Tag: pressure

Is Marriage the Ultimate Goal?

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I keep hearing that there are girls on their 20s to their early 30s who keep getting pressured to get married.  It’s amazing to me that anyone would pressure such a big decision like marriage onto someone.  

I’ve had discussions with women about this.  I really believe that your 20s is the time to really discover who you are.  You have the freedom to do whatever you want if you’re willing to stand up for yourself against those who are pressuring you.  

I’m not saying that there is anything wrong with getting married in your 20s. Many of my friends have done it and have had successful marriages.  I just think knowing yourself and what you want is really important.  If you don’t know yourself,  how do you know who will complement you? 

The other thing I think is why is there such a rush to get married?  Marriage doesn’t solve your problems.  If you find the right person and that is what you want,  then go for it.  But if you’re looking to solve the problem if having someone wanting you or feeling lonely or feeling like you should be married because that’s the thing to do,  then maybe more thought needs to go into the decision.  

Until you are truly happy with yourself,  how can you be happy with someone else?  No one has magic powers to make you happy.  And it’s not their job.  It’s your job to make yourself happy. 

So what do you do until you find that person? 

Live.  Have fun.  Travel the world.  Follow your passions.  I’m not saying that you can’t do this once you get married.  Hopefully,  you marry someone who can do all this with you.  But why wait for them to do it all?  

Marriage isn’t a goal.  It’s just something we do when the person and the circumstances are right.   It’s not something we have to stop living our own lives for.  

Have fun,  not stress,  in marriage.  

 

Love Who We Want

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Yesterday, I wrote about a teacher who was fired from my Catholic high school for marrying his partner of 10 years. 

Today, I want to hit a little bit closer to home with my culture regarding a similar issue. How free are we, as Indians, to love who we want? Is it possible to be with or even marry the person we want if they don’t fit into what our culture dictates is right for us? How much pressure do we even put on ourselves to fit into what we think is right? 

I’ve learned the hard way that what is right on paper isn’t what is right for me. But I had to go through a pretty big self-inflicted struggle to understand this. 

Even if we never hear anything from our parents or family about who we should end up marrying, there is this idea that we should end up with someone who is the same ethnicity and religion as we are. They should be equally matched in every way: looks, education, financially. And even if the pressure isn’t directly put onto us by someone else, we put that same pressure on ourselves. We want the approval of our community. And to get that approval, we have to fit into the mold that was shaped out for us and has been shaped out for us for decades or maybe even centuries. 

So what happens when we fall in love with someone outside of this mold? What happens when we realize that a relationship goes past the education and the looks and the families getting along? What happens when we realize that there is so many other aspects to consider that have nothing to do with what we have been taught? 

I have seen it go both ways. I have seen couples split up because one or the other isn’t approved by their family. Instead of fighting for their love, they choose their family and sacrifice their relationship. I have seen couples stay together and try to make their families understand their relationship.

So it’s a choice. It’s always a choice. Unfortunately, we can’t control the idea of what the perfect relationship looks like. But we can control how we react to the opinions of our relationship. There are still going to be times when the world won’t agree with a relationship. Is it worth it to fight for it? Or is it something that should be given up because it’s not “right”?

Should we love who we want? Or should we love who the world says we should? 

The Indian Kid Mentality

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Have you ever really wanted to do something but have trouble doing it without feeling guilty about it? If it’s for pure fun or maybe not the most logical, practical choice, the feelings of “why am I putting myself first?” manifest themselves inside you and then there is the famous tug of war between what we want and what we should do. Is it possible to be selfish for the good of ourselves when our conscience is in constant overdrive? Or is that just the voice of the Indian culture?

This idea of duty and responsibility is something I know I’ve dealt with and put on myself throughout my entire life. I don’t know how I came to think that way instead of doing what I wanted but it definitely was my own mind that put that pressure on me. My own ideas of what I thought I was supposed to be doing caused me to make the decisions that I make.

Until I get to that point where I realize that this isn’t what is making me happy. And that gets to a point where I know I need to make a change or I’ll be miserable.

So let’s discuss the “Indian kid mentality” as my friend called it yesterday. Why do we stick to certain things even if they don’t make us happy? I understand we are raised by a generation where they risked a lot to come to America and create a stable and opportunity filled life for us. Aren’t we obligated to take the next step and really try to make it a happy life? There are those that did break out of the standard but the majority of us still stuck to stability as our main driving force. What is it about quitting or ending something or changing something that scares us half to death? I even question myself before buying something that might be a little bit more expensive than normal.

Can anyone explain how we can really start listening to ourselves instead of pushing ourselves to the point of misery?