Self-love is not the Problem
Singleness, really, isn't for lack of self-love.
Among other things, I am drawn to content from people searching for love on social media. It’s a wholesome affair, and Instagram, knowing how much I love them, frequently suggests such content to me. That’s how I came across a certain guy. I should mention his account because his content is worth consuming, but I feel a need to protect him, so I’ll refrain from revealing his identity.
In one of the first few clips I saw of him, he struck me as deeply self-aware, brimming with love and regard for himself. In one clip though, someone asked if he felt optimistic about his chances of finding love, and as he answered (that too with the most eloquent choice of words), tears streamed down his face, and something about that clip seared my heart with the pain of his loneliness. Because I thought if there was anyone who deserved love, it was that guy.
For the rest of the day, he was all I could think about, and once I got the chance, I frantically searched for and watched every video of his I could find.
From what I can tell, he’s in his late 30s to early 40s, is comfortable in his skin, and has no problem chatting up a lady. Online diagnosis about his tears however assumes it to be a sign of his desperation for love (or discontentment with his singleness), and they couldn't be more wrong.
What dating coaches get wrong
I’ve had to grapple with different emotions in relation to my singleness over the years. I have been frustrated, sad, curious, all the works. In all, I enjoy my life on its merit, rather than as a phase I’m waiting on to give way to another. Of course, I have spent a ridiculous portion of the past few years fantasizing about being in love. Even so, I have been happy with my life. But a good amount of dating advice insinuates that people like me have not found love because we lack self-love.
One of the blessings of my singleness has been the quality of relationship I have been privileged to build with myself. I like myself, the befriend-me-if-I-wasn't-me kind of like. I make myself laugh, a lot. I relish my own company, give great advice to myself, hold myself accountable, and enjoy the pleasures of life with gusto. Sure, I’m still rough around the edges, but I am great company all by myself. Relationship coaches (or non-coaches) however insinuate that, deep down, people like me mask our self-dislike.
In reality, self-dislike is not one of my problems. After seeing variations of “you need to love yourself to attract love”, I started to wonder if I didn't love myself enough. But I soon realized that I was borrowing a problem I did not have, and these coaches were addressing an audience I did not identify with. Despite intimate knowledge of my flaws, I have plenty of love for myself, as with many single people — I am learning.
There are single people on the dating scene who are full of love for themselves, but they struggle to find love because of what the dating scene is these days. Present-day singles have to wade through a sea of catfishes, worrisome levels of self-absorption, and a world of cancel-culture to find love, and dating coaches sometimes ignore how much harder it makes things. Equally, they ignore the distrust today’s media is cultivating in the durability of heterosexual relationships, turning once-hopeful singles into unamenable skeptics.
It’s not self-hate, it’s the media
It’s been my observation, for a while now, that the media — by which I mean Hollywood — favors telling the story of same-sex couples in a healthier light than they do heterosexual couples, thus giving the impression that heterosexual relationships are bound to fail (or be hard).
It’s a pattern I noticed in the recent shows I’ve been watching. These shows cast same-sex couples as mature, well-adjusted, impressive at communication and conflict resolution in romantic relationships. Meanwhile, their heterosexual couples are portrayed with relationship issues; a partner who's unwilling to compromise for their lover, a married man who’s realized his mistake in marrying his wife, a girlfriend with trust issues, etc. In this way, Hollywood has normalized heterosexual relationships as inherently problematic or traumatizing.
It’s thanks to Instagram accounts like Meet Cutes NYC, couples on social media who are promoting healthy heterosexual relationships, and Netflix's latest show Nobody Wants This, that we have a reference for what’s possible within heterosexual relationships.
I’d like to digress and talk about Nobody Wants This.
It feels like so long since I last saw a healthy heterosexual couple on screen, and I was glad to know I wasn’t the only one who made this observation. With this show, however, hope was revived, crushes were born, and as someone put it, “hearts were healed”. With men serially portrayed as abusive, manipulative, and non-committal in the media, Noah (the show’s male protagonist) confirmed the existence of men who are anything but. It’s ironic however that our first interaction with him presented him as non-committal to another woman — we’ll forgive that for the sake of this essay.
In any case, Noah’s character is a far cry from what women fear on today’s dating scene. And the rarity of characters like his begs the question “Does the media derive a sadistic pleasure (or profit) from portraying heterosexual relationships negatively?” Furthermore, it makes me curious to see how much influence the media’s portrayal of heterosexual relationships have on people’s skepticism about dating.
Media portrayals aside, I know a couple of single people who are full of love for themselves yet desire romantic love. This is despite the plenteousness of single people on the dating scene. Yet, I feel a certain defeat as I consider this: the longer people spend single, the more of themselves they become and the less likely they are to have converging interests with random strangers. Essentially, the less willing they are to compromise, which means the longer they will stay single.
Take the guy whose IG clip I came across as an example. By his admission, he’s not without options of women to date, but a protracted period of singleness has grounded him so well that he’s not willing to self-compromise. As such, nothing less than the love he’s held out for will be worthwhile. I can relate!
In some ways I miss my naivety. The more I assess my non-negotiables, not to mention my exhaustion at the small talk that first-time meetings require, the more I wish I could afford the recklessness that naivety allows. At 30, I simply cannot anymore. This realization has got me embracing the very real possibility of a lifetime of singleness. At this stage in my life, I cannot stomach tactlessness in a man (and this is a tidy summary of a long list of non-negotiables), but I have come to know and love my own company.
I figure it’s a much better fate to spend forever with myself than it is to entertain a man who traumatizes me. Even so, I hope to someday (soon preferably) meet a man whose soul feels familiar. I am tired of keeping an eye out for the possibility of love. And this is a peculiarity of the single state that Mo Isu described eloquently when he said “When you are single, there’s this sense, even when you aren’t looking for love, that maybe you might find it. When you go out, when you see someone attractive in the airport queue, in the coffee shop, or on the internet, there’s a chance that you might meet someone and that could be the person. Being single is full of this potential.” But it gets exhausting standing on tiptoes while watching the horizon for a ship that may never sail in.
That’s why I hope for myself and other single pringles who, despite loving ourselves, want to experience the warmth of another’s soul, that we will be so blessed in our lifetime.
In the end, singleness is more complex than the run-of-the-mill advice people and dating coaches are quick to dish to single people. Singleness is not always a question of self-love. Sometimes, it’s the consequence of navigating a world that’s made human connection harder, a world where the media paints a pessimistic picture of heterosexual love, and the dating scene leaves people endlessly exhausted.
