How do you cope with loneliness?

[caracalled]

I was really lonely for a while and now I'm not anymore. I think in part it's just that being lonely sucks! We're literally hard-wired to crave human connection, whether we want to or not!
I also felt like people could smell my loneliness and that I had to do my best to hide it.
I think what helped was accept that I was lonely and not try to go up against it if that makes sense? I spent a bunch of time learning how to do usually social things like going out to eat or going to the movies or the beach while being alone and enjoying them! I feel like I kind of reclaimed the label if that makes sense? And with that also came a relaxed-ness about new connections I was making that in turn helped me make friends later.
And I think, lastly what helped me accept it was that it really is just a phase in your life and not your whole life. You're not branded and you're not going to be lonely forever! I like to imagine these as just.. growing pains? This isn't supposed to minimize the feeling, it really sucks in the moment but as long as it'll be over someday it's fine for me I think, and being able to look back on it and having had that experience will make things easier for me in the future.

So yeah, in one sentence: Go out and do fun stuff alone! Go to the beach, the movies, the museum, the park, whatever! Take yourself out to dinner (in my experience ramen places are a good start bc people often come in alone do have lunch/dinner).
You're a fun person to be around for yourself too!

[soju]

listen to wikipedia!
it's nice to think of how many other people are all awake and online at the same time as me, thinking and writing and editing and sharing information... there are so many people who know so much about things i've never even heard of before, and we're all here on earth together at this very moment! i find it really wonderful and relaxing and it always cheers me up a bit if i'm feeling down or lonely. whatever's going on with me, there's always somebody out there editing wikipedia... i get the same feeling when i'm up late and i see a light on in someone else's room, even if it's streets away; it's just nice to know someone else is here, too, right now, even if we have nothing to do with each other.

I just checked this out! Such a cool way to demonstrate the scale of the internet. Like you said, it's really comforting to know that you're not completely alone, even if you don't know who is out there. The ambiance and sense of connection is also really relaxing, I could definitely see myself using hatnote as white noise to fall asleep to.


As for what I do when I'm feeling lonely; I try to force myself to go outside and try new things I wouldn't usually do. Even if it's a fairly reserved activity like going out and getting lunch, I find that it just helps me to get out of the house. Going on walks, to the gym, to concerts, museums, or just driving around listening to music pushes away those thoughts of loneliness I have when it gets to be too much.

[cami02]

I guess being alone is pretty easy for me as a very introverted person so I don't really need to cope. If I ever do feel lonely, I just give my sister a call or text a friend. If it's nighttime and everyone is asleep, I cuddle my cats  For those who are more extroverted, I imagine it's more difficult... My advice there would be to just reach out to someone, anyone - someone you care about or even a stranger online. What's the worst that can happen? They might not reply or be unavailable at the time, but most likely someone is. It's also important to learn to enjoy your own company. Which, trust me, I know is very difficult - I struggled with that for years. But once you finally do, it's worth it. Being comfortable in your own company makes you more independent and makes loneliness easier to cope with.

[nana7828]

Reading or listening to music i like being alone a little with myself i talk with myself too for me this was a little common at school every break i was alone reading manga,i like to be a little alone :)

[e-]

I'd like to add context to this discussion, if I may.
for various reasons I stopped having friends when I was maybe 11 or so and never regained the ability to make them. I've shut myself off in my little room of introversion for my whole life and am generally fine. So when ppl are responding with 'I'm an introvert so loneliness doesn't bother me.' I very much understand. BUT. The problem with that is waking up realizing you're missing out on life because you've locked yourself away in your own prison of comfort and sameness. Being alone is quite manageable when everything is safe and sound. But when you get well outside your comfort zone suddenly you need people to help you through; and if you've spent your whole life comfortably recluse it feels a bit like being dropped in the ocean when you never learned how to swim. I started this thread when I was living in a hostel on the opposite side of the planet. That's why I was feeling unbearably lonely. Getting out of your comfort zone is necessary for progress though. So maybe coping with loneliness isn't necessarily a good thing. I feel like it's a uniquely modern thing to not need people. You can use technology to supersede the biological necessity of contact with other humans. It's really not so hard to be comfortably alone. I find that horribly tragic though. It's harder than ever to connect with anyone around you because they've all got their interpersonal needs satiated by media and the internet.
In short, yes, I can cope with loneliness. I just don't really want to anymore. :/

[MrsMoe]

I don't have any good advice to add because quite frankly, I've been doing a terrible job at coping. I try to do a lot of things the people suggest here, like create things or take care of myself, but the loneliness zaps so much energy out of me that I can barely get myself to do these things. This why I wanted to ask you all something: what do you do when your depression and loneliness gets so bad that you can't distract yourself?

[e-]

@MrsMoe Well, this may or may not be horrible advice, but it works for me: I don't attempt to distract myself. I often feel like distraction is the worst thing you can do, because ultimately you're just repressing which is in itself agonizing. I go for really long walks, sometimes all night, as long as it takes to untangle all the stuff in my head and come to some sort of realization about why I'm feeling the way I am and a hypothesis for what to do about it.

As painful as it is, I really do believe loneliness and depression exist for very important reasons. For me it usually has to do with too much stagnation. When I am not moving forward in life, doing new things, growing stronger--that's when my mental health just collapses in on itself.

I guess I've been surviving on the belief that if I'm feeling depressed, there is a very rational and important cause that I am simply unaware of. And if I think about it enough and keep trying new things, eventually I can work through it. This belief has never let me down. It's never easy, but it's the only way forward. It's like some unpleasant task you'd rather not do, like getting spiders out of your house or something. You don't want to go face the spiders but if you let that dissuade you you doom yourself to having spiders in your house forever. Avoiding discomfort can wind up being the most uncomfortable thing.

That's what I do. But take all of the salt. I don't know how to live, life is never easy for me. I do think that I've come a long from where I've been. My problems of 5 years ago would be nothing to me now. But my now problems are just as crushingly overwhelming as they've always been. Progress at least gives you an internal feeling of perseverance, which can go a long way.

[b̷a̷̷t̷̷h̷̷t̷̷u̷̷b̷]

i smell banana

[MrsMoe]

@MrsMoe Well, this may or may not be horrible advice, but it works for me: I don't attempt to distract myself. I often feel like distraction is the worst thing you can do, because ultimately you're just repressing which is in itself agonizing. I go for really long walks, sometimes all night, as long as it takes to untangle all the stuff in my head and come to some sort of realization about why I'm feeling the way I am and a hypothesis for what to do about it.

As painful as it is, I really do believe loneliness and depression exist for very important reasons. For me it usually has to do with too much stagnation. When I am not moving forward in life, doing new things, growing stronger--that's when my mental health just collapses in on itself.

I guess I've been surviving on the belief that if I'm feeling depressed, there is a very rational and important cause that I am simply unaware of. And if I think about it enough and keep trying new things, eventually I can work through it. This belief has never let me down. It's never easy, but it's the only way forward. It's like some unpleasant task you'd rather not do, like getting spiders out of your house or something. You don't want to go face the spiders but if you let that dissuade you you doom yourself to having spiders in your house forever. Avoiding discomfort can wind up being the most uncomfortable thing.

That's what I do. But take all of the salt. I don't know how to live, life is never easy for me. I do think that I've come a long from where I've been. My problems of 5 years ago would be nothing to me now. But my now problems are just as crushingly overwhelming as they've always been. Progress at least gives you an internal feeling of perseverance, which can go a long way.

Thank you so much for your words. Regardless if it helps, I appreciate it a lot 

If I can't go on a walk, will lying in bed and just sitting with my feelings work too? I live in a woodland area and my mom doesn't like it when I got on walks sometimes because it makes her anxious.

[splashy]

dubstep, weed and jacking off
or to be real probably just ridiculous amounts of escapism

[Snow]

How do I cope with loneliness?
I don't, really.

Well, I do try and find ways to cope with it, but there are some days and nights where everything weighs down on me and something will serve as a stark reminder of how lonely I am and how most of my life has been void of socialisation, friends, and pretty much any interpersonal connection with other human beings. I've been friendless most of my life. I've never had a "friend group" and I don't know what that is. At most I've had a couple of people I'd consider acquaintances come-and-go throughout my life but that's about it. I spend 99% of my time alone and I often go days at a time without speaking to anyone face-to-face. At this point I've grown used to it. I'd say I'm mostly lonely because I'm autistic and hardly relate to anyone. My whole life I have felt so alien - like I'm a spectator in life, on the outside looking in. It especially doesn't help when it feels like where I live (Australia) everyone is super extroverted, confident, loud and outgoing, and I'm the total opposite of that, being extremely shy, introverted, quiet and meek.

As a few others have mentioned in this thread, I find that staying distracted and preoccupied with hobbies is the best coping mechanism. When I'm bored I tend to get lost in my thoughts and I usually spiral into negativity often directed at myself. But I find that when I'm working on one of my creative projects my mind will concentrate more on that; same for if I'm listening to music, watching something or playing a video game. I've found listening to music to be of tremendous help and when I'm listening to songs I really like, I get lost in all kinds of daydreams and my mind will often try to imagine my own "music video" in my head full of colourful and crazy visuals to accompany the song I'm listening to, and oftentimes my mind will end up looking something like your average Cyriak video or something, and that makes me happy!

But going back to the topic of loneliness, I know it's going to sound cliché but I really think it's best to just try and put yourself out there, even if it means finding a community and sort of having to aggressively exist in public, for lack of a better term. It'll be weird and awkward and sometimes a little cringe, but if you go in with enough gumption and consistently try to engage, even if it doesn't seem to work for a while, very often you'll make a space where you can fit in. It has sort of worked for me before, with limited success, but like I've tried to go to social groups for things like tabletop gaming, Smash Bros tournaments, and even pickleball and 10-pin bowling, and I've been able to talk to some people there and that makes me feel less lonely. Can't say I've ever made any friends from those events or it's been able to "fix" my loneliness though, but that's not to say it can't! We're a social species; when we see someone trying to engage, we're literally wired to reciprocate. I dunno, maybe this is preachy and incoherent, but I think that's the best advice I've got.

I do wish people all over the world felt less lonely. A lot of people would be a lot happier if we all felt more included and a part of something, and that we are all worth something, you know?

[vaderbuild]

Loneliness is a very tough problem to overcome, and I've had many struggles with it. I think my perspective could be useful as I've been both lonely and un-lonely pretty recently, but granted I am in high school where social opportunities are shoved in your face a lot.

I totally agree with you that distraction is a pretty unhealthy coping method, but sometimes it can keep us sane when there seems to be no out, which is I guess why so many people have recommended it. I moved across the country during the pandemic and lost all of my friends and just completely disassociated with the internet and video games. It helped in the moment, but I'm pretty sure it also ruined my social skills in real life, and I was very very shy and awkward when school started again after quarantine. (I should add that I've good online friends, but none of those friendships really lasted long... but they were still nice. Although I think that nothing beats natural real-life connection, seeing people react to one another in real time and such)

The only thing that really helped me to make friends was to understand the people around me better - their mannerisms and things they found funny and their experiences. And the only way to understand the people around me was to be around them, quite a lot. And sometimes I had to force myself and sacrifice things and time to do so..

I remember in 9th grade, the only social thing I did was chess club once a week (I'm cool, I know). And that first meeting I was physically shaking with anxiety. But I also eventually met my best friend there, as we were similar skill level and would play each other a lot, which turned to talking, which turned to sitting with each other at lunch. Fast forward to 11th grade, and I had two hobbies I was good at - drawing and playing trombone. I liked drawing a lot more, but I got peer pressured into joining the marching band even though I thought it was kind of weird and pointless. Now with the season over, I can say that marching band was weird and pointless, and I wondered if it was a mistake a lot of times. But there were also parts that I enjoyed, and I improved so much socially with all of those hours around other people. I didn't quite mesh with most people there, but I found a group of people that I quite enjoy being around, while also being very tiring for me. So it definitely wasn't all great, but I can say that I didn't feel lonely during this period at all.

This is all to say that in my experience, having a social hobby or activity might help, even if it's not your main interest. I liked what Snow said, "aggressively existing in public" haha. Even if you don't say much, just showing up helps.

Thank you so much for your words. Regardless if it helps, I appreciate it a lot 

If I can't go on a walk, will lying in bed and just sitting with my feelings work too? I live in a woodland area and my mom doesn't like it when I got on walks sometimes because it makes her anxious.

@MrsMoe If the weather is decent, sitting outside could work too. I also find that writing my feelings out in a journal is really helpful for straightening my thoughts out. Best of luck to you too!

[candycanearter07]

I think the problem I have with loneliness is the same problem that causes most of my issues in my life: a lack of conviction to do things outside my comfort zone/outside the flow of things..

Like, I only really feel comfortable being kinda outgoing and nerdy about stuff when it's either like watching someone else play a game (and its like a group of people) or like they come up to me and force that conversation and while I do have some "friends" maybe in person it feels like the second there's not an event or like hanging out at a certain place each day to force us together then it just feels a lot harder to reach out and stuff and its even hard to like work on my hobbies sometimes because I'm all worried about messing up or it being hard and then I don't even try and IDK

TLDR I'm ok at talking with people when I'm not the one organizing and there's something else going on to comment on

[ayn_sweeet]

I used to have no friends. For about 2 and a half years of my life, I was bullied a lot and had pretty much nobody to rely on... and (being an extrovert) it was hard for me to cope with the loneliness. But before I give you any tips, please remember that it is okay. There is nothing wrong with being alone. Everyone feels lonely sometimes, and its okay. 

Here's just a general list of things you can do to deal with loneliness. :D

1. Acceptance is the first step to dealing with loneliness. Acknowledge that you are lonely, and acknowledge that it is okay... no matter what the circumstances.

2. Discover yourself (or re-discover yourself.) Go outside one day and go alone. Be alone with yourself and with your thoughts and discover who you are as a person. Go somewhere that nobody else goes to (like the middle of a forest or an abandoned park.) It might be uncomfortable... or you might even find that you enjoy it. No matter what, learn to love yourself and be alone with yourself.

3. Read something. Reading is what really helped me thru loneliness. Pick up a book that sounds interesting and dive in! If you can't think of any books, try researching a bit... but I would definitely not recommend booktok for newer readers unless you are a GIANT A03 fan...

4. Look around. No, seriously. Look around. Have you ever taken even one moment of your life to actually look around? Look at the building you are currently in or buildings around you and contemplate the design choices... why did the designer choose to do that particular thing? Do you think it's aesthetically pleasing? What could they have done differently? I never noticed that the mall I frequently went to on a daily basis had so many shops I didn't know about... so many fire escape doors that I could explore. I never noticed all the little corners of my school, all of the "out-of-bounds" areas that I hadn't given a second thought on. It was insane.

5. Romanticise your life. This is controversial, but romanticising my life is what really helped me thru being lonely. Making it into an "aesthetic" that I was following helped me a lot as it no longer felt like something I had to just trudge through, but as something fun and aesthetically pleasing.

6. People watch. Just watch people. Listen to conversations, pretend you are apart of them and add your own contributions.

7. Philosophy is your best friend! Research on it a bit and actually think deeply about your answers and the way you construct them in your brain.

8. Talk to people online. No matter how alone you are, you always have the internet. Try to find a community of people online that you can be friends with, to help fill that pit of loneliness you have created for yourself. You could even go as far as to finding communities in your town/city... but this can be risky and I wouldn't recommend this if you don't know self defence or if you don't keep pepper spray in your wallet.

9. Start a very long TV series. Gilmore Girls is my personal favourite.

10. Start playing/learning video games. I remember that when I was very lonely, I played valorant and league of legends frequently to get my mind off of things.

11. Listen to new music! This was also something I did to get my mind off of things/cope with loneliness. If you have some artists/songs you strongly like, go on this website called spotalike and find similar songs/artists! Music is a great escape from reality as well. I used to make up scenarios in my head that matched the beat of the music whenever things got tough.

12. Don't hold yourself in, let it out and cry. Crying is sometimes the best way to let things go.

13. Discover new hobbies.

14. Finish projects you have been meaning to finish but haven't had the time for.

15. Discover what your political views on the world are... like for example, through my loneliness epidemic I discovered that I was alternative.

I hope that these help! And remember, being lonely is okay. There is nothing to be ashamed or upset about. Being alone is actually (in my opinion) sometimes better than it is to have friends.

If you ever want to talk, my email is aynmerchant9@gmail.com. I'd be happy to have a discussion with you <3

[Bluuu2000]

I  go  on  walks  a  lot.  Also  I  was  an  only  child  and  moved  around  a  lot  so  I  just  sort  of  got  used  to  solitude.