Having trouble finding the love of your life? Are you always on the sidelines watching everyone getting into new relationships and engaged? Is it just me or has dating become less of a priority, and placed on the back burner? All I would hear growing up is that I would surely meet the person I would marry by the time I graduated college. Most of the wonderful individuals I have met at college have certainly met their lifelong partners, and I began to doubt if I was doing something wrong. I kept questioning if I was supposed to have met my future husband by now. We are constantly under the influence of societal pressures on marriage, beauty, political beliefs, job career, and so forth, however, we need to take a step back. Singleness is nothing to be ashamed of or sad about. Yes, finding a partner is amazing and wonderful, yet are we letting that take control of how we live?

I have seen long lasting relationships and short lasting relationships, strong and broken, loving and heartbreaking. Are we so afraid to be alone that we are willing to be with someone we do not love? There is certainly a time to be pursuing a relationship and a time to embrace to being single! Sometimes it can be discouraging to constantly be asked if you're in a relationship, or if there is a man in your life. Who is to say we need to be finding the love of our lives now? Maybe right now is the time to start dating ourselves.

Now is the time to experiment and to discover who we are. Now is the time to learn how to love who we are. What would happen if we stopped consistently looking for love in a significant other, and we began to love others and ourselves? Perhaps by changing our focus and perception of love, we could be happier with where we are in life? I have enjoyed growing through my friendships. I have found a greater love through my faith, friends, and my family. In fact, I used to obsess about dating and as of recently, I have seen a shift in thinking. Dating has become more of a societal pressure on people, rather than realizing timing will be different for each person. Just because a few of my close friends and half my Facebook friends are in relationships and/or dating does not mean I too should be where they are. As we do not need to be in a relationship, we should still celebrate the people who are in love.

Being single has been shown through media to be a lonely season of life, however, I have never truly been alone. Through surrounding myself with people who inspire, lead, care, and love me I have found being single has been my greatest adventure. So if you are also single go out into the world dance, sing, shout, praise, be crazy, be adventurous, figure out yourself and the world and how you belong in it.