Isolation is the act of isolating something; setting something apart from others or the act of isolating, or the state of being isolated; insulation; separation; loneliness. Strangely enough, isolation is perhaps the most valuable and difficult commodity to manage in the game of art making. Loneliness is a feeling where people experience a powerful surge of emptiness and solitude. Loneliness is more than the feeling of wanting company or wanting to do something with another person. Someone who is lonely may find it hard to form human contact. Many people have times when they are alone through circumstances or choice. Being alone can be experienced as positive, pleasurable, and emotionally refreshing if it is under the individual's control.
To experience loneliness, however, can be to feel overwhelmed by an unbearable feeling of separateness at a profound level. This can manifest in feelings of abandonment, rejection, depression, insecurity, anxiety, hopelessness, unworthiness, meaninglessness, and resentment. If these feelings are prolonged they may become debilitating and prevent the affected individual from developing healthy relationships and lifestyles. If the individual is convinced he or she is unlovable, this will increase the experience of suffering and the likelihood of avoiding social contact. Low self-esteem will often trigger the social disconnection, which can lead to loneliness.
Loneliness can evoke feelings that 'everyone else' has friends, and that one is socially inadequate and socially unskilled. A lonely person may become convinced there is something wrong with him or her, and that no one understands his or her situation. Such a person will lose confidence and will become reluctant to attempt to change or too scared to try new things for fear of further social rejection. In extreme cases, a person may feel a sense of emptiness.
People can experience loneliness for many reasons, and many life events are associated with it. The lack of friendship relations during childhood and adolescence, or the physical absence of meaningful people around a person is causes for loneliness, depression, and involuntary celibacy. At the same time loneliness may be a symptom of another social or psychological problem, such as chronic depression.
Secretly, you want to be found and you know that you eventually will but you persist in making yourself as invisible as possible even as you are filled with the anticipation of discovery. Waiting for change in isolation feels a bit like this except the anticipation is more akin to fear. I feel like I am holding my breath and the isolation make the struggle all the more intense. It’s not the being alone that is necessarily difficult it’s how that isolation clouds your perception of the world. Things seem bigger and more / too important without the benefit of another voice in the room saying, “chill out” (the voices in your head don’t count.)
We suffer a lot in our society from loneliness. So much of our life is an attempt to not be lonely: 'Let's talk to each other; let's do things together so we won't be lonely.' And yet inevitably, we are really alone in these human forms. We can pretend; we can entertain each other; but that's about the best we can do. When it comes to the actual experience of life, we're very much alone; and to expect anyone else to take away our loneliness is asking too much.
* American Buddhist monk Ajahn Sumedho: The Way it is
1."Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection", Caccioppo, John T and William Patrick,W.W. Norton, NY, 2008. ISBN 978-0-393-06170-3.
2. Doyle Paul Johnson, Larry C. Mullins, "Religiosity and Loneliness Among the Elderly ", Journal of Applied Gerontology, Vol. 8, No. 1, 110-131 (1989).
No comments:
Post a Comment