Overcoming Loneliness

Solitude can be a wonderful opportunity for some peace and quiet and some rest and relaxation, but it can become overwhelming and turn to loneliness if prolonged. Whether you’re considering a solo adventure or living alone and need some tips on overcoming loneliness, you may find a selection of the following tips useful. Choose the ones that feel right for you and put your all into it. And then consider the ones that don’t feel right for you, you never know, you might end up learning something new about yourself!

Create an imaginary friend.

A lot of us had these as children, especially if we were an only child. Parasocial relationships are, in essence, imaginary friends for adults and are completely harmless and can reduce loneliness. You can allow your imagination to run wild and create the friend you need, a group of friends, or an imaginary pet even. Imagining someone alongside you on your travels can bring a sense of comfort and, when alone in your home or your car, there’s nothing to stop you from talking to them either!

Write your autobiography.

It doesn’t need to be anything special, and you don’t need to be great at grammar or spelling, it’s for you and only you (unless you do decide to have it published of course!). Writing about your life brings so many benefits aside from giving you something to focus on. It’s a great opportunity for reflection, to consider your experiences, how you’ve changed, how you’ve come to be where you are today, how you’ve coped, what your strengths and weaknesses have been, and what you consider to be your best bits. Focusing on yourself in this way may help you find your own additional inner strategies to combat loneliness.

Acknowledge your loneliness.

Consider how loneliness really feels for you. Try to get out of your thoughts and feel the emotions that accompany it, and how it exists physiologically in your body. Where in your body do you feel it? How strong is it on a scale of 1-10? What colour is it? What action is needed to move it elsewhere or eliminate it? Our body knows what we need, and our feelings of loneliness are activated when our body knows we’ve had too much alone time. How do you know when it’s getting strong enough to need interaction? And what will satisfy it? Is it still manageable and satisfied with a distraction? Or do we need a chat with a friend?

This paragraph was published in inews in June 2024 and can be found here along with more tips for you to consider.

Join an online support group or forum.

There is a vast audience just waiting to talk to you about their experience or needing someone with wisdom to ask their questions to. Consider what you’re good at and become the go-to expert in the group or look for a topic you’re interested in and start asking your own questions, people love to talk about themselves and what they know. You’re giving people a great opportunity to feel good about sharing their expertise and giving yourself hours of interaction which you can do anonymously if you prefer.

Get yourself a pet.

It doesn’t have to be expensive or cost much to feed a pet and you’ll find worth in being needed by another living creature. Consider your budget and space in your home and what you’re physically able to commit to. Do your research and ensure you’re not taking on a pet whose needs exceed your capabilities. Do you go for the basic goldfish, a budgie, a cane toad, an axolotl or something even more exotic? A parrot will talk back to you so that’s definitely an option to consider! And all that research is a great distraction from loneliness in itself even if you decide against the pet in the end.

Create a vision board.

Spend some time getting creative and draw, paint, use magazine cutouts for a collage etc and imagine your world without loneliness. What would it look like? When we visualise an end-goal we are more likely to feel motivated to achieve it. Make it colourful and attractive and imagine how it would feel to have that life. Is it achievable? How can you go about making it a reality? It will likely feel overwhelming to begin with. Take one element of your dream life and focus on that. Break that one section down into manageable chunks and find your first step. Once you’ve achieved it, consider the second step and so on. Every step is a step further away from loneliness.

Get out of your comfort zone.

No-one ever really benefited from staying comfortable. Consider how you might challenge yourself, which activities you’d like to give a go, where you might meet like-minded people (potential friends) and check for events and groups in your local area. Even if you don’t meet anyone you get on with, you’ve still had a great time doing the new thing you can feel proud of yourself for pushing yourself to do. You’d be surprised just how little effort you sometimes need to make to generate a new connection with someone. People will even talk to you at the local library whilst you’re quietly reading, but if axe throwing is more your thing….

Make friends with yourself.

The one person we know more than anyone else in the world is ourselves and yet most of us don’t take the time to really sit with ourselves and consider what makes us truly happy. It may well be that solitude is something to truly relish when we are filling it with activities we wholeheartedly enjoy. Can we ever truly feel lonely when we have ourselves to keep us company? Take the time to get to know yourself. Build yourself up. Be your own cheerleader. Fill yourself with confidence and learn to enjoy your own company. Dance like everyone is watching and you don’t care!