To all singles who have been holding their breaths on Valentine’s Day, who can’t listen to a love song without feeling the bite of regret in their guts, I’ve got a question for you: do you know how many stars are in the galaxy?

The answer is one hundred billion (a few scientists say it’s two hundred billion, but we’re still falling in the same order of magnitude).

One hundred billion isn’t just big. A thousand is big; ten thousand is pretty damn big; one million is hard to imagine for a human mind. One hundred billion is one hundred thousand times one million.

This video is the only way that helped me comprehend a number this immensely large. So give it a watch and then come back to me.

Done? Okay. Remember: every grain in that last bunch of rice was 100,000 dollars. If we could count exactly 100,000,000,000 grains of rice, we’d find ourselves with 4,754,000 lbs (about 2,156 tonnes). If my calculations are correct, to store that rice you would need a silo of 9m of diameter and 33m of height.

Also, remember it’s stars we’re talking about, not rice. Every star in that bunch is unique—you’ve got blue giants, yellow dwarfs, neutron stars, pulsars, and so on. Some of them are old, some of them have twins, some of them have planets orbiting around them. Some of those planets may even host, or have hosted, alien life.

Can you imagine all that? Of course you can’t. It’s so much, and it’s so beautiful, that a mere part of it covers the entire night sky, which has dazzled civilization upon civilization for thousands of years.

Now guess how many neurons are in an average human adult brain.

That’s right.

You have a galaxy in your head. It’s filled with habits, ideas, nightmarish landscapes, mental photographs, imaginary friends, Prince Charming’s, echoes of your past self and hints of your future self. And they’re all talking to each other, all the time, conscious and subconscious. Most of them are even willing to talk to you, your soul, and you don’t even need a Tinder match for that.

Searching your inner galaxy for the the love of your life is hard, I know. Sometimes in your search you may find black holes, and you’ll need to learn to skirt around the event horizon; other times you may fight demons who want to tear your soul apart. Sometimes you’ll find entire civilizations of joyful aliens, and ancient weapons to aid in your quest. But most times you’ll find simple strength, and courage.

And one day, if you keep trying, you’ll find within you your True Soul Mate, the piece of yourself you’ve buried and missed for so long. And the outside world will open like a flower before your eyes.

I swear it will.