You’re Single Because You’re Picky.

“I refuse to settle” – No, you’re simply refusing to give up on your fantasy.

Being picky has absolutely nothing to do with having standards. Some single people (myself included) simply do not know how to see beyond themselves neither do they know how to see beyond perfection.

Last night I tweeted something spectacular,

“When you have been single for a while certain things like his jeans/ shoes are off-putting but you really have to bind that spirit.”

The tweet was autobiographical, as most of my tweets are and so I was surprised by how many tweeps ( a colloquial term for people on twitter) were able to resonate. I laughed and cried (you know the state of euphoria where your laughter turns to tears ) at the responses, however I was a little concerned. The replies revealed a real problem with single people, especially those of us who have been single for a while. We are too damn picky.

Without going into too much detail , the general gist was “why settle?” Why settle for horrible fashion sense i.e disgraceful pointy shoes, weird washed jeans, boots cuts, incredibly skinny jeans, a crumpled shirt , weird choice of heels or a badly put together outfit? , when you could wait for better. My follow up tweet read,

“Why can’t we work out”?

“Oh I don’t like your jeans.”

As ridiculous as the second tweet was , a lot of women have had this exact conversation in their heads. When the real man in all his boot -cut glory doesn’t live up to the image of the man we’ve envisioned in our minds, something turns off. An eternity with weird jeans man isn’t exactly appealing, so we retreat. Men do this too. Too much highlighter on a woman, the wrong choice of heels or outrageous lipstick could send him packing.

However, jeans don’t make a man neither does too much highlighter make a woman but we don’t want to hear that. We don’t want to hear that the reason why we’ve remained single is perhaps because of our inability to see beyond perfection. This man / woman could make us happy but it’s their outfit that counts. We’re quick to throw up red flags at the most mundane things, comforting ourselves with the “ I refuse to settle” line when really we’re being fastidious. Red flags are ( or at least should be ) reserved for character flaws and not his white washed jeans. Is he or she aggressive ? Do they like to shout at you wildly in public? Do they swear all the time? Do they never have anything good to say about you or others? We like to harp on about the subjectivity surrounding red flags but these are red flags. Yet, we romanticize having preferences and hold fast to our concepts surrounding settling.

My greatest contention with “settling” is its usage. It’s used so loosely and frequently to the point where its meaning is hard to deduce. We’ve talked ourselves into thinking that accepting his/her fashion sense ( or anything else as superficial) is settling when it’s not. We’ve totally disregarded what we actually deem important i.e shared set of values NOT interests, ( please note you won’t agree on everything) , physical attraction ( although there are days when I think we place far too much emphasis on this) religion, marriage, kids and complicated matters with things that won’t carry any real weight in quality relationship. If the prerequisites align then you haven’t settled.

Settling should be reserved for scenarios when you have given up on what you need and not what you want. This should lead to examining the things that are non-negotiable. Do you need him/her to be loving? Do you need him/her to be gentle? Do you need him/her to be a Christian? Do you need him/her to be ambitious? Giving up on your fantasy is not settling.

Believe it or not you could live with a man who only buys boot cut jeans or a woman who only wears kitten heels because every time they look at you they make you feel like the only person in the world and you know they would go heights and lengths to make you happy.