The Garden: Love or Convenience?

I’ve had my share of failed relationships for not just one but many reasons. Some hearts I broke and sometimes mine was broken too. It’s from my most recent of break-ups that I became rather curious about my choices when it comes to a partner and also the very thing that drives or motivates my choice.

It is then I decided to hold conversations around this subject which led to the tittle of this article “Love Vs Convenience”. Now, in as much as we all choose according to what works for us, I realised that those choices are usually narrowed down to either love or convenience. I went on and interviewed a few people, both male and female and the responses I received was interesting and quite overwhelming as I share my observations, and findings with you in this article.

In comparison to women, most men married for love. One of my interviewees was doubting whether there would be someone sincere enough to admit if they would marry for convenience.

It wasn’t even up to two minutes later when a young lady walked in and boldly confessed “convenience!” Could it be that the old saying “Mosadi ga a na lorato” directly translated as a woman has no love is true? Elders in our previous generations use to believe in this saying, simply because they believed a woman was capable of falling in love with the man who loved her. The most important elements rather for a woman to choose would be based on whether the man loved her or not, and not whether the woman loved him or not. When I spoke to an elder to try and understand this saying or concept she just explained to me that by no means are they implying that a woman is incapable of love, what they’re actually saying here is that a woman’s love is responsive to a man’s love and in order for the relationship to survive the man’s love is crucial .The woman needs the love of a man, she feeds from the products of that love which are security, provision, affection, etc. whereas in a man’s case the primary need is respect/honor.

As a woman you can be in love with your man, write poems, send gifts and all kinds of things but if the man lacks respect and honor from you those things have no meaning. Respect translates to love, so then the most important responds from a woman to the man’s love would be honor and respect which are a form of submission.

In our current time we have a lot of women arguing this notion and say it is just as important for a woman to be in love with a man from the very beginning. Some have said it’s possible to not love a man in the beginning and gradually fall in love with him in the process to end up being extremely in love with him. Who knows, perhaps the reason why relationships today are not stable or lack commitment in comparison to the former, is because women have made it a priority to go for the man they love without considering whether the man loved her.

One of the men I interviewed said “women do not have good judgement of character, it is another man who can tell if a man is good or bad” and he advised women to get an opinion from a close male e.g. dad, uncle, brother etc. before embarking on a serious relationship with a man. More than two women said to me “When I chose the first time, I did it for love and look where it got me?” With our current phenomenon of relationships where young boys date older women, we can’t exclude that a vast majority of these young men have also opted for convenience. Just like your student girl dating a man old enough to be her grandfather, these are clear indications of convenience. At the end of the day we as a society cannot dictate, this is a personal choice that depends on taste and preference.

However, what prompted me to ask this question is the current group of individuals that have demonstrated in their actions that they preferred both. For instance, a woman would marry a man for convenience and would still have a man on the side to fulfill her “void” and vice versa we also find that with men, although men cheating most of the time has little to do with the state of things at home. So yes we get selfish or rather greedy people that make decisions they’re not willing to live with. Now does this mean you cannot find both love and convenience in the same relationship? Of course not, but we’ve seen that with most relationships it is not common to have all your needs met at least not at once. With some relationships you’d have to put in an effort to achieving some of the goals.

This topic I tell you really brought out some interesting conversations so much that I believe much can be said about this, and we would need a broader platform and a larger audience and group of participants to come to a general conclusion on behalf of our public. However, from the little research I have done, my observations conclude as follows: Men would rather go for love and Women for convenience. My article is arguable as I look forward to your comments, questions and general response.