Rita Wilson says she once came surprisingly close to marrying a man she didn’t love — until she decided to ignore a piece of old-school advice from her mother and wait for something more.

During a recent appearance on Michelle Obama’s podcast, “In My Opinion,” the 69-year-old actress revealed that she was engaged before meeting Tom Hanks but had serious doubts about whether she should go through with the marriage.

“I was engaged before I got engaged to my husband. If I had married that person, I would have been divorced within a year,” Wilson said. “I thought that was what you were supposed to do at a certain age.”

At the time, Wilson said she had never truly been in love and wondered whether that was something she really needed before getting married.

She eventually turned to her mother for advice.

“I don’t know though. Should I marry him? I’m not really in love with him,” Wilson recalled telling her.

Her mother’s answer surprised her: “Don’t worry, you grow to love him.”

Wilson immediately knew that approach wasn’t for her.

“I was like, ‘Mom, that’s not my generation,’” she said. “Her generation was like, ‘Is he a good man? Will he provide?’ There wasn’t any of this, ‘I have to be madly in love.’”

Wilson acknowledged that her mother’s perspective came from a marriage that clearly had staying power. Her parents were married for 59 years.

“Whatever they figured out, they figured out,” she said. “But I still wanted to hold out for that falling in love thing.”

Wilson ultimately ended the engagement, believing that marriage alone could not save a relationship that was missing something so important.

Then she fell in love with Hanks.

The two had previously met as actors but reconnected while filming the comedy “Volunteers” in 1984. Wilson said she immediately recognized that her relationship with Hanks was unlike the one she had nearly settled for.

“When I finally met Tom and fell in love with him,” Wilson recalled thinking, “This is very, very different than what I had before.”

The couple married in 1988 and have now been together as husband and wife for nearly four decades, becoming one of Hollywood’s most enduring couples.

Wilson said choosing the right person also mattered when she thought about having children. She wasn’t always certain she wanted to become a mother, but she knew she “didn’t wanna have children with the wrong people or person.”

Hanks already had two children, Colin and Elizabeth, from his previous marriage to Samantha Lewes, and Wilson was able to see firsthand what kind of father he was.

“I already saw that he could be a good dad,” she said. “So, I was like, ‘OK, good, that’s helpful. A little example here.’”

Wilson and Hanks later welcomed sons Chet and Truman together.

Nearly 40 years later, Wilson’s decision to walk away from a marriage she doubted stands out as a pivotal moment in her life. Rather than hoping love would eventually arrive, she waited until it did — and found it with Hanks.