You Are Not Alone!

by Melanie Harvard. All rights reserved ? Melanie Harvard – the uncommon coach TM

We all feel lonely sometimes.

Lately, with most of the world locked away, and our friends and family out of physical reach, this feeling might be bigger.

If you are feeling this way, I want you to know you are not alone. Most of us feel like this at some point, and that in itself is a connection.

Today my Facebook feed threw up a memory from 6 years ago, where I was clearly in a bad space, and had written a few paragraphs about how we are all really alone. We are born alone, we die alone, we struggle alone. When I say those words the pathos is overwhelming.

When I want to feel completely shite about life this will be where I allow my mind to go.

I have, at times, allowed myself to sink into a pit of despair and disconnection. Like when someone close left me feeling attacked and threatened rather than loved and nurtured; or abandoned me, or the countless breakups when a person I have sunk my heart and soul into cut the ties and walked away. Those moments, at 3 am, when I can’t sleep, and feel so sad, but don’t know whom I would call if I cared to pick up the phone.

In all honesty, there are likely many people who would take that call and be there for me, if a bit groggily, but I choose in that moment to think about the whole world in a negative way. It is my thoughts about a situation, creating my reality.

I am good at rehashing every bad thing that has ever happened to me, and every hardship, focussing on every challenge I currently face, and then adding the thought, “So what! No one is there for me anyway. I just have to get through this on my own!” This negative cycle usually starts with thinking about as many sad and lonely things that I can remember. Or seeing some current evidence of how mean and nasty humans can be, which then sets me off into general disappointment and of course, disconnection.

I literally think myself into the worst mood ever. I am a bit of a perfectionist, and so I don’t stop until I feel perfectly and absolutely lonely. And really bad. Then I might tell myself that is just how it is and that I prefer being alone. Which I mostly do, being fairly introverted. So there. If I really wanted true perfection I might go eat some worms in the bottom of the garden.

With my awareness fully focussed on the negative, how can I possibly be surprised when the result is depression, demotivation, misery and teeth-gnashing.

Luckily with my new and improved consciousness, I can see the patterns. I can choose something different. And no, it's not blind positivity or just smiling.

Given that we know our thoughts lead to our feelings if we are focussing our thoughts on a bunch of sad and lonely things, we are going to feel sad and lonely. We need to change the quality and focus of our thoughts.

So how do we change our thinking around this?

It requires challenging some root beliefs and perhaps opening our minds up to some new, more helpful ideas. It requires teaching ourselves how to control where our focus goes and keeping it off pointless negativities. When you have done what you can about the challenge at hand, move on from the pity party. Unless of course, you want to make it an all-nighter.

We need to differentiate between alone and lonely. As an introvert I often like to be alone, it is peaceful and quiet. I can hear the birds in the trees and the wind. I can hear my own thoughts. I like it. Lonely is another state of being, it is when, even in the middle of a crowd of people, you feel disconnected. Not part of anything.

We actually feel lonelier this way, when the potential for connection is all around us but it just ‘ain't happening.

The opposite of this disconnected feeling is, of course, connection. And when I realised that other people aren’t the only form of connection available to me, life got better.

People as one’s only source of connection can be extremely good, or really awful. This is simply because they are in their own bubbles, doing their own things. Sometimes the connection can be out of this world, and sometimes we are left feeling disappointed.

No one can, or should be there for you 24/7 to hold your hand and make you feel better. That is a terrible burden to place on another being. After all, they too need to go to the loo, eat, sleep, work, deal with their own challenges, and perhaps have their own lives.

And this is where many of us lose the plot because deep in our little caveman brains we feel highly threatened and unsafe when the tribe shows any signs of rejection. God forbid they throw us out of the safety of the tribe, and we end up roaming around alone in the dark, being eaten by sabre-toothed tigers.

This is a real instinctual drive – safety in numbers, with others of our kind.

It's also a bit about our needs for nurturing in infancy - we learn we cry and hopefully someone comes to help. This reflects later in life when we expect a similar level of mind-reading and connection from anyone close to us. They must meet our needs, just like our mother or caregiver did if they really love us. But of course, this is not possible, or even reasonable.

Lack of awareness means we stay focussed on people as the source of our connection. As the source of our happy feelings. And confuses us when we cannot always have this on a level we want.

If connection is what we need, and turning to other people isn't always possible, where else can we find this? What can we do differently to fulfil our own needs?

1. Find and make connections with the right kind of people. Those people who inspire and motivate you. People who, when you finish talking to them, leave you feeling hopeful and energised.

Oh, and by the way, you have to do the connecting. The days of narcissistic wailing about how nobody calls, messages or cares are over. It is nobody's job to live your life for you. If you want something you need to go get it. Period! And accept when someone doesn't want to, or simply can't, share their time and energy, too. It's a free world.

You still won't have this all the time, and so you need to find other ways of connection with the universe too.

Realise where you are looking for a deep connection in all the wrong places. Don’t look for this with those who are themselves struggling with inner demons. It doesn’t mean you will never feel connected to them, but it could mean that this connection will come at a higher price, and it definitely won’t be reliable. Their energy cannot be shared with you as fully as you need, not yet, not until they have helped themselves.

Those people can be people you share inspiration and energy with sometimes, but with clear boundaries. When it becomes to draining for you, you need to move away.

2. Connect to your SELF. This is a biggie. We are always there for ourselves right? Physically if not emotionally.

Sadly, we have internalised a lot of nonsense about who we are, what we are worth and learned some bad self-care habits. We are encouraged to put ourselves last, to not feel good about ourselves as we are, and to put others needs first. Exactly what doesn’t actually help us to grow and be stronger individuals. 

Start working on your relationship with yourself. Cut the negative inner talk and look at how you can be kinder to yourself. Build yourself up rather than breaking yourself down with harsh judgements, criticism, guilt, shame, anxiety and doubt. That old lemon - be your own best friend. It’s trite but you should try it.

3. Connect to nature.

We don’t need all these studies to show us that access to nature is calming and energising. But scientists have done them anyway, and now we have ‘forest’ and ‘beach’ rooms with audio-visual and 3D, and calming screensavers and so on.

That’s all nice, but connect to real nature where you can. It doesn’t mean going on long hikes all the time. It can be as simple as sitting by the pot-plant on your windowsill, enjoying your back garden, planting your feet in some sand or grass, or watching the clouds.

Spend some time. Sink your awareness into that piece of nature you have found. If you are able, sink your mind further into the earth and feel the energy flows all around you. Reach out and ‘feel’ the life essence of cats, dogs, other people, and your budgie.

I hate to throw Quantum Physics around at this point, so I won’t, too much.

But energy IS. We are all made of the same energetic stuff, which has been proven to connect to energy all over the cosmos. Science cannot explain this connection yet, except to note that things happening to particles over here, seem to instantaneously happen to particles gazillions of miles away. Faster than the speed of light, and entirely annoying Einstein, if he was still around.

So we know there is energy, and there is connection – we just don’t know how or why.

And we don’t need to, to enjoy the thought of the existence of these connections.

4. Connect to a larger/higher consciousness.

Metaphysics talks of the universal mind, the cosmic web. It is the first hermetic law – that all is mind and the universe is mental.

Coincidentally, graphics of the cosmos look a lot like pictures of brain neurons. 

I love that video of atoms, neutrons and electrons in a brain, zooming out to the pictorial display of the multiverse. It really gives a great sense of similarity and also perspective.

Are we all just teensy particles forming some gigantic cosmic brain, and if so, is that cosmic brain perhaps not itself a tiny part of an even larger one? Where does it end? Am I aware of what one of my brain cells is doing right at this moment? No. I can perhaps focus attention and energy there or upgrade my diet and exercise routine to try help all my brain cells be healthier and have all the things they need.

I cannot say that ‘higher’ consciousness is at all aware of me as an individual. Same as I am not aware of the atom on the skin cell on my left toe. Or perhaps it is.

I don’t, and may never have, any tangible evidence of a higher consciousness. I know I have my own personal evidence, but this is subjective, and not measurable in lab conditions.

Whether as a Christian you believe in God, to whom you pray, or as an atheist or pantheist or any other kind of -ist you believe in consciousness in whatever form you decide it could be, is entirely immaterial to the subject. All of these choices are still a connection to this consciousness, in one form or another.

Attempting this connection through meditation, prayer, spells and incantations, or whatever form of ‘hello, look over here’ I can find to connect me to 'it', is something worth trying. It takes little energy. It is generally calming. I either achieve nothing, and also nothing is lost, or it may do something, in which case things may improve.

There are millions of priests, yogis, gurus and everyday people who swear by it.

Believing that there is no connection, feels a bit sad. Living in loneliness, disconnection and fear is horrible.

Hoping that there is some kind of shared, greater connection helps me feel better. I want to feel better, it helps me be and do better, so that’s what I will choose. It doesn't mean I don't take responsibility for my actions or anything else, it is simply a happy thought. I feel less alone on some level.

And back to the idea that the universe is mental – well it sure seems a little nuts at times although that isn’t what they meant. Is it though, is it mind or is it heart, or is it something more than this, something beyond our tiny ability to comprehend? Who knows.

But back to you.

In a nutshell, if you think you are lonely and disconnected, and don’t allow yourself to find whatever connection is possible for you, you will feel pretty bad.

I don’t see the point of that. It just breaks you down and makes life that much harder.

There are so many ways to connect.

I no longer lie in bed at night feeling isolated and sad. I haven’t for a long time. This lockdown has hardly touched me in this way. I do not feel disconnected. I feel held and safe.

I am not anything special, this form and feeling of connection is available to all of us. It just needs some tweaking of your thinking about it.

We might be going through hard times on our own. We may be physically alone. We may feel lonely. These are all separate things.

It's what you think about any of these which will make the difference.

In any of these states - you are free to connect to something more, which will hopefully make it a slightly less lonely world to be in.

for help with loneliness or any other form of distress, contact The Uncommon Coach - https://theuncommoncoach.co.za/