So, in the past few months, I have received over a dozen wedding invitations from friends in my high school graduating class. Over a dozen 20 and 21-year-olds are taking the big step in starting a family and a life before they begin their first career, before their undergraduate degree is complete and definitely before I even started thinking about marriage.

However, by the eighth invitation, I all of a sudden felt this extreme anxiety — the anxiety a parent is sure to feel when his or her child seems to be missing certain benchmarks like talking on time. Was I not getting married on time, and, in that case, had I failed at being a male?

However, after about an hour or so, I snapped out of the stupor and realized that, for me, not being at a place of marriage was actually the right place to be, not only for me, but perhaps for many of my friends who sent me wedding invitations. In fact, this hour of anxiety lead me to re-examine the idea of marriage in America.

So, let’s talk about … marriage. What is the purpose of marriage?

I believe in today’s society it has become merely a relationship benchmark: First  date, second date, three months later meet the parents; six months-a year later, engagement; a year-two years later, marriage (with moving in together often squeezed in either before or after the engagement).

Marriage becomes the ultimate commitment. Men are considered jackasses and are pressured by their family and friends if they do not propose quickly enough. Women are considered weak and, for lack of a better word, stupid if they keep dating someone long after the expected time of the engagement.

Marriage becomes this ultimate pressure and can often create a destructive tension in a beautifully blooming relationship.

Monogamy doesn’t seem good enough without the marriage certificate. Commitment doesn’t seem  good enough without the marriage certificate. Love, itself, doesn’t seem good enough without the marriage certificate.

Everything rests on marriage in our society … a relationship’s ultimate goal. This is why I felt the anxiety after receiving the eighth invitation — I was tied, with many Americans, for the last place in relationship’s game.

Now, up to this point, I am sure you are all simply brushing me off as another guy who hates marriage because he fears commitment.
If this was me in high school, I would have had to agree with that assessment of my personality.

However, I am writing this article as a guy who would enjoy commitment. Monogamy is a challenging and unusual event. Studies show that only 3-5 percent of mammals are known to form lifelong pair bonds. Males are biologically designed to spread their genes, while women are biologically designed to seek the best genes. Therefore, searching relationship longevity is a battle with nature that I will and have enjoyed taking, despite the dopamine driven roller coaster of love. For when the battle is won, your ultimate reward is this amazing bond that cannot be broken by anything but death … and sometimes not even that.

So yes, I want that emotional connection eventually … I believe that everyone should reach that goal once in his or her life.

However, I find that to be the goal — mutual love and commitment without stipulations, without a contract, without an ultimatum, without societal pressures, without sex.

A love that strong should be both the means and the ends of building a relationship … marriage should be the possible reward and not the necessary goal of a strong relationship.

If you cannot love and trust your partner’s commitment without a certificate, then the certificate will be merely a piece of paper.

Recap: Love = Goal; Marriage = A Lagniappe reward.