Love Society

By: Stephania Munson

Have you ever had one of those dreams — or call it a nightmare — where you’re in a situation with several other people or even at a party, and no one recognizes you’re there? Your dream-self is invisible; you’re on the Outside Looking In. You speak, even shout, but no one hears. To the others in the dream, you have no face, no voice, no ‘being’.

For some, it’s only in their dreams when they can be assertive, have meaningful conversations, exciting adventures, true social interaction. But when they open their eyes and face the day, the feelings of isolation and estrangement begin.

Imagine how it feels, deep within, to believe there’s a valid reason no one seeks you out for a friend. After all, you’re dull and uninteresting. You’re tongue-tied and never know what to say. You may even feel unattractive or ugly. Your self-esteem is non-existent, and just forget Confidence.

Someone actually invites you to a party, but you’re hesitant to attend. Mary invited everyone in the office, and she only invited you because she didn’t want to be rude. But your name wasn’t at the top of her guest list, you’re quite sure. So why should you go? Everyone else will be disappointed if you show up. Why spoil the party?

But then you win the days-long battle with yourself, and decide to go to Mary’s party. You’ll make an appearance. But when no one is friendly, you’ll leave early…

Perhaps you’ve always been shy. As a child, it was hard for you to make friends. Some are lucky enough to be born into families in which social skills are taught and encouraged. And some are not. In fact, some families are so enmeshed and such self-contained units that children can learn by example that Home is the only safe place to be.

Psychologists have conducted research to identify those children whose behaviors reveal inadequate social skills. At recess, such kids may observe other ‘popular’ children from a distance, without seeming to know how to join the group. Or a little boy might give money to a popular student, or offer to sharpen his pencils for a year, if only he will be his friend. By nature, we are social creatures, and have a deep need to connect with others.

Henry David Thoreau said that being alone is the basic human condition, which may be true. We can’t turn to others to imbue or give our life meaning. That must come from within. But psychologist Dan Kiley has coined the phrase ‘Living Together Loneliness,’ or LTL. Kiley described the stages of LTL as:
(1) a woman married at age 20 to 24, feels bewildered until age 28 to 30; begins to feel isolated;
(2) around age 34, the woman begins to feel impatient, anxious, and/or agitated;
(3) depression sets in at some point between age 43 and 50;
(4) ultimately, the woman may feel chronic bitterness, or unrelieved exhaustion. The ‘culprit’, in the woman’s eyes, is her husband, because he’s so self-obsessed, selfish, uncommunicative. For her, it’s all his fault because she is so lonely.

Many people remain in unhappy, imperfect marriages (a) without making a shared effort to improve or rebuild the relationship, and/or (b) from the searing fear of breaking all ties and suddenly being alone.

Loneliness can be situational, and may occur when college students are away from home and family for the first time. Most college and university counseling services deal with this issue. And seniors who lose a spouse or live far away from friends and adult children may feel lonely due to the loss or disruption of their previous social network.

But intense loneliness can transmute into depression, and depression to despair. Every 18 minutes, someone in the US commits suicide — women attempt suicide at three times the rate of males, but males are four times more ’successful’ in their attempts. In the past 40 years, suicide by teens and young adults has almost tripled. And for seniors 65 and older, the suicide rate is 50% higher than that of the general population.

In the UK and Ireland, there are 200+ centers offering confidential support for suicidal thoughts, feelings of despair, or distress — 4.8 million total contacts in 2001. Go to:
http://www.samaritans.co.uk/ Or try Haven of Hope Sanctuary Hotline, http://www.mhsanctuary.com/suicide/hotline4.htm
Wings of Support is a wonderful service, too: “Whether dealing with a crisis, addiction, coping with a mental disorder, or just feeling overwhelmed with life.” Their services are free, and run by caring volunteers: http://www.the-bright-side.org/
Still other sites: http://www.stoploneliness.com/ which encourages you to create a Personal Plan for making positive changes in your life. And you need to visit the courageous, poignant site of Susan Rose Blauner, http://www.howistayedalive.com/ Blauner wrote a guide to suicide prevention, “How I Stayed Alive When My Brain Was Trying to Kill Me.”

You’re not alone. There are more people who will understand, first-hand, what you’re going through than you could ever imagine. Please look in your Yellow Pages, under Crisis/Mental Health/or Emergency. If all else fails, call your local police department, and tell them you are desperate for someone to talk to. Don’t go it alone. It hurts too much. Reach out and trust there will be a helping hand in the darkness.

About the Author: Stephania edits a twice-monthly HTML ezine, Tidbits from the Pantry, that is currently sent to more than 11,000 opt-in subscribers. She recently retired after 40 years in the field of human services, and offers a free evaluation of a life problem to any subscriber by email.

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By: Nancy Arora

Loneliness is what?

To be alone or to be with our inner self.

For most of us being alone is taken up as when no one is with us, we are sitting alone, in a crowd. We name it as loneliness but if are alone then why we feel that in spite of being alone we are with someone, we say we are alone but in that loneliness we are not alone we are with our inner self. Just think of it. When we are alone we never sit idle, some thing fishy is always going on in our mind. Either we use to think or we use to talk. But if we say that we are alone then with whom we are talking. At that very moment we are not alone, though for others we are but for our soul we are at that moment with our inner soul.

This loneliness is life for some of us. At times we prefer to sit alone because at that moment we talk to ourselves, we try to find out why we feel so. We cry, we laugh then how can it be said as being alone. How can one laugh or cry or talk being alone.

To be alone is sometimes much better then to be with someone, because when we are alone we take it as what we want, what are our desire’s and then we use to think how to get on to that, though we feel bad also but in that case we find the reason to be happy for that very situation from our inner self. And at times we feel the presence of the person with whom we want to talk or to share something and then we just speak out what is there in our heart, in our mind.

Being alone is not as we normally take it up as, its nothing else then something a soothing time. Though at times we feel like broken, we feel like why we are here if we have to be like this only. Either we use to criticize others or we criticize ourselves.

As because we think only those aspects which we want to see, we don’t go for those aspects that should be considered or we may say at that very moment either we are in anger or we are in sad mood so we think only those point which make us unhappy and we feel low and we think we are left alone and we forget the good things because at that point of time our mind lets us to do according to one side only, and at times we listen to our mind only and we listen to our heart then we reach to the conclusion. Because at many places its better to listen to our heart then to our mind.

When one feel lonely just sit look for why you are feeling so, listen to what your heart say then the condition to which you say as loneliness will become your friend for times.

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