I ATTENDED a wedding once when I was 21. The bride, beautiful in her glacial white though she was, was old in my book. At the ripe old age of 30. I felt a measure of disdain and contempt for her for having waited so long to be plucked from the single’s line.

In my heart of hearts, I knew that by 24 I would have settled down with a pleasant young man with a bright future. He would probably be a middle manager already, steadily and serenely making his way up the corporate ladder. I would be getting down to the business of popping out eagerly awaited grandchildren for my mother.

My life of domestic bliss lay glitteringly before me, carefully planned to include a couple of well-behaved intelligent children whose good manners and wit would be the envy of other mothers. My adoring husband would of course be home faithfully every evening at the head of the dinner table, and willing to lay down his life for his wife and kids away from it. Ahhh, the best laid plans of mice and men. In this case cocky 21-year olds with no idea about life’s twisted sense of humour nor its propensity to overturn the grandest of designs.

Looking back now on my younger self, I envy her bright-eyed and bushy-tailed state of being. To a certain extent, I even envy her naivete. But with the benefit of hindsight, and plenty of literal and figurative miles on the clock, I would tell her the following things about her dating life and future relationships:

  • Age is just a number if you want it to be. There is no cut-off point for when you are no longer relationshipable. Pressure is something for car drivers to worry about with their tyres. Do not let other people’s misguided expectations force you into a course of action that is not right for you. Everyone will have an opinion about your single status, some might even be extremely vocal about you dying on the shelf and having rats eat your eyes out as one last indignity, but do not rush into anything you are not ready for.
  • You will meet men who will try to steal your joy, your sense of self, and your faith in humanity. Guard your heart jealously against these false prophets who wear the faces of knights in shining armour but want to use their spears to pierce your self-esteem. There might be days you wake up and you have forgotten that his role in your life is to complement not control you. It is all too easy to fall into the trap that he is your saviour and not your gaoler. But remember, you are your own saviour: own your power. A man who wants to control you does not love you, he loves the idea of you. Stunted by his shadow, he will never let you grow or shine. You are worthy of being loved wholly in all your flawed brilliance. You are more than just an idea to be manipulated to his fancies and whims.
  • Learn to be alone, to revel in spending time by yourself. Loneliness should not be the reason you stay in a dysfunctional relationship. Cultivate new hobbies, read, write, perfect your recipe collection, learn how to code. Broaden your skillset and take the time to know yourself better. Meditate. And if you cannot meditate, pick Doritos crumbs from your navel and build a modern art installation with them. Time that you spend on yourself, getting to know yourself more deeply and intimately, will never be time wasted. It will help you further down the line in your relationships. When you know what you are about, no one can lead you by the nose and take advantage of you. Your confidence and self-esteem will not allow you to be treated badly because you know you deserve to be treated with honest compassion.
  • There is every possibility that you will be the rule and not the exception. If a man cheated, was abusive and dishonest with his previous partners, it is more than likely that you will NOT be the one to change him. Unless you have been given a contract with Murray Roberts as a Project Manager, no man is a project that you need to work on. His ass is grown. He is not a fixer-upper that you need to sink time and resources into to bring him up to code. Not everyone that you encounter or who takes a shine to you will be worth your time. Learn to be dispassionate and to cut your losses before he sinks you with him. A little voice will try to tell you to acknowledge the potential in him, give him a little longer to come right, not to write him off. That voice is about as reliable as a crackhead volunteering to look after your baby while you go out for the afternoon and leave him alone with all your valuables. Ignore it.
  • Be a golddigger. Not in the traditional sense of the word, but dig deep to find those hard nuggets of truth that he might want to hide from you. A man will often tell you what he thinks you want to hear to make you open up to him. Some of them are better than a hunting pig sniffing out truffles in their ability to nose out your insecurities and vulnerabilities, only to mercilessly exploit them later. It is very tempting to take his pronouncements and declarations at face value to protect your image of him as your Neo, The One. But if that image cannot sustain a little determined, pin-point sharp scrutiny, is there any point in holding on to that fantasy? A fantasy which will disintegrate faster than promises of free and fair elections by African governments? No relationship can thrive or survive in dishonesty. Speak your truth and actively seek out his.
  • Finally, you will never get everything you want or need from one person – that is too heavy and onerous a burden for one mere mortal to bear. But if you can find the one who makes the compromises worthwhile, with kindness, and humour, and good grace and devotion to your shared values, that is a good starting point. And you will need to channel your inner samurai warrior if you can find one that can make you orgasm. He is a keeper worth fighting she-demons for!

Eleanor is an itinerant Zimbabwean with a passion for picking lint out of her navel, while trying to find the best ways of not turning into a charred mess in the desert heat. Less a writer, more a person who writes. Twitter: madziva_eleanor