On Being Single by 30 and Beyond

Just attended a wedding today. Ang daming nagsabi na, "ikaw na next". Alam kong alam nilang wala naman akong girlfriend ngayon. Siguro yung ibang mga mas bata sakin ay nahihiya sa akin na nauna silang nagpakasal kaysa sa akin. That's a self-centered thought though. Maybe they're just genuinely hopeful to hear a good story of love that will come from me.

Singleness seems to be treated as a disorder, an abnormality, since the usual order of life is this: enjoy childhood at school, graduate, find a job, have a partner, get married and start a family, have kids, raise them up, then the kids face their own version of the "normal" order of life events, while the adults fade into the background in supporting their kids and then eventually die. Singles in their 30s look like they're disrupting this order. "They shouldn't be single anymore by that age."

Ang natutunan ko in reading the Bible and in observing life itself is, there are two paths to this - singleness and being with a life partner. Now, singleness is so frowned upon that it seems to be not considered as a normal path. Or should i say, society does not consider two normal paths, just one. Singleness is not a normal path.

Which makes people "concerned" for single people. This concern does not help me at all, at least for me. It is a mirror that shows me that i am straying away from the norm.

I have to clarify that my singleness is not a desired singleness; I desire to have my own family, and I lay it down at the feet of Jesus and trade it for His perfect will in my life. Right now I spend time to really know His will as i take careful steps forward one by one. There are certain reasons why I cannot pursue having a relationship right now:

1. I have a lot of things to do - get enough sleep, do house chores (wag maliitin mahirap din ito gawin), work for a living, serve God through ministry (on weekends via Music and on weekdays via Prayer Groups), exercise, spend time with God in Word and prayer. I do not know if i can/should even let go of any of these things right now. Ito pa nga lang mga bagay na ito di ko na magawa lahat consistently, paano pa yung oras mag-girlfriend.

2. I do not desire a Long Distance type of Relationship. Our family's desire and plan is for Kuya and I to be able to fly to the US to live with our parents there. Having a girlfriend who does not have USA as her target destination will only cause us to hurt each other because we will not be able to work on our relationship with these differing goals.

Now this does not entirely kill the idea that I can still have a girlfriend who also desires to move to the US permanently. We know that is not an impossible thing. But I do not hold on to this strongly to push me to look for a person like that. I surely must ask this question on every woman I will date.

3. I do not have enough financial capability to enter into a relationship. I believe that eventually, the man will provide for the family. Right now I struggle to buy a laptop worth 50k; I've bee saving for this for a year now and I still couldn't reach my target savings to buy one. Plus the addition of owning a car, which entails regular gas and toll expenses as well as regular maintenance. Bigat din sa bulsa. Lately I gained additional clients which resulted to additional income. I'm grateful to the Lord for providing for my expanding financial needs. And right now what God has been providing for me financially is not enough for me for shelling out additional cash for dates and whatnot for my would-be partner.

4. I have a lot of things going on in my mind right now. I am occupied with many things about my family, my finances, my spiritual life, my prayer partners (who I lend my ears for listening to their struggles), my health, and how to clean the house. I could not bear additional baggage in my mind and heart right now. Fully loaded na.

I just wish that people would not let me know that they've set high hopes on me having my own relationship, so I wouldn't be pressured to go find a partner just because I'm expected to do so. They can ask me about it - I'm so willing to answer and let them know my thoughts. I wish people knew and understood these reasons so that they would instead show me grace and maybe lend me a hand with my current burdens. I wish they would not treat me indifferently because of my civil status. I feel so estranged from everyone when they do this, and I feel that there's no one who understands my situation, well not just my situation, but the situation of every single person above 30.