What do we fear the most, apart from death, of course? The end of our freedom, the end of all our dreams. In short, a death before death comes. That’s the worst that can happen to mankind. And what’s even worse is that millions of people across the world are living that life, by getting married. I am not saying marriage is a bad thing. But let’s just ask, how many married people are actually living their dream life? Here are 10 reasons why it is perfectly okay never to get married.
1. You do not need a reason to be with your partner forever
We’ve all been in relationships, had our ‘forever’ moments and pinkie promises with our partners. But the mistake that we make is thinking that this ‘forever’ should culminate in marriage. I myself was in a long-term relationship, spanning over more than 10 years. While we were the perfect couple to our friends and relatives and everybody was planning our marriage, I would always question the need to get married.
Did you need a social custom to make promises? Why do you need one now to fulfil them?
2. As if break-ups were not enough, divorce makes things even worse
When we put our heart and soul in a relationship and it doesn’t work out, it breaks our heart to walk out of it. But we know the relationship was completely our responsibility and only two people were involved. What happens when you are married and decide to walk away? I have met couples who had mutually decided to part ways, and all hell broke loose when their families found out.
3. Deadline for your dreams
As Indian kids, when do we actually get the freedom to live our lives on our own terms? At 22 or 23, maybe. And then after 25 we are expected to get married as early as possible. When do you get the time to fulfil your dreams at all? Do you think you are going to have a happy married life if you have to compromise your dreams to get married? Maybe this is the reason why, despite having an otherwise perfect relationship, I never dreamt of getting married.
4. After marriage everyone else’s life becomes your priority
And that is bound to happen at any cost. And it is not bad that you are supposed to take care of people around you. But doing that at the cost of your own happiness is what I was against.
5. The idea of marriage limits our thinking
Imagine how we grew up. We saw everybody around us married or getting married and then compromising in every situation. We even grew up playing ghar-ghar. As children, that curbed our imagination, because at the back of our minds we always knew we HAVE to get married someday. That’s not the kind of life I would want for myself.
6. Every person has a different character
And the range is so wide that it won’t even fit here. Some have trust issues, some find it difficult to share rooms with others and there are so many other problems that we have to deal with on a daily basis. Imagine a person who has had trust issues all his life. How can we expect him to get done with all that overnight and accept a new person for the rest of his life?
7. Families are involved
This makes things even worse. We all love our families to death, no doubt. But it is not fair to expect that one fine day we get married and love a whole new family just like we love ours. For me, things were all lovey dovey and we had a perfect equation, before our families decided to play a role in it.
8. We have to give up our dearest thing – independence
Just when you start to love your independent work life away from home, spending your money on all the things you had in your bucket list for so long, you have to give it up and take responsibility for another person, even if that means compromising your own happiness.
I had just started living the life I always wanted to when I moved to Mumbai, when my parents felt I had enough freedom and should start thinking of a future with my man. Yes, it scared the shit out of me.
9. You were not born to fulfil everyone’s expectations
Almost since you were born, you have been fulfilling your parents’ expectations, your teachers’ and professors’ expectations. Now, you have to fulfil your spouse’s expectations. Why does it have to be that way always? You should have your time to breathe easy and relax too.
10. Loneliness won’t be an issue after a point of time
One of the most important reasons why our parents get us married is that they fear we will be lonely when they are gone. But loneliness will never be an issue. If all you worry about is coming home to someone at the end of the day, better get a pet dog! Serves the purpose and is much less demanding!