13 Reasons why you should be single
The mythology of dating treats lovers like fires. They forge you. You come out different on the other side.
While that’s very romantic (and very Hollywood), I don’t think that’s always true. Try writing a sexy romantic comedy out of those two years you spent between partners, going through the daily grind, paying rent, walking your dog, and discovering what you like. It may not be the stuff that sells movie tickets, but you need those two years to grow.
Browse these 13 reasons why 2017 should be your year flying solo.
1. You grow more in the off-season.
Relationships, fuck buds, and friends with benefits all require maintenance — meaning they take attention off yourself. They give you a break from your own incessant self-obsession (we all have it).
But sometimes you need to focus on yourself. Few people want to admit this, but there are times in your life when you truly don’t need the distraction of partners and playmates. Some people — “relationship hoppers” — use human connections that would otherwise be healthy to avoid addressing their own problems and dissatisfactions. Because of this, their relationships become unhealthy.
You grow more in the off-season. If parts of yourself and your life need developing, fly solo.
2. Sexual interests change.
I was a freshman in college. My life outside the closet had just begun. I was drunk and lying on the linoleum floor of my dorm with a small, feisty blond man in my arms. We were entangled in my candy-red scarf. He was smitten by me and I by him. He whispered, “What are you into?”
“I’m a top,” I said.
Sexual interests change, gurl.
We had to eventually stop dating because I wanted to get pounded. What if we had stayed? We would have encountered those classic relationship pitfalls — infidelity, dissatisfaction, and that self-stifling so many suffer through when their needs aren’t being met.
When you’re in this spot, you can really do one of two things: You can convince your partner to try to satisfy you in the way you need to be satisfied, or You can open up your relationship to include sex partners who will.
3. You need to find your life mission.
What’s your life mission? This is an annoying question, but everyone should have an answer. Our missions may be grandiose or small, but they inform everything we do. My mission is to break down taboos and shame surrounding our sex lives and help everyone have happier, healthier, and more liberated relationships. Simple!
Your mission is what lingers in the wake of a loss like a death or breakup (which on a body-stress level feel similar). When this happens, you need that voice on your shoulder telling you to keep going — because you have a job to do.
When you’re young, you should find your mission when you’re single and running on your own — at a healthy distance from your family and with no romantic relationship to skew your views. You should critique your mission every few years, and it will probably change. As you get older you may find that you don’t have to be single to reevaluate your life or that your process of reevaluation means keeping with the person you’re with for a little bit longer (sometimes it will mean leaving them — never forget that).
4. Money, honey.
Relationships are expensive. You’re allowed to save money and focus on your career for a little bit.
5. Experimentation is the elixir of life.
Is your life getting dull? Even if you don’t know what’s missing and aren’t sure what needs to change, here’s a tip: Get single and do things differently. Shake it up.
6. Expand your sex skills.
I perform better now than I ever did with my exes. Why? Because I’ve been single for a little bit. I’ve had time to improve, expand my repertoire, and try new things — things that the men I have dated were not into. I’ve been able to focus on my own sexual development without worrying about meeting someone else’s sexual needs. The result for me has been more confidence in bed and, believe it or not, a better and more sincere appreciation for the future partners in my life.
7. If you’ve been hurt, you need time — more than you think.
A buddy once said that when a relationship ends badly, you need to take the full time you were with him — two months, one year, 10 years — and divide that number in half. That’s how long it’s going to take you to get over him.
It’s a weird formula, and I don’t think it’s totally true. Sometimes we mourn much longer than the length of our relationships, and sometimes you can drop a 10-year marriage and feel better in a week. But the sentiment that you should stay single for a while after something ends — longer than you think — is true. You need time to reevaluate, process, and heal.
8. If you hurt him, take even more time.
Take it from the guy who’s broken too many hearts. If you cheated, lied, or otherwise hurt someone who didn’t deserve it (and few guys do), you need to take some time off to figure yourself out.
Forgive yourself, list the things you liked and disliked about the relationship, list the things you want or need out of the next guy, and critically ask yourself if dating is the best idea for you at this time. Hint: It’s probably not.
It took hurting a good man who didn’t deserve it for me to finally sit back and realize that monogamy wasn’t right for me. Since him, my “monogamish” and semi-open relationships have been stronger and more fulfilling.
9. If you’re in a transitional period, try being single.
Transitional points include moving, the death of a parent, job-hunting, graduating from college, making a major job change, going sober/starting recovery, and, of course, breaking up with a long-term partner.
You shouldn’t attempt to start a relationship at this time. Relationships can get unhealthy. Sometimes they can keep you from fully committing to this next phase of your life. Sometimes we latch on to the people we’re with like rafts to help us through. You need to face change on your own.
10. It’s OK to play.
Every horrible teen vampire novel and darling rom-com tells us the same culturally enforced message: You should be in a relationship. But here’s a fact you won’t see on TV: Many people — many, many people — should not, because they still have stuff to figure out.
It’s OK to play, fuck around, cruise, scour the field, and be noncommittal. We paint noncommittal people as untrustworthy, flaky, disaffected, and uncaring, but I consider noncommittal people rather smart and self-aware. I’m biased here — I am very noncommittal. This doesn’t mean I don’t want a relationship or don’t need one — I do — but I know the importance and necessity of waiting, having fun, and focusing on myself until someone comes along.
I want self-care and self-love to be my basic, year-round procedure. Everything else, all that extraneous stuff, is the space where I leave the possibility of dating. This may shift as my priorities shift, but for the moment that’s where I am, and that’s where many, many people are if they are honest with themselves.
11. It’s OK to not know what you want.
No one is pressuring you to know what kind of relationship you’re looking for or what you want out of dating. You don’t need any clear ideas or clear answers. You’re allowed to just live, try people out, and see what happens.
12. You need to make mistakes.
Take heart, my darling. The fuck-ups are good. They are necessary. This will be cold comfort the next time you’re sobbing on the floor of your bathroom, but sobbing on the floor of your bathroom is what you’re supposed to be doing. You’re supposed to be making these mistakes and dating people who are bad for you — because that truly is how you learn.
13. You need to make room for the next guy.
Sometimes we date folks who we think are good for us, and they are — because the experience of dating them teaches us something. And while our breakups with them may be painful, we should love them and thank them. They lead us to the next one.
I have beautiful relationships with all of my exes, and this makes me a lucky man. I encourage everyone to try to make peace and get on good terms with the people you used to date, even if that means having painful, difficult conversations with them or reaching out to them after years of silence (abusive relationships are the exception here — some people you should never speak to again).
I am grateful to all of them and consider all of them friends. I hurt all of them, and some of them hurt me back, and in the process I learned what love, forgiveness, honesty, and self-scrutiny look like.
Love your exes. Forgive them. Learn from them. And look forward.
