What I Would Tell Younger Single Women if I Wasn’t Worried About Hurting Their Feelings

Dear younger, single women:

I have been where you are and I understand - all of it.

As your big sister, this is what I would say if we were having coffee and I wasn’t worried about hurting your feelings.

We romanticize what we don’t have

Whether it’s a job, a house, a vacation, or a husband, we do it with everything.

We assign characteristics to situations or people without seeing the whole picture, and make up in our minds how we think it would be.

The perfect job where we are always appreciated. The ideal destination for rest and relaxation. A home of our dreams where we can foster family and community. A husband who makes us feel seen, loved, and worthy.

We daydream in pure platinum.

When life gets tough, we believe what we lack is what would fix everything.

Too often, we fail to acknowledge there is another side.

That perfect job no doubt has its fair share of stress or difficult co-workers.

The dream vacation may come with a side of frustration over lost luggage or missed connections.

Every homeowner knows when it comes to maintenance, there’s always something.

Your marriage will take effort, and there will be days you don’t even recognize that loving husband.

I once envied a couple I thought was the epitome of a strong and healthy marriage and it turned out to be anything but that.

You never know what’s going on between two people after everyone else goes home.

Cultivate contentment right where you are (Philippians 4:11-13). Stay in your lane, and put your blinders on to what you assume you are missing out on.

This is not to say that we shouldn’t strive, hope, or pray for what we want, but we need to keep our aspirations in their rightful place - none of them lead to never-ending happiness or contentment.

None of them are worth worshipping.

Stop dating if you hate it

“You have to put yourself out there.”

I don’t even know what that means.

The single women I know are running businesses, traveling the world, writing books, getting involved in politics, mentoring, and serving in their churches and communities.

We are out there. We are everywhere.

You don’t need to hop on the dating hamster wheel because of pressure that you’re not doing enough to meet someone.

Let me guess: you’ve been told it’s a numbers game and you need to keep working at it if you ever want to meet someone.

People try to set you up and you can immediately tell the only thing you have in common is a pulse.

Dating apps are a revolving door of men you wouldn't trust with your luggage let alone your whole life.

But, hey, you’re “out there.”

If online dating leaves you feeling overwhelmed or unsafe, delete the apps.

If you know in your heart a guy wouldn’t be a good fit for you, don’t go out with him just because someone else thinks you should.

Nowhere is it written that you have to subject yourself to a certain number of bad experiences in order to earn your way to the right person.

It may feel counterintuitive, but loosen your grip on the need to make it happen.

Live the life you have, not the one you wish you had

I bought my first home when I was in my late twenties. It was a huge step for me as a single woman.

Someone close to me said, “Don’t you think you should wait until you get married before you do this?”

No.

There are many things I wanted to experience with my husband. Buying a home was one of them. Traveling to certain countries was and still is another.

But we miss opportunities when we wait for the ideal set of circumstances.

I’m grateful I bought my condo when I did. Had I waited until I got married, I’d still be waiting! I would have missed out on years of building equity that I’m so happy I have now.

And talk about a growth spurt - I was stretched! I learned a lot during the process of becoming a homeowner, and not just about real estate.

Adulting took on a whole new meaning, and I’m grateful for what I gained that I know will only serve me should I also gain a husband some day.

This past June, I spent nine days in Greece, a country I always wanted to visit with my husband. I took my sister instead and we had an amazing time.

Only after it was over did I realize that trip was meant for me to experience as a single woman.

God met me in a couple different ways; ways that strengthened and healed me; ways I may have missed if I was focused on my spouse.

Your life is happening right now.

Are you putting certain dreams on hold?

Or, are you digging deep, pressing in, and being present for your life as it is?

I know what I’m choosing.

You’re not late

You’re not late, at least not when it comes to God’s timing, and I know that’s hard to hear when you’re waiting.

When we combine how we feel about our timetable with what society constantly pushes, waiting feels painful, even irresponsible at times.

And yes, certain aspects, like childbirth and raising kids, may be easier when we’re younger.

But rushing and marrying the wrong person will make life a heck of a lot harder.

We serve a God who created time. He is not subject to it.

He can cause it to feel sped up or slowed down.

I’ve known couples who met each other past the point anyone thought they would and I hear them describe a quickening in their relationships.

With God in the middle of it, they feel as though they have known each other for a lifetime and wouldn’t trade the timing.

Maybe one or both of you needs this time.

Maybe the world does.

Everyone’s time was appointed, when and where they would live, so that they might seek God (Acts 17:26-27).

My great-grandmother had her last child (a surprise) when she was 45 years old.

Take a breath, this happens more often than you think, and God always gives us grace right where we are to handle things we never thought we could.

I might not be here if she had that baby earlier.

The timing of your marriage and birth of your children fit into God’s larger design for history.

Respectfully, it’s not all about you.

Not every woman who wants to get married will

Can you be ok if it never happens?

For decades I’ve had well-meaning friends, acquaintances, and pastors speak marriage and family over my life.

But the truth is, no one knows what the future holds, and I only recently came to understand this in a way I never had before.

October will be six years since I was diagnosed with breast cancer.

This diagnosis was so far outside my realm of thinking, I can’t begin to tell you.

One doctor told me I was the healthiest person he ever met, or, at least, was living in all the healthiest ways.

Cancer doesn’t discriminate.

And it didn’t respect my hopes to meet someone amazing, preferably right around that time, when I felt my patience wearing thin. COVID hit shortly after and those were some of my darkest days.

I would have given *anything* to have a loving husband by my side through that experience, but I didn’t.

Instead, the God of the universe met me in ways no spouse could have the knowledge or power to.

I experienced God in countless ways I wouldn’t have otherwise.

A God who knows me better than I know myself. One who moves on my behalf. Who shows up with answers to questions I didn’t know I needed to ask. And always right on time.

Cancer was a chapter, but not the whole story.

The times I wish for a spouse aren’t even chapters, they’re moments. Friends’ wedding days, Mother’s Day, doctor appointment days.

The way I work to not let cancer become the whole story is the same way I have to actively make sure that moments of missing a spouse stay just that: moments.

I can’t let them get bigger than they are to the point of drowning out the millions of other beautiful moments I get to experience.

More importantly, I can’t let them drown out God.

We are all here for the same reason

Legacy.

It came into sharper focus after my cancer diagnosis.

What am I doing that matters? What will I leave behind?

Newlywed or never wed, when we are in Christ, we have a role to play.

You’re not on a lesser path because you are single.

The children you hope to have aren’t the only ones to whom you can pass the torch.

After my diagnosis, I wrote something that helped me process the experience and also as a way to share it with a wider audience.

Someone I didn’t know well, who is not familiar with God, reached out almost two years after I shared it to say that the way I wrote about God inspired her and I know it got her thinking.

If you had asked me when I was younger how I wanted to reach people and make an impact, writing about my personal journey through cancer would not have made the list, and yet God knew it was a seed that would be planted in the soil of someone’s heart.

God has work for each one of us to do (Ephesians 2:10). What can you share, make, build, or speak life over?

Step into it and watch the ripple effect.

You will be okay

I’m not trying to minimize what’s important to you, or lessen the pain you may experience in the wait, but as someone who has been living this for quite some time, I am trying to get you to see the bigger picture.

I hope you get what you’ve been waiting for.

More than that, I hope you allow God to ready you for what you’re waiting for.

I hope you never rush thinking you are late.

I hope you choose to live, to embrace your present for the precious gift it is, and chase the adventures you may have been putting off.

I hope you discover the richness of all God has for you, and feel emboldened to step into the work he prepared for you to do.

And should you not receive the thing your heart desires, I know you’ll be ok.

Better than ok, actually.

I’m living proof.

With love,

Jen

Waiting

“You need to have kids.”

The room was loud so at first I thought I misheard. She repeated it, this time drowning out the noise.

“You need to get married and have kids.”

It’s been spoken over me for decades.

Like a broken record - skipping the beautiful soundtrack of my life to get stuck on something no one can make sense of.

The faces have changed, but it’s always the same.

Said in passing. Without thought. Said as if it was something I forgot to do.

In one stroke, it sweeps over the entirety of who I am, minimizing the journey:

Christ-follower

Writer

Mentor

Friend

Cancer survivor

Entrepreneur

But God also speaks over us, if we let him, and his words go farther back.

Before opinions, before I was born, before the world.

His ways are complete.

Whole.

With nothing left unfinished or forgotten.

He doesn’t leave loose ends.

And if I’ve learned anything sifting through these decades of noise, it’s this:

More than anyone, God knows what He is doing. He sees what I can’t.

Peace overflows when I rest my full weight on that.

So far, it’s looked nothing like what I planned, but His ways are marked by precision, intention, and a thoughtfulness unique to who I am.

The weight of the world’s words can get heavy. If you have experienced this, too, you are not alone.

But waiting on Him - waiting with Him - is never wasted.

He isn’t finished yet, and it will be worth it to see what he intended all along.

Five Years

Five years ago today was my final cancer treatment. ⁣

I stepped into the cold, feeling yanked out from under the daily watchful eye of the incredible team of experts I came to rely on. ⁣

Two days later all nonessential businesses in New York shut down. ⁣

I was told the usual prescription for post treatment was to go out, do things, see your friends, plan the trip. The way to move on is to live.⁣

With the onset of COVID, my doctors were sympathetic - they had no advice for me now.⁣

And that was the beginning of my path to healing against a backdrop the world had never seen before. ⁣

Five years later, I’m spending the day very differently. ⁣

Things are coming into sharper focus. The specifics aren’t important just yet but I’m no longer working to survive from one doctor’s appointment to the next.⁣

I’ve made plans again, not only for the near term, but without even realizing it, for the distant future, too. ⁣

These five years will always hold weight with me: for what was lost and for what was gained. ⁣

⁣But now I’ve come down off the tight rope walk.⁣

The tension is breaking.⁣

⁣And it feels a little like coming home.

The Work in Front of Me

Respectfully, I would ask that we stop interrupting women’s lives to tell them they should be leading different ones.

The Bible says that Jesus cast seven demons out of Mary Magdalene - meaning she most likely suffered from an illness not easily cured.

She contributed to Jesus’ ministry financially, so she had her own money, and there is no mention of her being married.

In other words, she did not live the typical life of a woman in that time.

I can relate.

And yet, she is the first person Jesus revealed himself to after he rose from the dead.

This in a time when women’s testimony was not permitted in a court of law because they were viewed as being lower than livestock.

Jesus instructed her to go and tell the others. She was the apostle sent to the apostles.

Ladies, you have so much more value than you’ll ever know because He placed it in you.

And that value doesn’t increase or decrease as your roles change, either at work or at home.

Imagine if Jesus yelled to Mary as she ran to share the news, “Girl, don’t forget to get maaarriieeeeddd.”

How ridiculous would that have been?

Because the message  - then and now - is about Him. Killing sin and death.

That’s it. That’s the headline.

And Mary’s willingness to be present and responsive to what He called her to is a lesson for us all.

It reminds me of when I bought my condo.

I was young. Anxious, excited, happy, scared.

And someone said, “Don’t you think you should have waited until you got married to do this?”

Man, did that ruin my moment.

And it made me feel like what I was doing wasn’t real life because I hadn’t checked another box first.

Or instead.

Would I have liked to step into other roles? You bet.

But that might be a conversation better had with the men today, many of whom seem more interested in quantity over legacy.

It can’t just be me doing all the work and dragging a guy along for the ride.

A remarkable thing about women is that we won’t wait to multiply whatever you give us.

Bring me groceries, I’ll make you a meal.

Build me a dwelling, I’ll make you a home.

Give me a story worth sharing, I’ll spread that news far and wide.

This photo was taken at one of my favorite press conferences. We made the front page of USA Today. Good Morning America even gave us a shout out.

I felt a lot of satisfaction from this effort. And I think God, like any good dad, gets a kick out of watching His kids light up and fire on all cylinders.

There are some who say I shouldn’t occupy this space. That I’m in the minority.

But while society sidelines me, God never does.

He calls me loved, chosen, valuable, and trustworthy to carry His message. In return, I do the work that’s in front me, whatever that looks like.

It could be at a job. It could be taking care of family.

It could be reminding single friends younger than me that marriage and children, however wonderful and worthy, are not actually what God looks for in the end, and then setting an example of how to walk that out, practically.

Maybe someday my life will look different. Maybe it will include a husband or a different home.

In the last few years, I’ve had cancer and the world got swallowed up in COVID.

Again, I do the work that’s in front of me.

It’s been years since this photo was taken and I still show up for God.

I bring my sickness and my singleness and the hurt I carry from the world telling me I’ve done it all wrong.

Sometimes, that feels really heavy. And I believe the lies the world has told me that I don’t have a place in it.

But then there are times I take God at his word and, like Mary Magdalene, I’m there before anyone else, waiting to see what He will trust me with next.

A Letter to God in the Wake of the Roe v. Wade Reversal

God, I pray my heart always breaks for what breaks yours.

63 million lives have been lost since Roe v. Wade was signed into law. I can only imagine the ache of your Father’s heart as each one toddled through your gates.

You ache for their mamas, too.

On June 24, 2022, when abortion was turned back over to the states, friends of mine in certain circles raised a banner in victory, careful not to get too loud.

Partly because the ‘victory’ is incomplete. While a step in the right direction, it merely passes the baton for others to decide.

And partly to not anger the ever-growing mobs forming in our streets and outside our churches.

The argument is that those of us who believe what you say don’t care what happens to women.

Ironically, we believe what you say because no one cares about women more than you.

When Sarah was long past the point of child birth, you opened her womb and made her the mother of nations.

When Hagar was abandoned in the desert, thinking she would have to watch her baby die, you showed up and showed her a way out.

When Ruth was widowed and outcast, you brought her to community and a man rich in life and in love.

When Abigail’s brute of a husband was about to instigate a war, you emboldened and protected her as she approached an army in the mountains to contend for her city.

When the woman caught in adultery was about to be stoned, you chased away her accusers. You knelt down next to her in the dust, not to condone what she did, but to lift her up from it.

When Mary found herself engaged and pregnant at 15, well, we all know how that story goes. Her son would become the Savior of the world.

I’m writing this today because she - and Joseph - chose the difficult path and trusted you as they walked it.

And as I’ve healed from cancer, I’ve used what I’ve seen and learned from you to encourage countless others during their own traumatic experiences.

The ripple effect of one one person choosing you over their circumstances is immeasurable.

And, finally, after sealing death up in that tomb behind you, a woman was the first person you told.

You entrust us with so much.

You find us abandoned, outcast, and caught up in the lies the world tells us.

Even so, I see story after story of your faithfulness to take on the ugliest we’ve got and make something beautiful. Something others can stake their lives on long after the last witness is there to tell about it.

My story is different from the stories of these women, but like them, you have entrusted me with much.

I will keep my heart tender where this issue is concerned, and share my resources with those who think there is no other way.

I will use my voice to speak your truth in love.

Psalm 139: 13-15

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.

Women Who Build

I’ve always been in awe of women who can seemingly bend the universe to their wills.

Married by this age, a house by this age, kids by this age. They draft a timeline, submit it for review, and the universe happily obliges.

Harnessing that kind of power to make anything fall in line with my plans on my time table has always eluded me. I submitted my plans. I had such high hopes.

Then cancer hit at 38 immediately followed by a global pandemic. I set hope aside and just tried to hold on to my health. 

But somewhere deep inside, the desire to dream is still there.

So for whatever reason you find yourself childless today - traumatic life events or just life - however you may have felt your plans got overlooked or denied -  I want you to know you still matter.

I see you. And God sees you.

Building businesses and building communities. 

Building up other women like you because you know how they feel.

Building legacy.

You may not be passing it on to little ones; you’re passing it on to everyone.

You just don’t get a day telling you how awesome you are. Keep going. Keep dreaming. Keeping making plans. 

Keep building.

Today and every day, I honor you.

Psalm 126:1

When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dreamed.