Raise your hand if you know a couple who met in college. Raise your hand—you know you do. Who is it? Your parents? Your friend? Is it you? The classmate-to-significant other pipeline is strong. According to an article from USA Today 28% of married college graduates met their spouse in college. To visualize this statistic, if you have four married college graduates in a room, one or more of them will likely be married to a person they met in college. That’s a lot of college relationships.
So, if you know a TON of college couples, you are not alone. If you are in a relationship in college, you’re also not alone. College relationships can be so much fun. How cool is it that you can learn to navigate life with a person you love? However, being single in college can feel isolating.
Take me for an example, I have been single my whole college career. My roster in college can be described on the scale of limited to nonexistent. I would be lying if I said it never bothered me because truth be told, it has. I imagined I would meet my future spouse in college, it just seemed like a natural progression of things. Unfortunately, life did not work out like that, not to say in the four months I have until graduation something might dramatically change (a girl can dream).
What’s even worse is the constant self-comparison to others in relationships. I think that’s something many single people can relate to. When you are in a state of prolonged singleness, it’s easy to wonder what’s wrong with you. The answer is simple, it’s nothing, but in the moment that answer doesn’t suffice.
It’s even worse when all your friends are in committed relationships. I love getting to witness my friends falling in love, but there are changes in friendships that come along with that. Suddenly topics of conversation change and your routine of watching The Kardashians on Saturday nights gets moved to Tuesday at 3. It’s not easy and can make you crave a relationship more.
Recently, I had a conversation with a dear friend that changed my perspective on being single in college. A traditional college student attends undergrad from the ages of 18-22. College is the primetime where we discover who we are and how to be that person. We compared college to building a house. Every experience you have in college is a brick being laid. When you are in a relationship, you tend to make bricks with your partner. If that relationship ends, those bricks crumble away, leaving you to patch up your house. The great thing is, in this example, you can always rebuild and renovate to have a better home without those bricks. When you are single, you get to make all those bricks by yourself, which is a difficult journey. You may have some help from friends, parents or mentors, but you are forced to learn and come to terms with brick building. What a blessing. As you leave your college era, you come out with a strong house, independent from a partner and perhaps ready for an addition. ;)
Looking back, I’m thankful for my single years. What an opportunity to truly learn about myself. How thankful I am that I had the time to build many strong friendships, to have the capacity to tackle challenging semesters, join as many clubs as possible and do what I want. While it hasn’t always been easy, I’m proud of the person I became because of my singleness.
This analogy is not to knock people who are in love, but it’s to add another perspective. A positive perspective of being single in college because too often, we are told we have to be in love to be happy.
