Are you a loner?

Loneliness is a tricky thing, its cure is rarely found in accomplishments, people, or things. We may start out thinking those “cures” work as we surround ourselves with friends and possessions.

          In the beginning, it seems to help. I bought a big house and filled the house with stuff and threw parties for people who liked the stuff and the parties. It all looked good, like — what a happy guy! But underneath it all was the familiar smell of loneliness.

This plot line is the inspiration for many Hollywood movies, the kind that nearly always end with the main character sitting alone watching other people enjoy his stuff while he endures his loneliness. That was me… in so many living what’s living the dream and yet always feeling isolated and alone.

Self-help books tell us to let go of the loneliness, look around ourselves, and focus on the beauty. That’s a brilliant advice… I hope. This kind of advice tends to come from the mind, intellectually wrangling an issue and dispensing words that are technically correct but lacking in the kind of real-world sensibility necessary to actually be helpful. The way politicians comment on unemployment by saying, “we need to create more jobs,” but then don’t actually give anyone a job. Like the lonely deer limping along the tree line of the forest, we need more than rhetoric to make it through the winter. Tends to come from the mind, intellectually wrangling an issue and dispensing words that are technically correct but lacking in the kind of real world sensibility necessary to actually be helpful. The way politicians comment on unemployment by saying, “we need to create more jobs,” but then don’t actually give anyone a job. Like the lonely deer limping along the tree line of the forest, we need more than rhetoric to make it through the winter.

So how do we cure loneliness? The answer is one that won’t get me elected to a public office, but I’ve found it to be true nonetheless. We don’t, at least not in the way that implies pushing it away and making it stop. Our loneliness is the product of a sacred and abandoned voice inside, and our attempts to quiet or push away the voice only result in more abandonment and more fear, causing the voice to grow louder and more resolute. Like a Grandma in orphanage floor struggling to hold it all together, we, all of us need a hug, to be understood and accepted as we are. The cure to loneliness is to listen to the loneliness and to be there for ourselves in a way that no one else can. We have to be our own hero, no one else can save us from it. We don’t overcome loneliness, we learn to embrace it.for many Hollywood movies, the kind that nearly always end with the main character sitting alone watching other people enjoy his stuff while he endures his loneliness. That was me … in so many ways living the dream and yet always feeling isolated and alone.for many Hollywood movies, the kind that nearly always end with the main character sitting alone watching other people enjoy his stuff while he endures his loneliness. That was me … in so many ways living the dream and yet always feeling isolated and alone.for many Hollywood movies, the kind that nearly always end with the main character sitting alone watching other people enjoy his stuff while he endures his loneliness. That was me … in so many ways living the dream and yet always feeling isolated and alone.irationiration for many Hollywood movies, the kind that nearly always end with the main character iration for many Hollywood movies, the kind that nearly always end with the main character sitting alone watching other people enjoy his stuff while he endures his loneliness. That was me … in so many ways living the dream and yet always feeling isolated and alone.iration for many Hollywood movies, the kind that nearly always end with the main character sitting alone watching other people enjoy his stuff while he endures his loneliness. That was me … in so many ways living the dream and yet always feeling isolated and alone.