Managing and dealing with shame/low self-worth

This may seem kind of unrelated, and I know some of this perspective is cultural and there may be more pressure some places to be paired off in your early 20s, but being single reflects... nothing. Especially at that age. Only that you haven't found the right match yet. And to be perfectly honest, all those people you know paired off, probably most of them haven't found the right match yet, either. Most relationships that form so young don't last because you're still all growing and getting to know yourselves and will change a lot over the next ten years, while simultaneously learning the skills for how to be in a healthy romantic relationship. Some last, but many people grow apart not together. Not everyone chooses perfectly right away, they learn through experience. There's a lot of compatibility and commitment involved, and I am constantly grateful I didn't end up with the people I chose to date in my late teens and 20s. Our values would have turned out to be really off and incompatible, and we wouldn't have been able to properly support each other in important ways. I'm also grateful for having a lot of experiences, dating-wise, professionally, even traveling alone when I was single, just getting to know myself and doing a ton I wanted to try out when I still had the free time and means to do some of it. It made me even more confident when I did meet the right person that not only was it the right situation but I had no regrets that I would wonder what else is out there or if I missed out on life experiences by settling down young and before I knew myself and got to accomplish other things that weren't just "someone's wife." Again, may be partially cultural, as some people only want to be someone's wife and that's cool if that's what they want.

That doesn't directly answer your question about how to deal with it, and I know it's kind of abstract to someone younger to say you'll have a different perspective with more experience. If someone said that to me when I was anxious and 23 I'd be pretty skeptical as it would be hard to relate to hearing that. But having a partner doesn't define your value at all, especially at this age, and isn't a guarantee of anything a few months and years down the road anyway. In a way, looking to the relationship and someone else's commitment to you to derive your value is doing it backwards. It all works out better when you define yourself first and then choose someone who complements that.

What being single at your age with your background says about you is probably just, you've been letting the anxiety subconsciously lead you to choosing other insecure partners, so they have problems with emotional availability and don't fully commit. That's something you're in the process of working to learn from and change, so therefore it doesn't define you or your future.

I think it ultimately goes back to the recurring theme of accepting yourself where you are and wherever that is being okay, and that it will take time to do what you're trying to accomplish which is also okay, and keep at it. You're not deficient just because your emotional self hasn't caught up to your intellectual self yet. It's all part of the process and processing that's happening over time. The process includes not comparing yourself to others, and continuing to build your identity by simply being and continuing to try new things without concern for how it reflects to other people and what they say about it. That may be an aspect where going through the motions and faking it until you make it (because in this case it means continuing to learn about yourself and be present for your own experiences, which will build cumulatively over time) will eventually start to have an impact. But when you'll notice that impact is impossible to predict.

I thought I'd be married 10+ years earlier than I was, because that's the cultural norm and expectation for me. But instead, I found the partnership I was looking for once I was actually ready for it, and not before. Cultural norms may exist for a reason, but they aren't the be-all end-all for best way to live your life. They are still guidelines you can question for yourself, and the parts where you're exploring who you are in the meantime adding up will give you the strength in the future to do that. It's very normal to be grappling with questions of identity and self-worth in your teens and 20s, especially in a rapidly changing world, even if you've got a secure attachment style. So I don't think you're behind at all, even if your peers aren't openly talking about these issues (they may or may not even be actively thinking about them at this point in their own lives! Lots of people run on auto-pilot).

I think you're definitely right about there being different moving pieces in place and giving it time. It does help to just sit with these ideas, take small steps towards showing up for myself and reminding myself of what's important to me. Over time there is definitely a cumulative effect. In terms of "being present with yourself", did you have moments where you didn't know what to trust? Whether the anxiety was caused by something that was actually something that didn't make you feel good vs just your mind/tendencies making you see red flags where there weren't any?

Risking my life coming to this side of the forum again….
At 22 I got married to my first girlfriend. A quote at the time was that it “made me a respectable eccentric”. While this was quite possibly true, there was no doubt I was acting from a place not dissimilar to yours.
Of course, it didn’t work out. It also didn’t work out for her and the person who made the quote, either. That’s another story for another day, lol.

The cultural aspect is important and you have to ask the questions… What are your expectations of marriage? The Western ideal or the Eastern utilitarian model? Both have risks, one is definitely more stable than the other, but at a cost. Is that cost palatable to you? Only you can answer these questions.