The meal you learn to make for yourself changes what an empty evening can offer.

Cooking for one is often treated as a lesser version of cooking, which is why so many people alone eat standing up. Learning to make something properly for yourself changes the character of an empty evening: it becomes an evening with a thing in it rather than a gap to be got through. Being worth the effort when nobody is watching is most of what it teaches.

Choose one dish and learn it well enough to make without thinking. Then make it on an evening when you would otherwise not bother. Lay the table properly too, since that part is doing more than it looks.