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    Validating Singles: Strategies for Living Single
    Validating Singles: Strategies for Living Single
    Validating Singles: Strategies for Living Single
    Ebook119 pages2 hours

    Validating Singles: Strategies for Living Single

    By Dr. Jim Towns

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    About this ebook

    VALIDATING SINGLES is an essential guide to healthy single life that is based in profound biblical truth and can revolutionize the churchs understanding in affirming singleness. Christian singles will no longer tolerate a message that is simply a pep rally for singleness. Both marriage and singleness demand serious scriptural insight. This book has developed such a treatment.

    If you are single and Christian, you face certain problems that come with the territory such as frustration in identity, sexuality, and professionally. You may feel a wilted identity amid a landscape of happy successful couples. If so, you will be pleased with this workcrammed full with pragmatic ideas, deep-felt experience and nuggets of spiritual insights.

    God has a plan for your singleness. You are not single just to bide time until the day you get married. Amidst extremes of celibacy versus marriage in Christian culture, there is todays proliferation of sexual non-commitment and a biblical stance. Whether you have a temporary or permanent gift of singleness, God wants you to discover fulfillment while you are single. Validating Singles presents strategies for living as a single. This insightful book will help you, whether never married, widowed, or divorced, to understand Gods desires and plans for your life as a single.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWestBow Press
    Release dateMay 8, 2012
    ISBN9781449742133
    Validating Singles: Strategies for Living Single
    Author

    Dr. Jim Towns

    DR. JIM TOWNS is a voice of authority about single life. He is a happy, fulfilled single who has shared his positive, practical and spiritual approach in speaking engagements and telecasts across the United States, Canada, and Europe. Dr. Towns currently serves as Regents Professor of Communication at Stephen F. Austin State University.

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      Book preview

      Validating Singles - Dr. Jim Towns

      Copyright © 2012 by Dr. Jim Towns

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      WestBow Press books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      WestBow Press

      A Division of Thomas Nelson

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.westbowpress.com

      1-(866) 928-1240

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-4214-0 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-4215-7 (hc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-4213-3 (e)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2012906484

      WestBow Press rev. date: 5/4/2012 

      Contents

      ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

      INTRODUCTION

      IDENTITY CRISIS OF SINGLES

      SCRIPTURAL PERSPECTIVE ON MARRIAGE AND SINGLENESS

      SINGLE: NEVER MARRIED

      SINGLE: SEPARATED OR DIVORCED

      SINGLE: WIDOW OR WIDOWER

      ALONENESS VERSUS LONELINESS

      SEX AND THE SINGLE ADULT

      INTIMACY AND MARRIAGE/REMARRIAGE

      CONCLUSION

      NOTES

      Acknowledgments

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      No one ever writes a book alone, regardless of what the title page may assert. It should be obvious that this book is not based solely on my personal experiences. In many ways it is a reflection of the experiences of many people that I know personally and many others whose thoughts and teachings I have found informative, enlightening, and inspiring. This book does not provide easy answers to the questions of single adults. Nor does it promise any simple solutions. I have accepted the fact that in this life there are many unanswerable questions and difficult (if not insoluble) situations. Yet these ideas make sense to me.

      Although there is a great deal of propaganda being poured forth today about the issue of singleness, the most accurate statements on the life of single adults should come from the singles themselves! Speaking at single adult conventions and writing this book have forced me to crystallize and refine my thoughts about my own singleness.

      I am deeply indebted to countless individuals with whom I have come in contact and whose ideas may have slipped unconsciously into my lifestyle—perhaps to have surfaced here as my own. I have been as careful as possible to give credit where credit is due, but so many people have helped me that I could never acknowledge all of the influences that went into the formation of this work.

      The writing of acknowledgments and thanks to valued friends and trusted colleagues is a difficult part of preparing a book. It is not possible in syllable and sentence for me to adequately express my appreciation for the influence and concern of the many individuals who have encouraged me in this work. I am grateful and indebted to all the people who have shared their experiences with me while I was speaking at conventions as well as in the university classroom. The events of their lives have become the flesh and blood of this book.

      Introduction

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      Most single adults would not use the two words single and validated in the same sentence. Finding out who you are is perhaps the most agonizing yet most beautiful task of your life. The voyage of self-discovery is a lifetime journey. I am a person who has never married, yet I am not a second-class citizen. I have learned to be alone but not lonely! As a flesh-and-blood human being, I feel, I think, I am happy, and I hurt. I am a vital person. I resent the negative societal connotations of being single as though that meant out of touch with life. I am very much a part of life, and life is very much a part of me.

      The major difference between a married person and one who is single is the fact that the married individual is sharing life with a spouse. The single person meets life head-on alone. Both married and single people do the same things—breathe, eat, sleep, work, play, talk, and enjoy life to its fullest! Properly adjusted singles are not anyone’s better half; they are their own well-balanced whole. Do not misunderstand; I am not anti-marriage, just pro-people—whatever their marital status!

      Marriage must not be an escape from singleness in the search for happiness. Abraham Lincoln noted that most people are about as happy as they choose to be. It is possible to be content in life, regardless of circumstances. Singles have been viewed as marginal members of a couple-oriented society. Rather than being members of one group called singles, they are members of multiple categories. Singles may be classified as never married, separated or divorced, single parent family, and widow or widower. Regardless of the label, a single is a person of value, dignity, and worth. It is a mistake to classify all single adults together. Each one has his or her lifestyle, background, and personality.

      There are at least three inaccurate assumptions concerning unmarried people:

      1. There is something wrong with them either socially or sexually.

      2. They have a carefree swinger or anything goes lifestyle.

      3. They are unsettled and irresponsible.

      A single can also be efficient and productive because of the goals he has set to channel his capacities and energies. Many singles accomplish objectives that could not be achieved if they were restrained by immediate family ties. Both marrieds and singles appear to be suffering from a kind of grass is greener on the other side of the fence syndrome. Whatever their marital status, many people look at others as if they had it made. The grass may be greener on the other side of the fence, but you can be sure of these things—the water bill is higher and tall grass is hard to mow! For myself, I had rather want what I do not have than to have what I do not want! In my association with people, it appears to me that for every single person who wishes he were married so all his problems would be solved there is a married person who thinks that being single again would solve all his problems. In a humorous analogy, marriage may be compared to flies on a screen door—those on the outside want in; those on the inside want out. For me, I humorously say, there is something far worse than being alone—wishing I were!

      Married people are usually described as more mature or adult, although many single people are far more mature and resourceful than some married people. Married people are usually thought of in terms of what they have, while singles are often described in terms of what they do not have. The label single is difficult for most people to define except in negative terms such as spouseless or not married. Dinner parties and most social occasions are planned for six or eight people; the odd-numbered guest often feels like a third thumb. Many social events (like family night suppers) are geared to couples and families. These are the rule rather than the exception. Yet one is not an odd number!

      If you are single or if you desire to better understand singles, then this book is for you! It will help you clarify who you are and help you learn to accept yourself, as well as give you some powerful insights into how to enjoy a fulfilled life.

      Jim Towns, Ph.D.

      Regent’s Professor

      Stephen F. Austin State University

      1

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      Identity Crisis Of Singles

      Singles in Society

      Many singles want to live the stylish life by emulating the lifestyles of the rich and famous. Yet some are more realistic and set their sights to be free and to develop their potential to the fullest. For a long time, singles have been viewed as marginal members of a couple-oriented society. In contemporary American society, singleness is acceptable and single people count. They are a new social class. Single adults are persons! Rather than members of one group called singles, they are members of multiple categories. There is no typical single person. Lifestyles and perspectives are as different as individuals and fingerprints.

      A single who has never married is either looking forward to marriage or adjusting to life as a single person, functioning in his own personal life, work, and society. The single who is divorced has gone through a physical

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