You feel light, powerful, capable and excited about the prospect of just being you – not half of a whole – but fully, totally complete as a party of one.

It’s not surprising that many single people are trying to find a life partner. Doing it alone, being 100 percent responsible for everything from scooping out the cat box to paying all the bills is a daunting prospect.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve stayed with someone long after I knew the relationship was seriously flawed — made excuses and lived in denial that the person I was sharing my life with, was slowly but surely changing me into someone I didn’t want to be.

Someday, I’ll spend some time pondering why we prefer to be “unhappily coupled” rather than “happily single.” It’s as if our culture has accepted, without question, that coupled=happy and single=unhappy when in reality, an entire spectrum exists.

In my experience, the coupled=happy is the first stage. That’s when you find someone you think you could fall in love with. Things are great. You’re both on your best behavior, your time together is fresh and exciting, the future looks full of promise and you wonder if soul mates might really exist.

In time, those things that were so intriguing become a bit annoying and those character flaws, the ones you shouldn’t ignore (because they will bite you and bite you hard) start to surface. You find yourself wondering when the next shoe will drop, you’re walking on eggs shells, and all those other clichés that describe how it feels to be in the same room with that other human being.

Coupled=happy is no longer where you’re at, and if you have the courage and strength, you’ll pack it up and move into single=unhappy: the raw, just split up with him or her stage that feels very much like a bad case of the flu. You feel like you’re going to die but one day you wake up and realize you feel light, powerful, capable and excited about the prospect of just being you — not half of a whole — but totally complete as a party of one. And that my friends, is single=happy.

I love that stage. Where you’re free from the pain of the last relationship and can look back with such relief that you’re no longer dealing with the control, or the anger, or the nagging, or the jealousy, or the selfishness or the pure boredom that was keeping you from becoming the person you have the potential to be.

Regardless of your place on the singular continuum, whether you’re coming out of a relationship (and would like to hide under the bed) or if you’ve resigned to be forever single, or you’re dipping into the dating pool, Singular magazine, the SingularCity community, the SingularView e-newsletter and our Singular Events were created for you.

Yes, it really is possible to be happily single. It doesn’t mean being lonely and it doesn’t mean you can’t experience romance and love. It means being comfortable with where you’re at today regardless of your relationship status. When you do that, you’ll be amazed by how beautiful and complete your life will be, single or not.

Copyright © Kim Calvert/2010 Singular Communications, LLC.