardship, and war. Across thousands of miles and years of distance, they wrote letters filled with longing, counsel, and shared dreams. They did not fall in love once, but countless times — through words, through memory, through faith in each other’s hearts. Their love was not untouched by weariness or grief, but each trial became a new reason to love again. Such devotion embodies McLaughlin’s truth: that to remain truly united, one must rediscover the beloved in every age, every mood, every trial of life.

To fall in love many times is also to forgive many times, to see beauty where others might see only routine, and to choose tenderness when it would be easier to turn away. Time can erode love if the heart becomes idle, but time can also deepen it if the heart stays awake. The wise know that love’s glory lies not in the constancy of emotion, but in the constancy of commitment — the courage to rebuild, to reignite, to reawaken. Thus, McLaughlin reminds us that marriage is not a single story told once, but a series of rebirths within the same sacred union.

There is a kind of heroism in this vision. For it is easy to love when hearts are young and faces unlined, when life is still soft and full of promise. But to love through decades — through illness, disappointment, and change — is a triumph of spirit. It is a victory of the soul over time. Such love is not the lightning flash of desire, but the enduring flame that lights the long road home. To “fall in love again” is to honor the sacred work of tending that flame, even when it flickers low, and to know that in rekindling it, one rekindles one’s own humanity.

The lesson of McLaughlin’s words is both gentle and powerful: do not expect love to remain unchanged — help it grow. When monotony dulls affection, look again at your beloved, as though seeing them for the first time. Remember the wonder that first drew you close, and let gratitude awaken that old joy. When conflict arises, choose patience over pride, for the heart that endures finds renewal on the other side of hardship. In the end, it is not the number of years that makes a marriage strong, but the number of times two hearts have found each other anew within those years.

So, let her wisdom be passed down as a torch for all who seek lasting love: fall in love again and again, always with the same person. Let each season reveal a new reason to cherish, a new depth to discover. For marriage, in its truest form, is not a single vow made once long ago — it is a vow spoken quietly, daily, in the heart. And those who keep it faithfully will find that love, far from fading, grows more radiant with every new beginning.