Three Liberating Insights for Single People

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The holidays are a time when being single can be especially hard. Feeling conspicuously uncoupled at gatherings evokes a private ache that many of us have become all too familiar with. Being home alone can feel even worse. Here are the three most liberating insights I know for everyone who is single and wishes they weren’t. Follow them, and you’ll change the course of your dating life in surprising and wonderful ways.

Your Dating Life is Not a Search For a Needle in a Haystack. It’s an Intimacy Journey

Single people are regaled with messages telling them they need to find a partner in 30, 60 or some other strangely arbitrary number of days. They are taught to view their dating life as some sort of pound-the-pavement self-promotion project unrelated to the deeper lessons of intimacy.

I think that the truth is much grander than that. Single people looking for love are on a profoundly important intimacy journey, and the insights they gain will change not just their dating life but most of their relationships. The great lessons of dating are finally the great lessons of love. Choosing people who consistently value you. Studiously avoiding those who chip away at your sense of self-worth. Facing and changing your patterns of fleeing and sabotaging love (If you don’t know your patterns, your closest friends probably do.) Learning wiser stewardship of your intensity and your sensitivity. And learning to value and deepen the love that’s already in your life.

This season, I encourage you to take all of the advice that focuses on the games and “rules” of dating and toss it right in the trash. It’s useless. More than that, it’s dangerous. Your job is to become more richly you–not to create an airbrushed mock-up of yourself in order to woo a potential mate. That’s the path to pain.

As You Grow, Your Romantic and Sexual Attractions Will Begin to Change for the Better.

After decades of working as a psychotherapist with single people seeking love, this is the phenomenon that comes closest to feeling miraculous to me. As you learn to embrace your authentic self, your sexual and romantic attractions will change for the better. As you learn to treat yourself with compassion, to name and honor your deepest gifts and protect yourself from those who take advantage of them, and as you learn to listen to the inner whispers—or shouts—inviting you toward intimacy, your attractions will actually begin to change. I’ve seen this happen countless times in my work, and I’ve seen it in my life as well. Again and again, I have had clients say that somehow, strangely, they find that they are dating and meeting men or women who are kinder, more available, and more consistent. And often for the first time, they are finding themselves attracted to these people. As we tackle our personal lessons of intimacy, our attractions change for the better. And when our attractions change for the better, we change the course of our entire future in love.

Your Longing For Love is Wisdom, Not Weakness

Anyone who takes his or her search for love seriously must learn to buck the cultural messages saying that loneliness is failure, or weakness, or (God forbid!) codependency; that we should be just fine on our own. Instead, we must learn to honor the deep humanity and validity of our longing for love. The next time you feel lonely, I encourage you to hold your loneliness with a sense of respect and compassion. Remember that your loneliness has most of its roots in the healthiest parts of you; the parts that keep reminding you of the urgent importance of love. When we respect our longing for love, another amazing thing begins to happen: Our loneliness begins to speak to us, to prod us toward our next steps in finding and building love. As long as we think we must silence or transcend our loneliness and longing, these next steps will be somehow obscured. The ache for deeper connection is one of the greatest gifts we own, because it’s that very ache that propels us out of the gravity zone of isolation.

Here is a micro-meditation that may create a powerful difference for you this holiday season. This gentle meditation takes no more than two minutes but it’s life-changing. Do it on the subway, on the bus, or in a moment of downtime. It’s a tool for discovering your personal lessons of intimacy.

MICRO-MEDITATION: YOUR NEXT STEP TOWARD LOVE

A good friend of mine learned this small but profound process during her wedding. In keeping with Quaker tradition, her wedding allowed space for sharing, and an older woman stood up and spoke. She said that one question had helped her survive and flourish in her long marriage, even during the hard times. The question was this: “What is love asking of me right now?” The answers that arose became her personal guide. I invite you to try this small question on for size. Right now, in fact. Just ask yourself, “What is love asking of me right now in my life?” See what answer emerges. It might be to get a good night of sleep, or to call a loved one. It might be to spend more time dating, or to have more alone time. Allow yourself to be surprised by your insight, and try acting on it. This tiny question, asked at the small and large crossroads of your life, will change your future in ways that can’t be quantified. I hope you try this micro-meditation during the holidays and thereafter, and that you allow yourself to enjoy the personal wisdom it inspires in you.