Breaking the Shell of Loneliness

Research indicates that individuals who feel lonely tend to be poor listeners. Regardless of age, cultural background, or social status, that is what overlaps. They are lonely because they are so busy with themselves and not ready to open up to others. What Tantra suggests is to take responsibility, to be active and learn how to step out of your shell.

The Paradox of Loneliness

Even though there are six billion people on the planet, many of them feel quite lonely. You might ponder how that is even possible.

Why do we remain lonely while we are social and collaborating in groups? Even on the lowest, most simple level, we were made to unify in a social sense, to hang out together.

On the spiritual plane, it becomes even clearer: spirituality and Yoga are about unifying, finding the togetherness of all the parts within yourself, but also of you with the world and even with the macrocosmos/existence itself.

What Generates Loneliness?

Loneliness is not related to how many people are in a room or if you have a spouse or not. Whether you spend time with other people or not. That’s not necessarily an indicator of whether or not you might feel lonely.

The feeling that you can not really show yourself to another person, that you cannot really share yourself with other people to the fullness of who you are – that is what creates loneliness.

You might be married for 20 years and sleep in one bed together every night and feel utterly lonely and awful within that.

Major Setbacks of Emotional Growth

We are born into a world that is highly neglected in the whole realm of connectivity. We are so poor in teaching our children to be socially capable and to be capable of sharing our emotions.

Apart from the fact that we are socially clumsy, and we really don’t put much effort into being trustworthy, being vulnerable with each other, and sharing ourselves. We also live in a society that celebrates this vector of separation by celebrating the ego that shells you and says, “This is me, and this is the rest of the world. I deserve more, and I should be treated like this, and the rest of the world should bring all that I want to me!”

We take it as a default condition within Western society: “Well, look, this is just how we are, let’s live with it and let’s make the best out of it.” And then we try to be the best ego in town, the most successful, the richest ego.

The Irony of Ego-Enforced Loneliness

The ego is related to perceiving ourselves as separate entities, and not so much as living, breathing parts of the universe. It tends to create a vicious cycle of reinforcement.

The ego says: “Well, this is me. I have to define myself by this shell. Let’s have very clear boundaries… And guess what: I’m feeling lonely here within my shell! All the world around me is doing it wrong. Why are they not coming to my shell and knocking on the shell and asking me if I need something?”