Alone Together

Even though I’m “The Imperfect Best, Awkwardly Awesome Guy”, I still catch myself feeling alone in the mistakes I make, not to mention my countless worries, perceived inefficiencies, failings, dreams that aren’t coming true fast enough, and fears of mortality.

To make this lonely conversation even more complex, there are other things I sometimes feel alone in too.  Sometimes, I feel alone in my strengths, talents, successes, and good fortune.  This is especially true when I see people struggling in the world around us.

Loneliness can feel so utterly painful.

When I’m feeling lonely, it can seem like I’m the only one experiencing such painful feelings, but I strongly suspect that’s not an accurate perception.  Even though I’ve done exactly zero scientific research on the subject, I imagine many, if not most humans experience some degree of loneliness as they do their imperfect best to navigate their lives day after day.

To make up for my lack of research, let’s do a quick case study together, shall we?  Like me, are you a person who struggles with loneliness sometimes?

If your answer is yes, then the question for both of us becomes:  How can we do our imperfect best to feel less alone and more connected to each other in this very big, complex, and uncertain world we share?

This is such a challenging question.  Each day I strive to learn a little more of that answer.  And each day, my answer changes.   Alas, I have no definitive take-home points to offer you on this subject.

But I do know this:

Although each one of us may feel lonely at times, we are not alone in any of this.  We are one of almost 8 billion people, the vast majority of whom we don’t know and will never meet, all with different stories, but all going through countless variations of the same stuff.