If there's one question I'm used to hearing is the usual "do you have a boyfriend?". My answer usually comes with a joyous smile and a happy "no." The following words always come along the lines of "but you're so pretty, why haven't you found yourself a guy yet?. After a few years, it gets tiring to hear the same things over and over again. Yes, I'm pretty and yes I could be a good girlfriend but the fact is that I am perfectly fine being on my own and I don't need a man to be fulfilled.

Being single is not an unfortunate state you're in or a stage of life but rather a relationship with yourself. The purpose of being single isn't to look for love in another person or to be alone. It's a time to fall in love with yourself, to find out your limits and exceed them. It's about finding passion in your life and stumbling upon that one thing that wraps itself around your soul and never leaves. That one thing that makes you, well, you.

The beginning of my second semester of sophomore year, I broke up with my long-distance "boyfriend," if you could even call him that, of 6 months. Granted, it wasn't the longest time and I didn't have the same maliciousness I do now, but 15-year-old me knew no better and to her, it seemed like she lost everything. I got so invested in it, that after the breakup a few questions started bouncing around in my head making me question everything such as "Who am I?", "What do I do?", "What is my purpose in life, and what do I want to do with it?", "Now what? Where do I start?" I panicked. I didn't know what I was supposed to do or who I even wanted to be.

One day I woke up and I decided I was going to take a few years to be on my own and to this day, it is the best decision I have ever made in my love life. I took that time for healing, to find all my flaws, my weaknesses, to make myself a better and stronger person, and to find who I was, who I wanted to be, and what my purpose in life was, no matter how long that would take.

During that time, I found that although I loved singing with all my heart and it filled me up with joy and happiness, my greatest passion was fashion and it was what I wanted to work in for the rest of my life. I understood that if I wanted to obtain everything I wanted and dreamed for myself, I had to get out of Puerto Rico and move to the U.S. I learned that family isn't always blood and sometimes the people you thought would be there through every dark and bright step are the ones that leave you stranded in the dessert. I matured as an individual and found the person I wanted to be. I may not be that person just yet, but I now know what I have to do to get there.

More than that, I grew strong on my own and became invincible from everyone and everything. Some people may call it being heartless, others being cruel, but the people that are truly worth my time will understand that I'm a strong individual that doesn't let anyone walk over herself. If there's one thing I am grateful for, is giving myself the chance to have spent all these years solo because more than anything, I learned to not depend on anyone for happiness and understood that I have to commit to myself before I can devote myself to someone because the truth is, how do I expect one day to be loved by someone if I don't even love myself?