Single Blessedness

By Virginia Jasmin Pasalo

I am not surprised that people have a certain curiosity about single persons. But I am surprised at some of the questions asked about them in the academe. Here is a list of the questions sent by a student as part of their academic requirements (quoted verbatim):

1. Please share your experiences as a single blessed.

2. When did you feel that God is calling you to that kind of life?

3. What are the blessings of being a single blessed?

4. What are the contributions in the society of Single Blessed people?

5. What are the values this life proposes to our contemporary world?

6. What are the challenges and difficulties of this kind of life?

7. What advise (sic) can you give those who desire to remain single blessed in life?

My spontaneous answers were:

Q1. It is a normal life, no different from the rest.

Q2. I don’t think there is a special calling for being single. Sometimes you choose to be single. Sometimes you don’t, you are just single.

Q3. Blessings of being single is you can decide faster. You are free and responsible. I am not sure if it is a blessing, more like an enlightened condition.

Q4. The contributions are the same as any other person.

Q5. It is an option that requires fortitude, strength, responsibility and independent existence.

Q6. This kind of life has the same challenges as any normal being.

Q7. I have no advice. Each person must go through life the way she wants it, be responsible for the choices and find happiness whatever the choice may be.

I added a personal comment: Single blessedness is a wrong term. Everyone is blessed whether single or married. Life is precious.

On second thought, the questionnaire is coming from a Catholic university, and “single blessedness” may indeed refer to a “special calling” from God (as stated in Q2) and therefore may refer to those considering this life as a vocation. I may be the wrong person to interview because I do not see being single as a special calling, but a manifestation of an “enlightened condition” (reply in Q3).

The enlightened condition is a result of the evolution of life experiences and the discernment that comes from it. Life teaches valuable lessons from which we continually integrate our spirituality and material existence, and to feel the pulse of “being”. In this context, you can be in this condition whether married or single, or whatever social status you want to define and confine yourself.

The term “single” needs to be qualified. There are single singles. Other singles have relationships. Other singles are serial monogamists. Some singles stay single because they cannot tolerate being married to a man who behaves like a perpetual single. Some men stay single because they cannot marry other men. So many other singles are living double, and polygamous lives.

My personal experience is that as I pursued whatever gives me joy, I truly forgot I was single. The world offers so many opportunities, so many cultures to enhance one’s own, so many people we can share ourselves with, so many places to breathe and feel the pulse of the earth. One lifetime is never enough to “be” in the magnanimity of the universe. Live.

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