Originally uploaded: 18th April 2019
When I was 14 years old I believed I knew who I was going to marry.
Yes, I was that girl, but at 14 years old I believed I was in love and I knew for sure that one day we would be together.
Not gonna lie I held onto that dream for years. I believed that God had shown me my man and I was just waiting for him to realise it too.
I can laugh about it because I’m now 20 but I’m bringing up this embarrassing yet hilarious fact about myself, because I recently went back home and saw - said - man that I believed would be my future husband.
And I laughed because I felt absolutely nothing for him. No offence to him, he’s an awesome person and I wish him the best but really, Sarah?
Another thing happened when I saw this guy.
I accepted this anxiety that I don’t want to get married.
I am now, unfortunately, at the age where people I’ve grown up with are getting married and having babies. This is no exaggeration 3 people I grew up with are engaged and a friend of mine is pregnant – this all happened in the past week. And I, my friends, have been nervous because I feel like someone is going to randomly propose to me on the street. I feel like I have to dodge men all together – even though I’m so single.
I don’t feel ready for marriage.
The first reason I don’t want to get married is because of how I’ve perceived its importance in regards to the church. As a woman, the biblical verse that is used to describe the role of the wife is Ephesians 5:22 which says ‘Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands as you do to the Lord.’ The way the church has interpreted this verse suggests the wife is submissive in everything, having no opinion and no real role other than to appease the man, her husband. The man leads and the woman follows.
Umm…
Um…
I can’t do that.
I can’t be a maid to a man and be compliant with all his demands. I might have perceived the verse wrong but the way it has been taught has only reinforced what I have said.
The second is sex.
Oh you thought I wasn’t talk about how a lot of young Christians are getting married so they don’t have premarital sex? Well I am. There are Christian couples who, although undoubtedly are in love, get married because they want to have sex. It’s taught to us from an early age that sex is meant only inside of marriage. And thus young Christian couples get married to stop themselves from sinning. In my opinion, I don’t believe that young Christians are taught about sex in a way that is healthy and thus when it comes to marital sex, it’s complicated. We are not taught to pursue ourselves but rather to pursue another person. How can you do that when you don't know yourself? How can you do that when you're just finding yourself? Is it really plausible to pursue and marry someone on the basis of sex? If marriage is on the basis of having sex and to avoid sin, are we not skewing the construction and reality of marriage?
Sex isn’t a concrete enough reason to get married.
Now, I have fallen guilty to this – I mean I did start planning while I was 14. But I don’t want to get married because there is too much emphasis on the wedding and not on the actual marriage. Marriage is a contract, it doesn’t need the pretty dress or flowers or colour schemes.
Pinterest doesn’t help.
The next two reasons are an overall societal issue surrounding the institution of marriage. I believe that the next two are synonymous with each other. I don’t want to get married because people believe that marriage equals love. I don’t want to get married because people believe marriage means being one half of a whole.
The latter personally scares me, you mean I’m going to be half of person walking around, confused and frustrated, until another half of a person comes to complete me? Nah. The notion suggests you need to find a partner that balances your characteristics. That sounds nice but it takes away from the quality of life by suggesting that you must find someone in order to be fulfilled. That puts way too much pressure on humans and it’s because of that pressure that I believe people rush.
It’s like a game of tag, picking people for the sake of picking people.
Too much pressure is placed on humans to pick the perfect person, when the perfect person doesn’t exist. Too much pressure is placed on the people we fall in love with, because we come with expectations that they will fix our flaws. Too much pressure is placed on us to live up to expectations we could never attain.
The former statement, this notion of love means marriage, is bull. I’ve come to believe that marriage isn’t about love but rather about commitment; thus you can be committed to a person and not be in love with them as well as loving someone and not being committed to them. You can love multiple people but you can only commit to so many because it’s draining. Love is choice, commitment is law. You can choose to break the law.
Thus I don’t want to get married. I don't want to get married to be someone's "wife," I don't want to get married to have sex, I don't want to get married for the aesthetic, I don't want to get married to my "other half". If this is what marriage means, I don't believe I can do it. The severity of marriage has not been grasped. Marriage, to me, is a combination of a legal, political and spiritual bond with economic and societal benefit. There needs to be an emphasis on the law part because, in the eyes of the law, breaking that bond is long, hard, strenuous and can cause you to loose half of everything you own. Marriage requires a balance of love and commitment, both of which need to be identifiable as separate elements, they are not synonymous with each other.
Marriage is partnership.
The choice to get married is supposed to be scary rather than seem romantic because it is a serious legal binding contract.
I might be a hypocrite, I might change my mind but, right now, I know I'm not ready.