Most young men and women complain of difficulties in finding life partners. A right partner is the basis for a happy and stable family life. Happy marriage has become a dream difficult to achieve for both men and women.
Our social customs require that a man who aims at leading a family life prepare a well-furnished apartment with all accessories in line with his financial standing before he begins to think of marriage. The money spent by the bridegroom on the wedding and other requirements vary depending upon the demands made by the girl’s family. The girl’s parents will naturally select the most financially eligible man from a number of suitors. Most young men find it impossible to satisfy the financially unrealistic expectations of girls’ families. For this very reason, both men and women in this region remain unmarried, even past the age of 30.
The hurdles blocking the way to matrimony have led to the emergence of marriage bureaus which help people find suitable partners. Men and women register their names in these bureaus and provide personal details in addition to various conditions their partners should fulfill. Marriage bureaus operate like the matchmakers of the past though they differ in several respects. The matchmakers were often ignorant women who strove to arrange marriages among their limited neighbors or acquaintances with little regard for the interests or temperaments of the couple. On the other hand, the bureaus are much broader in perspective and operate in a more sensible style. When the bureau comes across a suitable mate for a client, it arranges a meeting between them to make sure that they can be good partners.
It has been proven beyond doubt that marriages arranged by the bureaus are more successful than other marriages. The bureau differs from tradition in the sense that there is no interference by either parents or relatives. Emotions play no role in the selection of a partner.
Some people, however, hesitate to seek the help of the bureaus because they believe that it is degrading to a human being to be offered as a commodity in the marriage market. On the other hand, these people are not aware that the success rate in such marriages is very high. Our young men and women should realize that it is wrong to be forced to remain unmarried and that there is nothing degrading in seeking help from marriage bureaus.
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Recently I received a request for help from a highly educated woman showing great insight into the working of the human mind and its visible manifestations. She pleaded with me to suggest a solution for the problems in her married life.
She wrote in a desperate tone: "I am frustrated to the point of suicide. I feel that I am a worthless woman. The feeling that I have destroyed my husband’s life oppresses me. Though he does not say as much, I feel that that is what he thinks all the time. He is currently teaching painting at a school in a neighboring Gulf country. He had to abandon his ambition to be a painter because of the burden of a family life. Though he has succeeded in making a fair amount of money, he has become a man with no spirit or interest in anything. He does not find pleasure in life. We never talk about anything but our savings or the things we have acquired. There are no genuine emotions, no dreams, no lively discussions. The liveliness has gone out of our relations. For him our relations have become mechanical movements.
"I know him very well. I can read the thoughts in his mind because we have been in love since our secondary school days and we married while we were in college. I started working while he was fully engrossed in his painting. He could not earn money from that as no one bought his paintings. He would not accept money from his parents. On the contrary, he wanted to prove to them that he could manage his affairs on his own. By that time I had had our first child. Lack of money forced him to accept a job in a neighboring country. Though he spoke about his dreams of becoming a famous painter in the early days, our circumstances gradually made him give up his ambitions.
"At the same time, I was shocked to realize that he had not married me because he loved me but to show his parents that he was strong. I knew his parents were a terror to him and that he always wanted to get away from them. Though he showed a bold exterior, at heart he was afraid of everything.
"Another disturbing thing I realized was that he put me in his mother’s role. It was because he never got her tender affection; she was very stern and harsh to her children so he was looking for a mother’s unquestioning love from his wife! It was too late before I discovered this. Now I remember the way he boasted about his plans and ambitions in the early days of our marriage — like a child describes his plans to his mother. It was the child in his heart who wanted to marry me in order to put me in his mother’s place.
"Now he realizes that by marrying me he has wasted his opportunities in life. I should have realized his fears and weakness and served as a strong pillar in his struggle to achieve his goals. I should have offered him the moral support to work hard until he achieved his dream instead of allowing him to wreck his career in a school. I shattered my own ambitions for higher studies in my haste for marriage and family life. Both our lives have been wrecked."
Finally she asked me if there were any way to salvage their lives and have a normal marriage. I replied that it was not late to work for the fulfillment of their dreams. Since they had saved some money, they could return home to make a fresh start. I also suggested that she try her hand at writing since her letter showed a certain flair.
