I just want to start off by saying there's nothing wrong with being single.

We're essentially told by society that during college or our early 20s is when we're supposed to meet and marry the person we'll be with forever. I know for some people (including some of my closest friends), that is the case for them, but I also know that I'm made to feel bad for not having a significant other on my arm.

I'm tired of being made to feel like a spinster just because I'm not dating someone. And even when I look at my friends in college who are dating, it's not even dating anymore; it's going to a fast-food restaurant and scarfing down a meal as quick as you can because you barely have the time to see each other because you have work up to your eyeballs due for eight classes, even though you're only taking five, or you have a job or career that takes up so much of your time that you only sleep when you sneeze and your eyes close.

Girls, from a very young age, have the idea pushed on us that in order to achieve happiness, we need to be in a relationship, get married, have kids, and grow our families and care for them. Or, if we choose to focus on our careers, we are told that that's all we can have: a career. If we become career women, we cannot have a family because that will take away from our focus on said careers.

While the ideal of having a family and staying home to raise it is a nice dream, in this day and age, it is exactly that: a dream.

I believe that the ideal of meeting the person we're supposed to marry in college or in the years briefly after is an outdated expectation.

As my grandfather once told me, "You need to focus on being the best you you can be".

I truly believe that is where we need to start: we need to care for ourselves before we can properly care for someone else.

I understand that sometimes people just fall in love, and it works out for them to date and then be married at such a young age, but for others, like myself, we take our time to get there.

I ask that as a society, we remove the judgement and stigma that comes with being single, and accept that sometimes, it just takes some of us more time than it would for others.