Permission to be Single

I don’t think people mean to come across condescending and negative.  Well, maybe they do, but I’m going to choose to believe they don’t.  We all have this unnecessary urge to label everyone and fit them into a category of our own choosing.  We do it with denominations, careers, relationships, and lifestyles.  And when people don’t fit, we don’t know what to do.  I’m as guilty as the next person.

For those of you who need to hear this, let me offer you a freeing truth – you can just be single.  You don’t have to be married or even want to be married.  You don’t have to have children or even want to have children.  And just because you don’t want to enter into a lifelong covenant with someone does not make you gay, unattractive, or unworthy. 
I have friends who kneel down beside their beds every night and beg God for the godly spouse they’re waiting on to arrive from the castle.  And honest to God, I hope he shows up because they deserve it.  They feel called to be a wife and a mother and it’s heartbreaking to watch that seemingly never come to pass.

But it’s not for everyone and you’re not a lesser person if it’s not for you.

Don’t get me wrong.  The perfect guy shows up who can contribute to this life without killing it?  I’ll reconsider.  In the meantime?  No.  I’m not opposed to marriage.  I’m surrounded by people who live marriage really, really well.   I think kids are awesome and my friends always want me to hang out with theirs.  I just don’t like the part where I would have to raise them into decent human beings.  I’d so much rather be the fun person who lets them eat ice cream for dinner and tucks them  in at night…..like two times a week max.

I’ve never once cut anything out from a bridal magazine unless it was the card in the middle at the dentist office so I could spit out my gum.  I did not watch Disney fairy tales as documentaries.  And I’m certainly not producing offspring just so I won’t die alone.  Lord, have mercy.

I get self-conscious about it, too.  I get it.  I worry what people think, get tired of being alone all the time, and feel like I have to constantly defend myself about not being gay, not being the marrying type, or somehow be missing something by being alone.  I get sucked into that vortex of crazy.  I honestly do. 

But, guess what?  It passes.  And I can return to a life that I feel perfectly called to live. 

You can be a child of God, perfectly lovable, within the will of God for you, and be single. 
Stop apologizing.  Stop living like you’re waiting for something better to happen.  Because even if it does?  It’s not guaranteed forever.  Go have fun with your friends.  Take vacations with people you love or all by yourself.  Find friends with funny kids and be the cool person who stops by to play.  Seriously, live.

You might feel like a lesser species, but trust me.  Plenty of people think single people are the smart ones.  I tend to agree.