I'm stuck here in an awkward situation. For this example we'll use the names John and Jane.

John has recently graduated college and has a job. Jane is currently a sophomore. They have been seeing each other for 10 months. John is a very good friend of mine, has been since elementary school. He recently informed me he wants to be engaged to Jane soon and get married in the subsequent months. Not a problem but....

Neither one of them has EVER dated before and I know first hand that people change allot during their college years, and they started throwing out the "I love you" about a month into "dating" or whatever you want to call it which to me was an instant red flag. It seems that they just really liked each and its weird for them as this is their first time experiencing this type of connection. I would hate to see this happen and end ugly.

I'm no relationship expert but have had a few reasonably serious ones of my own so what can I do while still being friendly but honest with him as I feel he/she isn't ready?

My advice is to if he HAS to get engaged so fast is to at least wait till she's out of school as he lives 3 hours away from her as of right now.

This sucks

 

Unfortunately it's hard to watch a friends do something you think is a bad idea. But every couple is different. John and Jane ultimately are the only ones who will know.

The best thing you can probably do is of they get engaged, suggest they go through premarital counseling prior to get married.

 

Strange but completely true story:
A friend and I went on one of our famous drinking sprees. We hit more clubs and had more drinks in a couple hours than sanity should allow. To sober up, we went to a strip club (not our best plan). We continued to get even drunker, inviting the girls to join in. One stripper rapidly surpassed our level of insobriety but she continued to drink. The manager decided her last set of the night was signalled when she fell off the stage, bouncing off our table and rolling into his lap. He also decided we were a bad influence and booted us out.

We called cabs, me to go to my house alone . Him to go to his house, not alone with the aforementioned dancer. I woke up 2 days later and went to work. While at work I get a phone call from my friend:

"Dude I need a favor"
"What's up?"
"I'm in Vegas"
"Err... So?"
"Can you come up here? I'm getting married"

Yup, him and the dancer made a run to Vegas and were going to get married. I went, as did several others, just so we could say we witnessed this catastrophe. We even made a pool on how long the marriage would last.

Nobody won the pool. Who would guess a marriage between 2 people who knew each other 2 days would go 10 years and counting?

Moral: Love can surprise you

But just in case it doesn't, try not to say "I told you so"

 

I like this.

 

Dunno what to counsel. Personally I'd go with patience. I've been with my girl for 7 years now, 5 of those we have lived together and we're still not married. Not for any lack of desire, but the money is never there so it hasn't happened yet. We both agreed that we wanted to get through college before we made any long term commitments and we stuck to that though I have to admit that if I had the money it would have been touch-and-go in my last year of college, but even then, different situation from your friend since that was after we had been together for 5 years.

I'd say suggest patience and that there's really no reason that he has to pop the question for them to be a loving couple. Do they even live together? I'd say that every couple should have a chance to live together for a while before they get hitched. At this point both my girl and I know each others failing points and we're used to them. I don't know how you could get married without a year or so of living with someone to see if it will work.

 

if he hasn't had a great white buffalo yet, he cant get married

 

Never, and like I said it hasn't even been a year since they've been together. I know tons of people who got engaged in college but waited to get married till they were out and thats what I would suggest to him.

Agreed, its really hard to just sit back and let this go when he is a good friend.

 

I feel in love with a red-headed stripper from Vixens in West Va once. Our romance lasted about 6 hours.

That really has nothing to do with the story but Kuro's tale brought back some fond memories.