Why Are We Afraid of Being Alone?

Nurturing the most intimate relationship in our lives is a rewarding experience

“Loneliness” has become the buzzword of contemporary conversations about mental health. People keep saying, “We are facing an epidemic of loneliness.”

What do people mean by loneliness? Is it being alone without human company and social interactions?

Loneliness can also mean a lack of connection with others or a sense of emptiness about life in general.

Most of the conversations about loneliness revolve around the ‘dreadful’ prospect of being alone. During the pandemic, many people were confined to their homes, alone. People worked from home without in-person contact with their colleagues.

Why are we afraid to be alone?

People remind me of Pascal’s quote from his book Pensees when they complain that they are alone:

All men’s miseries derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone.

The consequences of our fear of alone time

I am not a social scientist; I am a concerned global citizen.

I wish humanity lived in peace and close harmony with Nature and other living beings.

As a global citizen, I exercise my right to offer a hypothesis about the root cause of the disorder, disillusionment and violence in the contemporary world.

I propose that our fear of alone time has compromised our ability to nurture the most intimate relationship in our lives- the one we have with ourselves.

Our failed relationship with ourselves spills over into the outside world regarding lack of self-control, anger, violence and mental illness.

How we view ourselves and treat ourselves, influences how we view others, which determines how others view us and treat us.

If we lack self-respect, we treat others with disrespect or fear others.

If we lack self-compassion, we fail to treat others with compassion.

The negative reinforcements can turn into a vicious cycle if we fail to introspect alone.

The fear of being alone also has global consequences. World leaders who have a troubled relationship with themselves, plunge the world into disastrous wars through their reckless actions.

See, there are planetary consequences of one self-relationship gone awry.

Transform loneliness into solitude

Sweet are the uses of adversity. ( Shakespeare, in As You Like It )

Despite the suffering it inflicted on humanity, the pandemic had hidden blessings.

People who complained about being alone, lost a golden opportunity to embrace solitude.

“Living together with others begins with living together with ourselves”. (Hannah Arendt, in The Life of the Mind)

Instead of fearing being alone, they could have transformed loneliness into solitude. People never will get the lost opportunity to be alone without distractions once they return to the post-pandemic life.

Fear of loneliness is fear of solitude. People are more afraid to be alone than to miss human company.

Our fear of aloneness traps us in a self-reinforcing cycle of negativity.

“The more we keep aloneness at bay, the less we are able to deal with it and the more terrifying it gets.”( William Deresiewicz, literary critic in The End of Solitude )

Solitude is the quality time we spend with ourselves. It’s the time to reflect deeply on ourselves and take stock of our lives. It’s the time to introspect whether our actions aligned with our values, to realise where we went wrong or how we wronged others.

Alone time is when we can converse with our souls intimately without distractions. It’s the time to heal ourselves through self-investigation and self-interrogation. Without self-healing, we cannot hope to heal others or impact the world by utilising our unique abilities and skills.

We cannot exercise free will without engaging in self-reflection if we have free will.

Solitude is independence. ( Herman Hesse, in Steppenwolf)

It’s a supreme irony that we prefer the shackles of frivolous and stressful social interactions to solitude's liberating, revitalising and transformational energy.

Final thoughts

Self-reflection drives personal growth. Solitude facilitates self-reflection more than social interactions.

“These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world.” ( Ralph Waldo Emerson, in his essay Self-reliance )

Human progress depends on solitude. Great people get world-changing insights when they spend time alone.

We fear loneliness because we are afraid to stand trial before the inner voice's court and listen to the charge sheet about our moral transgressions.

Self-relationship is the most important relationship in our lives. Solitude facilitates the building of self-worth and self-compassion.

Self-scrutiny facilitates personal growth, which only is possible if we protect chunks of alone time with ourselves.

A troubled self-relationship has consequences for the wider world.

The world will see peace and tranquillity if people shed their fear of being alone and transform alone time into introspective and healing solitude.

Thanks for reading this story.

Disclaimer

People suffering from disorders like severe depression should avoid spending all their time alone. They should seek professional help.