Unintentional Loneliness
I was sitting in a large auditorium listening to a presentation by John Hill, Vice President of story at Whop. There were quite a few people in the auditorium, yet I was sitting alone on one row. I was also the only attendee over twenty-five years of age. It’s interesting how a person can feel lonely when surrounded by lots of other people!
As a result of this feeling, I thought about the day before, when I was sitting at the kitchen table of a ninety-one-year-old friend.
“Not one person called or visited me yesterday,” he said, unable to hide the lonely disappointment in his voice.
He lives in a large, mountain property with a lot of land. He’s alone now. His wife recently passed away. Of this he says, “my wife left me.” He has some family members living in the same state, but they’re at a distance, making it difficult to be with him daily. I peered at him.
He seemed to be a small boat, drifting on a huge, once peaceful ocean, turned turbulent. He was rudderless.
“What would you like to do with your life now?” I asked. “What are you looking forward to?”
After all, my friend is physically and mentally healthy. I look at him with wonder, hoping I can fare so well at his age.
“Giving advice to others is giving a piece of yourself to them,” John Hill said, bringing me back to the large auditorium. “The foundation for all strong relationships is face-to-face communication. Video telephone conversations would be next best. The weakest relationship builders are email and text.” He continued, causing me to think of Melissa Kirsch’s given advice.
“We’re all connected, related, dependent on one another, but of course we forget this all the time,” Melissa Kirsch teaches. “We forget that every action we take has a whole cascade of unintended consequences. And so often we feel separate, lonely, disconnected.”
She coaches, “One way to challenge that feeling is to start with one small thing. It may seem a little corny at first, but it works.”
It may seem a little corny for me to feel lonely in a mostly filled auditorium as well. Especially when it allowed me to feel emphatically-connected to my lonely friend. And, John Hill was standing in front of everyone, seemingly speaking directly to me.
“Face-to-face, give a piece of yourself.”
At the end, I walked away vowing to give more pieces of myself to my aged friend, as well as to others who may be unintentionally lonely. Because small face-to-face visits create a cascade of beneficial personal connection, leading to other positive consequences, that help end unintentional loneliness.
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I’m Lynn Butterfield, Real Estate & Lifestyle Expert and Television Host for American Dream TV. I’ve helped hundreds of Buyers and Sellers, as an Associate Broker with Coldwell Banker, to discover where and how they want to live and work; to achieve what I call Realesation™. That’s why I bring you American Dream TV, Both Sides of the Fence, About the Dish, Monday’s Warm Cocoa and Home by Design Magazine to stir your heart and mind. Contact me so I can join you along your own unique path of discovery.
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