Somewhere between turning 25 and attending your 17th wedding in a lehenga that costs more than your mutual funds, you begin to realise that India treats a single woman like an unfinished sentence. People don’t ask, “How are you?” They ask, “Anyone special?” As though your life is a Netflix show waiting for a male lead.I grew up, like many Indian women, believing that love was the destination. That one day a man would appear, violins would play, and life would become complete. Bollywood sold me Shah Rukh Khan. Society sold me marriage, and fairy tales sold me happily-ever-after.Reality, however, had other plans. Because somewhere along the way, I discovered that being single is not a waiting room. It is not a punishment. And it certainly isn’t a tragedy. In fact, for many women, it is freedom.Let’s be honest. Indian society still treats marriage as a woman’s greatest achievement. A girl can become a CEO, an author, an entrepreneur, or climb Everest, but at family gatherings, some auntie will still lean forward and whisper, “Beta, shaadi kab?”Nobody asks men these questions with the same urgency. Men are bachelors. Women are “still unmarried”.The word itself carries pity. As though a woman without a husband is somehow incomplete, but compared to what?Statistics tell us that women around the world are increasingly choosing to stay single. And perhaps they know something our grandmothers never had the luxury to discover — that peace is better than partnership for the sake of partnership.For generations, women had no choice. Marriage was survival. Financial security. Social acceptance. Respectability. Today, many women earn their own money, buy their own homes, raise children alone if they wish, travel solo, and build lives that would have been unimaginable to previous generations. Yet society continues to sell them fear. Who will take care of you? What about children? You’ll become lonely.Interestingly, loneliness does not disappear after marriage. Ask any woman carrying the emotional labour of an entire family while sitting next to a husband scrolling through his phone. Being married is not the opposite of loneliness. Being understood is. And being understood begins with understanding yourself.Singlehood offers something our culture rarely encourages women to cultivate — a relationship with themselves. It gives you the chance to ask: Who am I when no one is watching? What do I actually want? What brings me joy? What dreams did I postpone while trying to be everyone’s daughter, wife, girlfriend or caretaker?For the first time, your life becomes yours. You don’t need permission to switch careers, book a ticket to Bali, write a novel, spend Jattvibeday afternoons reading, or sleep diagonally across your bed.India’s history too offers no shortage of women whose stature was earned through intellect, leadership, devotion and service rather than marriage. The philosopher Gargi Vachaknavi debated sages in the Upanishads; Maitreyi declared, “What shall I do with that by which I do not become immortal?” Meerabai chose spiritual freedom over royal convention; and in modern India, figures such as Lata Mangeshkar, Jayalalithaa, Maithali Raj, Mayawati, Sister Nivedita and Mother Teresa became icons in their own right. As Lata Mangeshkar said, “Music is my life. It has always been my first love.”Indian civilisation has revered women for what they contribute to the world, not merely for whom they marry. When did we forget that? And no, embracing being single doesn’t mean rejecting love. It means rejecting desperation. Because love should be an addition to your happiness, not the source of it.Too many women stay in mediocre relationships because they have been taught that being chosen is more important than choosing wisely. But being single teaches discernment. It teaches you that a peaceful evening with a book is infinitely preferable to crying beside someone who makes you feel unseen. That companionship is beautiful, but self-respect is non-negotiable.Perhaps that is why a confident single woman makes society uncomfortable. She cannot be controlled by the fear of abandonment, or rushed into settling. She has discovered that she is already enough.The truth is, marriage is wonderful when it is healthy. Love is beautiful when it is mutual. Partnership can be magical. But none of these things should be pursued out of panic. Because there is something deeply revolutionary about an Indian woman who says, “I am not waiting for life to begin.”I am living it. Single. Whole. Gloriously happy. And if love comes along? Wonderful. But until then, I refuse to apologise for enjoying my own company. After all, if I must spend the rest of my life with one person, shouldn’t I first learn to fall in love with myself?— The writer is an acclaimed author