How to Make Being Single Work for You: Life & Love Lessons I've Learned While Being Single

Speaker A: 00:00:02

What can you only learn about yourself while being in a romantic relationship? I'm Wioleta (@thisiswioleta on IG), your host. Welcome back to All About Being Single. This is episode two.

So today I want to talk about ten things that I have discovered about myself and the world while being single. Now, I am a talker, though, so I'll probably give you about 20 other lessons throughout my 10 lessons that I give you.

But I'm going to try to make it short and sweet and concise so that this way we can talk more about those throughout the next few months.

Honestly, now, these aren't all the lessons that I've learned throughout all these years of being perpetually single, but there's definitely quite a lot of them that I have learned, obviously as time went on and especially over the last few years, over the last, like five years of being single. Thing number one is make it work. First you.

Whatever it is, the most important life skill that we can learn is making things work for us, not against us. And I've definitely been guilty of making things worse than they actually were and really not going with the flow.

This really could be, you know, if somebody breaks up with you, make it work for you. Work on yourself. I know it's so hard to say that to somebody who's actually going through the breakup.

And it's so hard to see that in the moment when you're like all brokenhearted. But I promise you, any kind of emotional pain that you go through is there to teach you some kind of a lesson, as much as it hurts in the moment.

And again, if you're going through something like that right now, maybe bookmark this, come back to it later because you're not gonna believe, oh, you know, this is gonna end up being the best thing that's ever happened to me.

But I can assure you, most of the breakups that I've had, honestly, all of them, every single person that I've dated taught me so many things about what I'm capable of and taught me that I am so worthy of so many things. And so basically the biggest blessings in life really are your breakups, Honestly, especially because those hurt us the most.

You know, breakup of a romantic relationship. So, you know, glow up, glow up instead of just sitting there and being sad for yourself.

And again, I know it's hard to really feel that when you're going through it. Same thing with, you know, you have friends who are too male centered or female centered, whatever the case might be, make that shit work for you.

They cancel on you.

Because yet again, somebody, somebody just Asked them out on a date even though they had plans with you, and they're treating you subpar, like you're not on the same footing as a boy or a girl. Make it work for you. Go get hobbies. Engage in those hobbies.

And it won't even bother you if they cancel on you because you've got so much stuff going on and you're not boy centered or girl centered. Again, make that work for you. Instead of just sitting there and being heard about it. Make it work for you.

You know, you spilled coffee on your way to work. Make it work for you. What are you not doing or doing that's really in your way, in your life? And usually it's ourselves.

So, you know, again, maybe you spilled your coffee on your way to work because you're just rushing all the time. You're not even paying attention. So make that work for you. How can I improve the situation?

What can I do better moving forward so that I don't end up in these little things?

And I know some of it is just stuff that happens to you, but that's the thing, I guess maybe it's what I'm trying to say is we learn the most from the things that just happened to us that we weren't expecting that we were hoped wouldn't happen. And those are the times that you actually learn who you are. Which brings me to my next point.

You are capable of so much more than what you believe you are. It wasn't until I was single that I realized I wasn't really fully confident for a long time in my life.

And I didn't really realize that there's so many things that I can learn how to do.

So I basically lived my life kind of maybe trying like a hobby or two here or there, but not really going out of my comfort zone as much as I should have been.

So, honestly, this podcast for me is something that, you know, it's putting myself out there, it's putting my word out there, it's learning how to edit stuff via video editing software and audio editing software. And I apologize, this is just my second episode. So, you know, it's probably not going to be the best quality, but I'm learning as I go.

And the best way to learn is first learn about it, you know, read into it, watch some stuff and then obviously try it out, because you don't know if you've learned a thing until you really try it out. But anyhow, see, that's what I mean. I will just talk and talk and talk, but yeah, you're capable of so many things.

And I think people in relationships don't really see that because they constantly rely on somebody else. Somebody else is there to pick them up when they need it.

Somebody else is there to do things that maybe they don't enjoy doing or they don't think they'd be good at. But once you're single, you realize, hey, I can DIY stuff. Like, I diyed a lot of stuff in my own house. Like, I put in floors, I took floors out.

I painted a bunch of places. I started being creative with the way that I painted.

I started hanging shelves up, stuff that, like, I wouldn't do because I always thought those were, like, things that a guy needs to do. Oh, I put tile up in my kitchen. Like, I just did. So started doing so many things that. That actually helped me in bec so much more confident.

And I'm sure there's things that you haven't tried out because maybe you haven't been, like, in a sense, forced to do it because you've just been with other people. But when you're single, like, you can start doing these things, you know? Solo trips.

I didn't take my first solo trip Till I was 35, and I absolutely cannot believe I waited till I was 35 to take a solo trip. Those are some of my absolute favorite things to do now. Like, I honestly think I prefer taking solo trips over trips with my friends.

I've been to a concert by myself, which allowed me to talk to more people. Like, I literally talked to, like, 10 strangers at just one single festival. Like, and I was there for, like, a few hours only.

So it's these things that give you more confidence that you didn't think you really could do. And maybe it's stuff you don't want to do in the beginning.

Like I said, a lot of times we need to go through those bad experiences to really learn these things about ourselves that change our reality, that change our world, that change our future, honestly. Again, all of these things that you end up doing by yourself, even if you really don't want to do them at first.

And maybe you won't enjoy them, and that's also okay. But you have to try them out a few times to really see if that's something that's for you or not.

But once you get there, like, you get all the confidence. You get the power. The experiences really make you realize, hey, I. I don't need somebody else. I truly don't need somebody else.

I want someone in my life, but I do not need them. And before me doing a bunch of these things by myself, I don't think I've truly realized that.

I don't think I. I don't think I really understood what that meant. It's really the worst heartbreaks that we go through that free us to finally be truly happy. And again, I understand.

When you're just going through that breakup, it's so hard to tell. It's so hard to, like, listen to these words. I'm telling you.

And I'm telling you, like, the total opposite of what you're feeling, because you're feeling like garbage. And if somebody just broke up with you, you're probably crying, you're super upset. You're wondering where it all went wrong.

You're wondering what you did wrong. You're wondering what they did wrong. You're wondering if you're ever going to find somebody.

You're so unsure of everything because it's like your life is falling apart. At least for some of us, you know, who've had those feelings after a breakup.

But I can assure you, once you start feeling better, this will hit differently. But it's always, for me, it's always been the worst heartbreaks that truly led me on the right path.

Like, I am the happiest I've ever been in my life. And I know I can still get happier. There's still things that I'm still working on, but it's because of these. I can't even call them men.

These boys that I dated. And yes, I dated them. So obviously there was a lot of stuff that I wasn't working on myself. But, my God, I used to get so upset.

Like, listen, failed relationships devastate me. They absolutely wreck me, okay? And I'm a wreck for, like, weeks or months, depending on the relationship. I'm always such a wreck.

But once I start working on myself, and I always start working on myself by just walking, that's always the first thing I start doing.

And just, like, listening to, you know, upbeat things or podcasts or books or whatever it is that I need to listen to at the time, whether it makes me more sad or it makes me more happy, whatever the case might be. Breakups are the universe's way of telling us there's something that we need to fix within ourselves. And it always means that's not your person.

I can't say always, because I. You know, sometimes people can break up, like, once and get back together. Shit happens. I get it.

But most of the time, most of the time, it Means that wasn't your person, and you're not done working on something within yourself that needs changing.

And that will help elevate you to where you should be so that you're living a much better, broader, a healthier life where your potential actually meets your reality. Like, for me, I have all these cool hobbies that I never used to have because I was so boy crazy when I was younger.

And now I cannot imagine, A, being boy crazy, B, not having these cool hobbies that I've got and living this great life and enjoying my own company and traveling solo and going to concerts. And I have a cat that I love.

I have a whole ass house that I love that I've remodeled, and I got to be creative, and I got to remodel it just the way I want it. I literally look back at all of my exes and I'm like, what was I even thinking dating them?

But I also now know that they were the path I needed to take to become who I am. And I'm not even. I'm not done. I'm just starting becoming who I truly want to be at 38. Crazy how life works.

The next thing I've realized is healing has two components. And the first one, you absolutely have to do by yourself. And I know people tell you relationships, you know, are healing, blah, blah.

Yeah, But I think most relationships that people get in are damaging. They're not actually healing. They're just playing into people's traumas more.

And you get into relationships with people that aren't actually good for you. So then instead of helping you through life, they just make you more of a shell of yourself.

Because when you're in that bad relationship, you don't really see the bad clearly. Like, yeah, you might see the bad that's in there because there's always signs. Our bodies are always telling us something's wrong.

But because you're expending so much energy on that bad relationship and trying to keep it from ending, instead of expending that energy and working on yourself so you won't fully see your worth until you have left and been out for that fog and out of that relationship for a while, you know, And I don't mean like a month. I usually mean a few months, sometimes a few years, before you really start realizing, oh, this person was actually keeping me away from my destiny.

This person was keeping me away from knowing the things that I'm able to do by myself, from getting that confidence, from then doing those things by myself. Talking about healing, I don't believe you can heal and really start living a healthier, better life as far as your mind goes.

Until you also just do the very basics that I don't think our society emphasizes enough and people don't do enough, but they're technically just the basics of keeping your body healthy. So until you do exercise, do some form of an exercise every single day, basically.

Almost, maybe not every single day, but until you're actually doing that most days, until you're moving your body. Our bodies were meant to be moved. They were not meant to just be sitting all day long.

We are supposed to be expending our energy within our bodies by moving. Technically, walking is exercise. Some people like to walk. I walk quite often and I know it helps me again, expend some energy.

So it could just be walking, it could be running, it could be going to the gym, it could be whatever it is, however you want to move your body. But so going off with these basics like just pure nutrition and this is something that I still struggle with.

But until you're actually putting good stuff in your body, so until you're actually eating whole foods and you're not overeating on sugar, you're not over drinking alcohol, you're not overly getting high.

I know people love talking about weed and how it's so much better than alcohol and all of that stuff, but things in moderation, I don't even want to say almost in moderation. Doing the stuff that's not necessarily good for you, doing very little of it. Having a good hygiene.

So having good routines and sleep in addition to all of that. I don't think you can begin fully healing till you have some kind of a daily reflection.

So a little bit of time each day outside of the gym to just meditate or journal or read some kind of self help books or podcasts. Daily joy too, is so important. Like having joy in your life. Okay, let's move on to the next one. Nope.

You are not single because you're not actively looking. I cannot stand it when people tell anybody, oh, it's because you're not in the dating apps or oh, it's because you're not looking.

The thing is, you know, we can meet our future partner wherever you can.

Being at a grocery store, somebody could approach you, you could call tomorrow and you know, because you have a gas leak in your house, guilty of that. And somebody can come in. The person that shows up, they're your future husband. You're also not single because you're putting too much value into it.

It's like, no, I'm absolutely not. I'm not centering men. I'm not even centering my friends anymore. And we'll talk about that another episode, too.

But you don't have to be on the lookout constantly to meet your person. I mean, you can have interactions with the opposite sex or the same sex. What? You know, whatever.

Whatever floats your boat at any point, at any time during the day, any time during the week. Like, people meet all kinds of ways. Yes, it's. It might be harder as an adult to meet people, but it's still possible. It happens at all ages.

Okay, our next one. The more you know and like and love yourself, the harder it is to find a compatible partner.

But the more likely you are to be in a healthy relationship with them. And that's, I think, one of the biggest, most important things I've learned.

I think the healthier you get, the more you work on yourself while you're single, the more likely you are to really start upholding your boundaries, to really know who you are, to truly respect yourself. Therefore, you don't deal with people who don't respect you. You know what you want. You won't settle for less. So it's all these positive things.

And unfortunately, the way our society is, that's not where most people are in life. So. But that's where you should want to be in life, because you feel much better. You don't. You're not as codependent as you used to be.

But yeah, it is much harder to find an actual good relationship once you have worked on so many of your faults and you've worked on what's keeping you from living the best life. And no, living the best life isn't going out and drinking and partying. That's not living your best life.

That's honestly living one of your worst lives. You're not being healthy. You're not. You're probably masking and trying to hide the things that you really want to be doing.

You're fearful of putting yourself out there and trying things and getting more hobbies and doing the things that actually make you a better person and make you happier on the inside. Because the more hob you have, the more exercise you do, the healthier you eat, the more water you drink.

All those things, all those simple things that people tell you they are better for you and they truly work. They really make you feel better about your life, and they allow you to take more risks. Talking about that, though, this also is twofold.

It also means that single people do not need to love themselves to be in relationship. And people need to stop saying that shit to us.

I know stats are made up, but, like, 90% of people in relationships don't love themselves while so many single people do. Which is exactly why those single people are single.

You gotta keep in mind, like, if you don't love yourself, you will end up with people like your exes, people that weren't good for you, that didn't allow you to be your best self. And you'll end up in relationships that don't make you feel secure or safe.

But when you want yourself essentially, almost in, like, a weird way, you don't fall for those roller coaster relationships anymore. You get dopamine from things that actually matter. You get dopamine from your hobbies.

You get dopamine from having joy in your life instead of somebody being there that's constantly toxic towards you. That makes you a worse version of yourself. And this brings me to my next point. So figure out what you need to feel good in.

Your body, in your relationships, in your routines, in your job, in your career, in your friendships. You always got to listen to your body and your intuition, and those go hand in hand.

Your brain, a lot of times will lead you astray, which is the crazy part. So many of us ignore what our bodies are telling us when we're with the wrong partner.

Our bodies are screaming at us that we're with the wrong partner. Your body tells you what you need to know, and we just tend to not listen quite often.

For example, a lot of times when people are anxious in relationships, they confuse themselves and think it's, oh, it's just because I'm wanting too much. Or it's, you know, they listen to their friends or to society or whoever who's like, oh, no, you're just overthinking it.

All the while ignoring what their body is telling them. And our bodies are there to protect us. Our bodies know what we need.

So instead of overriding that intuition with anxiety and, like, overthinking, listen to your body. If you feel unsafe with somebody, you feel unsafe with them. Look into that. It's kind of like walking into a glass daily.

You keep walking into a glass and walking into a glass, and sure, you can't see the glass, but you can see your reflection through the glass. And you keep walking through that glass, and every time you see your reflection, but you're not really looking at it.

You're not wanting to look at it deeply. You're not wanting to reflect on yourself and why you keep Walking into the same glass every day.

Why you keep on blaming somebody for their actions instead of looking your own actions and realizing, hey, I'm putting myself in this bad situation over and over and over and over again. And I'm not listening to my body. Why am I not listening to my body? You know, it all starts with us. It's not about them being a bad person.

And some people are just bad people, or some people are just bad for us or to us. But it's also about us being bad to ourselves. And that's really the stuff that we need to look at.

I will say too, like, I am pretty bad with listening to my body regarding eating cues. And that's something I'm working on recently.

But I got into this habit of eating fast food when I was in college because I worked full time and I went to school full time. So I really didn't have much time. I was literally so exhausted daily and I had so much stuff going on.

Again, working full time and going to school full time was a lot. So then I got into this habit of eating fast food a lot.

And that's something I'm trying to break now because I literally do eat out so much instead of just making my food. And it's not making my body feel good. I weigh more than what I should, even though I'm skinny.

Like, there's parts of me that are skinny fat, and I hate that about myself. And it doesn't make me feel good about myself. And my body knows it's bad for me. Like, I can feel it in my energy levels. But I'm.

But I'm trying to do better. Going back to that whole listening to our bodies. Like, I know when I'm with the wrong person, I'm constantly anxious.

And I know if somebody's like, not texting me daily, somebody's not trying to actually make the relationship move forward or move in or, you know, we're dating past a year and they haven't proposed. My buddy's always screaming at me because it's like, that's not the right person for you. They don't care about you the way that you care about them.

And every single time that's been true. And every single time my body was just not fully energetic, my body was telling me, hey, this isn't it.

And I just kept overthinking and going to my friends and trying to get validation from other people instead of validating my own self, my own body that knew, hey, this person's not it for you.

And no Amount of you asking your friends what you should do about the situation is going to help you because you're going against what is best for you and for your own body and for your own mind and spirit. So the next one is, don't take advice from anyone whose life you don't want to live.

There's been so much information online about, like, decentering men and living your best life solo and how so many women no longer want to date.

And while I agree with some of those points, I am not interested in taking advice from somebody who believes relationships are garbage and that all men are garbage. Like, yes, I believe there's a lot of bad men.

I think there's also a lot of broken women because a lot of people aren't trying to get the help that they so need. Like, have I dated a lot of bad men? Yes, I've dated. But again, I've also made all those choices to date the people that I've dated.

And now looking back again, not something I'd do again. But I still don't believe that all men are bad. There's plenty of great men, and, you know, it's on us to make ourselves great women or vice versa.

Right. You know, those men who aren't lucky in love or who don't get the types of women that they're trying to get. Yeah, they need to work on themselves.

It's on them to work on themselves to get the kind of women that they want to get. Like, that's just a simple. That's just the way the world works.

But so many of these women are saying how they never want to date again, and it's like, that's not me. Like, I'm not interested in never dating again. I'm interested in dating better men.

So, yeah, I'm not going to go for those men who are walking red flags anymore. Like, I'm. And I haven't really been.

Like, the last few years, any date I went on, I was a lot more careful about, hey, no, this is a red flag, or this is something that's not going to work for me.

And instead of giving them more chances, like a lot of women do and then getting more hurt, it was more of, no, I only want to date people who are on my level now. I think that's also part of life is like, follow the people that inspire you.

Like, follow people that you admire and, you know, do more of those things and less of, you know, maybe even the people around you sometimes can steer us wrong if they're not. If their Standards aren't high, they might teach you to also not have your standards high. So follow people that you admire and listen to your body.

If something feels right for you, it feels right for you. But also, I already know some people are gonna think of, oh, my God, well, I love this person. And, you know, my body's telling me to be with them.

And no, that's not what your body's telling you. If they're a toxic or abusive person, that's your mind trying to convince you to not listen to your body.

So I guess we'll probably definitely have to do a deep dive. And maybe I can try to have a guest on that, can explain that a lot better than I'm sure I can. Okay, this one took me way too long to figure out.

But if someone is treating you poorly, you know they're toxic or they're abusive, yes, they are in the wrong and they're the bad guy or girl.

But if you stay through it and you just complain and you vent and you vent and you vent about it and make it everybody else's problem and you spend everybody else's energy, there is also a level of toxicity in you. Being a martyr never works out well for the martyr.

Never having pity parties, you know, just buffing your friends all the time about the same issue, being hurt over and over and over again by the same person and forgiving that person and just staying that bad situation. Like, I don't wish that for anybody. And I know, I know it's so hard to get out of it. Like, I understand. I've been there.

But we do need to look at why we keep putting ourselves in that situation. And so if someone is an abuser, they are an abuser. That is correct. But if you keep staying with them, you're also abusing yourself.

That is self abuse to stay with somebody who keeps abusing you.

And again, it took me so long to realize that, like, I just used to stay with men who just were not good for me, and I would just complain about them to my friends like I was a horrible friend, just complaining, just venting all the time to my friends about this person and bothering them with this issue when you know what? I could have just left. I could have left them.

And with most of those relationships, they were the men that actually broke up with me, which is crazy because that's how little I thought of what I deserved.

Honestly, once you do get out of it and you need to stay away, and once you actually stay away, you truly see how blinded you were and how little you thought of yourself when you were in it, when you know why you stayed in it. Moral of that story is figure out why you stayed. Figure out your shit. Why did you put up with that?

We need to take that accountability to just make ourselves to live the best life. You will not live the best life for you. You will not be on the path that you need to be on until you leave these bad, toxic relationships behind.

And I truly believe that my never again is I will never again stay in an abusive relationship. I had stayed with somebody for like four, almost four years who would gaslight me and cheat on me and, and he literally was a serial cheater.

He like cheated on me over and over and then ended up that he kept cheating on me with the same person and a girl that actually knew that he was in a relationship. And I would never ever again do that to myself because again I realized that was self abuse. That wasn't me looking out for myself.

That was me staying with somebody who absolutely was an abuser and a hill I'll die on. Is this cheating? Is abuse. Any kind of physical cheating isn't abuse.

I mean you, who knows, they might get an STD or an sti, whatever they're called now and give it to you. Like they're endangering your health by cheating.

They're also not giving you the ability to make an informed decision because they're cheating on you and they're obviously they're not telling you they're cheating on you. So you cannot make an informed decision about your future with this person or the present with this person or even the past.

Like you don't know that they've been doing these things behind you your back. When they're lying about the cheating, they're completely messing up your ability to trust other people.

So it's not just them that you're not going to be able to trust fully. It's other people.

It might even affect the other people around you because you know you're going to be like, if I wasn't able to see that they were cheating on me, what else were they not doing or doing that I wasn't seeing? What about other people in my life? What else am I missing? So like you're losing that ability to trust yourself.

So it's like that cheating, just the act of cheating isn't just the cheating itself. It's, you know, all the repercussions that go around it. Basically you deserve to be in a relationship that makes you feel better.

You deserve not to abuse yourself.

You deserve to feel good in any relationship that you're in, whether it be romantic relationship, a familial one, a friendship, any of those, any of those that you choose to stay in. Okay, I've got two more great voice memos from a friend regarding last episode's topics that I will read out loud.

So she didn't feel comfortable sending it in as a voice note, but I'm gonna just read them out loud. So a pro of being single, she said, you have the freedom to pour more into yourself and your other relationships.

You can spend the whole day with your friends without feeling guilty for not prioritizing your significant other. Your time is fully yours and you get to prioritize what matters most to you.

Which I definitely agree with everything that she said and especially the talking about, the feeling guilty for not prioritizing your significant other. I've definitely felt that way before. And a con. Well, she mentioned a few cons.

Showing up to events with coupled up friends and family often turns into unsolicited conversation about your love life. People start reminding you that you still have time, like you're on a deadline.

It can feel patronizing, even if it's well meaning, and can sometimes even come off as hurtful. Wow. I honestly haven't even thought about the whole you still have time. But yeah, that's just so condescending.

Like, first of all, we can fall in love at like 90 years old. I hope I don't live till 90. That sounds horrible, but you can still fall in love at any age. I really do want to hear more from you.

If you're listening, please send me any thoughts suggestions on how I can improve this podcast by going and sending me a voice note. You can find a little link once you go to allaboutbeingsingle.com and just send me the voice note there.

Or if you want to send in any thoughts about today's episode and just what I talked about as far as, you know, things that I've learned while being single about the world and myself. If you have things that you have learned about the world and yourself, please send those to me as well.

Or you can also email them to me at allaboutbeing single gmail.com or if I guess, let me throw out a third one if this is easier for you, just go to All About Being Single on Instagram and you can just DM me there too. Okay, time for our note to self. Have you ever stayed in a toxic, abusive relationship where you knew your body was telling you it Was unsafe.

Why do you think you stayed in that situation? And how much better did you feel once you were out of the relationship and the fog of it? So think on that.

Me and my cat trouble are gonna dance in a little bit, and then we'll come back and I'll tell you what I think of them. Sa Sam. Okay, back from our dance break. So to answer that question, the note to self.

I was so anxious about a guy that I dated in my early 30s who did not prioritize me. And he basically treated him, his friends, like they were his significant other. It was so strange. He was just not individualized at all.

Was too codependent with his family and his friends, and just was such a people pleaser. Come to find out, I was also a little bit guilty of all those things.

So usually the stuff that we hate about somebody else, we haven't healed that ourselves yet anyhow, so. But yes, we didn't. It was so strange. And my body was just screaming at me.

Like, I constantly had to go to my friends for advice and, you know, for that validation, and they constantly were like, oh, just give it more time. It's like his first real relationship. You know, you come around. And I knew it was all wrong. Like, it all felt wrong.

I knew it didn't feel right to me, obviously, which is why I had to constantly go to friends for advice and then wouldn't actually listen to my own body. And then he, of course, ends up breaking up with me, even though I should have broken up with him way before then.

And honestly, he was the catalyst for my healing of everything in my life. So, like I said, breakups.

Like, I literally cried over that guy for, like, months on end, really wanted him back, and, like, drank a lot by myself at home. Like, it was bad. Like, I thought my world was ending. Probably one of the worst depressive, like, moments of my life, honestly.

And now looking back, I'm like, I dislike him, obviously, but I don't think I would be who I am today. And I would have never realized that I needed to change so many things about myself because I wasn't good to myself.

And I basically started working on my mental health. I'm honestly so happy that that happened because I became a much better version of myself through it. So I'm so happy.

I'm so happy that I dated him, and I'm so happy that he broke up with me and made me so sad. Like, made me at one of my lowest points in my life, because without him, I wouldn't be here Today, doing a podcast. I wouldn't hike so much.

I wouldn't. I wouldn't have started solo traveling. I wouldn't have done so many things in my life, and I'm just so thankful for that.

Okay, going back to our question from the beginning of this episode, one thing you can only learn through being in relationships, in romantic relationships, to be very clear here is how to be in a romantic relationship. It does require skills you can use. Skills, obviously you've learned from, like, other relationships, you know, friendships and whatnot.

However, no book, no podcast, no therapy session, no self reflection complete. Prepare you for the skills that are skills that you actually learn in romantic relationships, like balancing independence with connection.

It's different from balancing independence and connection with like a parent or a friend because you are supposed to prioritize your partner. Compromise, again, very different from other forms of compromise.

This is usually with somebody that you are planning a future with, somebody that you live with. Again, it's not like a family relationship. Just knowing your deal breakers.

For romantic relationships, my deal breakers have honestly changed so much because each ex presented me with different issues that later I then learned were just something I didn't like. Something that I realized was a deal breaker for me might not be for somebody else, and that's okay.

But, you know, dating without a proposal in about a year or so. I will never date somebody for longer than a year without a proposal because I know that that's gonna make me anxious.

And it makes me anxious for a reason, because that after a year, you know the person very, very well. All the red flags have been shown. Well, maybe not all.

Obviously, there's always some stuff people can hide, but people cannot hide their character for longer than three, six months. I just know that that's something that's a deal breaker for me that I didn't know was a deal breaker when I was in my 20s.

But again, I've learned that through being in romantic relationships. And we'll talk more about this on the next episode that we have. Please do me a huge favor.

If you are enjoying this episode, please follow me wherever you're listening to this podcast and share this with a friend who's single. Who you think might be able to get something out of this. I would really appreciate that.

I really hope to be doing this for a long time, even if you don't. Thank you so much for listening. I appreciate that you're here with me. Okay, let's talk about a no lag to stand on when coupled up.

People assume, wrongly that we're not putting ourselves out there enough. Like, we're some products that are marketed. You know, it's that whole, oh, you're single because you're not actively looking.

We discussed earlier on this episode, it's like, love isn't a product. It's a service. Okay. No, just kidding.

But being serious, though, like, just living your life, just going out, going grocery shopping, doing our daily living tasks, that's putting ourselves out there. Right? Like, again, we don't have to be actively dating. We don't have to be actively searching for it.

People literally meet people at the grocery store all the time. People meet people while they're just living their lives while they're working. A lot of people meet at work or at school.

I mean, I've never met somebody at the grocery store that I've been interested in, but I know it happens. Usually when I'm at the grocery store, people will just be like, hey, do you know where I can find this?

And it's like, dude, do I look like I work here?

Maybe that's a flirting technique now that I'm thinking about it, but maybe I don't realize it's a flirting technique, but it's like, if it is, can you guys please find a different flirting technique at the grocery store? But anyhow, I'm out and literally just living my life all of the time. I am out and about all the time.

I am hardly ever at my house, and I have not met somebody. So it's not because I'm not putting myself out there enough. So coupled up people, please stop saying that to singles.

It's gonna happen when it's gonna happen, if it's gonna happen. But I don't have men come up to me. I literally walk all the time. You know what I get when I'm out on walks?

The people, the men that I definitely see without a ring don't even look at me when I smile at them as I'm passing them by, okay? That's the kind of people that are out there right now. People are afraid of other people and even smiling at them.

So don't tell me I'm not putting myself enough when I am out there literally smiling at men who are single and they're not approaching. Like, putting yourself out there isn't a guarantee that you'll meet somebody, you know, a significant other.

Yes, people can meet all kinds of ways, but just because I'm not putting myself out there enough, it's not why I'm still single. I'm super excited about the weekly Glow Up. So last week we spoke about the importance of walking or movement in the very early beginning of your day.

And I know some of us have more time, some of us have less time. But this week, as many days as you can, just try this out and I promise you it's something small.

But I highly recommend starting your morning off slowly and just more mindfully. So just adding a little bit of more of mindfulness to your morning.

So my example is, and this is just something that I do so for like your morning coffee, don't have your phone on you. Just when you. After you've brewed your coffee, when you go to sit down, don't be on your phone, just sit there.

Just really taste each sip, you know, or maybe do that with the breakfast that you have, right? So it doesn't have to be the coffee, but just enjoy the moment.

Even if it's literally a few seconds, if, even if that's all you can put towards is just a few seconds of just enjoying the first few sips or enjoying the first few bites of whatever it is that you're eating for breakfast. Your full presence with your own thoughts or even try not to think of anything right? So you could technically meditate for this.

Just help set the tone for the day and just relax yourself. I've definitely been guilty of in the very mornings just going straight on my phone.

And I think sometimes because when you're single, you know, you don't have somebody that you're waking up right next to. So that makes your mornings different, right?

You don't have somebody to kiss or hug right in the morning or even just look at like you just have yourself. So I've definitely been guilty of just going on my phone instead of really relaxing and just being with my own thoughts.

And I think that that's every day that I do begin my day again with a walk at first, and then once I come back and I have my coffee and my food and I'm just mindful for just a tiny. It just helps me to not go with that whole day as fast as possible and get as many things done as possible. It still makes me productive.

Just doesn't make me try to rush through the productivity and through my day. Thanks for listening. I want you to know that even if you're late, you're right on time.

And I hope that this is your space, your era and your community. And I'm very happy that I'm on this journey with you. I look forward to hearing from you and I'll talk to you next Tuesday, Sam.