The Positive Side Of Loneliness
When we went to school, we used expressions like “I passed it” or “I failed”. Many times we were not able to recognize the price of our decisions. We apologized for external things. The correct expression would have been “I chose not to study” or “I chose to do something else”. We are often afraid that the “group”, that everyone else, will not accept us. We are afraid of loneliness.
The freedom to be yourself implies two very important things. This implies that you avoid excuses and that you take responsibility for your actions. But it is very difficult to be free, free from the anxiety of being liked by everyone. Free from striving to follow what others want. To do what society or the people around us want us to do.
The freedom that the Western world is trying to defend and that many other countries are jealous of. But there is a much more subtle freedom. It is the freedom to choose within the margins of what we have, it is what really makes us afraid. Because it means that we must accept the risk of what we are: our own decisions. We must take responsibility.
Freedom and the acceptance of others
In today’s society, our behavior, and also the way we dress, comb our hair and talk, is a format for seeking the acceptance of others. It’s not about completely breaking the rules and doing what we want. It is instead about finding a balance between our personal freedom and our respect for others. But the paradox is that if we do not accept ourselves, others will probably never accept us.
At the moment, many studies indicate that we tend to show the best side of ourselves in social networks. We do this as a way to seek the approval of others.
We publish what we think will give us likes from others. And we do not publish things that we think will be less popular. This is also applied to our offline life. We show the parts of ourselves that we think others will like better.
There are also studies that have shown that the part of the brain that is activated when a reward is received is also activated when we get the approval of others. So we see it as a reward. It’s fun to get rewards from others, but it can not be the engine that drives our lives. The engine of our lives must be what we ourselves want.
The positive and negative sides of loneliness
There are anthropological studies that claim that this search for approval has its roots hundreds of thousands of years ago. In the past, we depended on a group to survive. A person could not survive alone in that environment. We have come to associate freedom with loneliness. For example, if the group does not accept me, I will be free, but I will be alone.
A study published last year by Perspectives on Psychological Science showed new findings when it comes to how loneliness affects quality of life. 70 previous studies were analyzed, conducted between 1980 and 2014 regarding how loneliness, social isolation and living alone affect life expectancy.
It was established that social isolation is associated with a previous death. By social isolation we mean to have few or no social contacts, or to perform few or no social activities. Therefore, these people’s risk of previous death increases by 29%.
But loneliness in the moments we reflect and learn who we are has a different meaning. Seeking confirmation from others can make us feel alone. But accepting ourselves and learning from our mistakes will help us get to know the person we really are.
