Become Friends With Yourself to Fight Loneliness

Photo by Samuel Austin on Unsplash

I don’t have to be a saint, I don’t have to be an angel! All I have to do is caretake this moment.

Sharon Lebell:

The loneliest place is in a crowd, and it’s not the crowd’s fault. It’s because loneliness is a condition that’s within us because we have to make friends with ourselves. We have to know what it is we care about, what it is we’re trying to do at this moment, in this day, in this life. When we become disconnected from those things, life starts to feel really stupid, really absurd, and the way that presents is loneliness, is feeling like: “where do I go? Who do I talk to? Life is so abrasively loud, but where’s the music?”

Loneliness eases off when we make friends with ourselves, I think, when we stop running from the bad or deficient person that we fear we might be and instead, from that philosophical Cosmopolitan point of view, we remember: “ah yes, I’m merely a human being… but I’m a human being! Think about that: I don’t have to be a saint, I don’t have to be an angel! All I have to do is caretake this moment and make choices about whether I am gonna hug somebody or am I gonna start an argument.”

Brandon Tumblin:

I got to repeat that quote: the loneliest place is in a crowd. It really reflected on me what Robin Williams said and, unfortunately…