Are You Lonesome tonight?

Post 7: Lonely.


Being alone is one of the things we are most afraid of in life. No one wants to be alone. It's not a great way to live. There is a Seneca Indian saying, "Even in Paradise, being alone would be hell!"

Part of the reason we date so frantically is our fear of being alone. Most of us would rather hook up with someone who drives us crazy than risk being alone. Many unhappy marriages were formed by people who just didn't want to be alone. It's understandable. The hard times are easier to go through if you don't have to go through them alone. It's good to be part of "we" instead of just an "I".

I personally had a relationship that lasted 11 years. We broke up and got bak together periodically. We sometimes lived together but it never laster long before she went back to her parents house. We'd fight and I'd eventually give in and apologize, knowing that she wasn't going to. It wasn't a happy or healthy relationship, but we both agreed it was better than being alone. As the Cheyeene Indian  saying goes, "It is never good for anyone to be alone."

Sadly, you can be lonely even when there are other people around. I've met married women who have said they were lonely, even thought they lived with a husband and children. Being around other people doesn't necessarily ensure that you will not feel alone. Often, being alone in a crowd can be worse than being completely alone.

For many people--if not most--there will be lonely periods. Some will be very short and some will be torturously long. So how do we handle the horrible feeling of being alone in the world?

The best way to survive it is to understand the Buddhist concept of interconnectedness. Karl Jung talked about the connected subconscious mind in his work. The Native Americans talk about the interconnectedness of every living thing on the planet, not just the humans. Think of it as the way Yoda explained the Force in "The Empire Strikes Back". Everything is bound together by a greater force which binds us beyond any untying. We are all a single cell in a massive body of life. Despite our love of gadgets, the only things that is really ours--and that we can never escape from even if we wanted to--is each other. We're all in this together.

No one is alone. Everything we do resonates in this big, amazing universe, and our smallest actions will one day affect someone else. It's like the Butterfly Effect. (A butterfly flapping its wings in America will lead to a chain of events that will cause a major storm in Europe.)

The point is, since we're not really alone, there is no reason to feel lonely. Certainly it's more fun to have people you love around you but if you don't, please do not despair! You are not forgotten. The world will not forget you. There's no escaping the human race and you will be drawn back into the collective humanity sooner or later. Nature abhors a vacuum and it won't let one of the cells of the body of humanity go unused for long.

So just remember, if you're feeling lonely, hang on! The human race will reclaim it's lost children soon enough, and before you know it, you'll be hanging out with new friends and maybe even a new lover.

You are not alone!