Why Should I Marry?

Dear Racheli,

I’m a 32-year-old semi-religious Jew who has read Rabbi Arush’s wonderful books. As a result, I have begun to strengthen my emuna and connection to Hashem. However, even though I know the Torah says people should get married, I have to say that I’m quite content not to. I don’t feel any lack in my life and see no reason why I can’t focus on strengthening my Judaism without having a wife. Furthermore, I enjoy my personal freedom to travel and do what I want, when I want. I feel like I won’t be able to do that with a wife and kids. Being that I can’t see any obvious benefit to getting married, why should I?

Josh

Ummm…. You know, Josh, I gotta be honest with you. Sometimes I wonder the same thing. Especially when I drag myself back and forth between preparing food, washing dishes, and picking up trails of pumpkin seeds and stinky socks left all around the house. You can’t imagine how irritated I get when my kids frantically start looking for their lost shoes three minutes after they were supposed to be on their way to school. Or when my oldest repeatedly calls me from school telling me he’s hungry, even though I sent him plenty of food.

But no worries, Josh! You’re not a woman and probably won’t experience these frustrations. I mean, whoever heard of a man putting stuff back in its place? Not me, no sirreee!!

Are you offended by my sarcasm? Great! Let’s continue.

So, why should you get married?

Okay, I’m seriously wracking my brain with this one… gotta come up with some convincing reason… hopefully these will work…

Josh, I assume that you might know one or two couples that are divorced. And maybe that has slightly (sarcasm again) tainted your views on marriage. I can’t say that I blame you. With all of the pain, broken dreams, broken childhoods, and disillusionment that comes with divorce, it’s a wonder anyone bothers to marry at all.

So when you look at it from a strictly practical point of view, you’re right. Marriage doesn’t make much sense. Sure, it might legitimize the relationship, but these days most people don’t feel that social pressure, even if they have kids. It seems that being in a relationship with a less messy way out would be preferable, because people fall in and out of love all the time.

Here’s something that many single people don’t realize. They take for granted that the love they feel for each other will always be there. Maybe in some way they realize that they’ll need to work to keep their love alive, but it’s a vague concept that comes with little or no practical direction, other than “give each other more attention.”

So first, let’s talk about the #1 Wrong Expectation that people have when they get married, and why it can easily lead to divorce. Are you ready?

The #1 Wrong Expectation according to many years of intensive research by the Iraqi Love Institute (headed by me, of course) is that people marry because they want someone to love them and give them attention.

What’s wrong with that? Here, let me rephrase it: they want someone to love them and give them attention. Instead of two people looking to give, they’re entering a marriage looking to receive. This creates a downward spiral that I fondly refer to as the Marital Black Hole. (OMGawwd how do I come up with this stuff??) The more they’re looking to receive, the less they’re satisfied and the less they’re focused on giving, and on and on ad infinitum.

Now that you understand how the original approach to marriage is rooted in selfishness, I’ll show you how you factor in to all this self-glorification that you young single folk suffer from.

Josh, your approach to life is all about how you can make yourself happy and meet your self’s needs. You are not in a giving state of mind, particularly because you are a man. (Oh, boy, I’m gonna get some hate mail for this one!) Men, by nature, have the tendency to be more self-oriented than women. Was that PC enough? Self-oriented is better than selfish or self-centered, right?

Women, by nature, have the tendency to be more giving. Unfortunately, many men take for granted the fact that their wives do all the womanly chores while they’re off being men and bringin’ the bread home. What-eva. But the women put up with these archaic caveman attitudes because they’re masochists just so darned righteous.

Hashem recognized this fatal flaw in men, i.e., the lack of appreciation and prevalence of selfishness. Therefore He proclaimed to all men, “Thou shalt get married and learn to give to another!” To which I answer, “A-MEN!”

Josh, marriage is the main opportunity for you to learn to see outside of yourself, to compromise, to give beyond what you thought you were capable of, to love, to be vulnerable to another’s love, and especially to fully enjoy the beauty in marriage that Hashem intended for you as a man.

Marriage is about growth, both within yourself and as a couple. Especially for this generation that is so unbelievably rooted in selfishness, marriage is the best way to fix that. Hashem didn’t create you just so you could do what you want, when you want. He created you so that you can learn from life, grow, work on being a better person, and reach your full potential as a man.

A man that has never had the challenge of a wife and children cannot understand how much of himself he has not yet developed. He cannot see that he is in reality not a complete man. And like everything else in life, the only way to grow and evolve is to go through challenges.

I have to add one more thing. While living the single life feels great now, and I admit I’m a little teensy bit jealous, you don’t want to look back on your life and think, “What have I accomplished?” A great career is nice, but did you change anyone’s life? Did you bring new souls into the word and invest years of blood, sweat, and lots of tears in raising them? Did you do everything you could to make your wife happy?

Think about it. Do you really think Hashem went to the trouble of creating you and all of the situations around you just so you could not do anything significant in your lifetime?

The first thing I would suggest is that you re-evaluate what you want out of life. Think long term, as in longer than next week. Remember, maturity and selfishness have an inverse relationship. When one goes up, the other goes down. It’s kinda like my bank account and my shoe collection. Except I wouldn’t dare think of reversing my shoe collection.

The next thing you should do is read The Garden of Peace, Rav Arush’s marital guide for men. Trust me, no one’s going to give it to you straight like he does. But if you take his advice, I am confident that you will have a beautiful, loving marriage that will be filled with blessings! And hopefully lots of stinky socks.

Looking forward to being the guest of honor at your wedding!

Racheli