Have you ever been lonely in a crowd? Have you ever been
perfectly content all alone? Me too. And I have also suffered from loneliness.
Loneliness is a complex mental and emotional phenomenon that
has at its base a powerful emotion that has survival value for children. All of
us have experienced some degree of abandonment, if only for a short time, and
remember the painful and scary feeling that goes along with it.
Whenever we are reminded of this feeling or anticipate it in
the future, we get a twinge of abandonment distress that we experience as
loneliness. This can happen among a crowd of friends or even after making love.
It can be pretty confusing and can put you off your game if you don’t know
what’s going on.
Here are some tips for recognizing loneliness for what it is
and dealing with it in the healthiest ways.
1. Realize that loneliness is a feeling, not a fact. When
you are feeling lonely, it is because something has triggered a memory of that
feeling, not because you are in fact, isolated and alone. The brain is designed
to pay attention to pain and danger, and that includes painful scary feelings;
therefore loneliness gets our attention.
But then the brain tries to make sense of the feeling. Why
am I feeling this way? Is it because nobody loves me? Because I am a loser?
Because they are all mean? Theories about why you are feeling lonely can become
confused with facts. Then it becomes a bigger problem so just realize that you
are having this feeling and accept it without over reacting.
2. Reach out because loneliness is painful and can confuse
you into thinking that you are a loser, an outcast. You might react by
withdrawing into yourself, your thoughts, and your lonely feelings and this is
not helpful. At its best, anticipation of loneliness might motivate us to reach
out and cultivate friendships, which is the healthiest thing to do if you are
sad and alone. When you are a child, and your sadness causes you to cry, you
may evoke a comforting response from others. If you’re an adult, not so much.
Victims of bullying may well have fans and friends, but they
often aren’t aware of it because the shame and loneliness get more attention.
Habitual assumptions about social status continue into adulthood and if you are
looking for evidence that the world sucks, you can always find it.
4. Make a plan to fight the mental and emotional habits of
loneliness. If you realize you are dealing with an emotional habit, you can
make a plan to deal with loneliness. Since healthy interaction with friends is
good, make some effort to reach out to others, to initiate conversation and
face time even when your loneliness and depression are telling you not to. Yes,
it is work, but it is worthwhile, just like exercising is worthwhile even when
you are feeling tired or lazy.
5. Focus on the needs and feelings of others, the less
attention on your lonely thoughts and feelings. I can walk down the street
thinking about myself, my loneliness and the hopelessness of it all, staring at
the sidewalk and sighing to myself. Or I can walk down the street grateful for
the diversity of people I get to share the sidewalk with, silently wishing them
good health and good fortune, and smiling at each person I meet. The latter is
more fun, even though I sometimes have to remind myself to do it on purpose.
6. Find others like you. Now days there are more tools than
ever before to find out where the knitters, hikers or kiteboarders are
congregating so that you can get together with those who share your interests.
This makes it much easier to identify groups with which you will have something
in common, a natural basis for beginning a friendship.
7. Always show up when meeting up with others. You don’t
have to run for president of the knitters society at your first meeting. But
you do have to show up. I have been telling others to practice yoga for 20
years and promising I would do it myself for just as long, but except for the
occasional coincidental yoga offering at a retreat, I didn’t take the trouble
of finding a class I could attend regularly until a month ago. Now I am
enjoying it and it wasn’t that hard. I have put a reminder in my phone to
resign from the procrastinator’s society.
8. Be curious, but don’t expect perfection or applause. Each
time you show up is an experiment, a micro adventure in social bonding. If you
are curious about and interested in others, they will be attracted to you
because you are giving them attention. So you will get attention in return.
Curiosity about others also takes your focus away from those painful feelings
that tend to make you hide and sulk.
9. Kindness goes a long way. “There’s nobody here but us
chickens.” This is one of my favorite lines from The Lazy Man’s Guide to
Enlightenment by Thaddeus Golas. Underneath the impressive facades of the high
fliers are the same set of emotions we all are born with. Celebrities suffer
from stage fright and depression too.
You have the power to offer loving kindness and generosity
of spirit to all you come into contact with. It isn’t instinctual to be kind to
strangers or people who scare you. But it is a choice. It is a choice that
Jesus and Ghandi used intentionally. And in the long run it is a winning choice.
The alternative, being mean or stingy with those you don’t know well, can get
you a reputation as a Scrooge.
10. Be persistent even if a particular group does seem to be
a dead end for you, try another. AA and AlAnon recommend that everyone try six
different groups to find one that suits you best. If you are persistent,
challenging the assumptions and feelings that tell you to give up and resign
yourself to a life of loneliness, and showing up and being curious and kind to
others and more and more groups, the odds are in your favor.
Article Credit : http://psychcentral.com/blog/
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