Psychologist Andrey Kashkarov told how to get rid of loneliness
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to get rid of loneliness. But it's important to understand - is it loneliness?
Perhaps loneliness frightens you as a lack of depth or forms of communication with the outside world, personal lack of demand - then this may be a problem of socialization.
The situation with the feeling of loneliness and dependence on it can be corrected by understanding the basic premises of the concepts, says psychologist Andrei Kashkarov .
It is possible to conditionally divide the concepts of "internal" (cherished by you) and "external" (brought into your life by others, the world) loneliness. It is possible to conditionally divide loneliness - as a consequence of a closed (shy, with elements of compromise, fear of being misunderstood, excessive modesty) character, including relying on genetics and hereditary traits, and on the understanding of loneliness as an unwillingly acquired experience of situations not worked through since childhood, which caused and prolonged the resentment of a specific person for "all life". There are many nuances in the topic. And high-quality effective therapy depends on each of them.
You can be very sociable and at the same time lonely. In the repertoire of the talented famous musician Andrey Makarevich (album "Rivers and Bridges") there is a song with the following words: "She goes through life laughing." And its resulting part:
"She goes through life laughing,
When she's visiting, she feels like she's at home, where everything is familiar,
Good luck with her, life is a success,
And without exception, everyone is in admiration
They look after her
And they don’t notice how he cries at night
She who goes through life laughing..."
Internal cognitive dissonance is very clearly visible from the outside – no matter how much you smile. What is needed, first of all, is harmony. A step towards it is liberation from the cyclical perception of one’s “mistakes” and the habit of looking for mistakes in others, relying on one’s own imperfect experience. We are now talking about a person’s critical thinking in relation to oneself.
Don't demand much from others. And, oddly enough, you will get a lot. No one owes you anything. This is the golden rule number one in communication and building a quality socialization route that will save you from external loneliness.
It is quite possible that in a particular case the problem is not loneliness at all, but a set of signs of voluntarism, when a person passes off wishful thinking as reality, trying to get attention - from others, loved ones, relatives, children, but receives only misunderstanding or even criticism, which turns into negative emotions for the initiator of communication. If they "accumulate", the situation for a particular individual will worsen and can lead to an affective personality disorder - depression. And who needs that?
Active actions work well against loneliness – everything that helps to “switch off” cyclical thoughts for a while. Active actions are sports and new impressions, emotions.
One of the few relatively complex cases of correction of external and experienced loneliness is the development of the sociopathy effect.
Sociopathy has five or six very clear signs. You can check yourself using tests. Conditionally - this is when the process is so advanced that a person has long been accustomed to living in his shell, but in this case he almost does not feel his loneliness until he goes out into the world, and he does not do it often - such is the protective reaction of his body. The most difficult case, but even it is "treatable". Another question is whether it is necessary to treat?
The world is multifaceted and unique, and that is what makes it beautiful, because people who are sometimes completely different in their characteristics, personal experience and goal-setting live and interact in it. Or maybe they do not want to get rid of loneliness and are in a comfort zone. It is not our business - without a request from them - to determine "who to treat" and "when to treat".
In addition, it is appropriate to consider this topical issue from a different angle - is it really necessary to get rid of loneliness even without treatment. After all, any understanding of the situation is subjective for you: for someone, your loneliness, so unpleasantly felt, is not at all critical and even "not loneliness".
In any case, you need to understand that you yourself are a unique, original person, no worse than others, and you choose your own life path, reactions to external circumstances. And if this is so, then somewhere in the world there are definitely people with similar thoughts, goals and experience. You need to look for them and find them. Perhaps they are already looking for you. The Internet, among other things, can help you; there are even clubs of interest not only for sociopaths, but also for lovers of solitude. If you recall the "Diogenes Club" - "a club of silent people", accessible to analytical reflection thanks to the literary heritage of Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle, then he is also suitable as an example.
Philosophical thought also presupposes such an understanding: “I am not alone”; that is, for a person communicating, say, with otherworldly worlds or a deity, the problem of loneliness does not exist at all. Therefore, one of the accessible and possible examples is religious studies or, in other words, church praxis.
