Sitting with Loneliness

"So be lonely. Learn your way around loneliness. Make a map of it. Sit with it, for once in your life. Welcome to the human experience. But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilled yearning." Elizabeth Gilbert - "Eat, Pray, Love"

The truth is that loneliness happens inside of us. That means it is something we can feel in a crowd, at a party, as a couple, in the middle of the night, in a roomful of family or even after a sexual encounter.

In the past, I've worked on "rolling" with my emotions - anger and depression being the most prominent feelings that I needed to "feel" and deal with. Now it is loneliness. And it is time to embrace it and learn from it.

Loneliness is something that we all carry around with us. Most of the time, we don't like how it feels in our bodies and we do everything we can to ignore, cover up or eradicate it. Thus, we drink, take drugs, have sex or become obsessed with music, friends or anything that might mask the loneliness. But try as we might, any of these methods that we use only result in a temporary distraction from that thing called loneliness that resides in each of us.

Perhaps the trick is to acknowledge it. "Sit with it," as Elizabeth Gilbert says. Become acquainted with it and content with its existence. Perhaps it can teach us something.

Somewhat related to this is learning to look inside ourselves for God. That's not saying that we ARE God, but rather that God is IN us! So many of us were taught to look to external things that serve as evidence of our faith and devotion to God: church-going, bible study, prayer on our knees, hanging a saint around our neck or holding a rosary in our hands. The reality of this kind of "devotion" is that it comes from an effort of SELF. It assures our involvement in the process of devotion. On top of this, any talk or attempt to look inward, to meditate or study Zen-like beliefs leads people to accuse us of dabbling in "new age" spiritism.

We've traditionally ignored the Holy Spirit and His presence inside of us. It is God's Spirit IN us that connects us to Him. We miss out on so much by always trying to depend on external things with which to build a relationship with God. I don't have to be sitting in a church, carrying my Bible or on my knees to experience God. "I am with you always!" He says.

How awesome is that?! So, while we may feel lonely at times, we can have the assurance that we are never alone.