I’m undertaking a 1000-day reinvention project, blogging here daily to track my progress. In Saturday Reflections, I take time out to reflect.
From Single at Heart: The Power, Freedom, and Heart-Filling Joy of Single Life by Bella DePaulo:
People who are single at heart have two big things going for them: they find single life deeply satisfying and they are not powerfully drawn to a coupled life. Why, then, do some people who are so well suited to living single keep trying to make romantic coupling work, even after disappointing experiences?
We keep trying because we think that we just chose the wrong person. Or we weren’t mature enough then, but now we are. Or we did not love ourselves enough to love someone else, and now we do. We keep trying because we are afraid that if we stay single, we will let our parents down. We keep trying because many of our friends have already headed down the path of romantic coupledon, and that makes it seem like we should too…. We keep trying because our steps toward success at romantic coupling are recognized and celebrated. Everyone is so happy for us when we are coupled! [emphasis mine]
I feel some sense of shame that I am single as much as I enjoy it. I tried for more than twelve years after my divorce to find a fulfilling romantic partnership. I tried it with different kinds of men and various types of relationships. I kept thinking, “that was just the wrong person for me!”
My attempts to find a more satisfying alternative within the same framework (necessary coupledom) is what Kazimierz Dabrowski would call unilevel disintegration. That’s when your life isn’t working so you try swapping out the components: how about this corporate technology job instead of that one? How about a different house in a different town? How about this romantic partner instead of that one? How about living together? How about living ten minutes apart?
With unilevel disintegration, you don’t question the societal scripts you’re living by. You just try to improve upon how you manifest them.
At some point, when this fails to bring fulfillment, you might think: maybe the problem is more deep-seated than that. Maybe I need to do something more radical than just switching out various options in the same style of life. You look at what is compared to what you imagine ought to be, if you were living your most value-driven and meaningful life. That’s Dabrowski’s multilevel disintegration where you don’t just stay on the same level you’re on (the level that says you must have a corporate job if you are less than 65 years old and that you must be partnered up). You explore different modes and frameworks of living and meaning.
DePaulo continues:
We keep trying [to make romantic coupling work] because we so rarely find themes of glorious lifelong singlehood in novels, TV shows, movies, poems, or songs. It is as if only romantic coupling can be truly, deeply, enduringly fulfilling.
All of that, and so much more, seems like a lot to give up. But somehow, for us, the life of conventional romantic coupling just doesn’t work. It is not fulfilling. It is not who we really are. When we are in a life organized around romantic coupling, we want out. We are never truly contented until we commit to our single lives and stop trying to unsingle ourselves.
Why aren’t there “themes of glorious lifelong singlehood” promoted in media? Because that’s not the societal script for people’s lives. That’s not the norm that cultures promote:
The couple norm positions romantic coupling, particularly in the form of marriage, as the standard against which everything else is measured and found wanting. Coupling is what is expected of adults. It is what they are all assumed to want.
How do norms emerge? And how and why did the norm of marriage as well as the institution of marriage develop? That is too large a question for this quick blog post.