Quote:
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut
I'll say this, and it's advice I'll at least give to my son and probably my daughters as well.
If something is important, act like it.
I've only known a few people who have gotten divorced in my circle of friends/family (I mean, excluding my parents and then my dad again), but to a person they did some chintzy wedding or got married at the courthouse.
If your marriage is disposable, sure - treat the wedding like it is. But if it's serious, treat it like it's serious. This goes for any event. I won't go to church without at least a jacket and damn sure won't do weddings or funerals without a suit, even if I'm not in them.
Now I do agree that things have gotten excessive in a lot of ways. But it was important to me that I make a sacrifice to get that ring. I ended up having to wait another 6-7 years to get a motorcycle because the money I'd have spent on it, I spent on her ring instead. I could've spent a couple hundred bucks and still been married, but again - if it's important, act like it.
I also understand people that think that's a load of shit. But I'm betting more of them end up divorced than people that look at it like I do. Put some skin in the game or how serious about this are you, really? And if you're not serious enough to make a sacrifice, you probably shouldn't be getting married.
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I've been rolling this around in my head a bit and IMO this doesn't accurately depict the skin in the game.
If you have Elvis marry you in Vegas drive through chapel the night you meet someone, you obviously don't have any skin in the game and chances are probably higher that it'll end poorly.
OTOH, if you date someone for a year or two, give up your personal space to live together, spend money on dates and gifts and so forth... and the get engaged, that's quite a bit of skin in the game already, no? Does paying 3 month's salary on top of that really change anything?
Or to turn that around.... if you met someone at a bar tonight, bought a $10k ring for her and got engaged.... you wouldn't expect throwing $10k into a 6 hour relationship is going to help anything, right? And if it did, probably not for good reasons.
I think there is sometimes a psychological component to it, like Buehler mentioned... dress for success or for the occasion. Granted, my wardrobe was pretty casual before working from home all the time, so can't exactly say I abide by it.