When Love Becomes More Endurance Than Joy

​I heard someone say recently, “I am seeking appreciation, not toleration.” This person said this in the context of dating, and more specifically, in the context of dating challenges.

It made me think about how often, in relationships, we settle for toleration. We call it patience, understanding, even love, but often, it’s just endurance. We learn to manage one another instead of marvel at one another.

If it sounds like I am writing this from a place of experience, I am.

I saw this in my marriage. Without ever naming it, we began to put more energy into tolerating than appreciating. The small quirks that once felt endearing started to feel irritating. The little differences we used to celebrate became things we quietly worked around. And before long, we were living alongside one another rather than with one another.

Toleration, I’ve realized, can masquerade as maturity. It can look like restraint, like grace, even like peace. But it’s a peace built on distance - an unwritten agreement not to bump into each other’s rough edges.

Appreciation, on the other hand, requires closeness. It asks us to lean in. To remember what first made us curious about one another. To see what’s still beautiful, still unique, still worth admiring, even when the shine has dulled a bit.

And that’s not just true in marriage. It’s true in friendships, families, communities, and yes, dating. We say we want connection, but sometimes what we really want is compatibility, someone we won’t have to tolerate. But maybe what we actually need are people who invite us to grow our capacity for appreciation.

Because toleration is survival mode, appreciation is life.

Maybe the real work of love is learning to shift from enduring one another to seeing one another again.

I hear it often in our divided world, we need to be more tolerant of one another. I am wondering now, though, if we might need to move well beyond toleration to appreciation. I wonder if we are settling by simply putting up with one another when we could be striving to find the good in one another.

I do worry about this, actually, because again, I know from experience, there is an end to toleration. There comes a point where simply tolerating one another makes love feel more like endurance than joy, and frankly, that's an endurance that eventually becomes impossible to endure.

Appreciation on the other hand - is there ever a good time to stop trying to find the good in one another?