ON LONELINESS

With the appointment of a Minister of Loneliness in the United Kingdom last week, the epidemic of loneliness afflicting the global community catapulted to the forefront of pressing public health issues on our radar. Chronic, sustained, isolation, studies have shown, is toxic. One study indicates that it is equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Sobering conclusions.

And although it is a scourge primarily affecting the elderly, young people, it seems, are not immune to its effects. I know my own father would die if he didn’t have regular contact and interaction with other people — phone calls are one thing but nothing replaces a one-on-one conversation and physical contact. As such, I go out of my way nowadays to initiate a conversation with an older person (if receptivity is there — and more often than not it is). We now know that for many, these chance encounters may be the only social contact they have in a day.

I’m a loner by nature — always have been — and I cherish moments of solitude because interaction with others is always “on tap” so to speak. But I am also painfully aware that that may not be the case thirty years from now — it’s an issue all of us who have either chosen to go it alone or find ourselves alone through circumstances beyond our control will, in all likelihood, have to confront at some point. It’s a fact that singles now outnumber married people in Western countries — that’s just a demographic reality (social media is highly deceptive in this regard — no one trumpets the fact that they are “alone” and so all we see, for the most part, are the happy “couples” of this world celebrating their unions, their anniversaries and their progeny — which is a good thing and worthy of sharing, don’t get me wrong — but perhaps not reflective of the reality for what is now a majority of the population. This “new world” raises interesting questions about the role of community in connecting people — what can each of us do to help mitigate the damage done by loneliness? I don’t have answers, but it is something I will continue to reflect upon in order to determine what my own personal response will be.

Related posts:

Invite them to join you by standing in their power. These people need the invitation most, because they see something in you that they want, too. Sometimes all they need is an invitation to find…