singleness is a gift

Last week in small group, we were talking about gifts from God that we are celebrating right now. It suddenly hit me that my singleness is a gift. Without it, I would not have had a lot of the experiences I've had in the last few years. If I were still married, for instance, I would probably never have finished school, would be in a totally different career, would never have found the theatre again, and probably wouldn't have had time to write as much as I have been able to.

Obviously, married women with and without children do all these things, but when I was married, all my energy went to making him happy. Now I know that relationships should be more balanced and that I need to keep my interests and pursue them while also paying attention to my partner, who will hopefully have his own interests that he wants to pursue.

Changing my perspective, thinking of this time in my life as a gift rather than a curse, has really changed my mind about a lot of things. I'm feeling so much better about this stage in my life. I can consider it a good time to do a lot of things I may not be able to do later - instead of a sort of waiting room.