Thursday, April 19, 2018

There Are So Many Ways NOT to Be Lonely, But So Many People Feel Lonely — What’s Up with That?

One of the funny things about being a therapist and also writer is that my clients (not all, some) read about my life in my blog and some of them ask about me (which a tiny bit is against the rules of therapy, but not like you’re going to jail or anything). Mostly two things are of concern. They either want to know how my dog is (I wrote about the cancer in her skull a couple months back. She’s doing well. Still running!) Or, they want to know if I’m dating anyone. The clients who ask about dating tend to be women who are my age or older and I think they ask from a genuinely caring place. Like I do for them, they want good and happy things for me. I think they don’t want me to be lonely. If they themselves are lonely, they may also look to me for hope or comfort.
I asked a friend recently what I should write about next in my blog and one suggestion he gave was, “the lies of loneliness.” Aside from being somewhat poetic, I liked thinking about that idea — does loneliness tell us lies? Is loneliness itself a lie? What exactly is the feeling of loneliness? What are the types and textures? What are the cures?
I want to start by saying there is one type of loneliness that is different from all the others, and it may relate back to the last thing I’m going to write about, but I want to mention it first because its characteristics are so different. That is the loneliness of chemical depression. I have not ever had a depression like that, but I work with a few people who live a great deal of their lives in deep and nearly intractable depression. One of the hallmarks, to me, of that type is a pervasive sense of alone-ness. No matter who is there in the room, who calls or texts, what person sits next to you at dinner, you feel disconnected, flat, and so alone. The main problem here is chemical depression and that’s not what I want to write mostly about today, but I want to acknowledge that the persistence and heaviness of that loneliness exists and hurts.
Most people have other forms and sorts of loneliness and often, I’ve found, that what their loneliness drives them to do, or the cure they think they find leads to more loneliness and here is where it’s worth investigating.
Here are some things I have observed about loneliness, which might be what my friend called the lies of loneliness:
1. When people feel lonely, it’s not always romantic loneliness. Though it often is. Or they often think it is. Even when partnered or married — even when you look on the outside “in love” — people often experience loneliness.
2. Loneliness is very close to emptiness. It might be worth asking yourself if you feel lonely or you feel empty.
3. When you feel empty or lonely, it hurts a lot and your brain and heart are going to urge you to fill up that space with a bunch of junk. It’s up to you what you want the quality of that junk to be — some common choices I’ve seen are: more relationships. More sex, but not in relationships. Social Media. Food. Alcohol. Drugs. Binging on Netflix. Sleep. Workaholism. Working out-aholism. ‘Helping’ others.
While I think some of these things are good for a weekend, I hate to see people get stuck here for months or years. Some are more destructive than others, but none will alleviate the loneliness in a deep or lasting way. (And often lead to more feelings of loneliness and emptiness).
It’s been a long time since I read Walden by Henry David Thoreau and it’s possible that I never read it sophomore year in high school, but just skimmed it (it blends in with Moby Dick in the ‘classics, but kind of boring’ category). But what I remember and what stays with me is that this man chose to live alone by a pond and be close to nature. He tried to be self-reliant. It was somewhere around 1854. He did not have TV, cell phones or computers. He had a pond, some plants, the weather. It probably sounds like a lonely, empty living hell to a lot of people, but I think he was on to something. When we feel lonely or empty, we often need less not more. Whatever it is in us that says we need more, more, more is probably the biggest lie of loneliness that I see.
Here’s a real life example. I tried Match.com last summer in large part because some of my friends encouraged me to ‘get out there’. In fact, one of my good friends said, “You are single. You should embrace this time in your life.” And I thought, “That’s probably true! Why not?!” (This is what my mom calls the Tigger from Winnie-the-Pooh part of me — “Tiggers love to bounce into tall trees!” And once I’m up in the metaphorical tall tree, I’m like “Tiggers do NOT like to bounce into tall trees.)
What I learned was that online dating is not for me. Here’s why: it’s a lot. It’s more, more, more. Men. Messages. Trying to suss through whether the men are nice or sleazeballs. More messages or winking (ugh). I shut it down after a few weeks and it’s hard for me to imagine that I would ever do it again. This sort of filling up my time and brainspace did not feel fun or even adventurous — it felt like too much…but that could just be part of my wiring. I did ask myself if I felt lonely. The answer to that was, “not really.” I realized that while, I have moments of longing, that is different than loneliness, for me. Longing, for me, is witnessing how beautiful and amazing it is to see two people falling in love. Or to hear a man read a poem to his wife of 40 years that he wrote all about what it’s like to love her for a long time and how their love changes with age. (This happened to me this week.) And there are moments where I hope and wish for those experiences in my life. To me that is longing, but not loneliness or emptiness.
Maybe I’m saying that if you think you might feel lonely, don’t be afraid to feel it and know that feeling in a deeper way. Loneliness may not be how you really feel and when you let yourself feel it, you may realize more accurately what you want or need.
3. There is a difference between general loneliness and being lonely for a particular person. Loneliness for a particular person is more like grief. To me,grief is a helpful way to feel and think about metabolizing that sort of loneliness. If the person you love died and that’s why you are lonely for him/her, it may never fully go away, but it will feel different — perhaps less heavy and perhaps less sharp and perhaps less pervasive as time goes on.
4. If you were recently dumped or you are getting the cues that a romantic relationship is on the downhill slide, you may feel excruciatingly lonely. However, I often think we go through something I call relationship ‘withdrawal.’ I think it takes a few months of not being in contact with someone, not hooking up with that person, etc., to not feel ‘lonely’ for them anymore. If you think it is in your best interest to move on, try to stop yourself from having contact with them. (This would be a good time to fill that space with the least damaging thing possible and I recommend The Walking Dead.)
5. Loneliness tells you that you will always be alone. When parents are anxious about their kids, I often say to them, “What if I could tell you that I have received a message from 2050. That message is: Your kids turn out great. They are well-adjusted, productive, and healthy — how would that change your parenting?” Loneliness makes us super-anxious, Many people have an underlying thought/lie, “This is it for me. I guess I’m dying alone.” If you feel lonely right now while you’re reading this, it is my sincere belief that you will not always feel lonely. Life circumstances change, luck changes, we try out a different grocery store or take piano lessons. If you are truly lonely for romantic love, and not empty from some inner emptiness, the best you can do is try to enjoy where you are and who you’re with and what you’re doing in ways that bring you a sense of well-being and health. One thing I know for sure is that when we are coming from a place of hunger, we often eat crappy foods. And what I mean is, if you are depleted, hungover, secretly hating yourself, the relationship you might find yourself in is not the one that will make you less lonely in the long run.
So this brings me to my final observation and it is this…A deep longing that seems utterly human and perhaps universal is the longing to be seen, deeply known, and loved for the very person we are in our core. To me there is something spiritual about this. I had a friend in college who was really smart (he’s a neurosurgeon now!) and also a conservative Christian (I am not…nor am I a neurosurgeon). We used to write notes and letters and talk about C.S. Lewis and Greek Civilization. He told me to read Mere Christianity, which included (I recall) a passage that each of us has inside, a God-shaped hole that we try to fill with many things that are not God. Yet, the only thing that will ever really satisfy us is God. Just an idea to ponder.
Maybe it’s blasphemy in our Hallmark channel world, maybe it seems on the ‘meh’ end of hopeful, but here is my truth: I’m not sure there is any one person out in the world that will see us, know us, love us fully in all of our parts, in the depth of our selves, over the course of all our lives (though I believe anything is possible.) I do believe that we search for this deep connection in conscious and unconscious ways. In the end, it is Whitney Houston (I Will Always Love You) and Stuart Smalley (I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, etc.) and is something internal rather than external. Often we are lonely for ourselves. The world gets us away from ourselves and sometimes gives us messages that we aren’t worthy or enough or intrinsically good and loveable. We are all of those things and we are good company.



Tuesday, April 3, 2018

I Took A Pledge to Help End Racism. Step One: I Am Asking You to Listen.

Most people who know me know, that in the past couple years, I've become kind of a church slut.  I've been attending a number of denominations, and I'm finding it difficult to commit.  Please don't judge!  (Maybe I have unreasonable expectations, but that may be another blog).  I love the social justice focus of the Unitarian Universalists and United Church of Christ, I love my personal history with United Methodists and much of the theology, I love the ritual and pomp of the Catholic church, and I read a number of Buddhist writers (not a church, I know).  I am inspired by Jewish stories and wisdom.  I wish I could combine them all into one thing and throw a little Hinduism too.  Yet, one thing I did commit to when sitting in the Unitarian Universalist pews the other week was signing a Pledge to Help End Racism. 

Here's some background:  My city has been in a process of transformation, protest, conversation, rage, avoidance, and effort since Michael Brown's death in 2014.  St. Louis is talking about race and racism in more honest and open ways than I can remember in my life.  It has been a particularly passionate topic in my small community within the city/county and permeates everything from the school board to friendships to facebook.  I've tended to be in a more personal than public role, because that's where I feel comfortable.  Going to coffee with people, talking in kitchens with friends, attending community events, putting a Black Lives Matter sign in my yard.   And in the UU church I attend, racial equity issues are addressed from the pulpit almost every week - hence, the action item - sign a "Pledge to Help End Racism."  Like you, I wonder, how can I do that?  I am a working single mom with many worries, hassles, concerns, interests, and passions.  Do I have the energy or courage for such a thing?  Who the hell am I to think anything I might say is helpful in this literal landmine of emotion?

But I am going to take the opportunity to try to say some things and I hope that people who read this will grace me with the generosity of knowing that I am taking a risk.  This is a topic that angers many people and causes people on all sides to shut down.  I know I am not going to talk about this in all the right ways from a political correctness point of view.  And I am going to take a stance that some people dear to me will want to argue with me about.  I am asking that you pause before you make assumptions or respond.  I am a strong person, but I am gentle.   And in talking about this, I am talking from my heart, which is certainly as tender as yours. 


I believe racism exists and is one of the great wounds that prevents every system in our lives from being all that it can be.  Racism  hurts people in every facet of life - our schools, our hospitals, our neighborhoods, our businesses, our friendships, our churches, our families, our prisons, the arts.  This wounding leads to more wounding.  It goes on and on until many people of good will feel hopeless and afraid - what can me done?  This is too big or I am too angry and I am not willing anymore.


I am here to ask you to be willing.  I am here to ask you to be willing to listen.  


I'll digress for a second and hopefully bring it back around.


When the night isn't too busy with driving kids around to various sports and practices, I like to cook dinner and listen to podcasts.  The podcast I am most intrigued by right now is the podcast from San Quentin prison in California, which is a look at life 'on the inside'.  Ear Hustle  The most recent episode provoked many thoughts in me for many reasons - it was called Dirty Water - a conversation between Sara, who had been a victim of sex trafficking and killed her trafficker and LA, who was a trafficker himself, serving time in San Quentin.  It was a conversation about the wounding of sex trafficking and a practice of restorative 

justice. In case you aren't familiar, restorative justice is defined this way in Wikipedia:


Restorative justice is an approach to justice that personalizes the crime by having the victims and the offenders mediate a restitution agreement to the satisfaction of each, as well as involving the community. This contrasts to other approaches such as retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, or incapacitation.

Victims take an active role in the process. Meanwhile, offenders take meaningful responsibility for their actions, seizing the opportunity to right their wrongs and redeem themselves, in their own eyes and in the eyes of the community.

In addition, this theory looks at crime as something that happens against an individual or community rather than the state.  The dialogue between offender and victim is supposed to foster victim satisfaction and offender accountability.  

In this episode of Ear Hustle, I was intrigued by the act of both talking and listening as an act of justice-bringing.  Sara and LA listen to one another.  Toward the end, Sara asks LA a question and deeply listens to his answer.  She is not berating, but she is honest - she does not hear some key aspects of him holding himself accountable for his crimes.  But they don't leave angry - they say, 'maybe we can talk and listen more on down the road.'  There is justice and generosity in that.  
These problems, like racism, or violence against women are so big, we forget where we have the power to make a difference.  In so many ways racism is a crime against an individual or community.  I believe that the beginning of healing most injustices in our society at this time, not the least of which is racism, is through individual or small community response.  The very beginning of this  - and it's so do-able  - is to cultivate our ability to listen.

We are not very good at it anymore.  I wonder if we ever were, but now seems particularly bad.  And listening means not just listening to the words that are said, but understanding the feeling and true meaning behind the words that are said.  

I know that for the sad, unjust or hateful things that have happened in my life, it is a gift to be believed.  For me to be able to tell what happened and how it hurt me and for someone to listen and not tell me that I should think about it or feel it in a different way.  This is, in a way, one thing a therapist does.  Even more healing, might be for the person or persons who hurt me to listen to me tell my story and hold themselves accountable.  That would feel like the beginning of justice.  I think it would restore me in many ways.

Defensiveness is an enemy of listening and probably an enemy of peace and justice.  When I went into people's homes as a hospice social worker, often they were understandably defensive.  I was in their space.  I represented something awful and I asked nosy questions.  I think I became skilled at disarming people, in a way.  I didn't want them to be defensive.  I wanted to work together with them to find ways to alleviate suffering.  To disarm them, I listened to them.  And I believed them.  Even if they told me to go away (which sometimes they did.)
Maybe that experience is what dictates my approach and I know it is effective.  Listening and believing other people from a non-defensive position is healing.  Healing for the speaker and healing for the listener.  And in healing, there is dignity, and in restoring dignity and agency there is justice.

I would like to live in a world where we aren't afraid of one another and angry with one another.  I believe that there is enough love, power, and money to go around.  You getting doesn't mean me giving up.  As a white person, I am trying to be accountable for the ways I may personally have perpetuated racism, or just by being part of the system of history and community that I am, I am in a fabric of racism.  That is hard for me to say, I'm noticing - even as I write it.  And I write it not out of being under the sway of some 'liberal media' bias or white guilt or anything like that. I am writing is because, as hard as it is to say, I believe it to be true.  

So this is a little thing that I am doing.  It is not the only thing, but one pebble in the water.  

When I started writing this blog this morning, you know, I didn't realize tomorrow is the anniversary of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King's death?  But he is someone I admire for many reasons and I have absolute awe for the poetry of his words.  So I will leave you with these, because  in all of us there is a seed of light, and one way we can grow that is by listening to one another and granting one another the dignity that we also want to be granted:

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.