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The ache of loneliness. I experienced it when I was with a room full of people I love, exchanging smiles and laughs. I experienced it during the “best years of my life” in college. I experienced it in the quiet of the night when the rest of the world seemed to be sleeping. I experienced it holding my two-month-year-old daughter tight, rocking her gently to sleep. I experienced it at the dinner table, sitting across from my husband.
It didn’t matter if I was in my late teens or late 20’s, or if I was married or single, well-off or barely getting by, a mother or a student, surrounded by people or completely alone, loneliness has affected me deeply throughout my lifetime.
That’s the thing about loneliness. It is an equal opportunist. It does not discriminate. It will affect you no matter who you are and what season of life you’re in.
Experiencing loneliness is just a part of our human condition.
The more I accepted that the more I was able to transform my loneliness and see it as a gift.
The reality is in our humanness, we all long for connection. We all have an ache to be seen, to be known, to be heard, and to be loved. When we don’t get that need met, it makes us feel really lonely. That isn’t a bad thing. It’s the very thing that draws us into communion with God Himself. However, it can be something that leads to a lot of mental health issues when we don’t know how to transform our loneliness and see it as a gift.
Instead of transforming our loneliness and seeing it as a gift, we often pathologize it. We think there is something wrong with us and then we eagerly try to “fix it.” This looks like distracting or numbing ourselves with social media, food, sex, projects, chores, some other kind of stimulant or deterrent. This also can look like surrounding ourselves with people who don’t align with our morals and values. Typically, the reason why we settle for these kinds of friendships or relationships is that they offer us something to keep the loneliness at bay. That something is usually rooted at the surface level of happiness or what Aristotle called “Level 1” happiness. Happiness, rooted in feeling pleasure.
In some cases, we might even self-sabotage and believe we deserve to be all alone. When people get too close, we might retreat, struggle opening up, or push people away. We might even prevent ourselves from reaching out to others and avoid groups, communities, and friendships that actually would be really good for us.
This can lead to depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive thoughts and behaviours, and even pathological loneliness or chronic loneliness.
Chronic loneliness is feeling lonely for a long period of time. It’s characterized as being uncomfortable with being alone, feeling separated or divided from others, and having an inability to connect with people on a deeper level. It can also include feelings of inadequacy, poor self-esteem, and self-loathing, and persistent negative or irrational thoughts regarding one’s perception of their loneliness.
In order to transform our loneliness, we don’t need more distractions, numbing, or pleasure, we don’t need more surface-level friendships, nor do we need to be overrun by our insecurities and irrational beliefs. Instead, we need to first accept our loneliness as part of our human condition and see it as an opportunity to form a real authentic connection with ourselves, God, and others.
Authentic connection with ourselves looks like taking time to journal, reflect on our day, being really honest about our thoughts and emotions, understanding our values, beliefs, and hopes, living a virtuous life, doing activities that bring us joy, using our gifts and talents, reading books or blogs, listening to music, and watching things that feed our soul, and serving others out of love of self, God and neighbour.
Authentic connection with others looks like taking time to get to know people (letting people tell their story), doing activities that bring joy with others (level 3 and level 4 happiness- happiness rooted in doing good for the sake of others/serving others and exploring ultimate Truth, Justice, Beauty, and Love), being a part of intentional communities, connecting with people emotionally and spiritually, being vulnerable with others, allowing ourselves to be truly “seen and known” and truly seeing and knowing others, asking people how they really feel, and supporting people’s deeper needs.
Authentic connection with God looks like taking time to really talk to God (tell God about our loneliness and the ache in our heart), reading His Word in Scripture and reflecting on how to apply His Word to our own life, getting to know who God is and allowing ourselves to really be known by God (giving Him your whole heart, mind, and soul and turning toward Him instead of turning away from Him in shame), spending time with people who were closest to Him through devotions and intercessory prayer (His Mother, disciples, and other Saints), and avoiding sin or behaviours that keep us from God.
When we are truly experiencing authentic connection, our loneliness can be transformed into solitude.
Catholic priest and author Henri Nouwen talked a lot about solitude in his life. He did not shrink or lose himself in the face of loneliness but saw it as a way to experience authentic connection. Even when he felt alone, he knew deep down he really wasn’t and there was a rich interior life gently waiting for him.
In his book Bread for the Journey he writes, “All human beings are alone. No other person will completely feel like we do, think like we do, act like we do. Each of us is unique, and our aloneness is the other side of our uniqueness. The question is whether we let our aloneness become loneliness or whether we allow it to lead us into solitude. Loneliness is painful; solitude is peaceful. Loneliness makes us cling to others in desperation; solitude allows us to respect others in their uniqueness and create community.Letting our aloneness grow into solitude and not into loneliness is a lifelong struggle. It requires conscious choices about whom to be with, what to study, how to pray, and when we ask for counsel. But wise choices will help us to find the solitude where our hearts can grow in love.”
There are some times when we can still have that authentic connection and we still feel the ache of loneliness. The best example of this is St. Teresa of Calcutta. She writes in her journal---
The place of God in my soul is blank—There is no God in me. In the darkness…Lord, my God, who am I that You should forsake me?...The one You have thrown away as unwanted—unloved. I call, I cling, I want—and there is no One to answer—no One on Whom I can cling; no, No One. Alone. The darkness is so dark—and I am alone.
In these more rare cases, loneliness is a particular cross that we are meant to carry.
When the Lord does not grant the gift of solitude, the Lord may be asking us to simply enter into His Son’s suffering in a very real and tangible way.
It was Jesus Himself who said on the Cross in a loud cry, “My God, my God, why have you left me alone?” (Matthew 27:46).
The Lord Himself entered into our suffering and our sin and took on our deep feelings of abandonment and loneliness.
Even though the Lord never really abandons us or leaves us lonely, sometimes we really do feel that way and sometimes He permits us to feel those feelings, but as we see through the Cross, that even when loneliness isn’t transformed in this lifetime, it certainly is transformed in the next.
“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”—Revelation 21:4
So I invite you to see your loneliness as a gift. You never truly are all alone or abandoned. The Lord is with you always, and your loneliness is an invitation for deeper connection, deeper faith, and deeper trust so that you can experience true peace, joy, and love.
If you are currently experiencing chronic loneliness, reach out to a professional therapist. Oftentimes there is a lot of negative and irrational core beliefs that keep people feeling really lonely, and behaving in the same unhealthy ways that only magnify their perception of loneliness. A trained therapist can help you better understand what those beliefs are, where they come from, and support you to transform your loneliness into solitude in healthy ways.
This article was originally posted on Brya Hanan's blog.
If you wish to connect with her you can reach her at bryahananlmft@gmail.com or through her Instagram.