“A half truth is always a whole lie’ but it’s also “the fastest way to prevent a mistake from turning into a failure.”

We believe we would find happiness in marriage and love would flourish of its own love, but it’s not quite as simple.  What at times seems soft spot could actually be turn out to be no more than an unpleasant familiarity. There is no such thing as “the right person”. The most important thing is to be in love with someone before letting it happen.

If you are one of those people who know who they are, what they want and won’t compromise with their beliefs or happiness, then you‘re in for a surprise!  People around you might find you wildly attractive. You’d stand tall, speak clearly and calmly refuse to do anything that will offend your sweet will. Everything buys you some crazy cutting edge every time you make a choice.

Yet… you may face a few straight ups too; “Nobody Should Marry That Person!!”

If liberal’s point of view is any good then wedlock must arise out of love alone. Still it’s a hardcore romanticism that never fails to rally and always comes with a pinch of idealism. Then there are disparagers who wouldn’t bite this. For them love perseveres and flourishes over time when two people decide to be together.

This double bind is perhaps crazy! But perhaps holds the key to getting what you might want in the first place-choices that earlier were never with you.

Shucks! What would you do now? Would you pretend your love so that you don’t appear disappointing? Would you confess that all love is lost between the two of you; you feel uninvolved yet would rather stay together? If you ask me I think each one of these would be more out of guilt and fear of backlash from people around you. On one hand your expectations of marriage are that it should be born out of love, on the other you can’t imagine being with someone you don’t love!

Too many questions but no straight answers! This of course is not an easy situation to work through. You’re trapped with no way out but to ride through.

Interestingly, it is still widely believed that men are more likely to marry someone they feel might not be quite right for them. If this is true then the myth that women would do anything for a ring and that men would do anything to shun commitment, is all sham and of course has few takers. By the way, which lady hasn’t sympathized with Bridget Jones or chuckled at 27 Dresses?

Then there is yet more cynical version which would urge you to just marry and settle down because it’s hard for good people to come by and this one might be exactly that. “Even if you don’t love that person,” some would say; “at least both of you are there to take care of each other. You can work on digging love after marriage over the time”; few would rather prefer a straight one; “Yes you should marry that person” or dismiss the whole thing with a “No you shouldn’t!”.

If you fancy spending the rest of your life with someone who’ll always by your side and take care of you when you’re old with white hair — then of course it’s easy to find someone who’d fit the bill. But this leaves something unanswered, “What marriage means to you?” assuming nothing changes after marriage. Wouldn’t you be just a keeper and she simply a reliable, caring and perceptive partner with none of you sharing the same closeness for each other!

Even so, the idea of being alone is overwhelming, sometimes soul crushing. You may get a fateful urge to try and make nice things permanent without mincing anything.

Getting married is a blissful recourse but not without hang-ups; anybody we marry might not always be the right choice for us. Besides, bliss doesn’t happen every day every time! You should also know that something else has walked in your life if dislike for each other is no longer short lived and hostility endures beyond the normal choleric fights and scratchiness.

If that’s happening- you have married the wrong person!

Given that, it is about the single costliest mistake any of us can make, it’s all the more reason why we often tend to make the wrong choices consciously. Seriously, we ruin our lives on excuses that would sometimes sound crazy in particular ways. Maybe Just–enough couldn’t hold to be Good-enough. And we also quite miss the consequences of a harmless looking willful accommodation between two people!

Want to freeze happiness?

It’s not uncommon to wish for good things happening in life to last forever. Much like our car or our homes, don’t we all want to spend our lives with the people we’re having a terrific time with?

Still…

Dreaming of marriage as harbinger of an everlasting happiness would fall flat if we couldn’t bottle our love for each other. Unfortunately there is hardly any connection between marriage and emotions that usually grow by Venice, a time of day, a lack of work, an excitement at dinner or a short acquaintance with someone…outside love none of this  guarantees happiness.

Not freezing anything marriage nonetheless is more of a peaceful, uneventful, sometimes nicely boring, comfortable, reliable and a decisive breather in life. It has the power to keep a relationship at a beautiful stage all through! A suburban house, long commute, small family; marriage has every ingredient of a lasting happiness. However, it’s a very different experience if you attempt to quick-freeze wrong ingredients. There will be as much doubt, hope, fear, rejection and betrayal in your marriage as there’s in your single life.

Don’t break free! Your future is yet to happen

It’s great if you’re here; nothing has happened yet and you’re free. There is still a chance and time to think over everything carefully and make a conscious decision. Of course, you will get chased by the feelings that you may well never meet someone that would come close. “What would I do then?” you may wonder.

What the heck!…

Truly nobody can tell if and when you’ll get to meet your perfect match one day, but when you do at least you’d be able to tell yourself; “When I agree to marry someone, I’m doing it because I genuinely want to marry this person and because this is the one I want to spend the rest of my life with”. You shouldn’t be looking for a partner merely because you’re fearful of the alternative– being left alone, not being able to find your perfect ‘One’ and not having someone to take care of you for the rest of your life.

Marriage indeed is a serious business and it deeply impacts lives. It’s never a wise move to look for hopes or expectations, that something else will happen of its own and that worries would leave you when love eventually happens out of a lifelong commitment.

So…stop, breathe and look around for your beau monde. Sure, trying to meet new people and finding the right match could be draining at times but in the end nothing would be more comforting than to know that you’ve eventually evaded being run down by that terrifying, heart numbing and draining unhappiness of being stuck in a marriage with someone you don’t love!