Shonda Rhimes Says It’s Okay For Women NOT To Want A Husband: I have never wanted to get married. I love having boyfriends, I love dating.

In a recent interview with Oprah’s Super Soul Sunday, creator and executive producer of ABC’s Thursday night prime line-up, Shonda Rhimes, reveals why she says yes to the things that scare her, why she will never get married, and the one sentence she uses to say “no” to something that she does not want to do. The Shondaland creator also shares the character she most identifies with.
[Tidbit: Recently, Rhimes released her first book, Year of Yes, which chronicles her year of saying “yes” to everything.] Check out some of the excerpts and paraphrases from the interview:

Rhimes explains why she says “yes” to the things that scare her:

I was absolutely the person who did anything you asked me to, that I didn’t want to do, and then rumbled about it quietly to myself….and then I feel resentful towards people. I really sat down and thought I need to start saying yes to the things that scare me. If I never say yes to anything, I need to start saying yes to things that I would always say no to automatically – and I promised myself that I would do it for just a year, because I thought that I was not going to survive.

On the major epiphany she had regarding marriage:

I was able to stand up and say, I don’t want to get married – at all. I said it to everybody – I said it to my family, I said it to my friends, I said it to anybody who asked, which feels obvious and maybe silly or something to people who are married or people who are older, people who have been through it. If you are a woman in your 30’s or 40’s, that’s a big deal. There’s a huge amount of pressure and the desire to want to get married, it’s a lot like the desire to want to have children in our society…like we are supposed to want it and if you don’t want it, what is wrong with you. I have never wanted to get married. I love having boyfriends, I love dating.”

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