I’ve thoroughly enjoyed articles by people declaring they ain’t getting married anytime soon & their 49 reasons why.
My take on it is the ‘I got married at 25 & I love it’ article.
Because a lot of older people talk about marriage, but not enough young people.
Young people really really don’t want to get married.
And I get it, it kinda sucks. Especially in India.
The wedding & marriage process really does go against what most of us believe in.
But I worry we’re rebelling too hard against it.
So, I have something to say about marriage. It’s not about my relationship, it’s about my work.
Marriage is the ultimate leverage.
Being married plays a big part in me being able to pursue writing.
Could I have written even if I was single? OBVIOUSLY
But could I personally have done it with such peace of mind? NEVER
I’m a worrier, it’s what I do.
When I got laid off in 2021, I worryingly made tons of bad decisions for myself. I considered jobs, clients, low payments & a lifestyle that I shouldn’t have out of immense fear of uncertainty.
Now, at that point, I’d been dating my partner for a few months & so, helping each other out financially wasn’t the first thing that occurred to us.
So every time I would spiral about my unemployed situation, listing out all the reasons why I probably would never make money ever again & why I should definitely take a low-paying content writing job,
we were only thinking about me as an individual.
Until we realized the power of two.
“One can take on risk while the other is stable” is the phrase that we like to use.
How small & limiting life would be if we all felt like we were on our own? That my getting laid off was mine & only my problem to deal with.
And my partner’s abundance was his & only his to enjoy.
It’s a matter of pure luck that the tech industry happens to compensate employees really really well, offers a level of stability & that my partner just happened to have been interested in computer science.
It’s just money until you try to make more of it.
And that money gave me the confidence to pursue self-employment.
My partner really doesn’t mind his tech job at the moment (with their 5-star food, hybrid policies & free transportation.)
I always say “If you’re gonna have a job, make sure it’s a great one.
But I’d like to believe that the employment status in this equation actually has little to do with it all. But the financial situation does.
Now, I never actually took money for expenses & the most I benefited financially from was not having to pay for date night.
But it helped me keep going. It helped me not make the worst decisions during my lowest months (both emotionally & financially)
I don’t know if I would be here if I didn’t have to worry.
I think I would have taken a job.
Because everytime I worried about all the big picture stuff like a house, taking care of my parents, having kids etc & and the small picture stuff like ‘will I ever be able to travel again’, ‘Will I ever be able to have craft beer’, 'will I ever be able to move out’,
All the stuff that makes people cave & go back to what they were escaping,
I knew that if it came to it, I can use my leverage.
I’ve struggled a lot to say these things.
Because I feel like a fraud who used the safety net available to them. Especially one that was available because of full-time employment.
I feel like an anti-feminist to say I considered depending on my partner.
I feel like I’m lazy for not taking the harder way through.
But very few people have done this without some form of privilege & leverage.
There are people who had a 6-figure net worth when they quit their job.
There are people who came from prestigious universities/jobs that they then publicized to market their services.
There are people who had jobs that gave them access to everyone they would ever need to be successful when they went independent.
We all have something that helped us or gave us a push. Some more than others. This is just mine.
Partnership & marriage has been my biggest leverage.
And it continues to be.
My payments are sporadic, we would never be able to pay our credit card bill if we didn’t have another source of predictable income.
When we were renting, we fully leveraged my partner’s employer's name to give us an edge.
(In Bangalore’s cut-throat renting market, I doubt I would have been able to get the house I want, telling them I’m a freelancer.)
Anytime I fall under the trap of taking on more work to make more money, my partner looks at me and asks ‘What would we do with more?’
Two has been greater than one in my case.
It has been since the day we realized we’re in this for the long haul. Marriage itself hasn’t changed anything but partnership has.
So, maybe you can consider it.
Wow - I love this! Your story is definitely uncommon but it gives a refreshing perspective and hope for many young women: we don’t have to pitch our careers against marriage/partnership. Thank you for showing us how both can be figured out simultaneously