“What was meant for you will never pass you by, and what was meant to pass you by will never reach you.” (author?)
One of my Ramadan blessings this year came in the form of a book, a book that a friend had heard about on NPR (or thought she did) and felt I would enjoy and benefit from. She sent it to me, not even sure it was the right book, but in the end it turned out to be the right book for me; it was truly a Godsend. Having a social circle in which over 90% of my friends are married (or single but much younger) led my thoughts to dark places to try and figure out “Why am I still single?”. When others asked, it reinforced the idea that I have been doing (or not doing) something to not be married. Provided on the front cover was the answer I needed to see and hear.
“It’s Not You: 27 (wrong) reasons you’re single” spoke volumes to me. Although the only things I had in common with the author, Sara Eckel, was being a professional female raised in the US who had spent most of her adult life single, it was enough. She spoke of the same struggles I had experienced: living single and alone in a couple’s world, searching for a life partner and coming up short, and more importantly, the comments and advice that well-meaning people would shell out in response to finding out her age and marital status.
“You’re how old and not married? Why, there MUST be a reason, and find a reason we must. Because once we find that reason, we can come up with the solution.”
Although I know (hope) it must come from a good place, asking “why aren’t I/you married yet?” whether it is the single person themselves or another person posing the question does more harm than good. As Ms. Eckel mentions, searching for the “why” just leads to a lot of self-doubt and self-deprecation. It insinuates that the person in question is in someway defective or at fault or doing something to hinder themselves from finding their life partner, when in fact that is not the case at all.
Ms. Eckel met her current husband at work – not online, not at some “mixer”, not after finishing a marathon – at the age of 39. She realized then that all those things she had tried to do to find love were not directly correlated to finding it – it was all by 
chance. If Sara Eckel were Muslim and was writing this from an Islamic perspective, her book would have stated “people are single and married for the same reason, because that is how the Creator decreed it”. As a Muslim, I believe in free will, that we are living our own life. I also believe that anything that we do and any result we get is by the Will of the Creator (Qadr Allah). Without going into it too much, because this post isn’t about predestination vs free will (a very complex topic), it is in a sense the allowance of the Creator for things to happen.
Here’s an example of this given by Yasmin Mogahed in her “Transformed” class: When Moses was facing the Red Sea, God told him to strike the sea with his staff. The Creator of the sea could have made the sea split on its own, without asking Moses to do anything. After all, since when does striking water with a wooden stick make it split in half?? But, because His Lord and Master asked him to, he obeyed and by his Lord’s Will and Power, the sea split.
Transfer this to single people searching for a life partner. Look here, look there and try your best. In the end, if and when it’s meant to be, the One who created you and that person will bring you two together. Until then, it will not happen.
That is truly the only reason it hasn’t happened yet. It’s not because you’re too picky (although surely you could have just married anyone…if you JUST wanted to be married), too selfish, not looking hard enough, etc etc. How many married people do you know were super picky and still ended up married? I could name a few at least. How many married people did everything under the sun to find their spouse? I can’t say many of my married friends did – most of the time it was a by chance encounter.
The book gave me hope, which is more than I can say for some of my (again, well-meaning I’m sure) Muslim brothers and sisters who have questioned my or another person’s singleness or tried to give me some explanation or “helpful” advice. How freeing and wonderful it feels to say and believe “It’s not me!!”, to know that the best and only reason I am still single is “Because I am”.
To my fellow singletons out there: it’ll happen when it’s meant to happen, not when you “learn to speak his/her language” or complete yet another “10 days to a better you!” workshop. (Those are all great things to do, by the way, for your own betterment and for being a better spouse, but not for being a better spouse magnet). Until it happens, by God’s will, asking or wondering “why” is just a waste of mental energy and headspace. Believing that there’s something you can do or stop doing to make it happen isn’t going to make you feel better nor your spouse appear sooner.
In the end, it’s all about trusting in and relying on the One who created you and someone for you (called “tawakkul” in Arabic; I wrote a blog post on that a few years ago). We do our part, not because that will yield the result but because our Lord and Master told us to, while knowing and believing it is in our Creator’s hands.
Wanderings and ponderings 