For All the 'Happily' Single Women

We are intelligent, goal-oriented and determined. We are attractive enough, involved in numerous activities and not too shy. We like to think we have our lives together, that we are people worth knowing, worth being invested in.

Yet we are also single.

Whether this status is of our own doing has yet to be determined.

However, I need to believe I'm not the only one, so this is a post for all the strong, independent, single, 20-something women out there -- the women who are OK with being single, content even, but at the same time can't help but wonder why they haven't found someone.

This is a post I have been sitting on for a long time because it has taken me that long to figure out how I feel. I've finally reached a conclusion -- I, among many other women, am never going to have a clear-cut explanation for how I feel about broad concepts such as love, relationships, independence or self-worth.

We may as well accept that now.

We like to claim that we are happily single, that we are independent people and only need ourselves in order to feel successful. This is true, but that doesn't mean that we don't wish we had someone to share life's triumphs and failures with. We are the farthest thing from alone in life, and yet sometimes we feel lonely because we are missing that one significant relationship.

Sure, we have flings here and there. Something that starts off with a bit of potential, but inevitably ends in, "I'm just not looking for something serious" from ourselves or the other person. A.k.a., "You're attractive and fun to spend time with, but I don't want to date you and limit my options lest I find someone else more attractive and more fun to spend time with." We're guilty of delivering and receiving that line.

When we fall, we fall hard. And when we don't, we try to convince ourselves that we have. We'll be the first to admit monogamy freaks us out, but more hesitant to admit that we crave it simultaneously. We often express disdain for clingy, codependent couples, but envy them at the same time.

But to clarify, we don't envy them in the sense of literally wanting what they have. We mean it more in the sense of we want someone to want to have that with us. We want someone to be content with us being their world, but not actually allow us to be their world.

We tend to be our own biggest critics and often fail to see ourselves in the light that others do. It is so easy to think of everything we are not, rather than everything we are. Flaws are so much more evident than strengths.

We often find ourselves wondering what someone could possibly see in us, why they would want to date us, to commit themselves to being in our lives. Because we can't see ourselves as worthy, we are convinced that others don't either.

But this is where we have to realize we are wrong.

We are worthy. We have so much to offer, and just because we have no one to offer it to romantically does not make it any less valuable. In fact, it makes it more valuable because it is not easily-given-away affection. Not just anyone can maneuver their way into our hearts and earn that affection -- it takes time and trust.

Because we don't always see ourselves in the light that others do, it makes it more meaningful when someone convinces us to step back and reevaluate. It means we value their opinion and actually trust their viewpoint.

When we find someone who makes us see in ourselves what they see in us, that is when it all will have been worth it. That is when we will know there was a reason for the delay.

But in the meantime, we need to remember that it doesn't make us weak to admit that once in a blue moon, we despise being single. It simply makes us human.