How to get rid of loneliness - advice from a psychologist

How to get rid of loneliness? Human nature says that at various periods of human existence or in a certain state of mind, a person needs loneliness. In general, it is believed that a self-sufficient person is one who is comfortable with himself alone. Such people spend their free hours on self-education and development, on analyzing their own actions, and drawing up further strategic plans. They simply have no time to suffer from loneliness or a sense of worthlessness. But there are periods when the number of lonely days and nights simply goes off scale, and the feeling of abandonment and uselessness is overwhelming, how to get rid of the fear of loneliness then?

Professional psychologists have developed a huge number of techniques and methods that allow you to get rid of loneliness on your own. In the battle with a sense of worthlessness and a feeling of abandonment, uselessness to anyone, the main weapon is the individual’s determination and desire to eliminate the feeling of loneliness from his own existence. After all, what is loneliness? In the scientific aspect, this concept represents a socio-psychological phenomenon, which is the emotional state of the subject, characterized by a connection with the lack of positive close emotional relationships with the environment or with the fear of their loss due to social isolation.

There are a number of psychological factors that contribute to the emergence of feelings of loneliness. These include low self-esteem, which causes avoidance of social contacts due to fear of being sharply criticized, thereby creating a “vicious circle” - a lack or complete absence of contacts lowers self-esteem even more. Undeveloped communication skills also contribute to the emergence of a feeling of loneliness in the soul.

What is loneliness

Loneliness is a person’s detachment from the real world (physical, mental, spiritual) due to the reluctance or impossibility of establishing contacts with others. According to the theory of K. Rogers, loneliness is caused by the contradictions of the individual with his own self; This is a variant of maladaptation (problem with assimilation of social experience).

Loneliness is not necessarily associated with social isolation. It occurs, as a rule, against the background of a violation of traditional social situations of development and situational interaction of the individual with other individuals. That is, we are talking about deformation in the passage of mandatory, age-appropriate elements and the formation of interaction models.
For example, in adolescence it is necessary to communicate with peers. If an individual was deprived of this, then he did not learn to interact with either the opposite or the identical sex. The result is loneliness in adolescence and adulthood.

Loneliness is always based on opposite poles of feelings. That is, a person simultaneously feels, for example, fear and interest.

What is pathology?

An extreme version of pathological loneliness is autism (the inability to establish social contacts with subsequent isolation). This is an independent clinical disease that requires appropriate psychotherapeutic assistance. Therefore, in this article I will not describe autism.

Instead, we will talk about non-pathological forms, which, as a rule, conceal a feeling of misunderstanding, lack of recognition, unlove, lack of support, and more. Perhaps every person has experienced non-pathological loneliness to one degree or another. As E. Fromm’s concept states, loneliness is an integral feature of human existence.

Two supporting positions clearly differentiate pathology from the norm:

Under normal conditions, loneliness does not change the communicative and activity sphere of the individual.
With the pathological negative destructive nature of loneliness, the sphere of communication and activity of the individual noticeably suffers.

Levels of Loneliness

Existential loneliness is the broadest level. In addition to this, social and psychological loneliness are distinguished.

The social is caused by a misunderstanding (non-acceptance) of the culture of society (change of values, immorality, changes in the environment due to growing up and changing location), that is, it is the individual’s non-acceptance of society. But it can also be based on society’s rejection of the individual (due to low status, different views).
Psychological loneliness is caused by intrapersonal conflicts, contradictions, and crises. A person experiences the whole spectrum of emotions and sometimes he himself does not understand why he feels loneliness. The “cocktail” of such loneliness includes personal values and attitudes, character, temperament, interests, needs and desires.

Loneliness as a result of the inability to forgive

It should also be noted that such a common problem as touchiness. Resentment towards a specific person or even towards the whole world as a whole does not allow a person to fully communicate with this world and receive full pleasure from life. Touchiness is a feature of people with an anal vector. Feeling that the world is unfair towards them, such people find it more difficult to make contact with others and may suffer from loneliness and misunderstanding. Yuri Burlan talks about this problem in exceptional detail at the free online training “System-vector psychology”

, helping to restore lost balance.

Types of loneliness

I would like to introduce you to several classifications of loneliness.

According to the mechanism of perception

The first is based on the psychological mechanisms of how an individual perceives his condition and the characteristics of loneliness itself.

Alienating loneliness

A person is aware of his condition and its cause. The mechanism of detachment is activated (from norms, values, people, the whole world).

Diffuse loneliness

The identification mechanism is enabled. A person dissolves so much in society that he loses himself. He doesn't understand himself and is scared. Sometimes a person is not aware of the alienation from himself.

Dissociated loneliness

Closer to pathology than others. It manifests itself as a mixture of identification and exclusion mechanisms. First, a person “dissolves” in someone, accepts him unconditionally and begins to see himself in him (which is bad). Gradually, he begins to see his own undesirable qualities in this person. First there is a partial detachment, and then a complete one.

Managed loneliness

Something to strive for. It is a balance between self-knowledge (reflection, self-regulation, social resilience) and identification with society. It's about maintaining your uniqueness while maintaining social contacts.

By personality type

The second classification is based on determining the type of lonely people and expressing their subjectivity.

Hopelessly lonely

People who are completely renounced from society and are not satisfied with their relationships. They do not have a permanent partner or spouse, or a social circle. They don't even communicate with their neighbors. They feel abandoned and empty. At the same time, they tend to blame others (family, ex-spouses, friends) for their loneliness.

Periodically (temporarily) single

They have many social contacts and connections, are active, but need close and intimate relationships, which makes them periodically feel abandoned.

Passively and persistently lonely

These are people who constantly feel loneliness, need close connections, but are resigned and do not try to change anything, often hiding their true state (“I don’t need anyone. I have me. Everything is fine”).

Existential loneliness as a separate type

Recently, words and phrases containing “existence”, that is, “existence,” have become very popular. Existentialism is a direction in philosophy about the very essence of human existence.

Those who believe in the loneliness of all souls are susceptible to existential loneliness. That is, everything that a person has that is permanent is the soul. Otherwise, he is alone, and outside of his personality he does not feel support and support in the world as such. An adherent of this worldview believes that each person is unique in his feelings and thoughts, and therefore is always alone.

A person feels his connection with the cosmos, his highest purpose, his supreme uniqueness. Experiences the whole range of emotions and conditions, including depression.
Such loneliness is on the verge of pathology and normality.
On the one hand, this is a distorted, disturbed perception of the world, constant anxiety and a feeling of loneliness.
On the other hand, a person is usually mentally healthy. Closely related to this crisis of loneliness are questions of life and death, the essence of existence. But this is a completely different topic.

And should I get rid of it?

Reading time: 9 minutes

What is loneliness
Types of loneliness
Emotional loneliness
Social loneliness
Psychological loneliness
Physical loneliness
Cultural loneliness
Existential loneliness
How to get rid of feelings of loneliness
Loneliness as a resource
Accepting your own worth
Self talk

More recently, loneliness, as a person’s status in society, was condemned by society. Terms such as “single woman”, “single mother” evoked pity and seemed to put a mark on a person: look - she’s a loser, no one needs her, she has a bad character, she’s ugly, inferior .

Gradually, in small steps, condemnation is being eradicated - women raising children alone are giving a head start to so-called two-parent families, in which mothers have to bear not only the child, but also the husband.

Unmarried ladies make dizzying careers and do not seek to chain themselves in marriage shackles. Loneliness has been legalized, but the fear of being lonely is so deeply rooted in our minds that we decided to figure out what loneliness is and whether we should be afraid of it.

Signs of a Lonely Person

Lonely people can be noticed in a crowd, despite the fact that their loneliness takes on other forms. Lonely people:

do not like sociable and happy people;
overly focused on themselves, interrupting, changing the conversation;
gloomy;
anxious;
unresponsive or, conversely, overly attentive to others;
sometimes overly critical and straightforward;
aggressive;
get irritated by little things;
conflictual or, on the contrary, overly compliant;
suspicious;
do not express their opinion;
hypocritical;
do not always control their behavior;
exert psychological pressure on others;
feel discomfort in companies;
cannot have fun (sometimes under the influence of alcohol);
experience difficulties in situations where they need to make an agreement, make a call, or resolve an important personal or business issue;
feel unwanted, incompetent, unloved;
self-critical;
prone to self-flagellation.

Thus, a lonely person is either too friendly to be rejected, or too rude to be rejected again. Sometimes mixed behavior occurs. That is, a person does not have standard models of interaction with people. Depending on the type of loneliness, it results in aggression or depression. One way or another, a lonely person is not happy.

Why do I feel lonely and unwanted?

Adolescence is a period of crisis when your body and your psyche change so quickly that your body does not have time to cope with it and therefore experiences severe stress. It becomes difficult for you to manage your emotions, experience negative feelings (pain, despair, sadness), and cope with life’s difficulties. Even small troubles are seen as a disaster that cannot be eliminated. And if we add here a lack of understanding on the part of others, or, even worse, violence - physical, psychological or sexual - then the feeling of worthlessness, loneliness, and rejection only grows.

Here is an example of a 15-year-old boy’s painful experience of his loneliness. We think you understand his feelings

Loneliness destroys hopes, makes you disappointed in yourself and other people, leads to bad habits or other, more terrible consequences. But it also has another, positive side - it allows you to realize your isolation from other people, to discover your unique and inimitable inner world. With this positive thought, let's start working on your situation.

Reasons for loneliness

The most popular reason for loneliness is the fear of rejection. Often this prevents a person from leaving his comfort zone and trying a new role, which increases the feeling of inner emptiness. It turns out to be a vicious circle.

An unfree person experiences loneliness. Someone who cannot share their thoughts and follow their beliefs. For example, he is forced to comply with the norms of some society, work in an unwanted job, live with an unloved person, infringing on himself.

Thus, the reasons for loneliness include:

low social organization (social loneliness);
severance of personally significant connections and relationships (divorce, death, relocation);
loneliness complex (a personal characteristic, an element of a person’s inner world, that is, fear of possible alienation or loneliness, despite maintaining social connections);
non-inclusion in society (existential loneliness);
certain personality traits (narcissism, aggression, delusions of grandeur, isolation, shyness, anxiety);
setting unrealistic goals;
cultivation of unreasonable needs;
lack of full communication (there is no emotional response from other people, although there may be a lot of superficial connections and communication).

There are also more global causes of loneliness:

urbanization;
population growth;
competition;
social concept of individualism;
changes in the socio-political and economic life of the country and more.

That is, everything that separates people from each other or divides them into different “camps”.

What to do?

Overcoming loneliness is achieving freedom. This is based on activity, first of all, work and love (according to the theory of E. Fromm). The structure of loneliness includes subjectivity, self-regulation and self-actualization. This is what I propose to work with. I’ll say right away: you need to work (for you!), it will be difficult and painful, but over time it will be interesting and enjoyable.

You must clearly see the purpose for which you want to get rid of loneliness. Not a single psychocorrection is complete without goal setting and motivation. Consider how many options there are for the “prize”, evaluate all the advantages and disadvantages. Calculate what you will need to sacrifice and what the goal will give you. Select a landmark. Why do you want to get rid of loneliness? Exactly for what, not why. Actually, this is the first point in the fight against loneliness.
Set realistic goals and conditions for interacting with people. Destroy unrealistic ideas about people and relationships.
In continuation of the above: find out your strengths and weaknesses, and then work with them. Conduct a personal diagnosis (identify possible innate prerequisites for your loneliness). For methods, I recommend turning to A. O. Prokhorov’s manual “Methods for diagnosing and measuring mental states of the individual: a textbook.” Pay special attention to chapter three, “Diagnostics of neuropsychic stress and its manifestations,” and chapter four, “Diagnostics of mental states in life situations.” Just take and pass all the tests and questionnaires (diagnosis of stress, anxiety, asthenic state, emotional burnout, subjective feeling of loneliness, depression, mood, temperament, frustration, self-esteem, uncertainty, self-regulation). Highly recommend! Everything in one book. Finally meet your true self! Find out your character type, accentuations, temperament, stressful and favorable situations for you. Your innate characteristics (there are things that we cannot change; we need to accept and stop torturing ourselves).
It is important to sort out your loneliness (after all, you are unique, and therefore your loneliness is unique) into pieces. Identify the reasons. What are they? External or internal? Permanent or situational? Stable or changeable?
Fight your fears, anxieties, traumas (someone's death, divorce, separation from your mother in childhood, a difficult separation from a loved one, forced escape), that is, the “roots” that keep you within the framework of loneliness. Analyze everything that you identify using techniques and decide what is stopping you. You need to find what has knocked you down and continues to hide somewhere in you and produce “toxins”. And then work through it.
Find out your psychological defense mechanisms and ways of responding to stress, conflict, separation, and so on (you can also find test methods). Are these the mechanisms that brought you to this state? If yes, then you need to change them.
Try to remember when you first felt lonely, what might have been the trigger, and how you changed after that.
Remember your “old” self, evaluate what you can use to return there (if that model “I” suited you).
Speak out all your thoughts, images, feelings. Try to visualize and structure them or express them in poetry, drawings, prose.
Tame your instincts and susceptibility to public opinion, reinforce your own position and rationality of actions, according to the situation and your beliefs.
Visit a psychotherapist if you cannot cope with the “pus” that has come out on your own.

Practical advice

Improve your communication skills and abilities (enroll in public speaking courses). Social contacts are impossible without communication.
Expand your horizons. Loneliness, without even realizing it, offers you favorable conditions. Outwit him and use him to your advantage: develop, study yourself, fight what doesn’t suit you.
Find (if you lost it, if not, so much the better) your Self (interests, beliefs, values). Join a club based on your interests and find like-minded people based on your interests.
Go to public places, make acquaintances and connections (I warned you that it would be “hurt”).
Think about what guides you when choosing your environment. If you don't pay attention to appearances, why do you think others do? This is not true, not all of them.
Reinforce your actions with positive memories of previous experiences, discard negative ones.
Accept the fact that truth is born from contradictions. Don't be afraid to be yourself. Knowledge and rapprochement between two people occurs, among other things, through constructive criticism, expression of desires and dissatisfaction, discussion of needs and problems (personal and general). If you are afraid of being rejected, then remember that people have much more in common than you think.
Rate your desired relationships. That is, write down those people with whom you would like to get to know each other better. Call them weekly (note this on the sheet) and arrange meetings.
If you have unsuccessful encounters (of course there will be some), write down your actions that probably led to this. At your next meeting, try to avoid them and evaluate the result. This way, over time, you will be able to build your own personal models of desired and unwanted behavior.
If your self-regulation and mental resistance to outside influence suffer, then I suggest signing up for training (personal growth, resistance to manipulation) or mastering self-regulation techniques (auto-training).
Volunteer. Here you have social contacts, a sense of significance, and increased self-esteem. But! As always, it is important that it comes from the heart and does not contradict your attitudes (for example, some people treat people without permanent residence very poorly, then what kind of volunteering can we talk about).
Learn to understand other people. You can also take training on relationship building. Learn empathy and compassion.
Respect other people's worldviews as much as your own. That is, stick to your position, but do not impose it.
Evaluate the information that comes to you. Beware of stereotypes, rumors, and unverified facts from the Internet. Books and personal communication can help you!
Get a pet. It's not just that you need to take care of it. After all, you still need to take him to the veterinary clinic, you can discuss his problems or funny behavior with someone. Do you feel what I'm talking about (social contacts)?

Loneliness as a need

Every person wants (whatever, he needs it) to be understood, recognized and in demand in his own mind and in the eyes of other people. With these facts and their harmony, a person will not feel lonely.

It is important to understand that loneliness is an integral part of our life, and according to A. Maslow, it is the highest need to achieve personal self-actualization. It's not loneliness you can't stand, but yourself. Loneliness should be manageable and necessary for self-discovery. That is, it is necessary not to get rid of loneliness, but to transfer it from destructive to constructive (creating personality, not destroying). But it is important to remember that, on the other hand, loneliness in the form of long-term social deprivation (unmet needs) is dangerous and not natural for a person.

Remember, you are not alone. You are potentially free! And in the end, there are only two points in overcoming loneliness: make friends (sort out, understand) with yourself, and then with others.

Popular mistakes

Loneliness drives people crazy (literally, alienating, diffuse and dissociated loneliness can become pathological) and pushes them to make mistakes that only make the situation worse. Common mistakes when dealing with loneliness include:

withdrawal into alcohol, drugs, or other illusion;
attempts to join any company, try on someone else’s personality, just not to be lonely;
join any group, take on any business in order to be needed, even if it contradicts your own worldview;
to be annoying;
ignore the situation, wait for self-resolution.

How to fight

Many people eventually come to terms with their loneliness and don’t even try to do anything about it. It is worth noting that this is a dead-end option that does not allow changing the situation. How to get rid of this condition? It is necessary to overcome the feeling of loneliness - at least in order to maintain faith in the existing prospects. You just need to do this gently and gradually. There are quite effective ways available to everyone.

Charity

Charity activities incredibly elevate us above the gray everyday reality. When we give the world something good, kind, bright, then, without a doubt, we feel the enduring meaning in everything. The feeling of loneliness will pass if you strive to be useful to others. People sometimes don’t understand that they can actually manage their condition on their own. There is no need to endlessly complain about life when you yourself can try to feel your need in the present moment.

Hobby or passion

When thinking about how to overcome loneliness, it is useful to remember your hobbies. A favorite activity helps a lot in moments of despair. You won’t even notice how your mood will lift, and all anxious thoughts will be left far behind. Having any hobby, a person can count on internal transformation and inspiration. By putting your soul into something, you can feel at the top of your position.

Physical activity

It has been proven that the more we move, the fewer negative thoughts come to mind. This phenomenon is understandable, since our feelings are closely related to our physical state. If you want to achieve inner balance, then start moving regularly. It is not at all necessary to exercise intensively every day. Sometimes it is enough to take an evening walk to improve your mood and put your thoughts in order. This is why you should never forget about physical activity. It is useful to ride a bike, go to the forest to breathe fresh air.

Personal achievements

Nothing invigorates a person more than success in a personal matter. Only then does a person begin to feel fully fulfilled and worthy of all benefits. Tormented by the thought of how to deal with loneliness and what to do with despair, it is necessary to strive for self-realization. You need to start small. Try new activities. There is no need to be afraid of another defeat. After all, only then will you know the true price of victory. If you have some small achievements, it will be much easier to move towards more impressive results. Intensive growth of self-esteem will partially cover the unpleasant feeling of restlessness. You just need to not sit in one place, but act. The more passionately you start acting, the greater the results you will achieve.

Thus, the feeling of loneliness really prevents a person from enjoying life and fully feeling their importance. Many people begin to feel that they are not capable of anything and are not good for anything. Of course, you need to work with this condition, look at it from different angles, and try to change something. When thinking about how to survive loneliness, you need to be ready to constantly change. If you have such a problem, we strongly advise you to seek help from psychologist Irakli Pozharisky. Working with a specialist will help you determine your life values and outline worthy ways out of the crisis.

Results

Thus, loneliness is a feeling of lack (loss) of something or someone personally significant in a person’s life. It is dangerous for a person: it threatens his freedom, individuality and identity.

But on the other hand, we can say that this is a specific version of self-perception, self-awareness. By taming loneliness, you can find confidence in the uniqueness of yourself and others, and realize the value of human relationships. Tamed loneliness is the basis for building trusting relationships with yourself and others.

The phenomenon of loneliness is at the intersection of psychology, sociology, philosophy, and culture. Therefore, it is difficult to name a single definition, reasons and specifics for overcoming loneliness. But we can still say that loneliness refers to the inner world of the individual. It is not identical with the concept of isolation or solitude. This is a discord in your relationship with the world or yourself.
To overcome loneliness, it is important to work on developing your inner world and developing psychological resistance to the influence of the outside world. There must be limitless content within you that you can share with others and that will allow you to preserve yourself.
You can’t find your circle of close people or be alone with someone if you haven’t been alone with yourself. Only two (or more) integral individuals with developed self-awareness can be together and create a group. The remaining individuals who have not known themselves (lonely) create a crowd (equally lonely, acting according to formal laws).

If you cannot cope with loneliness on your own, or you are tormented by suicidal thoughts, then be sure to visit a specialist!

Self talk

Every psychologist knows that several subpersonalities live within a person. This is an inner child, a loving parent, and a ruthless critic. Our inner voices, which sometimes quarrel among themselves, scold us or are capricious. Learning to recognize these voices is a difficult and important task in knowing your own “I”.

“Whoever does not like loneliness does not like freedom, for only in solitude can one be free ,” wrote the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, but this does not mean that in order to feel inner freedom and fulfillment it is necessary to live alone. It is important to feel comfortable both being alone and surrounded by people. Stereotypes imposed by society are changing - already now, according to various studies, single and divorced women feel much happier in comparison with themselves living in unhappy marriages.

When I feel good around myself, then I will feel great around others. Don't be afraid of loneliness. It is our helper, not our enemy.

Literature on the topic

In parting, I recommend reading the book:

Jean-Michel Quinaudeau "Taming Loneliness."
K. Grof and S. Grof “Frantic search for yourself: A guide to personal growth through the crisis of transformation.”
L. Svendsen “Philosophy of Loneliness.” This book will help you not only understand the phenomenon of loneliness, but also find the boundaries between your Self and other people, teach you to understand yourself and others, take responsibility for your life (including loneliness), and explain the subtle patterns of loneliness and friendship, love , trust.

If you experience cognitive dissonance (internal mismatch, contradiction), and you probably do, then I recommend reading the article “Cognitive dissonance - what it is in simple words.” Some recommendations are also given there. To analyze the issues of fear and anxiety, jealousy, insecurity, I suggest reading the articles “How to get rid of anxiety - advice from a psychologist”, “How to get rid of fear - advice from a psychologist”, “How to get rid of jealousy - advice from a psychologist”, “How to become self-confident - advice from a psychologist."

Be a unique, self-sufficient, constantly developing personality, and then none of the possible loneliness will overtake you. Remember that you have many alternative choices. And this is wonderful, not scary!