Although many men and women prefer retreating to solitude to escape the hustle and bustle of their everyday lives, imagine what it must be like to come home everyday to silence or to spend your birthdays alone. Mother Teresa once said, “The most terrible poverty is loneliness and the feeling of being unloved.” To support this sentiment, John T. Cacioppo, a University of Chicago professor of psychology, tells The New York Times, “Denying you feel lonely makes no more sense than denying you feel hungry.”
Professor Cacioppo’s mental health study titled “Toward a Neurology of Loneliness” shows that no matter how old you are, loneliness affects key bodily functions. Chronic loneliness is associated with increased levels of cortisol – a stress hormone – and higher vascular resistance, which “can raise blood pressure and decrease blood flow to vital organs.” Being lonely can also affect white blood cell production, thus impairing the immune system’s ability to fight infections.
So what are you supposed to do about it?
As psychotherapist Ross A. Rosenberg writes on Huffington Post, “The causes of loneliness are varied and multi-dimensional, including social, psychological and physiological factors.” It can happen at any time in your life. You can feel alone in solitude and while you are surrounded by a crowd of friends. And the worst part is – even when you don’t want to feel this way, you can’t help it.
Here are four tips to help shake that feeling.
In other words, Psych Central says, “Notice your self-deflating thoughts. We often create self-centered stories to explain our feelings when we are young. It is not unusual for children to assume that there is something wrong with them if they are not happy.”
As we get older, however, we tend to retreat to this mentality. According to The Wall Street Journal, feeling lonely causes our subconscious to rewind “back to when we were young and worried someone wasn’t going to be there to take care of us. It is the negative thought ‘I don’t matter.’” This is the kind of mentality that thrusts you towards a downward spiral.
Instead of thinking negatively, Leeanne Rebic Hay, freelance writer, tells The Wall Street Journal, “You can choose not to be lonely … You can tell yourself, ‘I am alone, nobody likes me, everyone hates me.’ But you have ask yourself: What can I choose to do to not feel lonely? You are creating the experience of loneliness by how you are thinking and behaving.”
The next time you go to the spa alone, eat at a restaurant alone or sit alone at home, don’t focus on your solitude, the silence or any negative feelings. Instead, see this as a time to clear your mind, to relax your body or discover yourself. Turn being alone into a positive experience. You can even do this by doing things you like to do – reading, walking, volunteering, et cetera.
Pandora MacLean-Hoover, a licensed independent clinical social worker in Cambridge, Massachusetts tells the Wall Street Journal, “The uncomfortable feelings are there. They are not going to go away on their own. It’s good to acknowledge them and then try to think differently.”
According to the Mind website, “Feeling lonely can be very stressful and can have a big impact on your general well-being, which might make it even harder to make positive steps to feeling better.” Your sleep schedule, stress levels and eating habits can all impact your mood.
For starters, the Sleep Health Foundation shares that mood and sleep are closely connected. Depression can cause poor sleeping patterns which can significantly affect our moods. Although sleep research is still exploring the relationship between depression and sleep, studies have even shown that 15 to 20 percent of people diagnosed with insomnia will also develop major depression.
Additionally, the Mayo Clinic writes that stress can affect your mood by increasing anxiety, irritability and sadness. Stress – which can make you feel overwhelmed – also decreases motivation.
When you are stressed, you may also overeat, which can also affect how you feel. When you are overeating, you are most likely not paying attention to the food that goes in your body. Because of this, Everyday Health warns that an unhealthy diet can lead to depression and a sugar and food addiction. How do you fight this?
One of the best ways to care for your body is to start moving. As US News shares, exercising can “reverse the detrimental effects of stress.” By exercising for as few as 30 minutes a day, your brain will produce chemicals like serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine, all chemicals linked to happiness. What’s more, US News says that “Animal studies have found that getting active boosts the production of brain molecules that improve connections between nerve cells, thereby acting as a natural antidepressant.”
Although loneliness is not exactly the same as depression, improving your mood by taking care of your body can motivate you to seek out communities where you belong.
The Mind website also writes, “It can be helpful to think of feeling lonely like feeling hungry. Just as your body uses hunger to tell your body you need food, loneliness is a way of your body telling you that you need more social contact.”
If you’re having trouble meeting making new friends, join an organization, take a class or even start volunteering. This will expose you to new people.
Mind says that “Volunteering is a good way of meeting people [and] helping others can really improve your mental health.” And as the Corporation for National and Community Service writes, volunteering has intangible benefits such as pride, satisfaction and accomplishment – all feelings that can help you feel happier about your life.
The goal, as The Wall Street Journal writes, is to “extend yourself.” It’s hard to connect to other people if you isolate yourself from others. Thus, make it a habit to accept social invitations, even if you don’t feel like going. The Wall Street Journal also suggests “mapping out yours social life” by making sure your week is filled with social activities.
While it is important to surround yourself with other people, Psychology Today also points out that “Loneliness depends entirely on the subjective quality of your relationships – on whether you feel emotionally and/or socially disconnected from those around you.” This is why more than 60 percent of married people are lonely and why you can have dozens of friends and still feel alone.
For this reason, asking someone to go on a coffee date with you will be more beneficial for you and your relationship if you are genuinely interested in the other person.
Entrepreneur also suggests learning to listen and understand. One of the easiest ways to connect with other people is by listening to them and “doing [your] best to understand where they’re coming from.” You can also find common interests to share, learn to trust them with your thoughts and to be patient as the friendship grows.
In fact, “fostering meaningful relationships” doesn’t have to be limited to humans. Adopting an animal can also be a good step towards combating your loneliness. According to WebMD, getting a pet can provide you with “uncomplicated love,” companionship and social interaction.
If one of your problems is coming home to an empty house, getting a loving and loyal pet can make a difference. In addition, WebMD says that “Having a pet can gently push you to get more social contact … Pets are natural icebreakers, and other pet owners love to talk about their animals.”
Overall, your loneliness can simply be a result of your choices. You can turn your lifestyle around by being more proactive. Change your mentality, your habits and the people with whom you (do or don’t) surround yourself. Be naturally curious, ask people questions and learn to listen. Choose to pull yourself out of your situation. When you do this, you are inching one step closer to the end of loneliness.
