I woke up today to yet another rejection message on my matrimonial profile. Not a good feeling to wake up to. It sent me on a downward doom spiral, bringing up all the reasons why I wasn’t good enough. Why don’t any of the attractive girls find me attractive? What if I never find ‘The One’?

Shifting My Mindset

All of this wasn’t making me feel great. I needed to shift. I needed to focus on something else. So, I watched an episode of some comedy series, ate some good food, took a cold fresh shower, put on some fresh clothes, and journaled. I previously discussed a similar approach in my blog.

This helped me shift from my doomer mindset to a more peaceful one. No, I wasn’t exactly jumping around with joy or anything. But peace was better than where I was. It put me in a state of mind to solve problems and not just feel sorry for myself.

Is Being Single Really That Bad?

I slowly started asking myself questions to figure out what I was so afraid of. What was the worst that could happen if I never found anyone, let alone ‘The One’? I would never get married. Okay, is it really that bad? Is loneliness really that terrible?

I remembered a TED Talk I had saved to my Watch Later list on YouTube called What No One Ever Tells You About People Who Are Single. I put it on, hoping to find some answers. It turns out loneliness has nothing to do with your marital status.

Single Does Not Mean Lonely

The speaker, Bella DePaulo, cited several studies. The people who felt less lonely were the ones who had people to reach out to when they had a problem. Marriage was not an indicator of loneliness. You can be married or single and still have lots of people to reach out to.

In fact, single people tend to have more friends than married people. They are the ones who look after their ailing parents, catch up with siblings, and help their neighbours. Whereas married people tend to be more insular. Married people are said to have found “the one,” but in practice, single people tend to find “the ones.”

What I took from the studies was that if you have the same level of income and you reach out to people when you are in need, you are not going to feel alone, no matter if you are married or single.

“The story we’re told is that married people have The One. The untold, more revealing story is that single people have The Ones”—Bella DePaulo

You Need More Than Love

We are told that all you need is love. But according to Bella, just love is not enough. To have a happy life, you also need autonomy, mastery, purpose, and meaning.

Single people, she said, often have more control over their lives and therefore more autonomy. They do everything that would otherwise be split between partners and so gain mastery over many things. They can pursue whatever matters to them and thus find meaning and purpose.

Should I Even Get Married?

In her talk, she also highlighted that single people tend to find and value meaningful work more than married people and that they experience more personal growth.

Growing each day and contributing are two of my core driving factors, like writing about this experience and hopefully contributing to someone in a similar state. It made me wonder if getting married would detract from my core desires.

From wondering if I was doomed forever to be lonely and never to find a partner to thinking if I should even consider marriage, what a shift in thinking this was turning out to be.

Married or If I Never Find ‘The One’, I’ll Be Fine

What all this meant to me was that I can lead a happy, relaxed, purposeful life—whether I be single or married. What I need to do is to reach out to friends and family during times of need, learn and grow each day, and contribute to the world in a way that’s meaningful to me. It seems my seemingly worst-case scenario is actually a good one. Phew, what a relief!

I no longer take people rejecting my profile on a matrimonial site to mean I am doomed. I lead a healthy and beautiful life no matter what my relationship status ends up being. Thanks.