Love and marriage… romantic, simple, and complicated. Aren’t they! Here are 8 [tag]questions you should ask before marriage[/tag] to tease out some of the mystery that invariably surrounds such a step into the unknown.

Ideas about of what is most important in marriage vary across cultures, times and places, so before we assume that our ideas are correct, or even better, we should ask ourselves how we have come by them.

And the answer is actually pretty straightforward – television, movies, books and magazines. The media!

Most of us in Western cultures believe that love is the crucial matter in marriage because this idea has been drilled into us from childhood. In Eastern cultures such as India, arranged marriages are the norm.

Why? Because those are the dominant paradigms of the media in those places.

In Western media, for example, parents who object to the love choices of their children are made to appear selfish and wrong. Such considerations as differences in family or social position are made to seem unimportant.

When young people defy their parents or their traditions and marry for love, we applaud. The movies or magazines have been presented in ways that make us feel that we should.

And do you know what? The movies, stories, and ads present this point of view because it is in line with what we already believe, and want to keep on believing.

Back of it all is the very powerful force of public opinion. The fiction is accepted because that is the way marriage choices seem to work out in real life.

Look at the movie The Notebook, for example. A lovely, heart-rending emotional tale of love between two people from the opposite sides of the tracks. Oh, if only our marriage could be as wonderful, we sigh.

Unfortunately, real life statistics show that such love matches do not always work out very well. Even in the stories, the glamorous Romeo, whom the girl left all to marry, was sometimes presented as little more than an attractive and exciting tramp.

Of course, the movie or the story stops at a certain point. What happens next? In real life, too often the story deteriorates. After the marriage he may desert her and their children and leave them without financial or emotional support for months or even years at a time. Or the opposite… a lone father left to bring up motherless children.

To help you separate some of the fact from fiction in your own relationship, consider these 8 questions you should ask before marriage.

Assess Your Readiness for Marriage

  • Are you both old enough to marry?
  • Are you close enough in age to each other?
  • Can you pull your own weight?
  • Are you both sufficiently disciplined with reference to money and property?
  • Are you socially adequate?
  • Are you vocationally competent?
  • How important is education?
  • Are you qualified for parenthood?

They might seem pretty basic questions. And they are so basic that most people flip them off as irrelevant.

But think about them. Decide how you feel and how you think your partner feels. Then discuss them…. and be prepared for some surprises.

For such simple little questions, they can get down very deep into your true compatibility. And therefore your potential for a happy and successful marriage.

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