Who do I settle for?

Dear Agatha, I am a man of 30 years of age, and about to settle down in life but, I am being been confronted with the problem of whom to choose from among my many female friends who are actually all very close to me. Candidly, I have about five female friends to choose from; the reason I am at this crossroad. Kindly lend me your professional advice. Wiszy. Dear Wiszy, Five women? What are you doing with the whole lot of them? No serious minded man surrounds himself with too many women. For a man planning to grow and go far in life, having too many women in his life can be a very huge distraction; the kind you are currently having, in making the right choice of a wife. Many promising future have been doomed by the inability of a man to either surround himself with the right people or have too many women contending for attention in his life. First you have to decide what works for you in life. A man is as good as the kind of life he plans for himself. Nobody but you can make the decision of what is good for you. There is no easy way to it. First, you must have a clear vision of the kind of life you want for yourself. This is where you kick-start the process of selecting the kind of woman who has what it takes to propel you to your zenith. Who are you? The fact alone of having five women in your life, means you are even confused on who you really are. There is no knowing what is good for you if you, who have the future, is ignorant on what you really want from it. The fault isn’t in the women in your life but, yours. If at your age you are already swimming among many women; what will you do when you are well established? What kind of legacy do you want to bequeath to your children; the kind that will see them in constant rivalry among themselves because of the influences of their mothers or the kind that will give them the kind of lifestyle worth emulating? You are only a caretaker for your children, the reason you should not mortgage their future for your own selfish ends. Children are perfect copy machines. They soak in whatever their parents are doing; good or bad. What you do becomes their examples. As a father, how would you feel seeing your son waste his life chasing after women? Beyond the thrills of their bodies, what are you benefiting from having these women in your life? Have you also considered the fact that these women are all hoping you would marry them and that they are investing their time on this relationship you know won’t take them anywhere with you? Hell has no fury like a woman scorned. The longer you keep them, the more you devalue the quality of their shelf lifespan. Because of you, they would have turned down viable relationships. How do you think they would react when they discover you never planned to settle down with them? If you are 30, it means the women are between 24 and 28 years of age; the critical age group a young woman fetches the cleanest water for her tomorrow. Where do you expect them to start from in a relationship market that is getting more competitive by the day? This is how some men inherit spiritual problems they never recover from throughout their lives. From all the five women in your life, who has what it takes to constantly oil the engine room of your life? Bear in mind that physical appearance isn’t the right barometer for selecting a good wife. There are more important things in marriage than good looks. A woman must have the right kinds of shocks to make her marriage work at all times. She must be ready to make certain kinds of sacrifices for her husband, home and family. She must be understanding, respectful, supportive, prayerful, loyal, responsible and wise. She must also be a good homemaker and cook. Her beauty must come from within and not just the physical only. She must have what it takes to be her husband’s best friend and worthy partner in every area of his life. Who among your women can be all these? Who without you saying it, knows when you are happy, troubled or just need that quiet companionship? Who can make you relax and smile inspite of yourself? Who among them has the right temperament, will no matter what; put your feelings first before reacting to an issue; who has the restraint not to overreact in public? The choice of a right woman isn’t something to treat with levity or do with the canal mind. You must seek the face of God in this matter. It doesn’t matter if you know how to pray or not, focus on God to get it right. A great deal of what we get from marriage is dependent on what we are ready to invest in making the right choice. As a man looking for a wife, you must be ready too to invest respect and responsibility to sustain the right woman. Good luck.