THE Bible says, “Ask and you shall receive.”
The question in Zambia today is whether women should ask the men, and they shall receive their partner’s hand in marriage?
This is already happening in our society today where women are popping the question, “When are you going to marry me.”
Others are putting it in a passive way by asking “Do you think we should get married?”
Whatever the case, it is necessary to note that men are born hunters and would like to pursue their prey in their own way and most of them do not need help from the women.
Many women who have tried to propose men have regretted as they have lost relationships because of trying to ‘help’ their men.
“I proposed that we should get married the following year and that was the most horrible thing I have ever done,” one lady confessed.
For others it has worked perfectly well but many others, it has ended in a disaster because it cost them their most valuable relationships.
The question, however, still stands, is proposing the last thing a woman should do?
It does not matter how much society has changed, but from time immemorial men in most parts of the world are the ones who propose to women 99 per cent of the time.
If a man has not proposed it means that he does not want to marry you at all and he is just enjoying the relationship for what it is or that he is not yet sure whether to marry you yet and is waiting for more information.
Sometimes it is because he wants to marry you eventually, but is not yet ready.
Of course there are some men who overstay in these courtships but that is a topic for another day.
For the women involved in relationships, instead of asking a man to marry you, try having a conversation to assess what he is actually thinking.
It is not all about the love chemistry between two people, men need to be convinced that “this is the one.”
One man, however, argues  that women propose marriage most of the time.
“The man will get down and ask her to marry him, but from my experience, the woman will usually bring up the idea of marriage first.
“The man’s proposal is merely a formality at that point.
Sometimes the man will agree to marriage without any additional discussion, and sometimes the woman has to do some additional ‘arm-twisting’.  So, it is completely normal to propose marriage to your boyfriend.
If you do not, most men will be happy with the status quo which is dating indefinitely,” he said.
One woman agreed to this saying “I am in that process of twisting his arm real hard.
It is annoying for me, some girls are so lucky and just have the proposal without having to do all these things,” she said
All things being equal however, there is no woman who should take pride in dragging a man to the altar no matter what the kind of marriage/relationship they want.
This is because this act has the potential to affect the marriage and how well he treats you after getting married.
Experience from time immemorial shows that when women proposed, the marriage did not last long. Whether that is true or not is highly debatable.
One woman however, said that “What you are asking is what happened with my first husband.  I ‘twisted his arm’ until he married me but it never lasted. I never wanted to go through that again, so I vowed to never ‘twist an arm’ again.”
“My second husband initiated every discussion about marriage.  I made a real point not to utter the ‘marriage word’ unless he brought it up and so far this has been a wonderful marriage for me,” she said.
It is necessary for women to note that there are men who want marriage so that they start a family while others do not .
Women just have to let the men who do not want marriage go regardless of how they feel about them.
This is because in the long run, these women will feel cheated by the men who are not proposing and turn violent on them.
Many women now have been languishing for years with men who “weren’t ready” but it is still not advisable for these women to propose.  If women can wait and be patient for the man of their dreams who wants marriage, there will be no need for any arm twisting.
Nowadays even two failed marriages are considered better than perpetual singlehood hence the reason why women end up proposing marriage.
Women should instead be patient and wait for a man who is crazy for them (or seems to be), who pursues them, who never leaves them guessing where they stand, and who may even end up “twisting their arm” to get them to the altar!
“If you chase a man down, demand a ring (or trap him into marriage with a baby), you might get that marriage certificate but you could miss out on having a man go into full courtship mode with you and genuinely ask you to marry him, instead of having to settle for the other way around,” another relationship expert said.
One woman made me laugh when she said that she proposed marriage to the father of her five- year- old child through a text and he simply did not answer.
She was so angry about it but that did not change the status quo either.
Some women hope that by allowing the relationship evolve in the bedroom, it will be easier for them to propose the men and land into the marriage.
While there is no measurable gauge to tell whether he should ask, or she should ask, it is necessary to note that this issue comes from traditions-learned or engrained and passed on from generation to generation.
Society could have moved on but culture has remained old fashioned about proposals and the man doing the asking is one of the few things that hasn’t changed as of now.
When uttered by a man, the words “will you marry me” serve to signal a tradition that is both widely accepted and ages old. Having the same spoken by a woman however can be surprising and shocking.
Women who asked men to marry them are still portrayed as ugly, mannish, classless or desperate.
“A woman asking a man is disrupting a sacrosanct power that men have held throughout history,” marriage experts said.
Many men spoken to said having a woman propose to them would not feel right.
According to research, despite loosening of gender roles at work and in society as a whole, men and women are remarkably traditional when it comes to marriage.
In fact, a study of students at a certain university found that not a single man or woman wanted a proposal in which the woman asked the man to marry her.
Women who do that find themselves unhappy and unfulfilled when the smoke clears. They also may cause resentment or frustration in the man because they put him in a position to “give in” to a situation he was not man enough to handle correctly in the first place.
If you want a man who is able to lead you and take initiative on things in life and your relationship, then do not take that responsibility away from him by deciding to propose.
Typically, a man knows what he wants. His actions speak louder than his words, so if a woman focuses on that she can understand his unwillingness to propose.
If you did that you also run the risk of not being happy because you will always wonder if he is happy or was he ever going ask you to marry him.
When a man is ready to get married, he makes the move and pops the question, no one has to force him, trick him or anything else.
Giving a woman an occasion to ask a man to marry him would seem an empowering moment but we have not yet reached there.
As a woman, do not settle for asking him, dragging him, pestering him or begging him to marry you. It is not going to work out. There is an equilibrium, let the man be the man and make his own decision, your response is your decision.
It is not yet “The Ladies’ Privilege,” despite society’s determination to balance traditional gender roles.
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