Do You Have to Lower Your Standards to Get Married?

Do You Have to Lower Your Standards to Get Married?

Will you be happy if you lower your standards and get married?

This question captures exactly how many unmarried men feel. Being alone is comfortable, but if there were someone decent, they'd want to meet her. Just not anyone at all. So what are they supposed to do? Lower their standards, apparently... but would that really make them happy?

The conventional wisdom: "Lower your standards, that's how you get married"

You hear this all the time. On TV variety shows, in matchmaking agency ads, even from older colleagues.

Who cares what she does, that's the best kind of spouse. A good personality is all you need.
Don't set your standards too high, or you'll never land anyone.
You're better off lowering your standards and getting married.

On the surface, it seems reasonable. In an era with a shortage of marriage partners, shouldn't you lower your standards so you can at least find someone?

But is that really true?

The uncomfortable truth in the statistics

According to the 2024 Social Survey by Statistics Korea, 75.7% of married people say they're satisfied with their relationship with their spouse. Looking at the number alone, that's pretty high. Doesn't it mean most people are happy with their marriage?

But the answer to another question in the same survey is interesting.

If you were born again, would you marry your current spouse again?

Here are the results:

• I would marry my current spouse again = 29%
• I would marry someone else = 35%
• I would not get married = 25%

Doesn't something seem off? Satisfaction is at 75%, yet only 29% would marry the same spouse if they were born again. Even more absurd, more than half of people who are already married said they would "marry someone else or not get married at all".

What does this tell us? It means 'satisfaction' and 'happiness' can be two different things. People call the state of having compromised and adapted to their current situation 'satisfaction', but it's not a situation they genuinely wish had been their choice.

Does lowering your standards make you happy?

There's an even more shocking research finding.

According to the paper 'Marital Satisfaction of Married Women by Method of Spouse Selection', marital satisfaction didn't differ much based on how the spouse was chosen (meeting through dating, through an arranged introduction, or a mix of both).

But look closely at the results and an interesting pattern emerges:

• External factor given high consideration: occupation
• Internal factors given high consideration: personality, values, drive to achieve, emotional maturity, ease in interpersonal relationships

In other words, what truly affects marital satisfaction isn't "how good are their specs" but "how well do our personalities fit".

So what does lowering your standards actually mean? Usually things like these:

• "She doesn't have to be pretty" (lowering the looks standard)
• "She doesn't need a fancy degree" (lowering the education standard)
• "She doesn't have to earn a lot" (lowering the financial standard)
• "Even if I don't really like her personality... whatever" (lowering the personality standard)

The problem here is the last one. Looks, education, income, you can lower those all you want. But personality and values... those you must not lower. Because they're directly tied to marital satisfaction.

So what happens to marriages built on lowered standards?

Let's look at what plays out in real life.

What happens to people who lowered their standards a lot and got married thinking "well, this'll do"? The first three years are fine. The newlywed hormones do their job.

But after five years, ten years? Then it's reality. You see the same person every day, live with the same habits every day, and sometimes your spouse seems different from the person you first met. (In truth, it's the things you'd been ignoring finally coming to the surface.)

What's left at that point? The compromise of "well... it was good enough". Not satisfaction. Resignation.

And what about people whose standards were clear? Of course, it's hard to meet someone at first. There aren't many people who fit the bill. But when they do meet? That marriage is different. They keep thinking about why it was this person. They spend every day together and still feel like a genuinely good match.

The practical question: so what am I supposed to do?

At this point someone will push back.

But where do I meet someone like that? Where is there anyone who fits my standards exactly?

Fair point. It's hard to meet someone like that. That's reality.

But here's what matters:

It's not about lowering your standards. It's about making your standards clear.

What does that mean?

First, you have to know what you really want. Not an abstract standard like "someone kind and pretty", but precisely.

• What values matter most to me?
• What kind of lifestyle suits me?
• How do I want to feel when I'm with someone?

Second, it means you have to actually put in the effort to find that person.

• Local-government singles parties? We've already seen how inefficient they are.
• Random apps? There's no way to verify who's trustworthy.
• Just waiting? What are the odds that person finds you?

Third, it means you have to get to know the other person properly. That's absolutely impossible in one or two meetings. You need a thorough understanding of their real personality, values, habits, family background, attitude toward money, and so on, and then judge whether they're "truly the right person".

Finally: lower your standards vs. clarify your standards

Lowering your standards means "I need someone, so anyone will do". But that's a starting point with no mutual respect.

Clarifying your standards means "I think I'd be happy living with this kind of person. I'm going to find them." Genuine recognition and respect begin in the process of choosing each other.

The reason you're single right now may not be that your standards are too high, but that you had no standards, or they were unclear.

Even thinking you're more comfortable alone may really mean that being alone is better than being with the wrong person. That's not an absence of standards. That's having standards. You just haven't clearly recognized them yet.

Don't lower your standards. Clarify them instead. And then put in the real effort to find that person.

Only then does marriage become a "choice" rather than a "compromise".