Top Five Wrong Reasons Why People Get Married

There is nothing more beautiful than witnessing a couple unite themselves in holy matrimony, and get ready to spend the rest of their lives with each other. The idea of having someone get down on one knee and propose is usually a reoccurring thought that goes through a lot of womens' minds once they get into a serious and committed relationships. While marriage has always been a symbol of the union of two lovers, most of the time, the intention behind the act of getting married isn’t always genuine. Instead of doing it for love, and the need, and want, to share a life with someone, some individuals get married for other reasons. Which in turn, tend to crush the marriage over time, resulting in divorce, the loss of capital and financial assets, as well as going through painful times, and learning karmic lessons. In this article, I’m going to go through the top five wrong reasons people get married, and why they should never be in the picture when you are thinking about making that lifelong decision.

1. Money

Financial stability is a key factor in living a good and joyful life. While it’s important to make sure that you and your spouse both have a roof over your heads, food in the fridge, and all the necessities to live your lives to the fullest, sometimes money becomes the focal point of a marriage, so that later down the road it becomes the reason why the marriage fails. To some people, having a substantial amount of money in your bank account is what makes someone marriage material. Which could not be further from the truth. Yes, financial stability creates opportunities to live the life most people only wish they could, however, when money becomes the reason why you want to marry someone, it’s only a matter of time before reality checks in, and tests the love you’re supposed to have for one another. Money can buy just about every materialistic item you can think of, but it cannot buy you unconditional love. Some people will say that one’s ability to provide a comfortable life is what attracts them to their partner, thus they choose to be married to them. That’s just a gold digging way of saying, “I married the person for his/her money.” You can have a big house, nice cars, and lots of money, but none of that will make you happy in your marriage if your spouse is cheating, disrespectful, verbally or physically abusive, and/or emotionally and physically consumed by work or other interests outside the home. Having money is great, but it should never be a priority or a primary reason to say "I do" to someone.

2. Fear of Losing Your Love Interest

This is one that most people do not realize until they get married, and then they realize things aren’t working out the way they thought they would. That’s when they begin struggling to try and make the marriage work, despite how obvious it may seem that they are not right for each other. Let’s face it, throughout our lives, we encounter many love interests. Some of them we had the opportunity to explore the possibility of being in a relationship with, and then it didn’t work, others we end up keeping in the friend zone, and eventually, they became our really good friends. However, love interests do that. They come and they go. Sometimes when it comes to love at first sight, people fall so hard for someone, and in the fear of losing that person to someone else who may sweep them up before they do, they'll quickly propose trying to take that person off the market. Not knowing that marriage is forever, and before that, there is a process of getting to know someone that will help them understand that person before they choose to share a life with them. When people do this, sometimes they get lucky, and due to their compatibility, they end up having a family and live a happy and positive life. However, the downside to doing this can lead to a negative experience where one may wish they did not rush into getting married, and had spent more time getting to know their partner. In addition, if they have children shortly after the marriage, now they’ll just have to settle with the cards they have been dealt, as most couples in this situation tend to stick together for the sake of the children. Marriage is a partnership, not an ownership. If you feel the need to propose out of fear of losing someone whom you’re deeply in love with, perhaps you need to look within yourself and resolve any insecurities that may make you feel as if you are only worthy of that one individual. Love trumps fear any day. Rather than being afraid of losing that person, you should feel loved, and confident that no matter what life throws your way, you two will always find each other and be together.

3. The Need to Establish a Family

Now, this may sound like a good reason to get married, after all with marriage usually comes having a family down the line. However, if your intentions of having a family are to patch up any past wounds and get over the pain dealt to you by your own parents, then it’s pretty easy to lose sight of why you chose your partner to begin with. Many times we’re on social media, and we see family photos where couples and their children are smiling and happy. Sometimes that is just an illusion. Behind closed doors, this could be a really toxic couple where the children in the photo may be receiving negative, and destructive principles from the parents. Sometimes a child is conceived and a couple would choose to get married. One reason would be out of fear of raising that child alone, or having to pay child support, another reason would be just to have both parents in the life of the child regardless of how incompatible they may be.

4. Financial Gains

Even here in the US people get married for financial purposes such as gaining residency from a foreign country to the US, acquiring certain assets, or even being a part of an inheritance. What makes this dangerous is that one person may believe that love is the reason why they’re getting married, while the other may have a different agenda in mind. This is where it can be hard to see someone’s intentions, and in the end, this can create so much hardship for the person who is genuinely in it for the right reasons. This is where compromise and sacrifice must be made by both parties. If one person is doing all the compromising and all the sacrificing, while the other person is not putting in the same amount of effort, then they are probably setting the stage to utilize their partner for any and all resources that they may own after getting married. It’s important to know that if someone is not willing to make an effort to meet you halfway before the marriage, then that’s a red flag right there that they will not make you a priority in the future. In addition, something, or someone else, may be more important to them than you are.

5. Arranged Marriages

In many foreign countries, there are some cultures where parents will arrange a marriage for their children. This sometimes is a tradition in the family, and other times it’s for financial gains, even though it may not be stated as such out in the open for everyone to know. Sometimes both parties will consent to this. However, a forced marriage may occur if one person does not consent to the marriage, in which case it would be illegal in some parts of the world. The concept of this type of marriage is that both parties are usually aware of the reason for their actions. So even if they may not have the love for each other, for the most part, they understand the terms and agreement of their arrangements. Arranged marriages are usually looked at as a business agreement or a cultural tradition. With that being said it is NOT necessarily a good reason to marry someone you may not even love.

As I stated before, marriage is a partnership and not an ownership. Even though the origins of marriage pointed out that in the old days, there have been times when a woman got married to a man, any property she may own became the husband’s, thus giving him authority over anything she owned and to some extent even herself. Over the years, laws have changed, rights have been given, and the old ways are right where they’re supposed to be, which is buried in the past. In today's world, marriage mostly is successful when it's based on a partnership. Both parties have value, distribute the same amount of energy, resources, and they work together to achieve their goals as one unit. This unity of two individuals, when done right, creates amazing results. Marriage is not a fusion of two individuals but rather the union of the two. Being married to someone does not mean that you will now start to act and think like your partner. What it's supposed to be is the two of you utilizing what you have in common to strengthen your relationship, so that you can both work and live together with very little conflicts, while keeping your differences. Also not allowing those differences to widen up a rift between you two to the point where it separates you literally and legally. The objective of a marriage is to help you both become greater, wiser, and stronger individuals before you got together. It is the journey of which you both will encounter challenges that will test how deep your love is for each other. It is the choice you both make to share that one life you have to live, with that one person whom you believe is worthy to be a part of it. So if you are going to propose, or accept, a proposal, be sure that those 5 reasons are not a key factor. At the end of it all, to give a ring, or to even accept a ring is to agree to a life-changing contract that will either bring upon you great loving memories or devastating and regretful experiences.