Marriage is a topic of intense debate no matter which side of the aisle you belong to. Whether you believe it to be life’s fulfillment or an immense impediment, one cannot ignore the fact that our Indian society by large remains chronically obsessed with marriage and all its trappings as a momentous event in someone’s life. If figures are anything to go by, Indians or South Asians in general pretty much splurge on weddings in excess. What does this say about our understanding of marriage though?
As a single Woman at 32, career oriented, I have been an observer of not only marriage as an institution, but of society’s attitude towards it at large. Being an outlier in a society like ours provides some very interesting insights into what people engage in, interpersonal dynamics plus its pros and cons.
When one looks at marriage, as it has traditionally existed through history, it is a very transactional dynamic, especially in the South Asian context, where economic status, caste, and several social parameters are the foremost guiding beacons that form the basis of two people coming together to share and build a life together. Seldom do such arrangements result in a true, equal or genuine connection between two human beings who have taken the solemn pledge of sharing their lives and building a family unit together. Nobody stops to truly gauge whether the people coming together will be compatible as two human beings in a relationship, because there so many other parameters being given priority and weightage.
What this results in is quite frequently a situation where two people stay together for the sake of societal pressure, and not because it brings them happiness or something which brings them true fulfillment.
This then results in deep seated discontent and the constant urge to look elsewhere outside the relationship for emotional, mental and many times physical fulfillment. As a single woman in this kind of society, I have lost count of the times that married men have made untoward advances at me, pursuing the attractive idea of having a confident, independent woman in their lives, who challenges them, their notions of propriety, and is not a docile homebody who goes with what is expected aka the role that their wives have been conditioned to play. Here, I would also say that women do pursue interests outside their relationships, albeit silently, and in no ways is this straying the sole prerogative of men. Only the methodology differs, based on what is socially sanctioned and what is not.
What needs to be understood with this is that marriage is ultimately a tool, whether it leads to life’s fulfillment or whether it becomes an impediment hugely depends on what the intent is going into the marriage, whether it is going to be a relationship based on mutual communication and respect, or is it going to be another expression of jarring traditional gender roles, which often lead to very unfulfilled lives of those within the institution.
The fact also remains that we treat marriage as an institution rather than an active, dynamic and constant negotiation, a living breathing thing between two people. That itself is the death knell for any relationship, especially in these times when the dynamics between genders have vastly changed due to access to education, careers of both partners and financial independence.
Perhaps if we go forward with making conscious choices of partnerships based on genuine connections, honesty and communication, we will see marriage leading to becoming life’s fulfillment, rather than being an impediment.
The two people in it, their connection, their choices, their outlook of building a life together is the only thing that ultimately counts. The slew of societal arithmetic only serves to create impediments in any marriage, because ultimately anything built out of pretense and fakery is bound to come undone some or the other time.
No matter how much money you throw into celebrating the wedding, marriage remains a daily and lifelong negotiation between two people which cannot be successful without genuineness. True and unconditional commitment comes naturally from mutual respect and candid conversations, and not make believe. The desire to do justice to marriage and its commitment comes from compatibility and constant negotiations. It is hard work, it is constant work, but it comes easily when you’re in it willingly and for the right reasons, not solely to please society or tick a box in the endless checklist of society.
You would wonder how an ummarried woman in her prime understands all this without having lived it. One watches and learns from other people’s struggles and failures, and perhaps I have done the best service to myself in taking my time to understand what it would take rather than jumping into it headfirst unconsciously, or for all the wrong reasons. Ultimately, we must acknowledge that aside from the two people involved primarily in the relationship, any future progeny would be at the receiving end of a disturbed home. We owe it to not only ourselves but also our future generations to build peacful loving homes which are a result of conscious marriages/relationships, so that we build a more fulfilled, loving and peaceful society at large. Individual choices, actions and decisions ultimately have a ripple effect on everything around us.
May we actively work on making marriages life’s fulfillment, rather than having it be an impediment in our journeys of growth.