All the Lonely People

All the Lonely People

Have you heard about the loneliness pill? According to researchers at the University of Chicago’s Brain Dynamics Laboratory, loneliness can be cured with medication. Scientists have determined that loneliness weakens immune systems leading to illness. People going through transitions, leaving for college, changing jobs, moving to a new community, or losing friends and family when aging, become socially isolated. Chronic loneliness can affect the brain and body. 

Today, more people live alone, fewer are getting married, and fewer married couples are having children than ever before. In former days, people were surrounded by family as they aged. In our mobile society, family members scatter. Getting together happens less often. Family safety nets disappear. Growing older when alone is twice as daunting as when surrounded by family and friends. Loss of mobility, hearing, sight, or even purpose, isolates seniors which can lead to depression.

Loneliness can strike anywhere. Adults can feel lonely in a crowd or at a party.  Children can feel alone at school. Teens can feel alone online. Feeling unwanted, unneeded, or useless, even temporarily, causes stress and sadness. 

Loneliness is daunting. In the classic Beatles’ song, “Eleanor Rigby,” Eleanor is socially isolated, sweeping up rice at the church after a wedding she didn’t attend, waiting at the window for someone who will never come. Father McKenzie “writing the words of a sermon that no one will hear,” darns his socks alone. Both lonely people, working at the same church, neither offering the other company. The chorus lays it all out, “Ah, look at all the lonely people. Where do they all belong?”

 

Belonging is the key. All people need to feel necessary and wanted. How can we make this happen? We must connect. Wouldn’t it have been wonderful if Father McKenzie had asked Eleanor’s opinion of his sermon? What if they had shared a quiet supper after the wedding? At the end of the song, Father McKenzie walks away from the grave of Eleanor. No one came to her funeral. He wipes Eleanor from his hands just as he does the dirt from her burial. If he had used those same hands to reach out in friendship to Eleanor, he might have cured both his loneliness and hers. 

Before we turn to medication, we should turn to one another to make connections that support those who are lonely. Do we make time to visit elderly friends? Do we call our scattered family members? Do we invite our new neighbors to join us for supper? Do we open the doors of our clubs, churches, and community centers to everyone? Do we walk outside the doors and welcome people in? Are we looking for the lonely people? 

During times of high risk for loneliness, times of transition, we must reach out to those around us. Loneliness is cured by connection. If you are lonely, reach out. If you know someone who is lonely, reach out. Making connections lifts the spirit and supports physical health. Look for the lonely people and help them belong. No pill necessary.