Dating to Marry - A Youth's Perspective

Dating to Marry: A Youth's Perspective.

As a 15-year-old, I've always been fond of the idea of ‘dating to marry’, but is that even possible for this generation? 

This is something that has been on my mind these past weeks, as I've recently been through a breakup and I realized how pointless dating really is if you can't see a future with said person. Why would you put such time and effort into someone if you couldn't see a possible future with them? It just doesn't make sense to me. But then I realized how much our generation lacks commitment and communication skills.

We (as in Gen Z) have been raised on technology. So much so that we depend on it to communicate with others. We lack the ability to communicate with people face-to-face because everything we've done for the past few years has been online, including talking. We haven't really had to deal with social interactions because most of them have been online—at least since COVID-19. 

Lots of people get turned off when they hear the words ‘dating to marry’, which leads me to believe that those people don't truly understand the foundations and basics of dating. Ultimately, the goal of dating (if you believe in monogamous relationships) is to find a lifelong partner—someone who you can laugh with, live with, and have children with (if that's something you want). It doesn't necessarily mean you're heading into a relationship knowing you're going to marry this person—but you head into it hoping that this person will end up being the one—your person.

I know some people aren't fond of the idea of marriage; therefore, this idea—dating to marry—may turn them off, but it's not about marriage. It's about dating someone exclusively and long-term (in my opinion). Therefore, using the term ‘marriage’ makes the most sense to describe this type of relationship, as marriage (by definition) is the legal or formal recognized union of two people as partners in a personal relationship. 

That being said, I wish more people my age were actually looking for a long term relationship - I just find it so silly how people will put so much time into someone when they know it isn't going to be a long term thing. Why waste your time like that? 

I have nothing against people who aren't fond of dating to marry, but I'm just so curious as to why. I understand wanting to experience life at its fullest before settling down, and It's hard to do that when you're in a relationship, as you may feel a responsibility towards them, and depending on your lifestyle, you may just be more of a hookup type person or a sexually experimentive person - but I'm not, and I guess that's why It’s just so hard for me to understand. 

Anyways, that's my ramble for today! let me know what ur opinions are, if you have any -- I would love to talk about this more with likeminded (or not) people! :3