There seems to be a stigma attached to being alone. Many of us would rather admit to being depressed than to admit to being lonely. The reason for this is the fear of facing condemnation. We are afraid of looking strange or like failures and therefore do not talk about the fact that we feel abandoned or excluded from society.
The lack of freedom to discuss this topic only reinforces the problem and how we perceive it. If we judge ourselves for being lonely, taking steps to change the situation is even more difficult. Then we start beating ourselves up for not doing anything.
The same unpleasant feeling that we experienced when they didn’t want to take us on the school team seems to stay with us into adulthood. Only the reasons and situations change. We often get the thought: if I don’t have friends, then there’s something wrong with me. The media often labels lone killers as the ones whose names appear on the front pages, which only increases the fear of being judged.
In fact, this feeling is not directly related to the number of friends. This is an internal experience. It is experienced both by those who really communicate little and by those who are surrounded by people.
Loneliness is not the same as solitude. Solitude means being alone by choice, wanting it, and being comfortable in that state. Loneliness involves discomfort and a desire to feel connected to others.
Loneliness is not isolation
Nap Ibanes
Many people think that loneliness is very bad. What can I say - lonely people in society are often considered eccentric
, if not antisocial. And the loners themselves (at least a considerable number of them) believe that everyone has abandoned them and no one needs them.
Not everyone knows how to benefit from this condition.
But loneliness is different from loneliness. And the reasons that lead to a person being alone can also be different. By the way, the concept of “loneliness” does not mean complete isolation.
from people for many years, in which, for example, the hero of Tom Hanks from the movie “Cast Away” found himself - it is certainly not easy to benefit from such a situation.
Life planning
Left without communication, a person often begins to feel sorry for himself. There is no need to give in to this feeling. Complete loneliness gives a person a chance to occupy his free time with new hobbies, to try something he has never experienced before. Some change jobs and start interesting projects. Others enroll in courses that have been put off for a long time. All these activities allow the individual to properly organize his free time and not succumb to melancholy. In addition, they provide a chance to make new friends. Despite all the disadvantages of this condition, loneliness helps you get to know yourself better and reveal previously undisclosed talents. Experts recommend making a list of things in advance that a person would like to do in the near future, and gradually implementing plans. After all, he will have enough time to bring to life even the most difficult project.
We have the opportunity to accumulate energy
Socialization, communication, a wide circle of acquaintances and friends - this, of course, is very good and useful on the one hand. On the other hand, it is rare that a person is able to spend whole days
“spinning” in society all day long, like a squirrel in a wheel, without feeling tired of interacting with other people.
When we are surrounded by a large number of people throughout the day, our internal energy supply is usually not enough for everyone. This kind of interaction often requires us to do more than just carry on conversations.
, but also shared their emotions, read the emotions of other people, which can be very, very tiring.
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As a result, not only psychological, but also physical exhaustion may occur. You can, of course, talk for a long time about the fact that some people are energy vampires, while others are energy donors
, so the latter should be kept away from the former and all that stuff. The truth is that constant communication tires almost everyone.
Therefore, there is nothing wrong with being alone for a while. And if it happens to you personally that you have to spend quite a lot of time alone with yourself, take advantage of this situation for yourself personally
. Give yourself a long emotional and psychological reboot, accumulate energy, calm down mentally, rest physically, since at a certain moment you may need your energy again.
Slam the door in the face of all negativity
If you are tormented by negative thoughts, do not brush them aside, but acknowledge them. You can even give them names if it helps: “you are pettiness”, “you are impatience”, “you are tired and frustrated”. Now, with Nora's determination, slam the door in their face so they don't ruin your life anymore.
Instead of complaining about how and why you ended up in a particular situation, find the nearest reflective surface and say out loud what you are going to do about the situation.
Of course, anything happens in life. I don't live in a fantasy world and don't wear rose-colored glasses. My heart still shrinks a little from the sound of my “thank you” to the cashier at the supermarket, said in a voice hoarse from a whole day of silence. And sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and can’t sleep from worry. I miss the calming feeling of having someone nearby who I can rely on.
The thoughts in your head are not idle, and negativity always does its dirty work. They whisper in your ear: “You are old. You're ugly. You're a loser. You are fat. Is it possible to love you? What good are you to the world?” Women are very strong by nature, and it is doubly offensive that we voluntarily become hostages of these vile voices in our heads.
Fight them as best you can, do not succumb to their corrupting influence. We must deprive them of their strength, otherwise they will take root and bloom magnificently. Don't let yourself get bogged down in habitual dissatisfaction with everyone and everything: this is an emotional dead end. Pull yourself out of the swamp, shake off the dirt and move on. You choose your thoughts.
We have the opportunity to reflect on life
The life of the modern average person passes at an incredibly frantic pace. For some, this rhythm is so crazy that not only do they not have enough time to think about some philosophical things
, give yourself time for deep and important thoughts, but you can’t even find a moment to be alone.
Moose
If there is a period in your life when you often find yourself alone, you can only rejoice at the opportunity to reflect on your life in complete peace
. You don't waste your energy analyzing other people's thoughts, you deal with your own thoughts.
You can focus completely on what is happening personally within you. A calm atmosphere allows you not only to tune in to a philosophical mood, but also to analyze many aspects of life
. Loneliness gives us the opportunity to get to know ourselves better and, having made certain conclusions, choose the right direction to move forward in life more confidently.
How to get used to living alone after 40
At this age, it is difficult to come to terms with life “solo” - it may seem meaningless and boring, since women at this time most often experience a psychological crisis from leaving their children or separating from their husband. The energy that was once spent on maintaining the family hearth now finds no outlet, and the main task of a woman is to find this outlet for her.
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In addition to the “classic” waste of time on yourself, you can allocate time and energy to helping other people. There are plenty of people around who need help: you just need to take a closer look at those around you, and we are talking here not only about acquaintances and not even just about people. “A man who feeds another feeds his own soul,” said Zarathustra.
In addition, you can turn your attention to interest clubs: if you live in a big city, then it won’t be difficult to find one, and if in the provinces, then you can try to organize a “circle” yourself. Communication among people who share your hobby is most often easy and relaxed, and even the most insecure people will find it much easier to open up in a circle of like-minded people.
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Loneliness gives you the opportunity to deal with your emotions
Learning to deal with your own emotions is not the same as thinking about life in general. Because many of us spend most of our time around other people
, constant communication and emotional exchange does not give us the opportunity to understand our emotional state.
We very often pass through the emotions of other people, who create a background that does not allow us to “meet” our own emotions
. Only our most vivid emotional manifestations appear on the surface - great joy, intense grief, irritability.
Rido
This becomes so habitual for us that we often risk losing our emotional connection with ourselves. Once you manage to learn to have fun
from being alone, great prospects will open up for you in terms of understanding your own emotional state.
More specifically, you will learn to understand what in your life makes you a truly happy person, what makes you often sad, why you get upset. These skills will make it easier for you to manage your emotions.
. However, it all starts with the analysis of deeper, rather than superficial emotions, which can only be carried out when you are alone with yourself.
Control your reactions
Very often you will have to mobilize all your internal resources to remain strong and courageous. You must admit that you cannot run away from unpleasant emotions or shrug them off. You must face them, acknowledge these feelings, understand them properly and learn to control them.[…]
It's important to remember this when people hurt your feelings, either intentionally or accidentally. They themselves are not always aware of the impact of their words and actions. At such moments, I try not to forget that people are only projecting their own attitude towards themselves onto me. By impulsively reacting to your interlocutor’s remark, you give him your strength. If I see that a person is really trying to hurt me, then I mentally raise a shield with a mirror facing him in order to protect myself and show him that now he is not talking about me, but about himself.
Of all the advice I have received in life, one of the most useful was the following: you cannot influence how people will treat you or change some situations, but you can control your reaction to them.
You cannot change the direction of the wind, but you can control your sails.
The same goes for living alone: perhaps you would like to share shelter with another adult or have a family, but the reality is that there is no one nearby, so how joyful such a life will be for you will depend only on your attitude to the current situation .
As my own life experience shows, difficulties strengthen us. A grain of sand in a shell turns into a pearl. Therefore, perceive any troubles - and they will be - as veils, through which you will become stronger and wiser. And if you urgently need to throw out your seething emotions, take a dozen eggs and go for a walk in the forest; Throw the eggs into the trees with all your strength - and feel how satisfaction replaces anger!
We can devote time to exactly those things that give us pleasure
Since we are constantly in the various company of other people, we almost always have to find a compromise between what we like and what others like. Otherwise, a conflict of interest
: you will be reproached for selfishness, for not taking into account the opinions of other people and for being too focused on yourself.
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In other words, we (many of us), unfortunately, throughout almost our entire lives are forced to do things that are not what we personally like
, but what we should do; something that satisfies (or at least does not contradict) the interests of various groups of people.
So why do we begin to anger fate because at some certain point in our lives we find ourselves alone, getting that very rare opportunity to finally do those things
, which give us the greatest pleasure personally? Loneliness in this sense is a real freedom, which it would be a shame not to take advantage of by devoting maximum time to your favorite things.
Being alone makes us more productive
There are a huge number of activities in which it is simply impossible to complete your work alone. If we talk about those types of activities where one person bears full responsibility
for the result, then loneliness is rather a blessing, but not an undesirable factor.
Working in a large company (meaning a group of people, for example, an office with a large number of employees), few people manage to resist the temptation
distract yourself, joke around with colleagues, entertain yourself with conversation. Such behavior undoubtedly has a negative impact on work performance.
Jacob Lund
It is no secret that there are situations when a large number of people, forced to perform various types of work in one room, do nothing but entertain themselves with empty talk
! Hence the disdainful attitude of working people and businessmen towards the so-called white collar workers, that is, office workers.
And this situation (along with the desire to reduce overhead costs) has become the reason that many employers are hiring employees to work remotely, although they previously maintained entire offices
. Thus, the time you spend alone can be the most productive time in your life.
Do something useful. What you have been planning to do for a long time, what you should do, but what you never had enough time for. Enjoy the process from a creative point of view, feel like an artist
, who retired so that he would not be distracted from his work. In many cases, only loneliness makes it possible to completely immerse oneself in work and do it quickly and very efficiently.
Loneliness provides an opportunity to learn to value relationships with people
Jacob Lund
Many people, being forced to spend time alone regularly, eventually get used to this state so much that they get a certain pleasure
. This happens to a large extent because such people use the advice offered to you in this article.
In addition, the state of permanent loneliness, which is not burdensome, but brings satisfaction, opens up another unique opportunity for us: in this state we begin to especially appreciate moments of communication
with other people. We become selective, choosing higher quality interactions, enjoying rare moments of interaction with people more than those who are constantly in society.
Let's be honest: people who like to be alone often antagonize us because they seem arrogant to us. It's all about that self-sufficiency
which such a person feels. But if such people choose someone with whom they communicate on a regular basis, then they value such communication much more than those who are already constantly in sight, constantly in companies.
Loneliness helps you become a more independent person
Maridav
Once the fact of loneliness ceases to be something terrible for you, you begin to realize the benefits of the fact that you yourself are now responsible for those actions and decisions
that you accept. In other words, you stop pinning your hopes on someone who sometimes doesn’t live up to those hopes.
It turns out that loneliness makes us more independent. We begin to rely on ourselves, gradually increasing faith in our own strengths, becoming more independent
, self-confident and, if you like, more self-sufficient. We develop discipline and learn many new things at the same time.
We immediately go away with a lot of small and large problems that we were worried about, placing responsibility on other people. There is no need to constantly cooperate
with people who are unpleasant to us; a lot of time is saved, since there is no need to explain something to someone again, to convince someone of something.
Avoid mindless consumption
When you're alone, you have an incredible opportunity to think about your life and the direction you should take. Are you truly happy and fulfilled? Should you continue doing what you are doing? Or do you feel unsatisfied? Should you change something?
Only you can answer these questions. If instead you fill your life with mindless consumption—TV, movies, Internet surfing—then you will never be able to answer them clearly.
Free yourself from the need to constantly make other people happy
Dean Drobot
This message looks quite selfish, but this is not always the case. Think about this: in our lives, in addition to our family and very close circle, there are often people whom we are constantly forced to please
. Of course, a certain balance is assumed in relations between people, but this does not always happen and not with everyone.
The need to provide services, give advice, constantly connect someone with someone, solve other people’s issues is a rather tedious task that takes up a lot of our time
. And if life turns out in such a way that you are alone for a long time, then, having learned to accept this loneliness, learn to enjoy not having to spend your time making other people happy.
Your loneliness now means only one thing - the only person whose happiness you need to care about is yourself. Now you can spend more time on yourself, focusing your attention
on those things that give you pleasure; you have the opportunity to work on yourself, engage in self-development, improve your level of education and do many other things that are not available to people who are constantly in the public eye.
Alarming symptoms
Some individuals are simply unable to live without communication. They fear possible social isolation. Such people are constantly looking for contacts with others. But at the same time they feel that communication does not bring them positive emotions.
If this condition occurs, you should seek help from a psychotherapist. In addition, you should not ignore symptoms such as depression, thoughts of suicide, drug use or alcohol abuse, phobias, and panic attacks. These signs indicate the presence of a mental disorder. You should consult a specialist if feelings of loneliness arose due to childhood trauma, the loss of a loved one, or a break in a relationship with a lover.
Loneliness gives you the opportunity to stop feeling like a victim.
Dean Drobot
Being a polite person is a very good quality. But the need to constantly please someone is hard and thankless work, which often puts us in the position of a victim.
. Telling someone "sorry" because you stepped on their foot is being polite. And constantly apologizing for not living the way someone else wants is trying to please someone, being in the role of a victim.
We often have to ask for forgiveness for what we have done or not done. This is because we constantly do things that upset other people and affect their feelings. But once you learn to have fun
from the fact that you are often alone, you will feel no need to apologize for anything to anyone (except for those whose toes you stepped on, of course, since no one has canceled basic politeness!).
The feeling of not having to constantly ask for forgiveness for anything, as well as not having to constantly feel guilty, makes it possible to feel truly free and independent.
human. Now you don’t have to constantly look around because you might accidentally offend, anger, or offend someone in some other way.
