owlolive

Well, it’s official: the odds of your marriage working out in Kuwait can no longer be determined by a coin toss. Now you can have the reassuring pleasure of knowing that a damning 60% of all marriages in Kuwait end in divorce.

Shocker.

Look, let’s not beat around the bush here: we all know Kuwait has something of a problem when it comes to domestic management. The problem has now grown into a festering, contagious sore that has worked itself into a lot of societal aspects that are both inside and outside the home. These problems can all probably be summed up concisely in the following word: misprioritization.

As in we have completely missed the priority train. Especially the ‘Marriage’ trolley car. And, yes, I’m totally committing to this train metaphor.

Point is! These horrifying statistics for failed marriages in Kuwait are not a surprise and, really, will only continue to increase unless we wise up and cut it out with the harmfully pressurizing, and, let’s admit it, pretty damn annoying social habits. The most annoying of which include:

• Making women feel like they have an expiration date and so they MUST marry by a certain age or else, I don’t know, their milk will go sour?
• Choosing your future spouse based upon how fancy-shmancy their car is, the amount of money they have in the bank, their last name, THEIR RACIAL LINEAGE. You know, your basic pointless and borderline elitist/racist stuff.
• Women making money their end goal, and men making, well, as the article put it, “physical intimacy” theirs.
• The belief that two people don’t need to be engaged for an extended period of time before tieing the knot. A year is about as acceptable as it usually gets. This is especially harmful in traditional marriages in which the two people don’t really know squat about one another.
• Men being expected to afford a wedding and a forthcoming lifestyle that is fitting of freaking royalty. Therefore being forced to take out loans and bury himself in debt from the get-go, and basically starting the marriage off on a wonderfully easy, carefree, and so not bitter note.
• Having babies a second after you get married.

Obviously the list is a lot longer and, of course, does not apply to every single married couple in Kuwait. These are just a few of the problems that I’ve heard of and witnessed for myself a number of times.

But here’s the bottom line: the culprit behind that sad statistic is undoubtedly our severely misplaced priorities.

Married couples (or people thinking about becoming a married couple) need to get one thing straight: marriage is not a game. In fact, it’s more like a freaking battlefield. A lovely, exciting, and worthwhile battlefield (for some), but a battlefield nonetheless. Just because you have money or status or physical attraction does not mean you’re going to survive the war.

And if that’s ALL you have then forget about it.

Contrary to what a certain government campaign will tell you, marriage should NOT come first. What should is education, independent life experiences, career development, emotional and intellectual maturity, living compatibility, and about a hundred other things.

Once all of those little tidbits are worked out completely THEN we can start considering something as serious as a total life commitment to a single person every day for the rest of your time on this planet.

So, for all the sacred, beautiful bonds (and immense responsibilities) which marriage represents, please get your priorities straight, guys. And maybe don’t listen to the government all the time.

All my love!