Does anyone celebrate being single?

I am newly single. Again.

I have just ended an 18 year relationship/marriage and have decided that I am fed up with partner relationships and just want to start enjoying the rest of my life single.

It is not easy for people to feel comfortable with the idea of being single when they have been brainwashed to believe that being with a partner is the only way to live life the "right way". I, myself, also spent many years trying to support a relationship that turned out to be one-sided so I am in the rip-tide of that as well.

Am I bitter? Sort of. But mostly I just don't feel like investing a lot of energy on a partner relationship anymore. Is that sad? Maybe, but I don't mean this to be an arena of sadness. I want this to be a declaration to live a new way that is going to be healthy and joyful and self-supporting.

Is it because I am a 54 year old woman with 3 grown kids and a one-year old granddaughter that I can say that I would rather live alone now? I am financially independent. I don't need anyone to support me. I don't need anyone to build a family. I have family in my kids and their spouses and kids and in my friends.

I enjoy doing things and the intimacy I have with my friends. They have been supportive and fill my heart with joy. I believe I do the same for them. I don't often feel lonely and I have never enough time in the day to do all the stuff I want to do. I am an artist and I like my job and co-workers.

I know I feel badly and will for a long time about my ex-relationship because it turned out to be built on secrets and addictions and betrayal . I have come to regard the things that were special and meaningful to me as being much less than I imagined them to be. Therefore when I become nostalgic and sad I remind myself that I had been deluding myself... perhaps that makes the loss easier to bear. At the same time, it reminds me of all the other times I have deluded myself in relationships (not just men, women friends also). So, for me, it seems to be the best thing to live alone; learn to love me and my life and value what I have to offer myself and others who value me.

It is true that I have looked to others to value me, especially the partners in my life. It is a mistake too many people make, I know. Doing this results in giving away a lot of power to others who might have their own issues and agendas. And seeing this, I have decided to live single and learn to give myself all that I need: and what I need most is to love and value myself and my life as I create it.

Why is it that I cannot find ANY other sites created by people celebrating their singleness? Maybe I don't google it right. I keep find sites wherein people don't celebrate single living as a way of life. Most of them are like advertisements, letting people know they are single... and looking for a partner. A lot of them say that it is great to live single...enjoy it until you feel like settling down.

I AM settled down! What does settling down mean? Having kids and a home? I have kids and a home! I was even single for a number of years while I was raising my children and I was single when I decided to have my last daughter, who is now 24. We always had a home. My kids live in their own homes now and that is great for me because I like living alone... settled in a beautiful home which I invested in and created myself.

When I lived alone before this last ex-relationship, I was always looking for a partner. I didn't even have an idea that living single was an option. I knew it wasn't a valued way of life. I wonder if I had been able to think beyond the way I was brainwashed to believe, if I wouldn't have saved myself a lot of heartache in the decisions I made in to settle for a being in a relationship rather than living single. I wonder if I wouldn't have grown more and developed more and learned to value myself more.

I don't think that living single precludes ever having a relationship if being in a relationship actually enriches both people's lives. I just know that since I haven't considered the lifestyle choice before, I need to spend a lot of time learning what that lifestyle has to offer me now.

So now I am 54 and I am going to live my life in a different way than I have before. I am open to embracing a new way of looking at living single. Whereas I felt I had no choice before, I see that I do have a choice and that I could be happier and healthier choosing to live single.

I invite you to share your experiences with me.