Marriage... What's the Rush?

Everyone thinks about it at least once. I'm currently at the age when people start asking questions and making jokes about it, and these comments actually begin to weigh on me. I personally do not feel ready for marriage.... Main reason is me being single. Yeah, I'm single and I'm perfectly okay with it (for the time being). I feel like I can wait a little bit longer. I want it to be right. I want it to be right. I want to be on the positive end of the statistic. I want what I've seen my entire life: A growing loving relationship.
I will admit to having a life plan back when I was 18. I wanted to have graduated from college at the age of 23 at the latest. Have a house by the age of 24 and have my own company in the works. be married to my college sweetheart by 26 and start having kids by the age of 28. I thought about all this. I had it mapped out in my mind and at the age of 25 I have not accomplished any of this. As sad as this may be, I'm okay right now. I already had my mental ( and physical) meltdown. There is nothing wrong with having made plans for your life. You are suppose to do things like this, but at least make them realistic. Include a margin of error (an incredibly huge margin of error). Set backs will occur in life. But you can't get down because of them. I learned a lot in my so called "lack of success." I've gained quite a bit of knowledge, appreciation and patience on my journey up until now. I'm still learning now, and I'm happy.

I'm setting this up to say that I see no rush in getting married. As much as I want to blame women for this (because that is what popular culture has programmed me to think), I can't because we men are at fault for this too. My number one, main reason as to why I advice people not to rush into marriage is this: Why rush to make a decision to spend the rest of your life with someone? That's what I think about. Why do it? What's the rush? Where is this person going?

There are the people who want to be married and are dating people who aren't even thinking about marriage and therefore don't want to be married. Do you seriously have to drag these people into marrying you? How appealing is that? You don't have to break up with these people cause they said they don't want to get married. Is this a serious deal breaker? Especially if the two of you haven't even established the fact that you could live together happily (as possible) ever after. Why do people rush to make these rash decisions off the thought of marriage? Give it some time, I'm sure if you are the right person for them then their minds will change. I do understand that there are situations where they won't change their minds, but if this is the only issue, then state your case as to why you want to be married and have them state their case. See if you can work it out for the better good of the relationship.

Women make these claims that if your boyfriend is with you for a certain number of years and has not brought up marriage or asked you to marry him, then he probably never will and you should dump him and start over. This is stupid. You don't know what is going on in his head. My question is why place these ridiculous time lines on things? Apparently you like each other, that's the only reason why I would be willing to invest more than a month of my time with someone. Maybe he hasn't brought up marriage because he can't afford it. Suppose he wants to give you your dream wedding, with all the bells and whistle but he can't afford it. He doesn't want to spend his honeymoon phase with you struggling to make ends meet cause the wedding and honeymoon blew the budget wide open and then some. Weddings are expensive. I also don't know many instances were the woman had to pay much for one. Also, there are these high expectations on engagement rings and popping the question.....

Engagement Rings- (this has to be because I don't know any better) These have to be one of the more unnecessary gestures and symbols of marriage to me. I understand that an engagement ring is a symbol of the engagement, but come on!!!! Is the size of the ring really a symbol of how much I love you? If this is the case then we don't need to be together. Clearly the way you want me to represent my love to you and the actual way I show my love to you are not on the same page and this is not going to work. An object should never ever show how much you love someone. That's not true love. If you are getting married because you want a big ring and so and so can get you that big ring then you need to find a corner and re-evaluate your life.

I really don't want to break down my idea of marriage right now. I just want to know what is the rush to get married (What is the rush to be grown period. I'm questioning myself RIGHT NOW as to why I wanted so badly to leave my parent's house on one of my occasional childish rants. I truly appreciate my freedom, but I appreciate the journey it took for me to obtain a true appreciation for it and all it involves.). The rush to get married is just crazy to me. I don't know where the fantasy of it all comes in.

I'll argue this point on many occasions, but I don't see why people make decisions purely based off their emotions. They completely forget that they have a mind to reason, think, and plan. Just because you think you love someone, or you feel you love someone doesn't actually mean that you do. It also doesn't mean that if you do, that this is the person you are meant to spend the rest of your life with. There is a reason why the divorce rate is so high. Rushing into a decision has rarely proven to be a good decision. People of sound mind and successful people rarely make rash decisions.
I think people have gotten caught up in the fantasy of the actual wedding day and the events of the honeymoon that they fail to actually think about what happens after the two. The living together under one roof. The joint accounts. The not doing whatever you want to whenever you want to do it. The raising of the children (sure we think about the "baby making" process but we don't actually put the baby in the equation). It's not all smiles. Marriage takes work. I don't know why we act like it isn't another relationship. Relationships are commitments and invested time in one another, there really is no room for complacency in any relationship. It's always in a constant state of needing improvement because we can all better ourselves.

I personally think marriage requires a certain mentality reserved for mature people who are compatible with one another. What does it say about a person who "falls in love" with the dude she has sex with and decides to marry him, and he is cool with it, so he agrees and they set off to get married. His and her parents are okay with it for whatever reasons and they allow or support these two people to be married. Three months later it magically doesn't work out and they break up (forgetting that they actually need to have a divorce) but now a baby is on the way. I seriously doubt that any of this was in the fantasy.

I also can't stand when men think they want to be married for the wrong reasons too. The guys that don't really want to be with their girlfriend, but can't stand the thought of her being with anyone else but him. Why propose to someone you really have no intention of spending the rest of your life with? How flawed is your logic? What's worse is the man who does this and wants this woman to relocate her life to where he is, only for him to change his mind during her trip. This is extremely messed up. You knew that you didn't want to be married to this person yet you put them and yourself through more crap because you don't know how to make up your mind at an appropriate time. Put your brain in the head it needs to be in.

I really don't see the rush in getting married. To me it has too many negative effects to it for me to not want to involve myself in any rash thinking. I take marriage very serious, and because I do I want to make sure that the woman I decide to marry is the right one for me. I want her to help me with the struggles of life and not place more struggles on me.

-VP