I’ve been trying to write this post for months. I was not able to talk about my singlehood, without mentioning several people (millions !) in the process, who did not ask to be mentioned, or even recognized here. I would love to be delicate and that’s… not my forte.

So, I will not really tell you about my experiences but more about what singlehood had taught me. Let’s give it a try.

Lesson 1 >>> Singlehood sucks

I remember myself from 6 years ago calling my brother or crying on the phone with my mother : “I’ll never be able to find somebody ! And I have two kids. And and and … ”

(The following dialogue follows: – When?/ -In eight years!)

At the time, my brother could not stop laughing. And let’s pause here to note the huge gap between the perception of one’s life by other people and the person’s perception of her/his own life, especially when she/he is guided, perversely, by her/his emotions: the distinctive feature of unhappiness is to ensure itself that it lasts … a maximum time.

So lesson # 1 was not much about singlehood than the image that I had of it. And for me singlehood was a loser thing.

And I write this post especially for those who suffer from it: who feel like loser because they are single. Truth is, to be a loser is mostly to think that. Like Sally, and many others, I finally quit crying, and like her and many many others, I blew my nose and then I took Harry’s part: I looked at myself lovingly and said “You’re stupid when you talk nonsense. But I love you anyway.”

Lesson 2 >>> Singlehood is awesome

I’ve lived my share of stories. With rather rad guys. But the relations were of the “complicated” type (one can find plenty of sub-categories to the “complicated” type, but I’ll leave that to you because I am trying to be…delicate).

Hence, living as a couple took me a lot of time and energy, so much time and energy that, as a single woman, I could dedicate to explore

via GIPHY

… YES!

Lesson 3 >>> Singlehood is essential

Besides my “explorations” I thought it was time I could dedicate to become someone … I’d like to be!

You know about my many wanderings, questionings, etc … but the bottom line is that I did not really like myself that much. I did not know who I was, I did not know what I really enjoyed. So how could I ask someone to do this for me?

It was time to grow up. Some may call it to become a woman. So through counselling (different types of counselling : classical, physical), naturopathy, mindfulness meditation, dance … blogging! all the time that I used to dedicate to save a relationship, I would dedicate it to grow. Some are already mature in their youth and grow even more starting from this “core”. But for me, that was not the case. I had to purge thousands of things before, in order to develop.

I think the highlight of my journey was my MBSR workshop. We ended the caring meditation by wishing to ourselves all the beautiful things. And oh my, I cried so much … I had never thought of wishing positive things to myself. You know what I mean? Ever since, I meditate a bit, let’s say once a week, but I put in practice daily what I learned during the workshop. In particular : not to identify myself with my negative emotions.

Little by little, I felt happy. Finally. I mean deeply and utterly happy. It was not just a check-list of things doing well (“okay so health is great, the kids are doing great, my job is great, my friends are great, my family is great, etc”) because no amount of things being “great” can provide a life where “being” feels great. But then yes, it began to take form, it was a very simple feeling of “I feel good.”

From this happy nucleus I figured out that I no longer wanted to be in a relationship at all costs. And the caring that I was providing to myself was protecting me somehow from bad choices: I was so good in my life that I could not bother anymore with a relationship of the “complicated” type.

And I never find myself again in the part 1 of this post, which brings me to the fourth part of it.

Lesson 4 >>> Singlehood sucks

But the thing is, as Sophie has said it so well, in reality, I hadn’t completely given up.

So there was this conversation, these dozens of conversations on the subject. I even gave an all-girls dinner with 15 friends to discuss this very specific topic: “LET’S FIND A GUY FOR MAI”

HAHAHAHAHA! (A male friend suggested to me last week that maybe I should have done this dinner with my guy friends). What emerged were two things:

> Mai, “she doesn’t see…” > So I had to “see” better. I had to improve my awaresness of things, including of myself myself. Okay go.

> Mai, she needs a “real man”. > Fucking shit, what does that mean a “real” “dude”? !! maybe I should become a “real” woman? but holy shit … what does that ever mean to be a “real” woman?

Others were saying that “the problem is that you are not available / you work too much / you’re too independent … and how about bigger breasts, things would be easier, right?”

… more and more I was processing it this way :”The problem is that … !!!” then : “Is this really a problem? Yes? No?”

Little by little, I managed to position myself against these so called blocking points.

And I realized that these generalities were aimed to please “men”. Men in general. But who cares about pleasing…”men”, right? Finally, I figured out that I did not care because … it only takes one guy.

Thousand apologies if I am just pushing at open doors here, but for me all this was a major discovery and if this can be useful to anyone of you out there … it would make me so happy.

Suddenly, my relationship to men has become much more simple because I did not feel the need to seduce any single (or not) straight (or not) (no wayyyyyyyy !!!! ??? !!!! ahemmmm) guy passing by (you never know, it might work !). I realized that there was a lot of guys I liked. It felt good because it was telling me that I was not fantasizing over someone who did not exist. But there was never this “je-ne-sais-quoi”. And I follow the fluidity principle: “if it does not feel well, well, it’s not happening!

Later, one day, I said to Sophie Trem, this time, “I did it, I’ve asked the Universe for a man.”

(For quick lessons on how to ask the Universe for things, ask Jean-Claude, my master)

And there she was : “A man from the Universe? That could be anything, you have to be specific. A man …. pffff, that doesn’t mean a thing, “a”man. If you make a request to the Universe, you must do it well and be accurate … otherwise it does not work.”

All this led me to apply to the Universe … in a proper form. And actually, OH MY GAD it is very, very hard. No, but really, really hard. It was very hard simply because I had to dare to… ask. So, again, I will not linger on my personal list but to give you an example, at the beginning, I asked for someone who would accept me, with all my quirks, my mess, my madness, my freedom … my children. And then after I asked for someone who would love these traits of my personality.

And then I was “Accept, accept, accept, meh ! How about if he’d love me!”

Then I even allowed myself to ask for someone who could not imagine the woman of his life eitherway.

That’s it, in short, and there are many other things. But it would be good for another post, right? All this to say to those of you who feel at the bottom of the singlehood hole (NO, I DID NOT JUST WRITE THIS THING EWWW) that their situation will allow them to grow for themselves.

And that being happy on your own is the best way to find someone who’ll love you. For this, among other things.