The following excerpt is from my book, The Meeting Place: Moments with God at Lookout Point.
Loneliness
Is Profound
It
seems to me that there is a debilitating grain in the fiber of loneliness—a
weakening section that follows the grain, a deadwood streak that affects the
strength of the heartwood, making it harder to be well and healthy, harder to
return to health. I also perceive through
personal experience that not all loneliness is the same. Some is generalized. To
be lonely on its own merits, not involving loss of someone, is the feeling of
being by oneself, alone—not that of pain associated with losing. The other type
of loneliness, the loss of someone that makes a hole and a vacuum created by
the loss is another matter it seems to me, although related by its empty, alone
feeling.
These come in varied increments
of tragedy, some after a long history of conflict, the type that leads to
divorce. Some after a short duration, such as an infant’s death, though not to
be discounted because of the much-loved time attached to the shortness of life.
And then the experience of losing someone who loved you and you have loved in
return, who has loved you in tenderness and deep affection in a shared meeting
of hearts, a soul mate, a defender, and even protector. The loss of this person
adds a loneliness that freezes action and recovery. They simply aren’t there to pick you up when the day
is hard, to smile with you at a pretty rainbow, to help you create your future,
or help you put the dishes away after a big fancy dinner with the family. Missing like this is profound in its
ability to make us stop, possibly cry, feel an enveloping sadness that grows to
a dark blanket covering our souls as we succumb to its numbness; a retreat of
mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical proportions. We hate it, yet we can
easily get lost in it—almost like a comforting retreat from the world and our
own reality. We want help—but we also don’t want help. It would mean giving up
that attachment, that person, that memory—that has grown to mean so much to us.
Self-pity seems to be a wrong definition to me. Yet it could be seen that way
at times. Denial? I suppose it’s there, too. Self-absorption, I’m positive, has
its part.
To face loneliness is hard. It
may require something of us—a letting go, a giving up, a moving forward, a
looking to the better good, an action, a formula, and a purpose, and more; the
list is endless. But we get stuck in the loneliness so often, especially on
days fraught with association of memories. Loneliness is feeling like you can’t
breathe—a grief of sorts: a gray heart on a sunny day, no lover on Valentine’s
Day, an absent child on Mother’s Day, no gift on your birthday, a missing plate
on the table, an empty room with its bed made, a pet leash hanging unused on
the wall, an empty pillow next to you on the other side of the bed, photos in
an album, no hugs, no kisses, no touches, no fingerprints, no paw prints, no
car door slamming—or happy sounds of walking feet. You are alone. You have to
face it—and you don’t want to.
What are the colors of
loneliness? I picture dim to gray to blue to black in muted colors, now brown,
greenish-gray, and checkered black and white.
Loneliness has a way of
bringing back memories—memories we want to keep of better days, of cherished
moments, interactions in word and deed, kindness interplay, intercourse,
co-habitating special days, all those things we took for granted that now become
bigger than life—more than they were at the time, a grand deception of the mind
but a welcome intrusion on life as it is. Such is loneliness.
I think loneliness often
involves an awareness that a part of our self is not where it should be and is
functioning in a subpar way; a sense of being detached from real living—the
“alone,” by-yourself sort of feeling.
...
“Loneliness
is Profound” was written on a particularly lonely Valentine’s Day. I had loved
and lost, cared and caused pain, tasted of that which is sweet and in the end
to taste of its bitter dregs. My joys ultimately became the meat for my
sorrows. I finally understood how it feels for people who lose a precious,
much-loved partner and find it difficult to recover from their loss and
struggle to find the inner desire to live again. This association of pain was
different than in divorce; the pain factor not of the same emotion. The grief
was like losing part of my own self and not being able to recover it. I felt so
alone, and my mind was full of memories from the Valentine’s Day of the year
before, when everything had seemed good, fresh, and happy. I decided to write a
record of my feelings, knowing that while my thoughts were in process, my words
would capture how it seems when loneliness or grief keeps you from being all
that you want to be. I found that the light of the soul became dim and muted,
it was almost like being in a fog, going through the motions, living but not
living. I hoped the insight would be of benefit to read in the future, to help
me remember its debilitating effect in productivity and spirituality. I offered
a copy to my minister with this in mind, since he counsels many people in
varying stages of grief.
N. L.
Brumbaugh
