Ask The Lonely

Yes, I used another Journey song title for today. I should offer a prize when people catch me using a song title, might have people notice the titles more)

This last weekend the discussion was about loneliness for the Big Idea at CCC. While it is something that most if not all of us can relate with, it is not really the easiest sort of thing for most of us to talk about.
I don't know what it is really that makes it so. I think many of us when we are growing up are told or taught that to be self sufficient and a loner is what we are supposed to be. Don't rely on anyone for anything. Self-made man. You know...like John Wayne characters or something.
We have counselors and psychologists that tell us it's important to share and not bottle things in. We have support and recovery programs that rely on you being open and relying on each other and God for strength. Yet...when it comes down to it, we hate to admit we need other people.
Last week and the week before when I had two blog-mental-meltdowns, I talked about how utterly embarrassed I am that I babbled and shared with folks. I could feel embarrassed for my father's sake without him even being there because I was showing myself weak to other people.
So why don't people say "I am lonely?" For the same reason they don't say I am scared, for the same reason they don't say I am depressed. They don't want to admit it usually, and if they do they are worried the people they tell it to might not care or understand.
Lonely is not about having people around entirely either. We have lonely people in cities with millions of people around. We have people that have neighbors that they don't even know.
One of the bad things about the wireless and internet age is it allows us to be able to exist without potentially knowing a single person very well at all. If we didn't have our last names on our mailbox I wouldn't even know the name of my neighbors in the same building as me. We can be surrounded by hundreds or thousands of people everyday and not be able to know a thing about them or have them know a thing about us. Progress has a price doesn't it?
The truth is, we need to be with people and to get close to people. John Wayne works for movies but doesn't really work for our everyday life. We need people to be there to celebrate when we do well, and to mourn with us when we are not doing well. Loners tend to shrink away from others when they need people the most.
I work for Telly who is an older man living in apartment home for retirees. For a while there the people that came downstairs to watch television with him didn't do it for a while, and I saw how his face would look, even without him saying a word. He had the look of disappointment when his friends were too busy.
He could watch television in his own room, so he didn't come downstairs to watch Wheel of Fortune because he liked the show so much. He loved seeing people down there with him, and even if he didn't say much, they gave him a sense of belonging just by being around.
Last week I ran into one of the folks in the hall who used to come downstairs and she said that they were playing cards instead in one of the rooms. I said..oh that's good, Telly just missed you and was wondering how you were doing. A guilty look was on her face, and within the next day they were back down there visiting and watching television again.
"They came back" Telly said with a big smile when we went upstairs.
Amazing how just having people around can make such a difference.
People that are married live longer...I am sure you don't need to wonder why. We need other people and we need God to make us whole. Do you know someone that you might need to talk to and maybe share a coffee with?
When you reach out to other people you don't just cure their loneliness, you can help your own.