for her was enough

So how do you do it? she asked. How do you let go of the ache for that one special relationship and accept the level of intimacy that occurs? she asked and she really wanted to know. Almost with a sense of desperation, but also impatience. Not because she couldn't wait to hear the answer--rather because she already knew and it felt repetitive to hear repeated what she'd been thinking about all night.
She'd had work to do tonight and in the quiet of the kitchen, betwixt banging pots and the whirring food processor she realized what was different now as opposed to one month ago. She realized how when there was a special man in her life she tended to involve him in most of her activities, in her mental depiction of him. It wasn't that she literally told him everything, but as she went about her life she would imagine what she would tell him about what she was doing, or something that happened and how he would respond or what he might think about it. She realized how habitual it would become when she liked someone to imagine him into the scenario as a means of validating herself and her life. As if things were somehow more important if he even just inadvertently experienced them with her. 
Tonight the feeling was different. There was, for the first time all year practically, there was no man in her life with whom she was hoping to have a relationship. The only source of validation was her experience of this moment in solitude and the fact that it was just for her was enough. 

How free it is to realize you've held everything you ever needed all within yourself.