Don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day. If you’re in a relationship, you might be asking why. Isn’t it nice to show your significant other that you care? Absolutely, but doing so out of obligation is wrong, and there-in lies the problem.

Due to the commercialization of the holiday, there is a massive amount of pressure on couples to turn out their wallets and prove their love by showering their partner in gifts and expensive dinners. But, buying your love is a terrible way of measuring the success of one’s relationship.

The kind of pressure that holidays like Valentine’s Day put on couples is one of the largest problems with relationships today. Love shouldn’t be bought, and even if you and yours agree that you don’t need something expensive on the holiday, there’s still that nagging societal pressure making you ask yourself, “Is this good enough?”

If you love your partner, then the answer is yes. You are not competing with the millions of other couples celebrating the holiday. There is no reward for the best Valentine’s Day present. And that’s the other thing that makes the holiday pointless: every couple is expected to celebrate.

Instead of choosing a day that means something to you, you are celebrating because you “have to,” and everyone is doing it at once. When everyone is making reservations for the same restaurants on the same night, it takes away from the romance of the day. Why be like everyone else? It would be far more romantic to pick a random night to dress up, go out and splurge on a nice meal simply because you wanted to.

And that is my advice. Don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day this Tuesday. Celebrate your love every day of the year. Show your partner you care about them because you love them, not because Hallmark told you to. Do something spontaneous.

By all means, buy your significant other some flowers or chocolates this week, but don’t do it because you have to. Do it because you want to. There are 365 days in the year; make them all count.

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EDITOR’S NOTE _ Thanks for reading A&E’s special Valentine’s Day series. Previous articles from this series are still available online:

Day 1 – Valentine’s Day for singles

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