My boyfriend wants to get engaged in a week and I am dragging my feet, not sure if I am doing the right thing.

My boyfriend is 23 and I am 24. He actually first proposed two or three years ago when both of us were still undergraduates at college. He didn’t have a ring and he just asked me out of the blue one night while we were sitting on the couch together. I knew I wanted to marry him someday, but I also knew that we were very young, our parents would be understandably upset, and that we wouldn’t be able to pursue our careers if we got engaged then and there. It took some convincing, but I was able to delay it. He wanted to get engaged again this summer, but since I was just about to move out of the state and live on my own for the first time as a masters student, I was able to delay it again under the condition that we’d get engaged this winter.

I have no doubt that he and I are very committed to each other and that I absolutely want to marry him someday. But I have a lot of concerns about getting engaged now. For one thing, I am pursuing a masters in music and I have very little money of my own. I have been and still am very dependent on my parents. I also have limited experience living on my own and I’m still learning things like good grocery shopping habits, managing finances, and cooking for myself. I am very concerned that if I get engaged now, I’ll just become reliant on my boyfriend. I’m also concerned that since my parents don’t believe in marrying young, they could use money to try to convince me to cancel the engagement. I’ve talked to my boyfriend over and over about this issue, and each time he just says that my parents probably wouldn’t stop helping me pay for my college expenses even if they get upset about the engagement. But if I’m not financially independent, am I really in a place where I can commit to someone? And if my parents did withdraw financial support, I probably would not be able to finish my current degree.

I’ve also tried to talk to my boyfriend about how we’re going to be able to afford a wedding since we are both in graduate school and how we would be able to balance wedding planning with our course work. It has been very difficult for us to find the time and money to visit each other more than once a semester, so I don’t know how we’d plan a wedding. I’ve also tried to talk to my boyfriend about this, but he either says I’m being unromantic or that we’ll just figure it out at some point.

I do also worry that because my family frowns upon marrying young, and because I’ve only had a semester in my masters program, that getting engaged now might compromise my relationship with my family and cause my professors to think that I’m not serious about my coursework.

I’ve talked to my boyfriend about all these concerns, but I can’t seem to communicate that I’m not questioning how I feel about him. I just question if we’re really ready to be married. And if we’re not, should we be getting engaged?

I am a big worrier, so is he right that I should stop thinking about some of these things, that they’ll just get settled over time? I want to marry him but I also want to be able to care for myself, have career goals, and have a solid relationship with my friends and family too. Is it bad to want to wait to get engaged until we’re both mature and experienced enough to build a strong marriage together?