Last week, a friend asked me to teach him how to enjoy single life.
This is when you know I've been single for so long that someone actually comes to me for advice on how to be. And anyway, this movie's coming out pretty soon, and Valentine's Day is this coming weekend, so what better time to embrace what some (judgmental, tsk tsk) people would consider a pitiful station in life?
I'd say first and foremost, you can push the limits of personal hygiene. I don't even care if you judge me and think I'm disgusting. As long as I can't smell myself, I'm good. See how many days you can go without a shower, without shaving. I would probably draw the line at foregoing brushing teeth, but maybe if you're running a little late when you wake up, you can skip the morning round and just come back to it at, say, noontime. If you're not kissing anyone, whatever! It's your own mouth! And I must say, it's been fascinating seeing what my leg hair looks like after a month (or two?) without shaving. I mean, it can be educational. You can discover the consistency and sparseness/thickness of your body hair, and best of all, when you want to get back out there and mingle, you'll already know for how long you can get away with not shaving. And not washing your hair. And not washing your... body.
Trust me, it's useful. You'll save time and water! (I'm also incredibly lazy so this has helped me out a lot.)
The most obvious perk of being single is alone time. For, you know, pretty much whatever you want. And that doesn't have to be weird either.
You get your bed to yourself, as much or as little space as you want — figuratively and literally — and you can stay in one room for an entire day without necessarily having to answer to anyone. You can actuallyNetflix and chill without a care in the world.
It's true that being single comes with its drawbacks, though, and probably the most annoying part about being single is trying to find other reliable people not in relationships to hang out with; But honestly, there's going to be someone else out there going through the same thing as you. Surround yourself with people who aren't in relationships, and if that person ends up finding someone special, engage in a rotation process and switch that person out!
I have a lot of personal experience with that. Freshman year, my roommate got a boyfriend a few months into school, leaving me to fend for myself. I found some other girl friends at my residential college, but of course, they all found people (and it all happened so fast), but hey, I still have friends. I count my blessings every day for my fellow single Bhangra teammates. They're amazing — and not just because they happen to be single too.
And it's actually pretty cool having friends in relationships (given that you have your single friends beside you). When you're single, you're able to focus sole attention on other people's lives and drama. It's fun! In fact, as an objective party, you can provide wise and detached advice when inevitably asked for guidance when it comes to everything from dates and romance to fights and passive-aggressiveness.
Sure, you might occasionally get jealous over other people's ridiculously cute relationships, but eventually, you'll reach that peak in jealousy and then you won't care anymore. Literally, you will run out of f*cks to give.
People think singledom sucks because it brings out a bunch of insecurities and questions, like "Why am I still single?? How come she has a boyfriend but I don't?!" And you know what? That's totally fine. Those questions are important, not because they should be answered in a self-degrading way, but because we need to learn how to answer them in a self-affirming way.
We're used to bringing ourselves down, to conforming to the societal expectation of turning away compliments, but when you're single, who really cares? You go and you declare to the world, "Hell yeah, I'm a single, independent individual who don't need no man/woman/other." It's a blessing to learn to say that, and feel okay with it, to know that you're someone to be treasured and valued, and that you shouldn't settle for anything less.
I know being in a relationship could be the most incredible thing ever, that it could make you the happiest person alive, but I think being single forces you to value yourself in a way you might not be able to when sharing your life with someone else.
Being single gives you time during which you have no choice but to think about you, and your life.
(Also if you're single you're free to pursue a "relationship" with your best friend... of course, as long as she's not already in one. *wink* )
