A few years ago, there were media reports out stating that the elderly felt lonely, it was a sad story because we are all heading that way and I thought it will happen to all the youngsters too when we get to that age. Recently, I observed that families were lonely too when I saw parents taking their children out to see Christmas lights on Christmas eve and Christmas day. I had thought that this is the time when everybody got together to celebrate the festival together but obviously it was not the case. This prompted me to test my hypothesis that our world was becoming an isolating place despite a growing population. There were a series of observations that took place and here is the summary:
I started noticing that there were hardly any additional vehicles on our road around the festive time, this meant that people were celebrating but within their own household
I read a report that eating out lonely was becoming trendy in London, restaurants were setting up tables for one for people who had no company
I saw a LinkedIn post where a man in his 40s said that he had no friends and it felt liberating to acknowledge this in the open. He had colleagues but no friends. Lots of people posted comments under his post to resonate the same
Another social media post had a single mother requesting local children to become friends with her child as she had no one to play with after school
There were countless other social media posts where people were looking to make friends and expressing their frustrations of having no meaningful social circle
Finally, there was a report out that university students were lonely too and this was affecting their ability to complete education. They cited an example of a student who moved back home and commuted to the university to overcome this anxiety
One could criticise me for confirmation bias where my mind was only looking for stories to support my hypothesis, perhaps the readers could reflect upon their experience to make this judgement.
On the other hand, I also see people who have a calendar full of social events and they are exhausted by it but they can’t decline invitations otherwise they risk upsetting their friends and family. If these people read this post, they would struggle to relate to it and rightly so. How can you understand this if you have never experienced such isolation?
The trouble with talking about such topics openly is the criticism you invite, constructive or otherwise. People would start offering advice and blame you for your loneliness, suggestions may include you need to work on yourself, give but don’t expect anything in return, be kind etc. What if people have already done this; they have fed people, paid their bills, stood for others in times of need but all efforts have fallen flat.
I once read this quote “Your vibe attracts your tribe”. In theory this sounds about right, and one should remain hopeful of finding people like themselves and some people will find such connections but there will be others who cannot and will not find friends. I know people who have changed multiple cities and countries in this hope of finding their tribe but no luck and these are good, friendly, down to earth people.
One aspect we have not touched upon is defining loneliness, to me it is the absence of meaningful relationships, it is true that family can fulfil this need but often one needs friends too, hence my observation earlier that families are lonely too. Some may argue that they lots of friends, often when you dig deeper these are acquaintances but we confuse them with friendship.
A friend is somebody who will stand up for you in bad times, offer the right advice even if it pits them against you, care about your well-being and if you would do the same for them then you can correctly label it as friendship.
Perhaps, we could pause for a moment in our lives to reflect upon this question, “What would be the harm of talking to other people, especially when somebody puts themselves out to start a conversation with you?”
Must you give them a cold shoulder, if so, do you think it is a wise thing to do? Do you still consider yourself to be a saint?
Moral of the story
Loneliness has nothing to do with age
Families can be lonely too
Some people are lonely whilst others are not
There is no formula to making friends
It is probably not your fault
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