Part of me feels unsure whether I should be writing about loneliness at a time like this, but the other part of me says now is exactly the time we need to be talking about ‘that lonely feeling’. I’m going to start by stating categorically that the latter expression is the one to choose when we articulate how we feel. I have an aversion to the very word ‘loneliness’.
Or should I say ‘Loneliness’? Because it is one of those words like Death or Cancer that seem to demand a capital letter. It’s a big word for a BIG insurmountable thing.
To deal with the lonely feeling we need to realise that it isn’t so big or so unsurmountable. It only feels that way when we’re weighed down by it. I figure that one of the ways we can stop being so weighed down is to see it for what it is: merely a feeling.
Not a nice feeling by any stretch. A hard feeling to negotiate our way through on occasions, certainly. A feeling that we might not want to articulate, absolutely. But still, only a feeling. The very reason we don’t want to articulate it, is because to say “I am lonely” sounds like such an absolute. A state of irreversible selfhood. It defines us in a way which denies the possibility of being any other way. It defines us in a way that makes people want to shrink from us. Tell someone you are lonely and you will see exactly the same reaction you will get if you tell them you have cancer, or that you are dying. There is a quick wash of sympathy followed by terrified embarrassment as they realise they have no clue what to say in response.
The worst of it is that we feel the same way ourselves. If we tell our self that we are lonely, that self also shrinks further. To say that we are lonely is to wrap our whole being in a dark lead-lined cloak and tie it so tightly around us that we cannot move. The good news is that we don’t have to do that. The better news is that the first step to not doing it is a very easy one. You don’t have to change the way you feel, you just have to change the label. You are not lonely. You feel lonely. You have that lonely feeling. And guess what the magic thing about feelings is? Yep…they’re fickle…they don’t stay around for very long once you’ve noticed them, identified them, figured them out.
The other thing about feelings is that we all have them. None of us are immune. Aside from the complete sociopaths (who have other things to worry about) there is no-one on the planet who has not felt lonely at one time or another. As I’ve worked through my recent life-changes, I have often asked myself if I am lonely. Most often my answer has been “no, but I am afraid of becoming so”. That was me thinking that “being lonely” was like some terminal disease, that once you had it you were tainted for ever.
Eventually, I figured out that it isn’t like that. When I started asking myself: “do I feel lonely?” I started getting different answers. I’d walked away from my job, my partner died, I decided that running my own consultancy wasn’t really where I wanted to be next, I moved house…oh, yeah, and then lockdown happened. I am solitary by nature but even my alone-ness was extended and intensified. Did I feel lonely?
What do you think?
Of course I did some days. Sometimes for days at a time. Even so: when I asked the question “am I lonely” I still kept saying ‘no’. At some level, I knew that I am not lonely – I just felt that way now and then.
I still do. Sometimes.
Having worked that out, the next stage was obviously to start getting curious about the nature of the feeling. Where does it come from? When? What makes me feel that way? What makes me stop feeling that way? What, in any case, does feeling lonely feel like? What does it look like? How does it sound? Does it have a taste? What colour is it?
I think these are good questions. They are not necessarily questions to ask when you are feeling lonely. When you are feeling lonely, simply acknowledge that and be kind to yourself and unless you have already discovered your own roads out of it, simply trust that it will pass. Simply remind yourself, that it is just another feeling and feelings come and then they go.
Once they have passed, then think back and get curious. Don’t get overly analytical – the last thing you need to do having just emerged from a lonely feeling is to create one of not-understanding. This isn’t about ‘understanding’ in an intellectual sense, more about ‘recognising’…it’s about finding the shape of the feeling, finding what it feeds on, and how it needs to be tended to quietly go on its way.
The thing about recognising the shape and taste of one feeling, you begin to imagine the sight and sound and touch of other feelings or moods, happier, or stronger, more resilient, or uplifted ones.
Things that make me feel lonely include too much indoor time, heavy grey skies – especially first thing in the morning. Sleeping too late and feeling like I’ve wasted a chunk of the day, not having a plan for the rest of it and feeling like, well, no-one will notice anyway if I don’t do anything. For the record: on any given day they might not, but if I repeat the pattern I’m sure they will.
Things that stop that feeling include simply going outside. Indoors it’s a lonely feeling; outside it’s solitude. Indoors it’s a heavy grey miserable day; outside it’s rain-washed or misty-mysterious. Inside I hear only man-made sounds; outside the planet speaks. A sky that through my window is gunmetal hued, battleship grey, shows more differentiation if I take time to look more directly, more intentionally – then it might become the colour of a pigeon wing or a heron flight.
Solitude. Alone-ness. These are my positive words. They do not change my state of being, but they fundamentally shift how I feel about it. They feel more like something I have sought out ~ even if, strictly speaking, on this occasion I haven’t ~ I remember the times during the previous decades when I yearned for such things.
You may not crave solitude, but tell me you object to peace or to calm. Tell me you object to breathing space. A pause. A break. A rest. Me-time. Find whatever words work for you, because this feeling will pass…and you might find that while you don’t miss the feeling, you do miss the circumstance.
Finding a way to describe the circumstance differently is a kind of magic. Not only does it alleviate the lonely feeling in the moment ~ ok, not in the moment, but eventually ~ it also makes you respond differently next time those circumstances come around. You will have a toolkit to bring out: ideas of things to do which lead to different feelings.
Trust your intuition here…you will know. Get curious about yourself, and you will know.
I’ve been talking about my own experience here. I recognise that there are other ways of feeling lonely: being disconnected within the crowd, being an outsider in a community, spending hours and days with a family you longer recognise. The technique is still the same: recognise the feeling, give it a kind and transient label, be gentle with your self until it passes, then get curious about the shape of it and therefore the shape of its alternatives.
I’ll repeat don’t look for opposites. When the feeling hits, you are not seeking to obliterate it. It is there to protect you, to tell you something you are meant to know about who you are, what’s happening, what you need. Listen to it patiently, and coax it into silence, by giving yourself what it is saying you need. Don’t make any radical decisions on the back of it…you can start thinking about those when you’re in a more connected, more positive frame of mind OR you will find that you don’t really need to. After all, it was just a feeling.
