Here's an interesting article by Lori Gottlieb for The Atlantic about waiting for Mr. Right (and run the risk of him never showing up) or settling down with Mr. Good Enough:
Of course, we’d be loath to admit it in this day and age, but ask any soul-baring 40-year-old single heterosexual woman what she most longs for in life, and she probably won’t tell you it’s a better career or a smaller waistline or a bigger apartment. Most likely, she’ll say that what she really wants is a husband (and, by extension, a child). [...]
Oh, I know—I’m guessing there are single 30-year-old women reading this right now who will be writing letters to the editor to say that the women I know aren’t widely representative, that I’ve been co-opted by the cult of the feminist backlash, and basically, that I have no idea what I’m talking about. And all I can say is, if you say you’re not worried, either you’re in denial or you’re lying. In fact, take a good look in the mirror and try to convince yourself that you’re not worried, because you’ll see how silly your face looks when you’re being disingenuous.
Whether you acknowledge it or not, there’s good reason to worry. By the time 35th-birthday-brunch celebrations roll around for still-single women, serious, irreversible life issues masquerading as “jokes” creep into public conversation: Well, I don’t feel old, but my eggs sure do! or Maybe this year I’ll marry Todd. I’m not getting any younger! The birthday girl smiles a bit too widely as she delivers these lines, and everyone laughs a little too hard for a little too long, not because we find these sentiments funny, but because we’re awkwardly acknowledging how unfunny they are. At their core, they pose one of the most complicated, painful, and pervasive dilemmas many single women are forced to grapple with nowadays: Is it better to be alone, or to settle?
Link - via Locusts & Honey
Curses, how can anyone withstand such compelling argumentation??
Mister or Miss Right will show up shortly after you fix what is broken inside. And, yes, I know this from experience.
Jessica sums it up nicely.
And like the author, I get so fed up with my married friends complaining about their husbands and how hard it is to be married and how lucky I am to be single. Occasionally I'll call them on it, and ask them why they're still married if it's so terrible, and they will grudgingly admit that it beats the alternative.
However, the most annoying part is that they're making it sound like I couldn't be happy if that happened, which is a load of crap. I've had a lot of single older women role models in my life, and for that I'm grateful. They are independent, adventurous women and some of the BEST human beings I know. My gradeschool music teacher, my great-aunt, and my two of my favorite high school English teachers.
And none of them take crap from anybody. ;)
The only truth I see in "settling" is that society in general today holds standards too high for a successful life. Advertisements may teach you that tall/dark/handsome/rich or stylish/skinny/beautiful/rich is the answer, but that sort of thinking often leads to our high divorce rate.
And if you're only doing it for your bilogical clock, and not your heart, what happened to just having friends? I most disagree with her statement that "more important than love is marriage." I think that's a rather wasteful way to look at things; getting everything you "want" just because someone tells you so is wasteful.
The end of the article also reminds me of this comic: http://xkcd.com/314/
I realized about 10 years ago I did want kids, and moreover, I wanted a partner in raising them. Still, I wasn't going to settle. I decided I'd rather be alone than with the wrong guy. And I decided that not being with the wrong guy meant being with the perfect guy. And that's the problem. As you mentioned, much of the problem is the too-high standards for a perfect life. There is no perfect mate, so in that sense, we all will have to settle. The trick is (and I sure haven't mastered it) is figuring out how much settling to do. I think the author is making a very valid point that IF you want a partner, you will have to do a lot more settling later in life than you will earlier in life.
The feminist idea that you can be happy without a man in your life is taken to the extreme: you can't be happy with a man in your life; men are deadweight.
You may then discover that being "successful" isn't what you really wanted in life, and now, there are less available guys to meet your criteria.
p.s. I'm gay and can't marry legally. But seriously... don't settle. "Alone" doesn't have to mean lonely.
I rarely encounter women who know what they really want and of those their idea of a finding suitable partner seems to revolve around anyone they have 'chemistry' with (regardless of whether he's a douche or not). They then spend the next decade trying to change him into the guy she should have gone for in the first place.
Of course not all women are like this - but I've encountered plenty that are. Is it any wonder they wake up one morning to find they're 40 years old and their repeated cycle of Find Mr Chemistry has left them single, unhappy and lacking faith in men?
Poor old Todd...