My parents are still married and have been for over forty years. Without their commitment to each other and their family, I’m not sure I’d be where I am today. As much as I respect their story, I know that the rules of dating have changed.
To expect my dating experience would be anything like theirs has been one mistake I’ve made in my love life.
You’ll never have the same marriage as your parents and that is a good thing.
In the Ebook, Find The Love of Your Life, released by Ami Santosh, the author tackles modern dating for South Asian American women who have spent their formative years growing up in the U.S.
No matter your culture everyone is affected by the stigmas of tradition when it comes to marriage. What the book challenges, which everyone can relate to, is recognizing that times have changed and creating your own plan for partnership, when it comes to love, is not only important but necessary. Married by 25 with 2.5 kids, a stable career and a vacation home – to many this is the American dream and to some their parent’s marriage but very unrealistic for this day and age.
If you’re like me you realize that, in the current environment, the path to marriage and a family isn’t going to look like anything you’ve seen before.
You won’t be married by 30 like you’re parents.
Being over 30 doesn’t mean your life is over. Society has long condemned single women in their thirties believing that once you hit your thirties a man can consider a marriage to you a charitable contribution. The idea that a woman might be thirty and single, with no boyfriend is a foreign idea. Despite the fact that it’s becoming the norm, the marketing for marriage still invalidates the single woman.
What I’ve learned as a dating coach, and blogger is that falling in love and being married are not mutually exclusive. You can love multiple people in your lifetime and not feel pressured to marry the first one. Famed psychotherapist Esther Perel says, “ You can love more people than you can build a life with.” Being over thirty and single doesn’t mean you haven’t found love, been loved or loved. It only means you didn’t make commitment your sole priority and that’s ok.
You won’t want to have kids like your parents.
The rush to get married, before the baby was born, was the original planned parenthood. In our world today numerous single men and women have children. Families are merged from the result of pre-marital sex and divorce giving us more family options than ever before. You no longer need to be married to have children. Unlike your parents you have options when it comes to family planning that don’t have to include a legal union.
A report from the National Center for Health Statistics shows that people living in urban areas are waiting longer to have their first child than people in the suburbs or rural areas. The need or pressure to have children before marriage, or even a career, has waned in cities and women are opting to delay motherhood. Unlike their parents, whom at the age you are now likely had one child or more.
You won’t be settled in your career like your parents.
In her book, Find The Love of Your Life (For South Asian American Women), Ami Santosh also explains the pressures of pursuing a career even to the detriment of finding love. A saga most single professionals understand.
You will not stay with the same company for 30 years like your parents. The average millennial will have their first job for less than 3 years. You will travel, you will get into debt, you will leave a job you hate, you will find a better job, you will start your own business, or you will be successful and still feel insecure in your career.
After graduate school, medical school, and possibly years of working abroad you might find the opportunity to settle down and get married. Maybe.
The traditions of marriage have served us well for a long time. Marriage has supported numerous industries from housing, to travel, jewelry sales, and life insurance but with obvious flaws. For better or worse, single men and women today can’t date the way their parents did and we all need to come to terms with that. The alternative however, is the freedom to fall in love and build community in leu of a siloed family unit.
Single adults contribute more to their communities, social causes, and politics over any other demographic. Not having a marriage doesn’t mean that you won’t find love or companionship.Your story is your own so you should break it to your parents that grand kids might not be included.