Well-known Austrian psychotherapist, representative of existential analysis Alfried Lengle talks about how the feeling of loneliness can help us discover ourselves and find love.
When I see all of you, I don’t feel alone. I hope you do too. Loneliness is familiar to each of us and is usually experienced very painfully. We want to run away from it, drown it out in every possible way – the Internet, TV, movies, alcohol, work, various types of addiction. We can’t bear to feel abandoned.
Loneliness is the experience of not being in a relationship. If you love someone, then you yearn for separation from your loved one when you don’t see him for a long time. I miss the person I love, I feel connected to him, close to him, but I cannot see him, I cannot meet him.
A similar feeling can be experienced with nostalgia, when we yearn for our native places. We can feel lonely at work if we are presented with demands that we have not yet grown up to, and no one supports us. If I know that everything depends on me alone, there may be a fear that I will be a weakling, a feeling of guilt due to the fact that I will not cope. It is even worse if mobbing (bullying) occurs at work. Then I will feel that I am simply given up to be torn to pieces, I am on the edge of society, I am no longer a part of it.
Loneliness is a big theme in old age and in childhood. It’s not bad if the child spends a couple of hours alone – for him this is an impetus for development. But prolonged loneliness is very traumatic for children, they stop developing their “I”.
In old age, loneliness no longer prevents development, but can cause depression, paranoia, insomnia, psychosomatic complaints and pseudo-dementia – when a person calms down and begins to be silent from loneliness. He used to have a family and maybe children, he worked for decades, was among people, and now he sits at home alone.
At the same time, we can experience loneliness being among people: at a holiday, at school, at work, in the family. It happens that people are nearby, but there is not enough closeness. We have superficial conversations, and I have a need to talk for real, about me and about you. In many families, they discuss what needs to be done, who should buy what and who should cook the food, but they are silent about relationships, about what touches and cares. Then I feel alone and in the family.
If no one sees me in the family, especially when it comes to a child, then I am alone. Even worse – I am abandoned, because people around do not come to me, are not interested in me, do not look at me.
Relationships always have a beginning when we first meet, but relationships never end.
The same thing happens in partnerships: we have been together for 20 years, but at the same time we feel completely alone. The sexual relationship is functioning, with more or less joy, but am I in the relationship? Do they understand me, do they see me? If we do not talk heart to heart, as we did when we were in love, then we become lonely even in good relationships.
We cannot be constantly ready for communication, open to another person. Sometimes we plunge into ourselves, busy with our problems, feelings, think about the past, and we don’t have time for another, we don’t look at it.
This can happen exactly when he needs communication the most. But it does not harm the relationship if we can then talk, share our feelings. Then we find each other again. If not, these moments remain wounds that we receive on the path of life.
Relationships always have a beginning when we first meet, but relationships have no end. All the relationships that I had with other people (friends, lovers) have been preserved in me. If I meet my ex-girlfriend in 20 years on the street, my heart starts to beat faster – because something was, and it still continues to be in me.
If I experienced something good with a person, then this is a source of happiness for me in the next stage of life. Every time I remember this, I have a good feeling. As far as I stay connected with the person with whom I have or had a relationship, so I will never be alone. And I can live on that.
I cannot truly experience a relationship with another if I am incapable of responsiveness.
If I was offended, hurt, disappointed, deceived, devalued, ridiculed, then I feel pain, turning to myself. The natural reflex of a person is to turn away from that which causes pain and suffering.
Sometimes we suppress our feelings so much that psychosomatic disorders can arise. Migraine, stomach ulcers, asthma tell me: you do not feel something very important. You don’t have to go on living like this, turn to it, feel what hurts so that you can process it – mourn, grieve, forgive – otherwise you will not be free.
If I don’t feel myself, or my feelings are muted, then I’m alone with myself. If I don’t feel my body, my breath, my mood, my well-being, my cheerfulness, my fatigue, my motivation and my joy, my suffering and my pain, then I am not in a relationship with myself.
Even worse, I can’t also experience relationships with others. I can’t have feelings for you, feel that I like you, that I want to be with you, that I enjoy spending time with you, I have a need to be close to you, to open up to feel you. How can all this function if I have no relationship with myself and no feelings towards myself?
I cannot really experience a relationship with another if I am not capable of responding, if there is no movement in me, because the feelings are too wounded, because they are too heavy feelings. Or because I never really had them, because for many years I did not get close to other people.
If other people take me seriously, then I feel that I am not just seen, but recognized for my worth.
If my mother never took me in her arms, didn’t put me on her knees, didn’t kiss me, if my father didn’t have time for me, if I didn’t have real friends who could do it, then I have a “dull” world of feelings – a world that could not develop could not open up. Then my feelings are poor, and then I am always alone.
Is there any way out? I may have feelings, but those are my feelings, not yours. I may feel close to you, but I still come back to myself and have to be myself. The other person has the same feelings, he feels the same way. He is also in himself.
If other people look at me, in my direction, then by doing so they will let me know: “I see you. Are you here”.
If other people are interested in what I do, if they see what I have done, then they notice our boundaries and differences. They tell me: “Yes, you said it,” “That was your opinion,” “You baked this pie.” I feel seen, which means I was treated with respect.
If other people take the next step and take me seriously, listen to my words – “What you said is important. Maybe you can explain?” – then I feel that I was not just seen, but recognized as my value. I can be criticized – maybe someone else doesn’t like something, but it gives me contours as a person. If others come to me, tune in to me, I am not alone.
Martin Buber said that “I” becomes “I” next to “You”. “I” acquires structure, the ability to communicate with itself – and then learn to communicate with others. We have a personality – a source. This source itself begins to speak in us, but for this “I” must be heard. This “I” needs a “You” who will listen to him. Thus, through meeting with another person, a meeting with oneself becomes possible.
By meeting with the other, I can go to myself. And at the same time I have an inner life, the personality inside me speaks to my “I”, and through the “I” speaks to the “You” and thus expresses itself. If I live out of this consistency, then I become myself. And then I’m not alone anymore.