The opinions of a single life

The other day I was posed with a statement: 'You're twenty-four now, shouldn't you think about settling down?'. It stumped me for a little bit because even though I know my answer, if you look all over social media there are people my age whom are engaged and are getting mortgages, perhaps because they're happy or perhaps because it's what society and instagram shows is what makes you happy and this can be an extreme influence on our daily lives. I think we all seem to fall into this trap of what is meant to be good rather than taking the time of looking into ourselves and thinking about what it is that we actually want as people. 

It's funny how we take other people's opinions so seriously and yet the person who has come up with that opinion, will take no more than a couple of seconds to think about it before getting on with their own lives and yet we use that opinion to fulfil some of the most important decisions that we will ever make in our lifetimes. We all get too easily sucked into what our lives should be, that we can end up unhappy in the long run. All of us feel like we're in a constant rat race to be better and compete against each other, but that will only ever bring us temporary happiness. If marriage isn't for you, and yet it is seen as the done thing, your instagram of your wedding day may be pretty but your life won't be, if it's not what you really wanted. 

In response to the question, I had to look at what was the right thing for me. I don't have to be in a relationship constantly in order to be happy. In fact, a lot of relationships, especially the wrong ones, can breed more unhappiness. There is no rule book that states a relationship will make you happier than being single as it is all down to the person. We seem to have this romantic vs classical philosophy that being single is wrong and makes you unhappy, but people forget about the toxic relationships that exist and own personal preferences, which should all be considered.

At the end of the day, there is nothing that will make you happier than doing what feels right within you. If that means never getting married, or travelling the world and starting a career when you're thirty, that's okay. There is no hard and fast rule, just because someone on instagram has got hundreds of likes...they may be extremely unhappy in their choices down the line just because they felt this invisible pressure to follow the trend. 

There are certain external factors about my environment that mean I am not fully in the place where I want to be right now, but that is something I have to accept. What I can change is important and with that, it is what I want and not what others deem my success to be. Real success is making decisions, that at the time feel right, even if they may not work out in the end. 

Two years

Change is happening all around us, all of the time. It is happening to ourselves every single day, even if we are not purposefully forging forward with it. 

I have experienced more change in myself over these past two years than I have in the majority of my life. I'm twenty-four now, moving towards twenty-five and the last time I felt that I had to make as many life-changing decisions as I have, I was sixteen. During that time I was stripped back to my bare bones and had to build my life up from scratch. This is something I've not necessarily had to do again over these past two years, but I have definitely uncovered parts of me that I didn't know I still had issues with. 

it's taken everything I have had to make it through some of the horrific dark times during this period, but I've also been graced with so much growth. I've made mistakes, as does any human-being, but I feel that I have now been equipped with a strong sense of what I want and don't want and am getting to a point where I can see the light through the trees. Looking back, I felt that I knew myself and the state of play in the world, but now I know this was never the case at all. It took me taking a step back and spending many day alone by myself to understand the change that was right in front of my face. Naivety is always present. 

I've played with guilt a lot over these past few years too, wondering whether I'm making the right decision for myself and others. We all know that guilt comes from a subconscious effort to do the right thing and to treat those whom we love around us, with respect and honesty. If we feel that we haven't fulfilled that or done something that may have hurt others, this feeling will present itself. It's important to note however that the feeling of guilt may not mean that we have always done something wrong as the traditional understanding would suggest, but it can be us putting ourselves first which might be at the unfortunate detriment to some close to us. It's important to keep looking at ourselves and being truthful that if we have done wrong and haven't treated someone as well as we could, we try to fix it. But the notion of that must always be balanced with our external environment. Not every guilty feeling means we are inherently wrong, but we must always be able to accept where we have done wrong. I know I haven't always been right in the past and this is where we learn going forward, because we cannot go back.

If you are making the decision for yourself and not intentionally hurting others, then you have nothing to be ashamed of. Of course, it is about a fine balance but the core element remains that you cannot stop living your life because of other people's opinions or else you would be stuck in the same place forever. We all hate harming the people we are close to, but we cannot maintain the same from fear of the outside perception if we have been clear with those around us to the extent that is necessary.

Guilt is a funny thing. It's something that makes out heart sink and race and it may show us another side to ourselves, but it must be something that must always be meticulously reviewed and understood, balanced with harm and risk. The difficult times that come with it, often present ourselves with the most growth and at the time, we may feel that the struggle will never end but it always does in one way or another. Don't substitute. 

Loneliness

Loneliness is something that we tend to associate with the elderly, but we all feel it. Physically, loneliness can happen at any age. We might find ourselves not making any friends at university, having just moved to a new town or too sick to go outside. More recently we might connect with this feeling during the midst of the covid pandemic.

The deep sinking feeling of loneliness can occur at any time. We might feel our heart fall out when we're in a crowd full of people, even if those people are our best friends and family and yet feeling like there is no one there at all. This is common to be familiar with and happens to all of us at some point in our lives. It's worth noting that although we may feel lonely, we are in fact very loved. Feelings are just that, feelings.


Physically, it's important to remember that being on your own isn't isolated to the age that you are, nor is it always something to be frowned upon. You can be lonely not matter where or whom you are. I'm twenty-four and I have been severely lonely at many points in my life. I have felt the pain of being in a new town, hours away from home and not knowing anyone or anything, trying to find my way across a new country or having no one to talk to in a hotel room at two in the morning. Our circumstances is what leads us to be lonely, nothing more and nothing less.

There is a key amongst all of this however. We must take this time to understand ourselves, and not attach ourselves to the nearest thing or person that provides us with a little bit of company and solitude. Our decisions need to be as calculated and understood as if we were surrounded by a hundred people. The struggle that we face as humans, is that most of us are born to have an emotional connection with at least another person and when we don't have that, we strive and accept anything that may give us something similar. The issue we then face, when we are in this vulnerable state, is that we accept behaviours that can be toxic to ourselves and our lives. A good stead and fast rule is to look and see whether, if we were in a loving and fulfilled environment, would we still accept and spend time with the person. The answer to that question may still be yes, however our actions may differ if we were in ordinary circumstances. Reviewing your actions and taking a step outside yourself to look at it, is still as important as understanding how to cope with the loneliness that you are facing. Desperate actions can be just as detrimental to your self as sustained unwanted loneliness.