5 Satisfying Situations Why Being Single Is So Liberating
People often have the perception that the grass appears to be greener on the other side of the fence. The truth is all about how one views their current circumstances. Single people versus those in a relationship often desire to be in each others’ place. Contrary to what society tells us to do, get married and buy a house on the hill, there are actually a lot of positive things about being single, including a lot of freedoms you might not otherwise have if you were to be in a serial relationship.
1. You don’t have to be home at a certain time
If you are an adult and have dated someone in the past where you shared a deep and bonding relationship with someone, you know that you always have the other person’s best interests’ in mind (you definitely should if not, get the heck out of there). Yes it’s nice to be dependable, and have someone to depend upon, but being dependable is a big responsibility. If you don’t want to be there for the other person, you need to understand why. If you’re a single adult, all variables set aside, then you really don’t have anyone who needs to depend on you. You can go out with your friends, and stay out as late as you like. No one has set a curfew for you, and you are a completely free agent. As they say in some part of the world, ‘You do you.’
2. You can have opposite sex friends without having anyone getting jealous
When you’re dating another person, and you are pretty serious in the relationship, inevitably you or your significant other will be jealous at one point or another. This happens when you or your partner receives attention from another, and there is sexual tension (mild or not). If you have dated enough people, and are through with dealing with jealous partners, or you can’t seem to handle yourself, take a moment for yourself to be single in your current walk of life, and evaluate your values. Sometimes those deep feelings are rooted from childhood abandonment feelings. We’re all messed up in some way or another, right? Breathe in, then breathe out. Relax.
3. You have the ability to take off and work wherever you like
Many people who are in relationships may have a house, children, and a significant other. With all of the responsibilities, an individual may have, taking off and leaving to do work in a foreign country may be difficult. When you are single, you have a lot more freedom. If you’re a twentysomething, you are also probably renting. Without all of the responsibilities you would have with rearing a family and being in a serial relationship, the movement may be a bit difficult. Take a moment, if you’re single, to appreciate the freedom you have right here and now. Be fully present, and love your life for all the freedom you have. Could it get any sweeter?
4. The only person you need to please is you.
It may be nice to spoil another, charm them, and treat them well. However, when you are single you can direct all of that attention towards improving the person you are. You can take yourself to the spa, eat greasy Chinese takeout, and even get a front row ticket to a concert with friends. A lot of time and energy goes into building the other person up and letting them know you love and care for them. When you’re single, you have the opportunity to adapt yourself into the best version of yourself before you get in a relationship. It’s all about perspective. Time and money are variables you either invest or squander. Make the investment today to be the best you can.5. You have a thriving social life.
If you are single, go and plan a happy hour with your friends right now. Being in a relationship over a long period of time can morph your social life to a circle of you and your significant other. Grow your circle of friends. Take time to be friends with as many different circles as you can. You will become more social, open minded, and inevitably, more cultured according to Bella DePaulo who studies singles.
5. You can invest in yourself.
You are your own best investment. You are responsible for your success. You are responsible for reaching your goals. You must learn about yourself in order to achieve your full potential. No one is responsible for you, except for you! Once you begin to accept self-responsibility and practice self-discipline you can become the best version of yourself! Start to focus on yourself and become the person you have always wanted to be! No significant other is needed!
There you have it singles, no better time now than to mingle. Keep your independence, and be happy in life. The grass really can be greener on your side if you take the time to water it. Stride on with confidence and make the most of your singleness through building up your friendships, taking off and traveling for work, and experiencing all life has to offer.
Views expressed in this article are the author’s opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of Secure Single. It is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment or financial advice. James Bollen is the author of Thriving Solo: How to Flourish and Live Your Perfect Life (Without A Soulmate). Now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon. Subscribe to Secure Single’s Substack for free!
Friendship is the state of forming a bond with another person to get to know them better and to enjoy spending time with them. The Greek word for the love between friends is philia. Friendship often neglected and placed behind sexual and romantic relationships. Despite the age of social media where people can have hundreds of friends, most people do not know how to be a good friend. Society also emphasizes that people should pursue sexual and romantic relationships; despite that once they end, the people in those relationships go there different ways because it did not last and lose contact with each other. Friendship, if done well, should last since the goal is to build and continually improve the human connection with another person who you want to know more by spending time with that person. Here are five steps to be a better friend.
1) Loyalty
Friendship is about making time to support your friends when they are going through a hard time or they just want to get together over coffee or drinks to talk. This also means that you are willing to hear your friends concerns and always be honest with your friends. This is especially true when disagreements arise between friends. Loyalty means that you make time for your friends out of your busy life to stay connected, or to reconnect with old friends.
2) Accept Your Friend Unconditionally
To unconditionally accept anyone is difficult. It requires that you accept your friends for their problems and all. This also means that you are willing to accept them when they expose their vulnerabilities and expose some of their hidden problems or secrets that you were not aware of until having a real conversation with your friend.
3) Stay Friends Regardless of Your Friend’s Choices
People can make their own choices and to decide how they want to live their life. Regardless if you agree with your friend’s choices, stick by your friend. This means that even when you disagree with the choices your friend is deciding to make, or made, that you will not leave them just because you don’t support their choice. It is easy to leave, bail on a friend, and to lose a friendship. It is hard to stay friends and to stand by your friend’s choices. Do the hard choice and stay friends regardless of your friend’s decisions.
4) Work to Improve Their Life
As a friend, you should genuinely want to help and want to improve your friend’s life. This requires that your friendship is a vehicle to benefit them in the different areas of their life. Listen to them. Talk to them. Help them as needed. Be there when they are having a difficult time in life. As a friend, you want to see their life improve and watch them become a better person.
5) Show Up
Take time out of your busy life and show up when your friend wants to do something. This reveals to your friend that you care enough about them by taking time out of your day to meet up with them. Showing up proves to your friend that you actually care and that you are a loyal friend.
Views expressed in this article are the author’s opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of Secure Single. It is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment or financial advice. James Bollen is the author of Thriving Solo: How to Flourish and Live Your Perfect Life (Without A Soulmate). Now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon. Subscribe to Secure Single’s Substack for free!
Single and Lonely? How To Deal
“If you make friends with yourself you will never be alone...” Maxwell Maltz
You’re single and proud of it. While all your friends are out there getting married, starting families, and pairing up, you’re left standing there alone as the free bird. It should feel great, but for some reason, you may feel very feel more alone than ever. One thing you need to know is that you’re not alone.Companionship is great, but only if you’ve taken the time to truly love and accept yourself first and foremost can you then fully share yourself with another person. Too often, people rush into a relationship for the sake of having one. If you’re a free bird and feeling lonely, the best thing you can do is to find the root cause. Take your time in building the relationship you have with yourself. When you become solid with how you feel about yourself, in a positive manner, then you will watch as outside relationships with other people start to grow and become deep and meaningful – with family, friends, and coworkers.
Love will come when you are ready, and if you are out there looking for love, you will only attract the wrong people. When you feel most lonely, follow these steps to lead a more fulfilling life as a single person. Just as you start loving and enjoying your life to the fullest, you may stumble upon the next love of your life.
Here are 4 things to do when you feel lonely:
Attend Meetups
If you live in a city, you will most likely have Meetup groups in the area. Meetups are a great way to break out of your isolation and loneliness. Find at one or two meetups you can attend in a week. Search for groups that are relative to your likes and interests. Being a part of a group with similar interests makes it easy to find a connection with at least two or three people. With common interests, you’re bound to make friends. This is a great cure for loneliness. Go out with a positive attitude that you will make friends wherever you go!
Volunteer
It may be the last thing on your mind when you feel lonely and are comfy at home in your pj’s, however, a recent study noted in the Harvard Women’s Health revealed that volunteering helps people who donate their time feel more socially connected, ultimately warding off depression and loneliness. Giving back to the community is a great way to boost your happiness levels, and can help you make great connections with other people. Working with others builds rapport, and strengthens relationships. You might make a handful of friends at your next volunteering event! Simply Google volunteer opportunities in your area, or ask a friend who volunteers to let them join you. You always have options.
Adopt A Pet
Having a pet at home can be a great source of companionship. Dogs and cats are among the most popular domesticated pets to own. Not only are they great company, but most pets will love you unconditionally. After a long day, coming home to a pet can help reduce stress levels, and lend a loving and non-judgmental ear to listen – even though they may not understand what you are saying. Getting your words out to a pet can reduce your stress levels, simply because you are letting everything out that you have kept bottled up. Pets also take a lot of dedication and are a huge responsibility. Having to take care of a pet will keep you busy at home, which means your mind will have a moment to rest from the daily activities, and sit back to make some food for your pet. Your mind will have a moment to relax and switch hears while you are taking your pet out for a walk.
Realize That Not Everyone Is In A Relationship
After scrolling through the 5th Facebook post in a row about another wedding engagement, know that not everyone is getting married. According to Huffington Post, the average age of people getting married is from 27 – 29 years old, (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/14/married-young_n_4227924.html). If you’re in your 20-somethings, don’t feel pressured. You definitely have the rest of your life ahead of you, and if you’re not ready to commit to something, that’s completely okay. You should always go forward in relationships at a pace you are comfortable with.
There are many remedies to help yourself from feeling lonely. If you don’t have a special relationship with someone yet, then continue to love your life – though, make sure you love and enjoy your life. Read the above statements, and apply some into your life. Positive people are attractive, needy people are not. Take this time while you are single to become the most interesting person you can be! You are not alone, to take your friends with you. The only remedy to change a current situation is to take action. Live your life to the fullest as a Secure Single, and feel good about who you are. While you are living your life, you may just meet the person of your dreams.
Views expressed in this article are the author’s opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of Secure Single. It is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment or financial advice. James Bollen is the author of Thriving Solo: How to Flourish and Live Your Perfect Life (Without A Soulmate). Now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon. Subscribe to Secure Single’s Substack for free!
If you are single, and have a lot of time to yourself, you should check this out. These are three activities that every single should do to connect with others and be healthy. These three activities can help you become a better person and more well-rounded in society today.
3 Activities Every Single Needs To Do Today
Improve Your Relationships With Friends And Family
Your quality of your relationships with people is the measure of the quality of your life. Improve, amend, and fix the relationships in your life that need a little tender love and care. If you have moved to a new city as a young 20 something, you should keep in touch with visits to family and friends. Join a meetup group in your city, and work to improve your communication skills and build your circle of friend up. You can never go wrong when you are around good friends.
Take Time To Reflect
I feel like people don’t take time to sit and reflect. This can easily be done by meditating, and working to study what really makes you happy. I have found that pina coladas, getting caught in the rain, and doing yoga seems to do the trick (: Though, if you’re not into yoga, or any of that, take long walks and begin journaling at the end of your day to reflect. Through journaling, you achieve clarity. Life is always asking for us to, be, or give something — which is part of life. So you should keep at least an hour to yourself. The key to life is to find your happy place. You can do this, begin one step at a time.
Workout Your Mind And Body
You should definitely join a gym if you haven’t yet and you should stick to your routine. Also, pair this with reading quality books every day. Make it a goal to complete 1 to 2 books a month. You truly will benefit from improving your body and mind. You put out what you put in, so also remember to eat healthy items! Organic veggies, meats, nuts, and fruits. Through, a glass of red wine can do the trick after a long day of work to reward yourself.
There you have it singles. Be proud of who you are, and you will begin to build the life you intend one step at a time by making the most of being single with these activities. Just believe in yourself, love yourself, and improve your relationships, mind, body, and spirit. You got this!
Views expressed in this article are the author’s opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of Secure Single. It is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment or financial advice. James Bollen is the author of Thriving Solo: How to Flourish and Live Your Perfect Life (Without A Soulmate). Now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon. Subscribe to Secure Single’s Substack for free!
5 Ways to Love Your Single Self During the Holiday’s
Some say ‘it’s the most wonderful time of the year.’ But how do you embody that when you have a sense of secure-single-loneliness?
While your friends are pairing up and starting their families, here are some tips to keep you focused during the holiday’s:
- Love yourself.
No matter what situation you are in, whether recovering from a bad break up, or are chronically single and have no clue why you can’t seem to get a glance from the opposite sex, keep one thing in mind: you can love yourself — even when others don’t seem to.
Explanation: Yes you may have some issues, like having a high number of cats at your house or that embarrassing comic collection… But you can still love yourself. If there are some ailments you would like to remedy, talk to your friends for feedback or simply seek out professional help. There is always a way to love yourself. This is one of the most important keys to a happy life.
- When your family asks if you are dating anyone…
It’s okay to say ‘no.’ This is perhaps one of the most powerful words in the dictionary. When preparing the rebuttal of why you are still single, here is one powerful you can add into your tool belt:
I am taking time to find myself — you can never go wrong with this. Seriously, we could all benefit from studying ourselves on a deeper level. As the great philosopher Socrates once said, ‘Know thyself.’
- Focus on the great relationships you have with friends, and amend ones that need nurtured.
So many times people can get lost in their own minds… Especially when you are single and trying to decide if a relationship is right for you.. ‘Should I do this? Or should I do that…?’ Take this moment in time you have to build up great relationships and amend the past. A good circle of friends is the icing on the cake to a beautiful life.
If you feel lonely this holiday season, call a good friend and go shopping, eat out, and treat yourself! Perhaps a disagreement has distanced you from a good friend. Communication is key. Talking about how you feel, and expressing yourself in a safe environment will do a person good. Whatever route you take, make sure to appreciate your friends.
- Go workout.
Who doesn’t like a beautiful body? Head to the gym and work out for a quality hour. Mix it up with cardio, weights, or simply picking up a game of basketball. Bring your friends along, or simply go in solo. Either way, a workout will leave you feeling refreshed, and will vamp up the release of endorphin’s in your body — when they’re released, [they] make us feel better, improve our mood, increase pleasure, and minimize pain (altered-states.net).
- Meditate.
This is a great call to action for any time you feel lonely, lost, or confused being single. Simply meditate. All you need is a quiet space, and time to focus on your breathing. You will come out the other end a lot happier.
Now that you are armed with some great tips to survive this holiday season, you can definitely have a more positive one. Happy holidays Secure Singles!
Yours truly,
Views expressed in this article are the author’s opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of Secure Single. It is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment or financial advice. James Bollen is the author of Thriving Solo: How to Flourish and Live Your Perfect Life (Without A Soulmate). Now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon. Subscribe to Secure Single’s Substack for free!
Love is an important aspect of life. However, society often neglects the love of friendship (philia) by preferring romantic love (eros). Society elevates romantic love with a nationally recognized holiday, Valentine’s Day, but fails to recognize Friendship Day. Friends and community are vital, whether married or single, because “Man is by nature a social animal” (Aristotle, Politics, 1.1253a). For this reason, it is essential to have friends and to invest in friendship. Singles should be aware of the different levels of friendship and decide which type of friend to invest time and effort when developing and maintaining friendships.
There are four general levels of friendship: acquaintances, casual friends, close friends, and best friends. Robin Dunbar was the anthropologist and psychologist who arrived at the maximum social group that an individual can keep. An acquaintance is someone that you know slightly, but not well enough to be called a friend. Casual friends are people who you know and would invite to a large event or party. Dubar found that someone’s casual friends group could range from one hundred to two hundred, depending on how social a person is. The next level was close friends that is around fifty people. Within that group of fifty, there will be a smaller group of fifteen that you will talk with on a more routine basis and will turn to for support when problems or something good happens in life. The final group is made up of five people and these are best friends. This smallest group is often made up of your closest and best friends along with family members. These various types of friendship are important for singles and for society because it develops intimacy between friends and people.
In the age of social media where you can easily have more than two hundred friends, it is important to be able to relate and to actually know our friends. This means knowing the things that they enjoy, their birthday, and their life goals. The level of intimacy and knowledge of your friends as a single person will go deeper for each of the four levels of Robin Dunbar’s social groups. The human race, and the single and unmarried, are social animals by nature. As social animals, it is important to have friends and to decide which friendships to invest time and effort in as singles.
Society too often trivializes, or worse neglects, friendship by placing romantic and erotic love on a pedestal. Start to spend time with friends outside of Facebook and other social media and start a conversation with someone at your local bar or your favorite hang out spot. Friendship and social connection is an essential part of humanity. This indirectly harms individuals and society as a whole. It is important for singles and the unmarried to spend time with friends and to decide which friendship to grow and maintain in life.
Views expressed in this article are the author’s opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of Secure Single. It is intended for informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment or financial advice. James Bollen is the author of Thriving Solo: How to Flourish and Live Your Perfect Life (Without A Soulmate). Now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon. Subscribe to Secure Single’s Substack for free!
Society pushes on single people that they are only valuable to society if they are dating or married. There is nothing inherently wrong with this since human connection is important, but there are different degrees and different types of human love. On a deeper level, though, society neglects and underplays the importance of friendship in individuals’ lives in favor of romance and erotic love. Robert Waldinger, in a Ted Talk, explains that Harvard University conducted a study that found people who had social connections and close friendships lived longer than people who were lonely and who isolated themselves from human connection. Contrary to society’s portrayal of single people, singles have the ability to form a close community of social connections and human relationships that have been found to make individuals live longer. Singles should seek to find a core community to form various levels of social connections with other people.
Society and the media often portray singles as being lonely and isolated. It is important that single people have a core group of friends that they can talk to and interact with in life. Further, it is important that singles become confident in their singlehood by attending different events in their home city or town, even if they are unable to find a friend to go. It is healthy that everyone, but especially singles, should leave the house or apartment for social interaction. Physical interaction with others has been found to increase how long one will live and one’s overall health. Social media can both help singles to find events attend, but it can also help lead to further isolation.
In the age of the Internet and social media, virtual relationships have become common. It has changed how we interact, in both good and bad ways, with others. On the positive side, it can find events in their town or city that relates to their interests to meet new people and to interact with more people. On the negative side, social media can become a virtual reality where people spend all of their time without interacting with another physical person. Use social media as a tool to get out of the house or apartment to meet new people. Websites such as Meetup and Facebook events that Facebook recommends are great ways to meet new people with similar interests and to build a community. In addition to social media to find events, singles should find be involved in communities. Single people should strive be involved with a community such as their family, church, community, events, hobbies, or causes that one cares deeply about to form friendships. Singles should have a few close friends and build a community in order to combat against society’s stereotype of singles as being lonely.
After getting involved with a core community, begin to develop a couple of close friendships. The quality of one’s close friendships will influence how long one will live. Single people can develop these close friendships, whether they are living a life of singlehood or a life of singleness. One does not need to be dating or need a romantic relationship to develop this level of friendship. Society, the media, and Hollywood say the contrary. In the age of social media where a single person can have thousands of friends on social media, social science research has found that individuals’ can have at most five close friends. Ultimately, a single person needs close friends for the benefits of personal health and to build a strong community.
Social and human interaction is important and provides many personal health benefits to individuals. Singles should find people and communities that they enjoy hanging out to have social interactions with other people. Social media is a great tool to discover new events that may be interesting and to meet new people at different events. With a society that portrays singles as being lonely and isolated, it is vital that single people show otherwise by seeking out events that they enjoy and to find a core community that they want to help while developing close friendships with a few friends.