Is Marriage Overrated?
If you’re in your 20s or 30s, you may feel like all your friends are getting married. Whether you’re single or in a committed relationship, the constant sound of wedding bells may cause you to ask some questions about your own future. Maybe you’re wondering if you should get married, too.
Some people worry that there is something “wrong” with them if they aren’t married by a certain age and if they don’t want to be married at all. Or maybe you’re asking yourself, “Is marriage overrated?” If you’ve recently been pondering any of these questions, you’re not alone! In this article, we’ll explore the answers to these common questions and more.
Why people think marriage is overrated
There are several reasons why people believe that marriage is overrated. It used to be that if you wanted to settle down with someone and start a family, you needed to get married. It was unacceptable to live with someone outside of marriage and a disgrace to have children out of wedlock. The world has become a more accepting place now.
Not only has it become commonplace for couples to live together without being married, but it's what many people are choosing to do. Among adults ages 18-44, 59% have cohabitated with an unmarried partner at some point in their lives, while only 50% have been married.
There are several different reasons why people think marriage is overrated, and they usually are tied to why they think people originally got married in the first place. Let’s explore common reasons why people believe marriage is overrated.
Gender roles have shifted
In days of old, men generally worked outside of the home or in the fields as farmers, and wives handled domestic matters like cooking and cleaning. They maintained the house, cared for the children, and made sure that everyone was well fed. The division of the work was split between the couple.
Things look different now. Many couples both work outside of the home. There are also stay-at-home dads and working moms, along with single parents who wear all the hats. Over the last several decades, women have worked to make great strides in proving that they could take care of themselves, and some of this has shifted the mindset and ideas that people had towards marriage.
Marriage is expensive
Then some people believe marriage is all about the wedding. They don't see a reason to spend thousands of dollars on a relationship they already maintain. They feel that they are just as connected and committed as a married couple without spending the money to throw a party for the enjoyment of their family and friends or by making things "official" with the government through marriage.
Not to mention, if they have any doubt about their relationship succeeding long-term, it's a lot more expensive to go through a divorce than it is to split up when you aren't married.
Marriage is not a prerequisite for having children
Not only do you not have to be married to have a child, but you also don't even need to have a partner. You can adopt or conceive with a sperm donor. In the past, wanting to become a parent motivated some people to want to get married. Now, there are plenty of people who are parents and unmarried. Many even live together as a family unit, but there isn't a marriage certificate connecting the parents.
Many marriages don’t last
Some people have given up on the idea of marriage because they see the high divorce rate numbers and don't think that marriage can work. They may have come from a broken home where they saw how difficult a divorce truly is, and it's the last thing that they want to go through themselves.
If you hear that 50% of all marriages end in divorces and the percentages increase for second and third marriages, it's easy to think that marriage is overrated. Why should you go through all the hassle if it isn't going to work anyway?
Marriage is not always overrated
Not all people should buy into the belief that marriage is overrated. For many people, marriage is an extremely fulfilling journey. Is marriage perfect? No. Is it something that you have to invest time into and effort into? Yes. But is it worth it in the end? It certainly can be.
Marriage isn't perfect, and it is hard. The divorce rates prove it. People don't get married to get divorced in the future, but so many couples find themselves there anyway. While you don't have to be one of them, it may also be worth considering the viewpoint that positive outcomes can stem from a divorce.
Real commitment comes from the heart; if you and your partner don’t have a foundation of deep love and trust, it’s probably not a good idea to marry them. Sadly, however, many people make this mistake, hoping that the seriousness of a legal commitment will create the abiding love and trust they lack. Of course, it’s important to remember that a legally binding document does not inherently create a real commitment.
Every relationship is hard from time to time. When you're legally bound, it's not as easy to throw in the towel, which means there is a better chance that you both decide to try working on it instead of calling it quits.
Not getting married doesn't reduce your chance of splitting up. As shared earlier, statistics show that the percentage of people who have lived with more than one person without being married has continued to increase. So, if you think that you're reducing your chance of splitting up by not putting marriage pressure on the relationship, you're possibly wrong. Splitting up is easier to do when you're not married because you don't have to go through the legal process, meaning that you're more likely to stay together if you've both committed to doing so.
All things consider, strive not to trick yourself into thinking that it will be emotionally easier to separate if you're unmarried. The end of a relationship can be damaging regardless if you're married. Trying to avoid that pain by not getting married but still being in a committed relationship may not help you in the long run.
Do you have a fear of marriage?
Although this is not the case for everyone, some people may say they believe marriage is overrated as a cover for their true feelings. That’s because, deep down, some people are afraid of getting married. Whether you’re afraid that love won’t last or that your partner may leave you, you’re not alone.
It's true that marriage is a big commitment and that it’s a decision you should take seriously. But it’s not necessarily something which you should fear. Instead of swearing off marriage completely, you can collaborate with a therapist to help work past the things that scare you about marriage. A trained therapist can help you identify where your underlying beliefs stem from and learn how to change your thoughts and fears around marriage. You can take these steps in person with therapy sessions or through talking with an online therapist. This is true whether you're currently married or just thinking about the idea.
Remember, marriage is neither inherently good nor bad. It's how you handle your marriage that determines your experience as a married person. People can have a good marriage when they focus on the important things and learn the right skills and strategies. Success is all about what you choose to focus on and how you choose to invest your time.
Online therapy for marriage concerns
If you expect your relationship to be good simply because you're married, you're likely going to be disappointed. However, if you realize that good marriages take time and energy to make successful, you may be rewarded in the end. This can be a learning process that a counselor can help you with if you're struggling.
Online therapy platforms like Regain allow users to schedule appointments at times that are compatible with their schedules, which can be advantageous for couples in long-distance relationships who would like to attend therapy together. You can meet virtually with your dedicated therapist from any location with a safe internet connection and even text them directly if you have pressing concerns.
Couples seek therapy – including online therapy – for a variety of reasons, and often with a goal to improve their overall relationship health and satisfaction. In one study, researchers found that therapy conducted via videoconferencing produced comparable positive outcomes to face-to-face therapy for participating couples. A post-intervention increase in relationship adjustment and satisfaction was reported across both cohorts, in addition to reductions in symptoms of depression, anxiety, and stress.
Takeaway
Should you get married? Should you not get married? Your answer, whatever it is, is okay. You deserve the opportunity to explore either scenario in a safe space with someone who will support you in a nonjudgmental manner. Marriage is not right for everyone, but for many people, it can be a catalyst for personal growth and fulfillment. If you’d like to discuss the pros and cons of getting married with a licensed relationship therapist, you can reach out to Regain at your convenience.
Frequently asked questions
What percentage of marriages are actually happy?
According to one longitudinal study, married people are happier than unmarried people. Across 50 years of conducting surveys, figures indicate that 36% of people who have been married at least once report feeling “very happy” while only 11% are “not too happy.” Marriage quality depends on several factors, and everyone defines happiness differently.
Further complicating the issue is the potential percentage of people who report happiness in polls, but do still end up getting divorced, whether that is due to not being honest on surveys, or a partner not expressing the same level of happiness, or another change in the relationship down the road.
Happiness is not readily quantifiable, making it difficult for researchers to definitively identify what constitutes a happy marriage, self-reporting has a reputation for being extremely informal and prone to error and difficulty in accuracy. Marriage isn’t easy to differentiate as either happy or unhappy in a clinical or objective sense, making it difficult to create accurate and up-to-date statistics regarding happy marriages.
Marriage is changing rapidly, which has also changed some definitions of happiness; previously, couples might have expressed happiness in their relationships partly due to the American dream's standard measures (marriage, children, home, etc.). These same measures are frequently not used in modern marriages, which may hold the opinion that marriage, overrated as it can be, is no longer required to be happy.
People are more likely to measure happiness in their marriage according to how much their marriage feels like a partnership, how heard and felt they seen, and how they rate their partner in terms of companionship and support.
Marriage has evolved, and, consequently, the definition of happiness within marriage has evolved. Marriage is no longer viewed as essential, apart from some specific religious or cultural paradigms. The understanding of marriage now is far closer to the notion that marriage may benefit some but is not required for happiness or fulfillment.
Is it normal to regret marriage?
Many things can lead to regretting your marriage -- some of these issues are easy to remedy, while others are more substantial and pose a risk of destroying your relationship.
Regretting a relationship can be the initial catalyst in the avalanche of issues that buries your marriage, or it can be one step toward getting what you think you want out of life. Marriage doesn’t make your life perfect or fill a gaping wound. It is healthy to experience doubt, and overcoming that doubt can lead you to feel more confident about your marriage in the long run.
Many people who regret marriage do so because they entered their marriages with unhealthy or unrealistic ideas about or expectations for marriage. For some, the question, “Is marriage overrated?” is met with a resounding “YES,” after having been in a marriage.
People who get married young often regret getting married because they were young, not because they do not want to be married. These individuals might experience some rifts in their marriages without divorcing. People who regret getting married due to their age when they marry may take some time off from their relationship or experience a sort of “second young adulthood,” in which they indulge in the behaviors and experiences they may feel they missed out on.
People who feel as though they’ve settled in marriage, whether they believe they’ve settled for someone “below” them or settled for a situation or marriage as a whole, may also regret the marriage. These individuals may be more likely to leave their marriages.
Due to settling, people who regret their marriage may feel as though they were robbed of a more attractive, successful, or compatible spouse, or may feel as though they settled for marriage when they wanted a career or another type of fulfillment from their life. Regret in these cases can be perfectly natural, even if it is not ideal.
What percent of marriages are unhappy?
If the divorce rate is believed, the percentage of unhappy marriages typically hovers somewhere around 40%-50%. These are marriages that ultimately end in divorce, so it is difficult to determine whether or not both spouses were unhappy in their marriage.
Happiness waxes and wanes in life, so marriages can be happy at one point, unhappy at another, and right back to happy a few months after that. Determining what constitutes a happy marriage invites a conversation about what it means to be happy, and whether happy marriage is required to be happy at all times (or at least generally happy).
Marriage doesn’t fix the existing relationship or mental health issues, and many couples find that they do not actually experience joy or satisfaction in marriage as initially thought they might.
What is the success rate of marriage?
One way of determining the success rate of marriage, as an institution, is to consider the divorce rates. Currently, the divorce rate is thought to hover right around the 40%-50% range, suggesting that the success rate of marriage hovers around 50%-60%. The success rates of marriage can have several caveats, including the number of marriages in question; subsequent marriages have much higher divorce rates than first marriages, with as many as 75% of third marriages ending in divorce. The thought is that once one divorce has occurred, couples are far more likely to consider it again.
The success rate of marriage is usually identified as the number of marriages that do not end in divorces, but not everyone views success in this way. Some couples consider a marriage successful even if they went through a divorce – they value the relationship for the gifts it brought into their lives and feel good about breaking up while maintaining love and compassion for one another.
Others might consider a successful marriage one that provided exactly what they were looking for at any given time before eventually being dissolved. A standard definition of success suggests that a successful marriage does not end in divorce, but marriage has evolved, and so have attitudes about marriage and divorce.
Divorce isn’t always identified as a failure, and marriage isn’t always identified as a success. Marriages can also not end in divorce but persist in making two people unhappy throughout their entire lives. Are these marriages considered successful simply because the couple did not get divorced? Asking questions such as these has changed the debate about what constitutes a successful marriage, and not everyone who gets a divorce views their divorce as a source of failure.
What is the #1 cause of divorce?
Although financial issues have long been hailed as the most common causes of divorce, a few other issues have sparked an upsurge, effectively shifting the narrative about divorce in the United States. Although financial issues are still considered a leading cost of divorce, financial issues may be accompanied by a perceived lack of commitment, infidelity on the part of one or both partners, and an inability to get along.
All of these have been identified as the leading causes of divorce. Marriage has evolved over the past 50 years, with the reasons for getting married changing dramatically during this time. 50-60 years ago, marriage was an essential part of leading a healthy, stable, and successful life.
Still, more and more people willfully choose to be single in today’s society without as great a stigma or source of embarrassment. This has led to an interesting decrease in marriage rates overall while maintaining a relatively stable divorce rate—apart from people over 55, for whom divorce rates have risen substantially.
The precise #1 cause of divorce is difficult to pinpoint because different studies and surveys provide different results. Financial issues continue to frequently make a list in polls regarding divorce, while basic incompatibility and infidelity are also frequently cited as the leading cause of divorce. Marriage has evolved, and as marriage continues to evolve, reasons for divorce experience a similar evolution, leading to a seemingly constant shift of the top reasons people find themselves getting divorced.
Marriage isn’t considered quite the same way it was regarded even 30 or 40 years ago, which has also created a shift in why people get divorced. Marriage used to be considered more essential for someone to be healthy, happy, and well-adjusted. Reasons for getting divorced had to be substantial to attain societal acceptance. Most often, unhappy spouses were limited to a string of infidelity (not necessarily a one-time or single-relationship instance of infidelity) as legitimate reasons for obtaining a divorce.
In modern society—at least in much of the Western world—reasons do not have to be so restrictive and challenging. Excessive fighting, simple incompatibility, and financial issues are considered acceptable reasons for getting a divorce compared to mere decades ago.
Is married life overrated?
Why do people prefer not to marry?
Are people happier married or unmarried?
Why do millennials not want to get married?
Why do people still get married?
What is the number one cause of conflict in marriage?
What things do most married couples argue about?
Instead of marriage, what things must be thought of as overrated?
What is the primary purpose of marriage?
What are the benefits of being married?
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