5 common symptoms of loneliness and what to look out for
- Phil McAuliffe
- Nov 2
- 10 min read
Updated: Nov 3
Loneliness can show up in many ways. Explore 5 common symptoms of loneliness, recognise them in yourself, and learn how to build authentic connection.
This is an updated and adapted version of an article first published on The Loneliness Guy blog in February 2023.
Hello my friend
Some of my favourite shows growing up were medical dramas. There was ER, House and – if you’re Australian of a certain age – A Country Practice.
The good doctors in those shows all had the ability to look at the patient holistically and diagnose the real cause of their problem by looking beyond the immediate symptoms.
I find myself doing the same thing with loneliness. I see the common symptoms of loneliness and begin to ask questions to find the root cause. I often find that addressing the root cause – in this case, loneliness and social disconnection – tends to quickly clear up the other symptoms.
I notice that there are five common symptoms of loneliness. Perhaps you recognise one or more of them. Perhaps the root cause underlying these symptoms and behaviours is your loneliness and your need for meaningful, authentic connection.
A disclaimer: I’m not a clinician, physician, psychologist or behavioural scientist. The purpose of these words is to serve, support, challenge and inspire you rather than diagnose you.
Besides, loneliness doesn’t need a diagnosis. It’s an emotion that all humans experience, not a mental illness. If you feel lonely, you are lonely.
The beautiful thing about loneliness is that you most often don’t need to see a doctor for a prescription to treat it. Meaningful connection is the antidote to loneliness.
You can self-generate and self-administer the authentic connection you need.
How empowering is that?!
Let's get into these 5 common symptoms of loneliness.
1. The High Achiever – a common symptom of loneliness
The High Achiever seeks to prove their worth and worthiness through pursuing success in their chosen field.
The High Achiever often starts down this path in school, where the quest for acceptance and only seeking positive judgement starts by getting good grades, sporting accolades or other awards for being awesome. This continues to university and then into the workplace.
Outside of the workplace, classroom and lecture theatre, the chosen field where The High Achiever seeks to prove their worth and worthiness can be in community work, within their own body or other places.
While this symptom has some positive side effects, The High Achiever can learn that no amount of success and praise silences the inner critic.
However, because high achievement and perfectionism is one of the only ways they know how to find their worth and worthiness, The High Achiever feels that there’s no other option but to persist with ever more success. They become tired and scared that if they’re not perfect, they’re unworthy of love and belonging and the people around them only love/respect/fear/see them because of their successes and achievements.
This is one of my most common symptoms of loneliness, by the way…
The High Achiever’s loneliness begins to shift when they allow themselves to be human and learn that they’re worthy of love and belonging precisely because they’re human, not because they’re perfect or successful.
If you identify as a fellow over-achiever, you'll like this article.
2. The Nice One – how loneliness shows up in caring people
The Nice One - also known as a people-pleaser - is the first person to volunteer to drive someone to the airport, even if they only met the person a few moments earlier. They’re the first to offer to help someone move house, do their taxes or change their smoke alarm batteries.
They are the living embodiment of the adage: The only way to have a friend is to be a friend.
And what amazing friends The Nice Ones are. They’re always there when needed.
The Nice One can form when they resolved sometime in their youth to protect themselves from judgement for being different by being the nicest person who was friends with everyone. They avoid conflict at all costs.
No one can hate the person who’s the nicest ever, right?
That may be so, but in avoiding conflict externally, they’re often at war within themselves. No amount of external niceness silences the hateful internal judgement. This internal conflict is another common symptom of loneliness I’ve noticed.
And while The Nice One presents in a most lovely and appealing way, the truth is that they’re a cunning social manipulator.
They enter others into unspoken social contracts whereby the other party is somehow bound into being a friend based on The Nice One being a friend first.
The Nice One is crushed whenever someone doesn’t abide by their unspoken, unagreed social contract. However, they’d rarely express their disappointment and chooses to suppress it instead. The Nice One then resolves to show up in an even more friendly way in the hope/expectation that the connection is reciprocated.
The Nice One’s loneliness comes to their attention because of the disappointment and exhaustion they feel from all the effort to show up for others. However, they don’t feel worthy of allowing others to show up for them.
The Nice One’s loneliness begins to shift when they learn their values and create boundaries based on those values. They often resist this because they fear being seen as an asshole. They hold tightly to the belief that they must always be friendly and pleasant.
If The Nice One resonates with you, you'll find a lot of insight in this article.
3. The Organiser – fear of exclusion drives connection
There’s an Organiser in every social group, family, community and workplace. The Organiser is the person who makes things happen. They’re the one who organises the events: dinners, the parties, the trips away, the fundraisers.
They often present as the social butterfly or the Mama/Papa Bear. They know what’s going on, have a circle of friends they protect and defend, and are loyal and loving to those within their fold.
The Organiser does this because they’re terrified of being left out.
They’re guaranteed an invitation if they organise the social event. The Organiser often keeps ‘their people’ close so they can be the first to know if they’re being judged and falling short. Each Organiser I've supported in our work at HUMANS:CONNECTING has clear memories of times when they weren’t included in social activities in their past. Their response to this trauma is to ensure that it never happens again.
The Organiser’s loneliness surfaces when they discover that things have happened without them. Whether it’s deliberate exclusion or an accidental oversight, they feel crushed and unworthy of love and belonging. In their hurt, they may say or do something that causes conflict, leading to even more disconnection.
Oftentimes, they’ve brought the drama and they are the drama.
This is another common symptom of loneliness: the compulsion to control social interactions to avoid feeling excluded.
The Organiser’s loneliness shifts when they learn that they cannot control the words, thoughts and actions of others.
4. The Grump – living on an island of loneliness
It’s easy to see The Grump’s loneliness. The Grump will often be the first to admit it, too.
The Grump often says that they’re fine being lonely (as distinct to being fine being alone). This is a mask.
The Grump can be grumpy in many different environments. They’re quick to point out flaws during in-person social interactions (when they have them). They’re often the keyboard warrior in online spaces and group chats who express their dissatisfaction with the current topic or the general state of the world.
The Grump wants you to stay away, yet also wants you to stay. Their grumpiness is a kind of test. If you can withstand them at their worst and stay anyway, they might let you in.
The Grump’s loneliness is akin to them living on an island. The island is their protection. They spend their time alone on their island constantly bemoaning how no one sees them, visits them or includes them. However, when they see a ship on the horizon and sees that it’s coming their way, they fire cannons at it to protect themselves and their island. They keep firing at the ship until it turns around, at which time The Grump returns to bemoaning how no one sees them, visits them or includes them.
This island is The Grump’s place of comfortable misery. They created that island in response to something that deeply upset them in their past: social exclusion, a sudden break-up or perhaps the death of someone they loved dearly.
The Grump’s loneliness shifts when they bravely and courageously begin to allow visitors to their island. This is a tough for them to do, because they’re terrified of being hurt again.
5. Itchy Feet – avoiding being seen and heard
Itchy Feet is perpetually looking for what’s next. They’re often also looking for who’s next.
Itchy Feet is non-committal and flaky (read this article for tips on how to connect with flaky people). They won’t give you a definite answer on an invitation until they know that there’s no better offer coming.
You know Itchy Feet soon after beginning a conversation with them. They look over your shoulder mid-conversation, scanning for who else they might talk to. They’re the person chatting with multiple matches on a dating app at once, deciding who’s worth meeting.
Itchy Feet doesn’t hold down jobs for long. They don’t stay in relationships for long, either. They travel to – or possibly relocate to – new cities, states, countries often.
Itchy Feet is keen to be seen and heard doing the right things at the right places with the right people.
At first, Itchy Feet’s loneliness is hard to spot, because they don’t stick around long enough for you to see it.
They’re terrified of being truly seen and heard. When someone gets too close, they move on, fearing that if they’re known for who they really are behind their masks, they’ll be judged and rejected.
This fear fuels their loneliness. They long to belong but avoid the very connection they crave. This is paradox is one of the most common symptoms of loneliness I see. But I don’t see if often, as Itchy Feet people often seem to have an avoidant attachment style. They typically think that what we do at HUMANS:CONNECTING is great for other people and not for them.
Itchy Feet’s loneliness can shift when they begin to take off their masks and allow themselves – and a few others – to see them for the awesomely and beautifully flawed human they are.
A quick note on flakiness
Itchy Feet has a lot in common with flakiness - which is another common symptom of loneliness.
Flakiness is comparatively easy to spot. It's all about unreliability. Flakiness commonly looks like someone who says yes to attending a social event but then pulls out at the last minute. Once or twice is understandable, but when this happens more often than not, loneliness can be at the core of it.
The flaky person is caught in a paradox. They want to be social when they accepted the invitation, but the idea of being social is exhausting and overwhelming at the time the connection's about to happen (a phenomenon outlined in this article previously).
Loneliness only ever shifts when we seek and allow ourselves to receive the connection that's meaningful for us. A flaky person's loneliness shifts when they follow through on their commitments.
Courage and support are what's needed here. Courage to show up and support to help in the showing up. Also, knowing what connection is meaningful for each of us makes it easier to get that connection without the need to do things that will never fill our social batteries.
What these symptoms of loneliness may reveal about you
Are any of these familiar to you? Did you recognise yourself in any, some or all of these?
Of course, the symptoms of loneliness are as unique as the person experiencing them. However, these are what I most often encounter in my work with humans experiencing loneliness who want to feel authentically connected.
Did you notice anything?
Did you notice that these symptoms of loneliness are often generated as a response you have to something traumatic from your past?
Loneliness is often the unintended consequence of decisions we’ve taken in our past – and continue to take – to keep ourselves safe and small.
Your behaviours were formed in response to this upsetting event – or events – and kept you safe. In that way, each of the symptoms of loneliness has a clear benefit. However, they each have a very real cost in that they can feed your loneliness when they’re the only way you know how to relate with yourself and others.
You get to learn other ways of responding that don't leave you and your social health paying the price.
Your choice now
My words may have made you aware of how your behaviours can be a symptom of your loneliness. Your choice now is what you do with that awareness.
Do you get curious and explore them further with us or with anyone else in your life? Or do you file this all away as something interesting and continue on as you are?
Either way, you’re making a choice. One option feeds authentic connection and another feeds your loneliness.
What do you choose to feed?
Closing invitation
If this article resonated with you, share it with someone who might need to hear it. Send it directly, post it on your socials, or pass it along in your networks.
Connection Starter Course
Meaningful connection is the antidote to loneliness.
We know it can be tough to know what kind of connection is meaningful for you, so that’s why we created the Connection Starter Course: to help you explore what meaningful connection looks like for you.
The Connection Starter Course walks you through how you can feel connected to your authentic self, the people who matter most, and your wider community.
This understanding helps you develop your personal Connection Plan — your roadmap to becoming, and staying, meaningfully connected.
That’s where we’ll leave it for now
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Until next time, be awesomely you.
~ Phil
Important:
All views expressed above are the author’s and are intended to inform, support, challenge and inspire you to consider the issue of loneliness and increase awareness of the need for authentic connection with your self, with those most important to you and your communities as an antidote to loneliness. Unless otherwise declared, the author is not a licensed mental health professional and these words are not intended to be crisis support. If you’re in crisis, this page has some links for immediate support for where you may be in the world.
If you’re in crisis, please don’t wait. Get support now.
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