I spent Valentine’s Day alone. I still got up and went to work, but I was very much romantically alone. I have never had a valentine on Valentine’s Day. That sentence carries a lot of weight. We automatically equate being alone with being sad, and therefore put so much pressure on ourselves and others to be with someone, especially on a day like February 14th. This is why parents work so hard to fix up their adult children. They want to see them happy and a dominant belief surrounding true happiness is that it only comes when you’re in a relationship. I think our ideas of relationships have become so distorted. There is so much pressure to find your perfect person without having the time to evolve into the perfect version of ourselves we want to be.
This year I stopped talking to someone I really cared about two days before Valentine’s Day. Of course I was upset about parting ways with this person, but my brain also automatically thought, “Can you believe you are going to be alone on Valentine’s Day again?” I was so fixated on being with someone, anyone, that I negated to see how Valentine’s Day is a day to celebrate the people who we love. I ended up exchanging cards and gifts with my best friends and my family, and not only did I feel more loved than I ever have, but it made me kind of rethink my entire way of looking at relationships.
I think this is something that I needed to hear, and writing it down here for you is helping me come to terms with the fact that being with someone romantically is not the goal. I have always felt embarrassed by the fact that I am single, absolutely chronically single. But being alone, with myself, just me, isn’t so bad. There are so many people and places for us to devote our love to, and an entire life to live.
I do love love, and I 100% support relationships. But I think we just need to realize that we are the only consistent things in our lives, and without celebrating love for ourselves, our lives will be a lot less full. This Valentine’s Day I was alone, but also very much filled with love.