A few days ago, I read the letter that Álvaro Villanueva published in the newspaper El País to his 17-year-old disabled son. The title sums it up perfectly: “It’s NOT about how much I give up, but how much I love.” (Álvaro Villanueva, newspaper El País, January 16, 2025).

Reading it, although it spoke about his relationship with his son and with himself, inevitably led me to consider the relationship within marriage. The title is also valid.

I was thinking about why so many divorces occur, and, probably because I spent so many months in Mexico, the expression “burning the ships” came to mind. This refers to the myth that Hernán Cortés ordered his ships burned after arriving in Veracruz to prevent his soldiers from being tempted to return to Hispaniola, now known as Cuba.

I thought that when you get married, you have to burn your ships.

Does this mean you have to close off all possibility of divorce?

That’s the simple conclusion. What I mean is, literally, you have to burn your ships.

Which ships?

Two. The ship called “I” and the ship called “my.”

Yes, both. It’s actually what husbands and wives affirm in church: “I, …., accept you as my wife (that is, I accept you as you are and as you become, I renounce any objection, as parents accept children) and I give myself to you.” If you give yourself to me, you no longer belong to yourself; you belong to your spouse, and that means giving up your “I” and your “me” to become the custodian of their life.

You have just given up what you desired, planned, hoped for… and also what you may desire, plan, or hope for in the future.

From that moment on, it will have to be what we both desire, what we both plan, what we both hope for.

Our old ships, our “I”s, should now only serve as supports for the “we.”

It may sound very radical, but when you love—and if you don’t love, don’t get married—you are either radical or you don’t love.

Of course, there remains the temptation to reserve a small boat to sail alone: ​​a free rein… a small (or large) hidden vice.

The boat called “me”: “my time,” “my golf,” “my gym,” “my Pilates,” “my friends.”

Some even have a frigate: “my professional career,” “my dream.”

Nothing wrong with that if they are recognized as concessions from the “we” and always subordinated to you—to your spouse—never as priorities.

It’s clear that marriage involves giving up (the title of the article that led me to this reflection), but going in one direction always means giving up going in the opposite direction.

I’ve sometimes wondered what my life would have been like if I hadn’t gotten married, even if we hadn’t had five children.

The first thing that comes to mind is that I would have written much more. I would have already had several books published. I would also have studied much more. I would have been a better professional. Today, I think it’s most likely I’d be living in the United States.

But would it have been more worthwhile to write books, or have more knowledge, or more money, or live with more ease and comfort, having had to give up any of you, or even your mother?

The answer is obvious.

It’s true that marriage is, at times, difficult. But most of the time, the difficulty lies in the circumstances, not in the people involved.

For us, living with our financial burdens up to our necks meant periods of great stress and even distance. And seeing things differently makes you think the problem lies with your spouse, not the circumstances.

And without a doubt, the devil does everything possible to destroy marriages. All marriages.

We have suffered too.

For a time, the devil convinced me that your mother was a very difficult person, and that there was no way out. It was a time of enormous fragility.

Fortunately, the Virgin Mary intervened, literally, and made what had distanced me from her disappear like a fog, allowing me to see your mother again in all her beauty. I think she went through something similar.

There is no better way to destroy a marriage than by making the spouses think—often it only takes one of them—that there is something more important in their lives than their marriage.

You increasingly focus on what you are “losing,” and fail to see any gain in all that you are receiving. Furthermore, you question whether you’re even receiving anything, or whether it’s “Aren’t I the ones who put everything in?”

It’s as if the “I” rises stronger than ever from the ashes, like the phoenix, and becomes unstoppable. “I, I, I,” “me, my, my,” are the words we use most in arguments at that moment. The word “you” only appears to blame or reproach. The word “we” disappears.

We must burn our ships. Those of “I” and those of “me.”

We must accept that we have arrived in this new land, this new and unknown place called marriage, to stay. We cannot turn back and flee forward. It will, in reality, be whatever we want it to be. We can make it a paradise or a hell. It depends on how much we love (how much we reciprocally renounce).

But since I’ve been using the simile of ships, I’d like to end by giving you a compass for your journeys. Not just that of marriage; it’s actually a compass for life. As you might expect, it’s a compass I found in the Bible. In fact, they are words of Jesus, which I find as surprising as they are enlightening: “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21).

Do you want to know where you have placed your heart? Think about what your treasure is.

I’ve met people whose treasure is football. Do you remember the poor deceased who was in the funeral home room across from his grandfather’s, who asked to be buried in his Atlético de Madrid uniform? We already know where his treasure was.

There are people whose treasure is hunting, and they live for it, or whose treasure is whales or turtles, and they live to “save the whales,” or who live for money, or for work, or for play, or for anything. There are also those who live for themselves.

If you want to get married, if you ever do, always make sure that your treasure is your spouse, and when they are born, if you ever have children, they will too. Let your family be your hobby.

Father Mendizábal said: “Affections are the place where the heart goes when you set it free.” Wherever your treasure is, there your heart will be.

And if one day you discover that your affection is drifting somewhere other than home, then take the reins, steer your ship, and correct its course before it’s too late. Otherwise, you may go very far, but I assure you, you will arrive burdened with loneliness.