How connected do you feel to this life? If you’re single, are you perhaps lost as to how to find your sense of belonging? So much you read out there assumes that people are in romantic relationships. That’s slowly changing but still, belonging for singles isn’t so easy to find. Perhaps it lies in our perception?
How connected do you feel to this life? If you’re single, are you perhaps lost as to how to find your sense of belonging? So much you read out there assumes that people are in romantic relationships. That’s slowly changing but still, belonging for singles isn’t so easy to find. Perhaps it lies in our perception?
Belonging is Just a Construct
Everything around each of us is constructed by our minds. In a sense, what we call reality is simply an illusion because each of us perceives something different. I’ll never forget bounding into my new office in a hot, sunny Asian city over a decade ago ecstatically praising the sun and the heat only to be met with harsh words about how unbearable it was. What I saw as amazing, conditioned by many decades of dreary and cold British winters, was seen as bad by those conditioned by years of heat, disease and sun damage.
The word “belonging” is also a construct. What does it actually mean? Do different cultures agree on the definition? What about different people within the same culture?
Most psychologists agree that a sense of belonging is a basic need but what’s interesting is that it doesn’t have to be met by friends and family alone. Connectedness to nature can be equally, if not more, important to some people, depending on where they are in their lives. This study on connectedness to nature even goes so far as to say that those who seek out nature might become less motivated to find human connection. Of course, nature and people can go together for others.
It all brings us back to what you need to feel connected. The art is to distance yourself from social expectations and assumptions and listen to your heart. It starts by reframing what belonging for singles actually means for you.
Meeting your Needs or Aiming for Something More?
When we talk about needs, many refer to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs although, few appreciate that he never actually put his needs into a pyramid. It seems that our needs are much more fluid and circular than a pyramid implies.
What this means for your sense of belonging for singles is that depending on context and your life stage, you might be more focused on self-actualisation, or fulfilling your potential, rather than just needing social connection.
Everything in life is a balance. At times, you might need to have more people around you but alternatively, you might go through phases of working on transcending the ego. Whilst that isn’t exactly a project with linear milestones, you might be focused on a more spiritual path to discover what lies beyond all the constructs created by the ego. The paradox is that, for some, the work is to develop our individuality whilst at the same time giving up that sense of identity and connecting to something bigger and more ephemeral.
So, we come to something called healthy selfishness that leads us to greater purpose and meaning in life. Yes, we’re still connected to people and the universe but we also sometimes need to connect with ourselves.
Where Can You Start to Find Belonging for Singles?
What all this means is that belonging for singles isn’t just a question of reaching out to people and making new friends. It’s connecting with your inner heart to discover where you are on your journey in life and what works best for you at this moment in time. That way, you disconnect yourself from what society expects and instead, you find your definition alongside which the “how to” will become more obvious. The reason we’re often stuck is because we follow others’ definitions that don’t ring true for us.
As always, this isn’t necessarily easy but the search for your definition of belonging for singles can start with these steps if you’re up for it:
1- Meditation
In Buddhism, the aim of meditation is to develop concentration so that we are not blinded or overwhelmed by our distractions. Those distractions are essentially constructs, for example, I can’t do this or I’m an anxious person. The more you meditate, the more those beliefs become obvious and then gradually, they fall away. You’re left with a sense of belonging to something greater than “me, myself and I”.
2- Selfish altruism
As mentioned, sacrificing yourself isn’t the answer to a healthy life. On the contrary, it’s about finding a higher purpose that supports others as well as yourself. Essentially, how can you honour what you need alongside giving something back to the world? In Japan, they have the Ikigai model which is more than just giving money to others. It’s about using your skills to make the world a better place.
3- Practice empathy with self-love
A wonderful polarity where you can take empathy too far or self-love into the depths of obsession. Similar to this example, draw a 4 box square that details the positives and negatives of self-love versus empathy with your own points. The balance is then on the horizontal line where you can create strategies for yourself whether spending more time in nature or reaching out to new hobby groups.
Where Can You Start?
No matter what we do, we walk alone. No one will be there to suffer our deaths or other tribulations on our behalf and yet, we can feel surrounded by love at the same time. The key is to find the balance that works for you, not as society wants you to believe.
Yes, single people can engender a strong sense of belonging and the way you do that is up to you. If you feel more spiritual, you might feel connected to something bigger than yourself. On the other hand, you might need more people around you. In that case, send that message and pick up that phone. There is no right or wrong and only you can decide whether you feel connected or simply, transcended.
