BEING SINGLE IS SACRED
I’m no stranger to singledom - I’ve lived it for 9 years (creeping very close to a decade which just sounds increasingly more depressing). Sometimes I think I’ve grown so comfortable being alone that it makes me nervous. I enjoy my own company, and yet this past year I allowed myself to WANT a relationship.
This wanting was new. For the first time in those 9 years, I felt a new flavour of aloneness. This felt like a real ache in my heart. I remember one night waking in the middle of the night, crying and it all hit me - I want more than my own love. I got the lesson, I’d learned to give myself the love I sought outside myself. I learned to be OK with who I am…but there is no substitute for another’s presence, for someone else’s support, for romantic love. I realized it wasn’t weak to want this, it was human. I was tired of doing it all alone.
At the time, all I could do was acknowledge this new piece within me. That particular night happened in January 2021…and here we are 10 months later and guess what? Still single. And guess what? I’m still wanting to share a life with someone just as much as I did that night, and guess what else? I’m savouring these moments of my single life more than I ever have before.
For I’ve come to realize, this time is sacred. It is vital to who I am becoming. I wrote a long time ago “I stop worrying about where he is, and instead, I ready myself for his arrival”.
Now, at first read that may sound a bit traditional - archaic even. I picture this Bridgerton -esque woman primping and priming herself to meet a Prince at a ball.
But that’s not the type of preparation I’m referring to. For me, this time is about becoming my fullest, truest, most authentic self. For integrating lessons learned, of gathering pieces of myself I have given away and calling them back and in doing so, becoming more “whole”. A wholeness found on my own, not through meeting someone else.
It’s a time of getting clear on what I want and desire and all those qualities I desire in someone else?…well, I damn well better embody them first. If I want someone “next level” I must do the work to meet them at that level. I want to rise to the caliber of person I want to meet.
Being single is not a time of waiting around, it’s a time of doing you, being you, living life on your own terms, meeting yourself at new depths, loving every single broken, mended, beautiful, in-perfect part of yourself. It’s a time when you realize who you are and what you value in this life so that you know exactly what you have to offer (and you know exactly what you deserve).
I remember my final week living in Amsterdam, naively thinking that when I left for Italy I’d magically meet someone (wishful thinking), but that week served as a reminder for me. I decided to spend my days as if they were the last moments I had to be alone; to enjoy every second with just myself. I knew things would never look that way again; it was time to celebrate the love I’d worked so hard to give myself.
So to you, my single friend. If you are feeling alone, please know you’re not alone. If you’re wondering where your person is, stop. Don’t waste this precious time worrying about anything other than your own heart (I think it’s the one time in our life we get to be this selfish). Enjoy the time with yourself the same way you would enjoy the last moments with a dear friend before they leave.
Savour your aloneness.
For being single is sacred.
You are in a relationship with the most important person in the world - yourself.
Don’t take a moment for granted...
make it your ultimate love story
Stand in your power, cultivate your own strength, take up space in this world, speak up, share your truth, this is your time to shine. This is what is being asked of you. Let this process be a homecoming, let it be a remembering of who you are...and let it bring you to love.
