The Power of Communities of Single People

The Community of Single People is 7 years old and now we also have Singles Helping Singles in Need

Photo by William White on Unsplash

Seven years ago, in July of 2015, I started an online Facebook group, the Community of Single People, for people who want to discuss every aspect of living single except dating or trying to unsingle themselves. We talk about all sorts of things — our joys and accomplishments, our challenges and frustrations, our observations and our questions, the latest studies, something intriguing or enraging that showed up in our feeds or in the media, and those experiences that sometimes only single people really “get.”

We now include close to 7,000 members from more than 100 nations. We are an engaged group, too. Each day, members contribute an average of 21 new posts. Over the past month, 71 percent of the members have posted, commented, reacted, or viewed posts. (The growth of membership over the years, the ages and genders of the current membership, and the countries and cities with the most members are all described at the end of this article.)

At the Heart of the Group Are People Who Are Happily Single

If you look at the “About” section of the group’s page, the first thing you will see is this important reminder, “This group has nothing to do with dating,” then this:

Welcome to this Community of Single People who want to live their single lives fully, joyfully, and free of stereotyping and stigma.

To me, the heart of the group is single people living their single lives fully and joyfully. Too many people outside of this group buy into the belief that no one really wants to be single — at least not for the long run, and that no one is truly, deeply happy living single. Many of us here in the Community of Single People live in blissful defiance of those backwards ways of thinking.

Substantial numbers of us are Single at Heart — single life is our best life. It is our most authentic, meaningful, and fulfilling life. It is a psychologically rich life. When I say that single life is our best life, I don’t mean that it is better than being in a bad romantic relationship or that it is better to be single than to…