Believe it or not, being single is a relatively painless existence.

I don’t mean that I don’t want to date or that I purposely try to remain boyfriend-less. I like to say that my romantic status is more circumstantial than it is purposeful. Like most girls my age, I would love to replace my relationship with Netflix with an actual human being. I look forward to going on dates and meeting “the one”, and I fanaticize about having some of my meals paid for. And yes, of course, there are lonely days when I re-think my priorities, but the generic side-effects of being single aren’t what make it hard.

What makes being single hard is not what I think about myself but what others think about me. It’s the unwarranted, not to mention unwanted, opinions of who I am without a relationship and who I’ll be when I finally get into one.

Let me start by saying that being single in your twenties means you are alone in some of the most formative years of your life. I don’t say this to be bitter or melancholic. I say it not only because it’s true, but because it’s relevant. Your twenties are years where you begin to be your own person. You are defining who you are and what you want, and the true beauty of being single at this time is that you have no one else to focus on but yourself. You are your sole focus and you come out of it knowing yourself better than you ever thought you could.

That being said, I find that my opinions on relationships are often invalidated because of my status. When I express my likes and dislikes, I’m met with promises that my stance will change. I hear variations of the same sentiment – I’ll be different when I start dating someone.

I won’t pretend that there won’t be things about me that will change in a relationship. I understand that one of the most significant parts of a healthy relationship is the ability to take the best parts of your partner. I know that it’s about mutual growth and compatibility. I don’t doubt that my future significant other will influence what I do and the way I see the world.

What a relationship won’t do, though, is change who I am.

I don’t need to be taken to know what I want and what I don’t. I don’t need to have a boyfriend to understand why I won’t be doing certain things in my relationship. Whether or not I’m dating someone will not change the experiences I’ve had to reach my decisions. Who I am and what I want is defined by the things I’ve lived and the things I’ve felt, not who I’m with.

I’m sure the advice is well-meaning, and I’m sure that it was true for them. The effort is appreciated, but as someone who prides themselves on knowing myself well, it comes off as condescending. Some people won’t see a problem where I do. Some people will see a problem where I won’t. Most people don’t walk around openly criticizing someone’s relationship to their face, so why is the same courtesy not extended to me and my prospective relationships?

If everyone is different, then so must be every relationship. What works in your relationship, or what you think works, won’t necessarily work in mine. What you do in your relationship isn’t the standard.

We can’t generalize what will and won’t happen, because at the end of the day, we’re only experts in our own relationships.