Engagement Vs. What?!
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Side 2
Side 2
Side 1 says...
I've officially been dating my boyfriend for a little over 3 years. I'm a few weeks away from being 21, and he is almost 22.
He has said from a while back that he wouldn't like to be with any other girl and that he is 100% sure that I'm the one he wants to marry. I feel the same about him.
I'd ideally get engaged now, and we would then have a longer engagement - we're both studying and working and getting our careers in shape, I just want the engagement to go ahead just as an extension of expressing our love and commitment to one another.
Now, in my mind, when a guy and a girl reach this conclusion, it usually leads to a proposal. Because in essence, an engagement is when two people both agree that one day they intend to be married.
Let me also say that I do not want a wedding any time soon. Let me add to this that I would get married to him tomorrow, or a heartbeat! But I understand that a wedding right now is a bad time for both of us. To even think about sitting down and actually comprehending planning the event any time soon would be unrealistic right now. We're both in transition periods with studying and work. But what's wrong with a long engagement?! My parents were engaged for 7 years, and they're still together today.
So the only thing we argue about is the fact that we both can't understand each others points of view on this.
In my mind, I'm giving valid reasons why an engagement is a logical and due step right now: we love each other, we're best friends, we spend every moment together and never get sick of each other... and we both want to marry in the future and never be with anyone else. I just feel like we're mentally engaged but he doesn't want to actually say it out loud to anyone else. This tends to make me upset even though I know he has a bad association with the whole term since he's American (I'm Australian) and many of this friends have been married, divorced and re-married at a very young age, as well as both this parents.
But his argument is that engagement is synonymous to marriage and is a commitment that he can't comprehend making right now... SIGH!
I just see other people I know getting engaged after knowing each other for a few months, and here I am over 3 years into it and just as in love as ever and wondering why I can't have that too!
He has said from a while back that he wouldn't like to be with any other girl and that he is 100% sure that I'm the one he wants to marry. I feel the same about him.
I'd ideally get engaged now, and we would then have a longer engagement - we're both studying and working and getting our careers in shape, I just want the engagement to go ahead just as an extension of expressing our love and commitment to one another.
Now, in my mind, when a guy and a girl reach this conclusion, it usually leads to a proposal. Because in essence, an engagement is when two people both agree that one day they intend to be married.
Let me also say that I do not want a wedding any time soon. Let me add to this that I would get married to him tomorrow, or a heartbeat! But I understand that a wedding right now is a bad time for both of us. To even think about sitting down and actually comprehending planning the event any time soon would be unrealistic right now. We're both in transition periods with studying and work. But what's wrong with a long engagement?! My parents were engaged for 7 years, and they're still together today.
So the only thing we argue about is the fact that we both can't understand each others points of view on this.
In my mind, I'm giving valid reasons why an engagement is a logical and due step right now: we love each other, we're best friends, we spend every moment together and never get sick of each other... and we both want to marry in the future and never be with anyone else. I just feel like we're mentally engaged but he doesn't want to actually say it out loud to anyone else. This tends to make me upset even though I know he has a bad association with the whole term since he's American (I'm Australian) and many of this friends have been married, divorced and re-married at a very young age, as well as both this parents.
But his argument is that engagement is synonymous to marriage and is a commitment that he can't comprehend making right now... SIGH!
I just see other people I know getting engaged after knowing each other for a few months, and here I am over 3 years into it and just as in love as ever and wondering why I can't have that too!
Added by queenjane (female)
Side 2 says...
To start, I do understand and respect what my girlfriend has to say regarding the matter. In fact, I am lucky to have a woman who I adore and love greatly, continually out-loving me (not in the sense that I don't love her enough, but in the sense that she is infinitely loving.) It's fantastic. However, I don't think I am yet in the mental or emotion space to even begin with engagements.
I feel young. I cherish my youth. I don't like the thought of losing the great feeling of being a young person. Throughout my life marriage has formed itself as one of those things associated with "growing up" just like "getting a real job" or building good credit. I don't view my relationship with her this way, but I feel like such things are to happen in due time. And that isn't taking her for granted. My parents divorced when I was 14 years old. They have had several divorces under their belts and started with being married at an early age. My sisters have followed similar paths of young marriage and have had their share of hard times. I haven't been one to follow any of their paths in the slightest nor do I intend to follow. In fact, it scares the hell out of me. I feel like there must be something in life more than what everyone does. More than what is safe. A sort of destiny I am meant to find that fits into who I am rather than what everyone expects. Sounds pretty haphazard huh? So I don't want to commit to an engagement as I am embarking on a life I have no vague idea about.
I want to get engaged close to the time of marriage. Not something like 7 years before the event. If I think back 7 years I can barely even remember if that was actually me or just some character out of a book I have read 10 or so times. Life is a journey of constant evolution of everything you are, especially at my age I believe (21). How can I commit to something so large 7 years in the future? Or even 4? I want to feel in my mind and heart that it is the right thing to do and that I am completely ready to make that kind of commitment. And that is when I will be able give that relationship it's due time and attention. Not to say that I don't want to be with her. There are just so many things that need to happen in my life before I arrive at that stage. I hope and ask that she can wait for that to happen. And yes, I have given her a timeframe of this. I haven't just left her in the dark. I said I would probably be ready to get married by my late 20's.
Regarding telling people that I am engaged, it isn't that I don't want to tell people. I just don't feel the term fits right in who I am at this current point in time. I am a guy with a fantastic girlfriend. Not a soon-to-be-married man.
And to conclude, I am certainly not getting engaged because all these youngsters think whimsical engagements are quite the festivity.
I feel young. I cherish my youth. I don't like the thought of losing the great feeling of being a young person. Throughout my life marriage has formed itself as one of those things associated with "growing up" just like "getting a real job" or building good credit. I don't view my relationship with her this way, but I feel like such things are to happen in due time. And that isn't taking her for granted. My parents divorced when I was 14 years old. They have had several divorces under their belts and started with being married at an early age. My sisters have followed similar paths of young marriage and have had their share of hard times. I haven't been one to follow any of their paths in the slightest nor do I intend to follow. In fact, it scares the hell out of me. I feel like there must be something in life more than what everyone does. More than what is safe. A sort of destiny I am meant to find that fits into who I am rather than what everyone expects. Sounds pretty haphazard huh? So I don't want to commit to an engagement as I am embarking on a life I have no vague idea about.
I want to get engaged close to the time of marriage. Not something like 7 years before the event. If I think back 7 years I can barely even remember if that was actually me or just some character out of a book I have read 10 or so times. Life is a journey of constant evolution of everything you are, especially at my age I believe (21). How can I commit to something so large 7 years in the future? Or even 4? I want to feel in my mind and heart that it is the right thing to do and that I am completely ready to make that kind of commitment. And that is when I will be able give that relationship it's due time and attention. Not to say that I don't want to be with her. There are just so many things that need to happen in my life before I arrive at that stage. I hope and ask that she can wait for that to happen. And yes, I have given her a timeframe of this. I haven't just left her in the dark. I said I would probably be ready to get married by my late 20's.
Regarding telling people that I am engaged, it isn't that I don't want to tell people. I just don't feel the term fits right in who I am at this current point in time. I am a guy with a fantastic girlfriend. Not a soon-to-be-married man.
And to conclude, I am certainly not getting engaged because all these youngsters think whimsical engagements are quite the festivity.
Added by QueenJaneApprox (male)
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