Feeling lonely? Here's what to do next.

Owning your loneliness is powerful and opens up great choices for your connection.

https://youtu.be/_vILOj6g7uQ

It's time to take control and own your loneliness

Hello you wonderful human.

What a pleasure it is to be with you again. Thank you for choosing to spend part of your day here with me reading these words.

We’re going explore what you get to stop doing and what you get to start doing instead once you realise that you’ve been experiencing loneliness.

There are a few questions for you at the end of this article. Don’t scroll down to get a sneak peek at them! For now, I simply invite you to start paying attention to what’s happening with you as you read through the words I’m sharing with you.

 

Remember: Loneliness is an emotion

Loneliness is an emotion that all humans experience. It doesn’t need an official diagnosis: if we feel lonely then we are lonely. While you and I don’t like or enjoy the experience, loneliness requires no more of an official diagnosis than does happiness, joy, grief or any other of the countless emotions we experience.

Our emotions, including loneliness, are signposts telling us that something requires our attention. We can make those signposts mean something more than they really do, or we can accept them and thank them for doing their job and telling us something’s happening within us.

Image: canva.com (with edits from Phil)

Loneliness is telling us that we’re not getting some kind of connection that we need and deserve. It’s a prompt to nudge us to get that connection.

We’re meant to notice that we’re thinking and feeling some yucky thoughts and feelings and take a step towards connection. We’re meant to act. 

Let’s stop making it mean more than this.

I always find it empowering to know that I can choose what I can do once I realise that I’m in the midst of a loneliness experience. Let’s explore now some options you have in response.

 

Here’s what you can STOP doing

The point has been made that we all experience loneliness and that we’re meant to act towards connection – we’re meant to connect – when we notice we’re feeling it. With this known, I’ve got a list of things that you get to stop doing:

• When you realise you’re in the middle of a loneliness experience, you can stop ignoring and denying that you’re a human who experiences loneliness.

• You can stop avoiding the discomfort of loneliness by numbing it through any one of the countless vices you have available to distract yourself when uncomfortable. There are myriad ways that we have at our disposal to numb and avoid: scrolling on social media, excessive working, excessive/disordered exercise, excessive/disordered eating, alcohol consumption (including ‘to take the edge off’), recreational and prescription drug abuse (see point about ‘taking the edge off’), sex (including porn), gambling, shopping (including retail therapy), gossip, travelling (including beyond your financial means) and many other ways we avoid pain in our lives.

Image: canva.com

• You get to stop pretending that you and everything in your life is perfect. You get to stop striving for perfection and setting unrealistic expectations on yourself and possibly even those around you.

• You get to stop subscribing to the belief that to be a successful human that you need to be a self-sustaining, fully independent island.

• You get to stop being a human who only ever shows up in support of other people in your life and not accepting – or even seeking – support from others when you need it. This applies to you if you’ve ever said or thought of the words ‘I don’t want to be a burden’.

• You get to stop being so stressed and worried that you don’t fit in.

• You get to stop seeing threats in the words and actions – and even imagined thoughts – of others. You can stop that horrid voice within that tells you that you’re not [insert word here] enough for the friendship/relationship/job/whatever.

• You get to stop walking down some scary mental and emotional paths within yourself when you get lost in your loneliness experience. These paths are awful, aren’t they? They can lead me to some dark thoughts, too.

That’s quite a list of yucky things that you get to stop doing, isn’t it? And that’s not even an exhaustive list.

Let’s look at the other – more fun – list.

 

Here’s what you can START doing

For all these things that you get to stop doing, there are some amazing things that you can start doing now that you know you’re a human who experiences loneliness.

• You get to own that you’re a human who experiences loneliness (just like you experience other emotions). You get to own that you’re a wonderful human who has connection needs (and that, at this moment, they’re not being met).

• You can start sitting with your loneliness and learn how to understand what it’s been trying to tell you about the connection you’ve been missing.

• You can share your loneliness story with someone who’s earned the right to hear it. Not everyone has earned this right (it’s a privilege to hear your story of loneliness, after all), but someone in your life has.

• You can start slowing down and being more present in moments, because you know that the connection you seek and need only ever lives in the present moment.

• You can start being – as coined by Francis Weller – ‘a place of welcome’ for others in your life. You can start being a place and space where others in your life feel safe to be themselves and connect with you.  

Image: canva.com

And the big one:

• You can start being you. You can start showing up in the world as you, for when you do connection as the awesome human you are, the connection you receive back is the connection you need.

A quick aside

The points on both the ‘what you can stop doing’ and ‘what you can start doing’ lists have all come from my own experience when I’m lost in loneliness and from when I choose connection. I understand the horrors and the discomfort of loneliness and the joys and awkwardness - and fears - of connection. 

And in case you’re feeling that I’ve peered into your mind and soul with both these lists – especially the first list of ‘what you can stop doing’ – they also come from very common thoughts and feelings from the thousands of humans from all around the world and from all walks of life we’ve supported since 2018.

Your loneliness is unique, just like everyone else’s. 

Time to reflect

As always, the HUMANS:CONNECTING team and I never want you to close any of our content without something to help you end your loneliness and feed connection.

So as this article comes to an end, I have a few questions for you upon which I invite you to reflect:

1. What’s been happening within you as you read these words?

2. Is there a part of you dismissing the words as some kind of nonsense?

3. Or are you noticing a kind of calm within you?

4. Is there a calm mixed with fear, perhaps even a call to something different?

5. To which part of you – the dismissive part or the curious part – do you choose to give your attention?

We don't always get to choose whether we experience loneliness. But recognising it gives us an opportunity to become curious about the connection we need and what we might be able to do differently.

Taking steps towards meaningful connection can feel uncomfortable, especially when we've been feeling lonely for some time. But we can begin with one step.

 

A place to start

Recognising that you're feeling lonely is one thing. Understanding what your loneliness might be telling you about the connection you need is another.

If this article has got you thinking about what you want to stop doing and what you might start doing instead, what kind of connection are you missing, and what would you like to change?

The Connection Starter Course helps you explore the connection you have with yourself, the important humans in your life and your communities, understand the connection you need, and decide what you want to do about it.

You'll develop your own Connection Plan, a practical way to strengthen the connection that's meaningful for you.

Explore the Connection Starter Course

Thanks for reading.

~ Phil  

Phil McAuliffe is the founder of HUMANS:CONNECTING, Board Chair of the Global Initiative on Loneliness and Connection, and a speaker and writer on loneliness, social health and meaningful connection. 

FROM THE H:C STORE

Connection Starter Course - self-directed

Get your Connection Plan

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.