Loneliness is not just a state of mind as some people claim. I think it is a physical condition. Not all suffer from it constantly and yet all of us feel it in some form or another at some point or another in our lives. Whether you are single, married, kids, gay, straight, poor or rich. This is a condition that happens to creep up on us when we are least expecting it and punches us in the gut.
It is not the domain of the depressed or unhappy. Though they might feel it more strongly then others.
When your friends forsake you for their pleasure. When your spouse does not understand why you think something or want something or feel a certain way. You feel isolated, alone...misunderstood...
When a parent looks at you with confusion wondering why you said that. When you are in the middle of a crowded room and there is chatter all around you...yet no one seems to be talking your language.
You feel alone and thus lonely.
The worse is of course when you are all by yourself and all your loved ones or whom you think are your near and dear ones are too busy to spend some time with you. You might be brave enough to reach out timidly, afraid of being rejected or ridiculed.If there is a lack of empathy it drives you further inside and the shame of being needy just compounds the loneliness. Thus you put on a brave face and soldier on all the time feeling the dull ache of the growing hole of loneliness eating you from the inside out.
There are people who say they are happy to be alone. I wonder, is it all the time that they are happy. Don't they miss a human voice, a kind touch, a warm embrace or just a loving look? I am betting they do and they sweep the feeling away, telling themselves that feeling lonely is for the weak. Isn't that then just their ego telling them they are not lonely? In fact are they not just suppressing the reality? Some people fondly call it manning up!
To achieve great things people have been known to say they are faster alone. If you are a runner I guess you are. But in all other things...I believe no one person can succeed, there is always another nudging them along or making the path easier. It could be a parent , a friend, a sibling, a spouse and in some cases your employees. "No man is an island" said John Donne.
'No Man is an Island'
No man is an island entire of itself; every man
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as
well as any manner of thy friends or of thine
own were; any man's death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
MEDITATION XVII
Devotions upon Emergent Occasions
John Donne
Explained- Donne returns to his idea that
“no man is an island,” indicating that
everyone is connected to every other human being in some way.
Just as dirt and sand clods are part of the European continent,
so too is each man part of the entire human race;
the removal of a clod diminishes the
continent,
and the removal of a human life diminishes mankind.
Since every death diminishes the rest of mankind in some way,
when the bell tolls for a funeral
it tolls in a sense for everyone.
