Being single means freedom to do what you want, when you want. You don't need to "get permission" to go out with the guys, or spend the day lounging around the house, or whatever you want to do. I am very fortunate in that my wife is very lenient with me as far as my hobbies and stuff. I don't think you should feel like you need your wife's approval to do something, as long as it isn't interfering with your marriage, work, financial obligations, etc. By the same token, my wife doesn't ask me if she wants to buy something or go out with the girls, etc. I think what was nice is that she was slightly older than me when we started dating, and was already out of school with a career...so I think she had a more level head on her shoulders than a lot of college girls, the type of which I was frankly tired of by the time I started dating her (I was in my last semester of college, incidentally). The other nice thing was that we both knew we didn't want to play games or mess around...we got engaged about 9 months after we started dating, and married about a year after that. Almost five years later, so far, so good. By the way, I did start going out with her after I had decided to "quit looking". I figured I'd just focus on finishing college...I'd had enough of dating girls and getting disappointed. So there is something to the idea that you will meet the right person when you're not looking for them, at least from my personal experience.