With Valentine’s day come and gone, your social media is likely to be awash with stories of Valentine’s day proposals, elaborate date nights and Instagram posts of over the top presents. If you’re not currently in a relationship or perhaps have just gone through a breakup, this kind of public boasting can sometimes make you feel lonely and left out. 

The way to solve this? Time on your own.

Sounds counterintuitive, right? Read on…

It’s so easy to view time on your own in a negative way, with society telling us constantly that we need to be in a pair to be happy, that we need to be surrounded by friends at all times to prove to others that we’re popular, and to ourselves that people like us. 

In fact, having time alone can be a great way to reconnect with yourself, reevaluate your goals and to understand what’s important to you. 

Here are just a few things you can do to make your alone time more valuable… 

1.   Make a plan for your alone time

You’ve finally got a free weekend to yourself with absolutely no plans. You don’t have to meet anyone, you don’t have work – it’s time to spend time with me, myself and I. 

As good as it feels to not have any plans, being on your own all day without direction will most likely lead (if you’re anything like me) to you sitting on the sofa watching reruns of your favourite Netflix show, and majorly overthinking everything. 

The best thing to do to avoid this, is to make a loose plan of things you want to do that day. You can even include minor things in this plan, such as taking a bath, going for a walk or going shopping, but having a plan for the day will give you a much healthier mindset and stop you overthinking as much. 

2.   Put down your phone

Yes, this might sound like something you don’t particularly want to do, but ignoring the excessive *pings* of messages and putting your phone down for a bit can help you fully immerse yourself in whatever you’re doing, and allow you to fully relax. 

If you have your phone on you at all times, you’ll be tempted to reply to messages and scroll through social media, which may feel good in the moment, but will make you feel quite deflated afterwards. 

To maximise the benefit you’ll get from putting down your phone, download the Hold app. It will give you points for every hour you don’t use your phone, which you can then use to purchase a variety of different things, including discounted cinema tickets, free cinema popcorn and money to donate to charity.

3.   Enjoy a solo activity that you wouldn’t usually have time to do 

As much fun as doing activities in a group can be, some activities are just more enjoyable when you’re on your own. 

Go to a café and start reading that book that you never got around to reading, treat yo’self and have a long bubble bath, do some baking or go for a run through the park. Alternatively, take a walk and listen to a new podcast (The High Low is pretty good*, with Dolly Alderton and Pandora Sykes).

You can also use this time to catch up on any things you’ve been putting off doing. Put on a motivational playlist and use your spare time to clear out your wardrobe, bulk cook your lunches for the week or do your laundry. Woo productivity!  

*The High Low is also on maternity leave until April, but there are enough archive episodes to keep you busy!

4.   Teach yourself something new 

Whether this is learning a new language on Duolingo, starting your own blog, or heading to a museum, there are plenty of ways to teach yourself new skills, for little or no cost. 

My personal example of this is that after a tough breakup, I decided to head over to the Natural History Museum in London on my own because I’d never been. Not really knowing what to expect, I started walking around the museum, looking at the exhibits and reading the information available. To start with, I felt very self-conscious to be on my own, but then I soon realised that (of course) no one was actually paying any attention to me and I was then able to relax and enjoy myself. 

Overall, I would definitely recommend a solo visit to a museum, as I found you tend to take in a lot more information when you haven’t got people distracting you. You can also stay as long as you want, have a coffee and cake break whenever you want and go to the exhibits you want to visit, without anyone telling you not to. 

5.   Challenge yourself by meeting new people

Although this is technically breaking the solo activity rule, sometimes it can be nice to just go out and meet some new people. 

There are plenty of places to meet new people, whether this is through your local City Girl Network, a parkrun or in a gym group class. If you attend these events on your own, you’ll probably come out with loads of new friends because you’ll be more inclined to talk to people you don’t know.

Written by Chloe Lane