The One Where Carrie Chooses Herself

For as long as I, and many girls in this world, can remember, our earliest visions of happiness and romance often began with what we saw at home: parents together, love intact (sometimes lack thereof), and the fairytale promise or expecation of being chosen, even if it meant going out of your way to find it on your own. Those images and ideations imprinted the dream of marriage, partnership, and love as the ultimate validation.

But Carrie Bradshaw, in her spinoff And Just Like That, offers us something radical. In the original Sex and The City series, she spent it at brunch or dinners with her besties, shopping, and most notably, chasing Mr. Big (and at one point, Aidan, who was always my bachelor of choice). In the end, however, of the (at points questionable or an over reach) spinoff series, Carrie reminds us that choosing yourself isn’t a loss — it’s liberation. That being alone is not the same as being on your own. And being on your own? That comes with powers, not weaknesses. For as long as you have yourself, and this stretches far beyond the show’s New York backdrop, you are never truly without. The moment you find strength and warmth in your own company, you discover the most loyal confidant of all: you. Having yourself to hold, yourself to come home to each night, should feel freeing, not isolating.

That’s something I needed to witness with my own eyes, even if parasocially. For a long time, I believed my worth was proven through who chose me, who stayed, and who loved me back. But! Seeing the warm, femme, fuzzy, girl-next-door archetype — the woman who gives endlessly, who holds space for everyone (all characteristics I see and love in myself) — finally give herself that same space… that felt like a happy ending I didn’t know I was waiting and longing for.

Somewhat recently, I had found myself questioning whether there was something “wrong” with me for becoming choosier about who I let in, for no longer chasing validation in the same ways. For being grateful just to have a seat, even it was at the wrong table for me. The truth? The missing piece wasn’t who I allowed into my life, but who I had been neglecting all along: me. I’ve been so busy learning, doing, giving, that I forgot to ask — where do I fit into the picture of life? MY picture? 

The answer is simple, though it takes practice: I make myself fit. And with time, it won’t even feel like a matter of making space — it will be about prioritizing it. Time will pass whether single or not, so there’s no use in living with guilt for choosing yourself, or in believing that outward validation will save you in the end.

The princesses we grew up with — Tiana, Rapunzel, Jasmine, etc never needed to be saved. They just needed to be set free.

And that’s the truth Carrie shows us too: friends can't and won’t always be there, even if they’re around. All you will always have is you. Use that, cherish that, live in that. Because self-love and self-worth will always outshine everything else.