Like many New Yorkers, I often head to Sheep Meadow, Central Park, during the summer months to read and enjoy the sun. I'd been reading a book that made me think more and more about my soul's purpose. As I sat alone one day pondering the social dynamics of Sheep Meadow - why there were huge groups of people picnicking together while some people sat on their own - I heard a man justify his joy at being able to run around in the park, "I'm caged up in a tiny apartment all day." It dawned on me, then, that all of us have at least one soul purpose in common and that is to be ok with being alone.
Aloneness is part of the human condition. If you think about it we are always alone, even when we're in a group. We alone inhabit our body, we alone experience the thoughts, the pain, the feelings that we experience. No one else can experience them for us.
It's our attitude towards being alone - whether we think it's normal and we'll be ok once we've left our shoe-box apartment or that it is sad and shameful- that determines how much that "aloneness" becomes a soul-numbing, overpowering feeling of "loneliness".
According to University of Chicago psychologist John Cacioppo, who has dedicated his career to studying how social isolation affects individuals, it is the perceived loneliness - how lonely people think they are, rather than the actual size of their social network - that influences how lonely they feel.
In the dictionary, "loneliness" is defined as "sadness because one has no friends or company." But we can be surrounded by multitudes and feel lonely. We can be alone and feel happy.
I invite you to watch this clip from "Mork & Mindy: In Mork We Trust (#1.21)" (1979) - where Mork talks about loneliness. (You can also paste this URL in your browser http://ow.ly/Cas5Z )
Just like anger, loneliness is a mental, emotional and spiritual toxin that ends up poisoning our body.
Loneliness and disease: The chicken-and-egg problem
I have not gone through a period of feeling lonely without falling ill shortly afterwards. Just like loneliness can create disease, disease can also create loneliness.
How loneliness creates disease
Negative thoughts and anxiety triggered by loneliness or the perception of loneliness create stress - "I'm always alone", "No one cares enough about me", etc...Stress will, typically, trigger a short-term "fight-or-flight" response to protect us from immediate danger. When we're chronically lonely, however, our body switches on the stress response and leaves it on long-term. This increases the risk of disease. Multiple studies have demonstrated that loneliness leads to:
- A greater hormonal response to stress e.g., decreased thyroid function, accumulation of abdominal fat, impaired cognition, etc.
- A suppressed immune function, which reduces the body's ability to fight infection
How disease creates loneliness
The chronically ill often end up being socially isolated due to:
- Their inability to physically join others in their daily activities, e.g., playing, working, etc.
- A self-imposed detachment due to fear of judgment and an over-sensitivity to what others will say - probably because we no longer know how to accept ourselves in our new reality; or that we suffer from low self-esteem and feel embarrassed that we're not capable of doing what is a simple task for everyone else
If this social isolation goes on for a prolonged period of time, it eventually turns into depression.
The anti-dote
In a study conducted at Harvard Medical School, a group of people with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) were given a placebo and were told that they were being given something "like sugar pills that have been shown in clinical studies to produce significant improvement in IBS symptoms through mind-body self-healing processes." Despite those patients being aware they were taking a medical "nothing", they still reported that their symptoms "moderately improved". Taking "something" made them experience fewer symptoms.
We've all heard similar stories that demonstrate the power the mind has over our bodies. Many scientific studies have proven that the mind can control the immune system. When we have a positive experience, like feeling we're being cared for, we relax. This reduces the levels of cortisol and stress-induced inflammation - the opposite of the "fight or flight" response triggered by negative thoughts.
As adults, however, we crave those days of "being completely taken care of - of unconditional love, unconditional attention..." - Tuesdays with Morrie. We end up looking outside for love and acceptance from others, instead of loving and nurturing ourselves. When we don't get that love and attention from others, we wind up in a little corner feeling lonely and sorry for ourselves.
Tips for dealing with loneliness
Loneliness is not something we can get out of with a snap of the fingers; it's like everything else, a process. Buddhism teaches that loneliness, even depression, are part and parcel of being human. We need to work with our loneliness. For some people ending loneliness is just a matter of leaving a shoe-box apartment and spending more time with other people. It can be especially helpful for the chronically ill or the newly diagnosed for example if they mingled with others facing similar challenges and built a support network of people who understand what they're going through.
More often than not, however, healing loneliness is about changing our attitude...mostly towards ourselves.
We have found so many ways to not be with ourselves. We often seek outside entertainment to divert our attention from ourselves. Many of our social constructs mask our loneliness. Facing and being with ourselves is so overwhelming we end up "carry(ing) - our sadnesses - around in public in order to drown them out with the noise; like diseases that are treated superficially and foolishly, they just withdraw and after a short interval break out again all the more terribly".
Here are a few tips to help deal with loneliness before it turns into or exacerbates disease
- Love and accept you - healing loneliness is about loving and accepting ourselves just the way we are. Try, at least, once a day to do something nice for yourself. That doesn't mean going out and buying expensive things but it does mean treating yourself like you would treat a friend - with the same love and respect that you would hope to get from one. If it helps, look at a picture of yourself when you were a little younger or even a baby - you were just perfect. There was nothing wrong with you then as there is nothing wrong with you now. You just took on all the noise that you've heard over the years and personalized it. Let it go, love that baby and promise to truly take care of him / her every day like they deserve to be loved and cared for
- Sit in silence. Enjoy it. Let it be the window to your soul. Listen to you instead of blocking that inner voice with entertainment. You never know what kind of healing may happen when you just pause to listen. "The best you'll ever do is to understand yourself, know what it is that you want". To that end, try to sit in nature - stand barefoot on grass or sand and feel the earth support you
- Give meditation a try. Meditation allows your body to relax. There is evidence that meditation boosts the immune response and alters the structure in an area in the brain involved in fear. Try not to be intimidated by the time investment -as little as 20 - 25 minutes a day for three weeks, can produce those structural changes in the brain and reduce cortisol levels
- Journal. I'm a huge advocate for journaling. Get it off your chest and on paper. It's amazing what comes out once you start writing
- Resist the urge to hang out on facebook. You'll be tempted to compare one of your lowest points to everyone else's 'best of' - that is unfair and - you know what they say about comparison - it's the surest way to unhappiness
- "Turn on the faucet. Wash yourself with the emotion. It won't hurt you. It will only help." - Tuesdays with Morrie. If there are tears, let them flow. Don't question why you're feeling the way you're feeling, just feel it
- Spend more time doing what you love, something that gives you purpose and meaning
- Be grateful for something that's good in your life - this will counter the stress and help heal and prevent disease
Ultimately each one of our souls' journeys is to befriend our aloneness - not label it or judge it but just like any other emotion, to be with it, feel it, be open to whatever it needs to teach us!
