HOW NOT TO BE LONELY

by Dr. Richard D. Dobbins, Minister and Psychologist

The only thing about creation God saw as not good was the fact that the man was alone. He then created woman and designed marriage and the family so that we would never have to be alone.

WHERE DOES THE FEAR OF LONELINESS COME FROM?

We were created for fellowship with God and each other. But Satan wants to put distance between you and God—between you and those you love.

Every healthy Christian fears being separated from God, and every healthy human being fears being separated from other human beings.

I believe there is a universal awareness that human beings were at one time in union with God. Also, I believe there is a universal awareness that outside of Christ we are estranged from God.

The Bible tells us that he who fears is not made perfect in love and that perfect love casts out fear. (see 1 John 4:18). So, if that fear has its roots in our separation from God, the first step toward dealing with it is re-establishing a healthy relationship with God. And this can only be done through Jesus Christ.

When we accept Christ and we renew our relationship with God, this fear is swallowed up in God’s love. In fact, John tells us if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another (1 John 1:7).

From a natural point of view, some believe our fear of loneliness has its roots in our expulsion from our mother’s body when we are born. After all, birth is a very anxiety-provoking experience for the baby. At the time the baby is born, there is a transformation that takes place in human existence.

Prior to birth that baby has gotten all of his needs for food, nutrition, waste expulsion, oxygen, met in the mother’s body automatically. But when the baby suddenly is pushed and squeezed and shoved and pulled into the world, he has to gasp to see if his lungs work as the new means for getting oxygen.

He has to acquire food and take care of his own waste disposal needs. These things all then have to be learned by the baby, and that is a very anxiety-provoking experience.

HOW DOES LONELINESS AFFECT PEOPLE?

Lonely people experience a kind of depression that is created by an absence of human warmth, an absence of close, personal relationships. That depression really is an expression of loneliness, and often it leaves the person feeling anxious.

Anxieties are undifferentiated fears. When we talk about a fear we are talking about something specific. When we talk about anxiety, we are talking about a generalized fear.

You will also discover that lonely people have very poor self-concepts. They do not like themselves. And it is not liking themselves that makes them assume that other people will not like them. Oftentimes that makes them shy or timid in approaching other people.

Lonely people do tend to criticize themselves to a greater degree than most people. They tend to hold rather cynical and rejecting attitudes about other people and really about humanity in general.

Many are not good listeners. To be a friend that other people enjoy, one has to be a good listener. They may not tune in to the subtle nuances of conversations. Lonely people may give you the impression that they really do not care to know you.

This is not true; they do want to get to know you, but their fear that you do not want to get to know them makes them reluctant to reach out to you.

WHEN DO WE BECOME AWARE OF OUR NEED FOR FRIENDS?

We begin to become aware of our need for friends very early in life. However, the roles of our friendships change as we get older. For example, in our third year we begin to make friends with children our age.

At that age we see a friend as a momentary physical playmate. There is no sense of permanence in our friendships. But a 5-year-old sees a friend as someone who does things that are pleasing and helpful. It is at this time that we are beginning to be aware that friendship is a two-way street.

At about nine or ten years of age, friendships come to be seen in terms of intimacy and material-sharing. These are the friendships that are really close to our hearts, where we believe people hear us the way we hear ourselves. And we hear them the way they hear themselves. We know each other.

From the time we begin to have friends, triangles become a problem. You can watch two little kids play and have fun together until a third child joins them.

Throughout childhood and into adolescence, friendships are often viewed as exclusive and possessive. Not until later adolescence do we come to understand friendships as close relationships between two people that have other friends and other interests in life.

WHAT ABOUT FRIENDSHIP CURES OUR LONELINESS?

Only intimate friendships can cure our loneliness. And when we are about eight or nine years of age, we begin to long for that kind of a close relationship with another person.

This longing for intimacy creates a desperate search on the part of the child for a close friend, a buddy, or a chum. Although this level of friendship creates the capacity for greater and greater levels of intimacy, it also increases the likelihood of greater levels of loneliness when we face separation from an intimate friend, or worse yet, the loss of an intimate friend.

In fact, the termination of an intimate relationship—through death or separation—is one of the most traumatic experiences of life.

So, intimacy and loneliness are forever wrapped together in life. Intimacy involves two people who are capable of relating to each other in supportive and helpful ways. Each of them is secure enough to share his or her wholeness with the other.

Their relationship will have the following characteristics:

• a warm affection for each other

• the ability and willingness to trust each other with intimate details of life

• growth stimulation

• a concerned commitment for each other

• a willingness to share time and space with each other

• a sense of unity

• both are surrendered to God

• there is harmony between them

• they set aside times and places to nurture their intimacy

• each keeps the other in touch with reality

HOW CAN A PERSON LEARN TO BE AN INTIMATE FRIEND?

If you want to have intimate friendships you will need to learn how to be an intimate friend. This will require you to be seen by others as: neutral—not dogmatic; warm—not cold and distant; sincere—not phony; loving—not indifferent; appreciative—not demanding; and less dominant, less self-centered.

You will know when you are succeeding in your search for these characteristics when you find yourself thinking more about people and your relationships with them; you will engage in more conversations and write more personal letters; and will be less likely to report wishing you were alone.

Intimate friendships provide an attachment from which you derive a sense of security; a feeling of shared activities and concerns; opportunities for nurturing, in which you take responsibility for the welfare of another person; reassurance of your worth and your competence; sense of reliable alliance, or the expectation of continued assistance in the future; and guidance, or help during times of stress and support for solving problems.

Solomon says that friends are born of adversity (see Proverbs 17:17). That is, you find your real friends when you are going through personal storms and trials.

My mother used to tell me when I would try to explain some awkward situation I was in, “Son, no explanation is necessary for your friends and none is adequate for your enemies.” Do you have this kind of friend in your life?

Are you this kind of friend for others? Solomon said something else about friends: “There is a friend that sticks closer to you than a brother” (Proverbs 18:24).

That Friend is Jesus Christ. Is He your intimate Friend? He wants to be; and, He can be if you will let Him. Open your heart to Him. Confess your sins to Him.

He will take the loneliness out of your life and help you to become the kind of person other people want as their close and intimate personal friend.