“I’m going to die alone!” is the sarcastic, yet slightly serious cry of many of my single girlfriends.
What if you were? Now what?
Ironically, my epiphany was born on a treadmill. Rihanna’s “Rockstar 101″ had quickly become both a mantra and favorite workout track. Exercising had become necessary for my sanity at the time. Feeling rejected both by men and a job hunt during the recession, fitness was the only area where I would put in effort and see results. I escaped to the gym, my sanctuary of solitude from all the stressors in my life. If I worked out, I knew that I hadn’t neglected my own needs that day. If I didn’t have a man, I would give myself the attention that I wanted from a man, and make myself feel beautiful.
While on the treadmill, Rihanna boldly belted through my iPod’s headphones, “To be what you isn’t, gotta be what you are…”
It hit me. What if I would never be anyone’s girlfriend or wife? What if this was it? Would this be enough? Would I be enough for me? I couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t be single and miserable.
It was time to surrender to the idea of being indefinitely single. If you’ve been single for a while, you probably want to punch every person who says the cliché phrase, “Don’t worry. He will come. Just be patient.” I’m not going to do that to you, #TeamSingle. I’m just going to ask you, “What if he doesn’t?” So what? Realize your worst fears. You’re single. You’re not dead. You will survive single.
We live in a society that presupposes that being single is a sad thing, but it doesn’t have to be. Now, you could either be single and miserable, single and desperate, or..
you can rock single like a fresh pair of Louboutins that will never go out of style. It’s your choice, and you do have a choice.
Yes, there are women who never get married or who divorce and never remarry. They’re fine. I resolved that if I were going to die alone, my concept of single needed a makeover. I had to take single by the stilettos and work it like a runway. If I was going down single, I was going down making single look good.
That day, I resolved to being single and satisfied, and never looked back. I’d tried dating and miserable, desperate and miserable, and single and miserable. None of them were good looks for me. The pain of each situation hurt too much to revisit. But single and happy? This was a concept that I’d barely even seen. It became my happiest scenario yet. Getting there didn’t come without a fight. I had to get honest with myself to let go of some of my insecurities and weaknesses. Like my body on that treadmill, it was no longer about where I was going, but what I was becoming.
“But Bonnie, that’s easy to say in theory, but I still want to get married one day,” you say. So do I.
“Single and satisfied” doesn’t mean you’re not open to romantic love. It simply means, that contrary to popular belief, you don’t really need it to feel complete, joyful, or like you’re living a full life. You find other ways to meet your needs. You resolve that if you needed something you would have it, and if you don’t have it, you must not need it because you’re surviving without it. It means that you’re seriously no longer searching, but attracting what fits with your destiny. In fact, the idea that someone may disrupt your new-found contentment with life will make you nervous. There is no settling for the single and happy. The bar has been raised for all of their dating partners. Their partners don’t have to beat out “single and miserable” or an ex-lover that got it wrong. Their potential mates have to convince them to give up their lifelong exclusive marriage to their oldest friend– themselves. It’s a tall order. However, it is the very reason why being single and satisfied not only improves your singlehood, but also any potential relationships.
In fact, I attract more men now than ever before. There’s something exceptional about the swagger of a woman who knows that she’s not missing anything… except for maybe a black guitar (according to Rihanna). Rock your singlehood, ladies.
