Sadhguru: We need to understand the institution of marriage. It is about bringing a certain sanctity to the simple basic needs that every human being has. Human beings have physical needs, psychological needs, economic needs, emotional needs, social needs – a variety of needs. To fulfill all these needs, we set up an institution called marriage, where all this can be conducted in a sensible manner. Marriage exists to achieve a sense of organization, aesthetic and stability.
People may debate whether marriage is needed or not when they are eighteen years of age and the physical body asks for freedom. But this is hormone-fired freedom. Between eighteen and thirty-five, when your intelligence is hijacked by hormones and the physical body is dominant, you question the fundamentals of every institution. But when you become forty-five, fifty years of age, you will be hundred percent for marriage again.
And when you were five years of age, you valued a stable marriage immensely – not your own but your parents’ marriage – because compared to any other creature, a human infant is the most helpless life and needs the maximum amount of support. You could leave a puppy on the street. As long as he gets food, he will grow up into a good dog. That is not so for a human being. A human being needs not just physical support but a variety of other support as well. Above all, a human infant needs a stable situation.
I am not saying marriage is “the thing”, but do you have a better alternative? At any point in our life, before we break any existing structure, whether it is a social structure, political structure or psychological setup in society, we must think through whether we have a better alternative system.
Without an alternative, if you break the existing structure that is working reasonably well, the situation will go crazy.
Marriage is not compulsory for everyone and it is good that young people take time to consider whether they should get married or not. You do not have to get married because everyone does. It is your choice whether you should get married or not, so choose consciously. Each individual should consider this for himself or herself, not by the social norm.
If you get into marriage and especially if you have children, you must understand it is at least a twenty-year project whether you like it or not. If your whims, fancies and emotions keep changing, do not get into such situations because a stable situation is a must for a child. If you do not have the commitment, you should not get into such a project because this is not a project you should walk into, drop halfway and walk away.
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