Loneliness is perhaps the most common emotion single girls have, but I don’t think it’s simply tied to our lack of marriage. Yes, we want to find our soulmates and get married. But loneliness is also an outcome of our friends finding true love before we do. When we attend bridal showers or weddings, we’re reminded that we’re single—and that our friends no longer are.
There’s nothing wrong with feeling lonely, friends. But even when you feel alone, you have to remember you aren’t alone. If you’re struggling to keep that truth in mind, I completely understand. Here are a few suggestions for dealing with loneliness in healthy, practical ways:
1. Count the contacts on your phone.
Yes, I’m serious. It’s time to invite logic into your loneliness! If you count all the married people in your contacts and all the single people in your contacts, I bet there aren’t as many married people (or as few single people) as you thought there would be. It’s comforting to know that there are other people in the world—people you know personally—who are waiting to get married too. You may feel like the last single girl on the plant, but take heart—you aren’t!
2. Don’t rely too heavily on your friends.
Yes, I’m serious about this too. In college, I learned the hard way that there’s no such thing as the “marriage” version of a friendship. A friend is simply meant to be a friend—not a husband or a fiancé or a boyfriend. When I depended too much on one of my friends, she quickly let me down. While I definitely think it’s important to have Christian friends, it’s also important to remember that friendship isn’t an equal substitute for marriage. Friends come and go, but God designed marriage to last a lifetime. Unless you want to feel constantly disappointed by your friends, make sure you have boundaries in your friendships.
3. Give your loneliness to God.
Though our friends can (and will) fail us, our Heavenly Father is completely trustworthy. There’s no one more faithful or compassionate whom we can turn to when we feel lonely. Instead of trying to hide your loneliness from God, give it to Him. Tell Him how you feel. Write in a prayer journal. Be honest with Him. He already knows about your loneliness, but His desire is for you to entrust it to Him completely—which can’t happen unless you take it to Him in prayer.
It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. (Psalm 118:8 NASB1995)
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