There is something simultaneously embarrassing and deeply human about the fact that I just deleted and redownloaded dating apps for the third time. Not because I want attention. Not because I thrive on grind until ghosted culture. But because I am still hoping someone exists who actually wants real commitment.
Modern dating feels like trying to find a single grain of rice in a warehouse of popcorn. It is noisy. The bar keeps moving. Someone will tell you, “Just be patient,” while swiping past you as if love is a menu item that has already sold out. No one really talks about how skewed love has become. Inconsistent availability. Ambiguous intentions. The strange social sport of emotional unavailability.
And do not even get me started on the psychological whiplash of dating culture. For people like me, whose parents stayed together for decades, I watched love that endured. We watched forgiveness. We saw mistakes met with conversation instead of abandonment. We grew up believing love was something you worked at, not something you canceled when it became inconvenient.
But then there are people whose parents divorced. And both groups, those raised on longevity and those raised on reinvention, now find ourselves trying to be trailblazers while still using The Bachelor as some strange prototype for what lasting love is supposed to look like. As if fantasy dates and televised proposals are a reliable blueprint for real life.
And let’s be so for real. It gets spooky out here when you start to date someone and then there is that moment of horrifying clarity.
Wait. Am I on the Are We Dating the Same Guy group on Facebook?
Yikes. Hopefully you are not that guy. Hopefully I am not that girl. But the anxiety is real.
And here is where it gets even more vulnerable for me. Yes, I started hopping from church to church hoping divine matchmaking might happen somewhere between the coffee bar and the worship chorus. Maybe he would be behind me raising his hands in praise. Maybe he would trip into my line of sight during communion. Maybe we would fall in love over kale smoothies after service. I wish I could say I was joking.
As the years start adding up and my biological clock gets louder, there is a part of me I am embarrassed to admit feels like it is slipping. A tiny corner of hope that sounds a lot like fear of being left behind. Or fear of being damaged goods simply because I still want something that feels old fashioned.
But here is what I am learning.
Wanting commitment is not embarrassing. Wanting a love that forgives and stays is not unrealistic. Still believing in enduring love after disappointment is not delusion. It is inheritance.
Some of us did not imagine this kind of love out of thin air. We watched it happen at our dinner tables. We saw forgiveness in real time. We saw love choose longevity over ego.
And somewhere along the way, faith shaped that vision in us. It taught us that love is not proven by how quickly you leave, but by how willing you are to stay, to repair, and to keep choosing one another when walking away would be easier.
So no, we are not asking for too much. We are refusing to lower our expectations to match a culture that treats people as disposable.
I am learning to trust that God sees the desires of my heart, not as a wishlist, but as something He understands more deeply than I do. Until then, I am praying for the patience to see why He has me in this “single” season (that exists on purpose,) and for the humility to learn what it is teaching me before I step into whatever comes next.
Hope looks different now. Quieter. Less naive. More honest. But it is still here.
And being single in this season does not mean I am behind or broken.
It means I am still willing to believe that love can last.
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