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Finding Peace

I had not heard of the anti-bride movement but it sounds quite sad - all the pomp and circumstance of a wedding without any anchoring tradition that people (including the bride) maybe familiar with. It would make more sense if the whole business was frugal and simple but that is clearly not the objective. It is as if not dressing like a bride and skipping the rituals of marriage will de-risk from bad outcomes. The bridal and wedding industry is making just as much money and the bride best have a very good prenup no matter now truly, deeply and madly she is in love. My friend T who is in her 60s now said something the other day that resonated with me. Historically and until quite recently, marriage and love were not meant, required or expected to intersect. 

Marriage was a family and social obligation - the true nature of the union most evident in royal alliances but the same construct applied for the rest of the population - the stakes were much lower but the union had to bring some tangible, material value to each side. The success of the union was not measured by how deeply the two loved each other getting in or along the way. They figured it out. All this pressure centering marriage in T's opinion comes from overloading the institution and asking to deliver all kind of things its not meant to. Imagine you accept a job offer and expect to find God by working that job and when you don't you feel like your whole life a big mistake and failure. That would sound a bit ridiculous. Maybe the anti-bride folks need to think  more like T about marriage and find peace.

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