By 
The US Census Bureau says the fastest-growing household type since the 1980s has been one-person. The same is true in some other countries like the UK and Japan. One report says that sixty percent of people living in Stockholm live alone.
It raises the question of whether it is better to be single living alone or living together in a committed partnership.
benefits of living alone
People who live alone tend to have fewer financial burdens. Advertisers, particularly in fashion and entertainment, target these consumers because they often have higher disposable income.
The person who lives alone may feel that life is less complicated. He or she may appreciate the freedom as an opportunity to study or as a form of independence for the development of his or her career.
Single people may not be interested in a committed relationship or having children.
Alternatively, being single may be thought to be for the best simply because you haven’t met the right person yet.
“A bad marriage can make a person feel more isolated than being single”(Professor sociologist Eric Klinenber).
Benefits of living with the right partner
The quality of life of couples varies greatly. One cannot be truly happy living in an unhappy relationship if, for example, one is always dependent on another person for emotional and financial resources. But if you’ve found the right partner, you’ll want to share the responsibility for making decisions and responding to time demands regarding the home and/or children. The other partner can provide emotional support and companionship, and one can depend on them if life gets tough.
A large body of published research has found that people living with a partner on average have lower rates of premature death. Physical and emotional health tend to be linked, and a happy couple creates an emotional gain.
On the other hand, some recent research suggests that the more self-sufficient single people are, the less likely they are to experience negative emotions.
Importance of the challenge for spiritual growth
From a spiritual perspective, I would say that personal growth has an important spiritual component. For me it’s about stopping prioritizing what is naturally pleasurable and pleasurable for oneself. I no longer see life in terms of me: my preferences, my social position, my convenience, my desires. Instead, you are learning to think more about others, their feelings, needs, worries, difficult situations.
That twist, in what we pay attention to, sounds pretty radical, and actually quite difficult to pull off. But I would suggest that life itself is a training ground for this type of personal growth. It is continually forcing us to do the right thing. It offers endless challenges to test our resolve and teach us new life lessons. These challenges we can avoid or escape. On the other hand we can try to deal with them.
Many benefit indirectly from such personal difficulties in life. I would say this is because they require a positive response to help us shift from being ego-oriented to being other-oriented. Sometimes, throughout life, a person gradually changes from confusion to enlightenment, from seeing in the dark to seeing in the light, from self-centeredness to loving-kindness.
Challenge of not living alone
Living together as a couple, especially as parents, offers endless challenges. But we can learn a lot from them.
You can’t get away with it when you share a house. Give and take rules okay!
Living with someone means spontaneous communication at any time. Your spouse wants some attention, so you stop what you’re doing. You learn to listen with sensitivity and sympathy. You start to talk openly and honestly about uncomfortable topics.
Children force us to be more patient and tolerant of noise, disorder, and demands on their attention.
Having a shared house means that the other person will expect you to do what you have agreed to do, be it cleaning the house, cooking, doing laundry, gardening, maintaining the car, etc.
Your partner will expect you to share important decisions. You cannot spend a large sum of money on a whim. Similarly, income choices are not just a personal matter: they raise questions of balance between work and family life and the location of work and home.
Good relationship and spiritual growth.
Family life requires that we meet the needs and expectations of others. In this way we develop as human beings. An intimate and committed relationship supports spiritual personal growth in another way. Facing life with the support of a good partner, who is right for you, can puncture your balloon from time to time and will help you get off your high horse. If the partner has a warm heart, it can have a humanizing effect on you: for example, becoming less harsh in your judgments or more lenient with those who have offended you. When you notice your partner’s no-nonsense response to your ideas, you may become less cocky.
You can lean into their practical suggestions instead of getting caught up in your thinking.
A spouse who can discuss matters that concern you objectively will help you steer clear of subjective bias. Similarly, if they can see the things that bother you from a higher perspective, they can guide your thoughts and actions.
These things can come up on a daily basis and over a period of time they can make a significant difference in the way you think and feel.
A notion like this can seem unrealistic in unsatisfying relationships, many of which fail over time. However, he would say that only when two partners become one in a partnership of what the philosopher Emanuel Swedenborg calls ‘conjugal love’, in deep harmony together, can they:
- Warm feelings affect you when they go beyond your own interests.
- Rational thought influences you when it goes beyond your immediate perception.
Thus, a deepening intimate relationship, one that Swedenborg calls a marital loving partnership – supports the further development of each person into a deeper union of love and light.