As a moderately successful businessman, friends often ask me if they should quit their jobs and start their own businesses. My answer to the question when phrased that way is always “No”, because it’s a sign that their focus is wrong. If you’re asking about starting your own business before you’ve got a business idea and plan in which you have the right combination of confidence and passion to devote your life to it, then you’re by definition not ready.
Marriage is, I think, much the same. “Should I get married” ought to be answered with “no”, whereas “should I marry person X” is another matter.
If, with respect to a specific would-be spouse you’re already in a relationship with, you can imagine any set of circumstances which would lead either one of you to file for divorce, then you should consider this concern an absolute bar to marriage, and not get married until it’s been dispensed with.
And although the cost of divorce is higher for men than for women, the same rule applies equally for both.
If you’re not BOTH committed to be in it for life, come what may, then at least one of you lacks the emotional maturity to handle marriage. And if you’re not sure whether the other party is as committed as you are, then you don’t know them well enough to marry them.
Marriage used to work in spite of the frequent lack of considerations like this because divorce was way harder than it is now, and unilateral divorce was harder still. But society changed the rules, cut away the safety net, and now we must rely far more on ourselves and our ability to discern the necessary qualities in a partner.
