The Antidote for Loneliness: the Mundane and the Mess

I was terrified to share my story.  Actually, that’s an understatement.  I don’t think there is a word for the mind sizzling fear that gripped me.  But now I see it’s really no wonder.

Something I’ve really struggled with for quite a while now is isolation and lack of connection.  It seems to be a somewhat natural result of chronic illness.  Sometimes this happens to people with long-term illness because people you thought were friends turned out to be fair weather friends, and the winds of illness blew them all away.  But thankfully, for the most part, that wasn’t the case for me.

Mostly it happened because I didn’t have the energy to maintain relationships.  I have a hard time with technology.  So much is miscommunicated online.  (Okay, okay, the irony is not lost on me.)  Therefore, I get weighed down by social media.  Face to face communication is what we were made for … but face to face is tiring.  And requires leaving my house.  And it’s too hot for me to be outside.  And I have to work tomorrow so I need to conserve energy.

… and, and, and.  You get the idea.

Brene Brown, Ph.D., L.M.S.W. defines connection as “the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued;  when they can give and receive without judgment;  and when they derive sustenance and strength from the relationship.” ( FYI: You need to read The Gifts of Imperfection ASAP.)

I haven’t been connected with people in the last few years.  I had a couple of really great close friends who got me through the really, really hard early days of illness and diagnosis … and then the jerks moved away!  (Ladies, you know who you are!)

In the last year especially, I have really started to feel it, the loneliness.  This is something I would never have told anyone before, before spilling my guts in Chronic Blessings.  It was too personal.  Too vulnerable.

But that’s just it.  I was losing the ability to be vulnerable with people because without close relationships, I wasn’t practicing it.  Then when someone who genuinely cared wanted to know what was going on in my life, there was SO much heaviness on my heart I just didn’t know where to begin.  I’d try to dive deep to pick the weight at the bottom of my heart I most needed to share.  But there were so many that I’d take too long to decide which to choose and eventually I’d give up and come up for air and just share something floating on the surface.

Have you been there?  Desperate to share, but don’t know how.  Or don’t know who to share with.  It can be tricky choosing or finding the right person to share with.  I know those of us with chronic illness struggle with this.  But today’s world of self-sufficiency and technology is increasingly isolated, so I know sick people aren’t the only ones who face this problem.

Do you know what one of the gifts of imperfection are, as described by Brene Brown?  Connection. 

Now, you KNOW I love finding hidden gems in seemingly bad situations!  So, how does imperfection—something we think of as bad—lead to connection?  Our imperfections make us vulnerable and connection comes through sharing our vulnerabilities.  Remember the definition of connection?  Connection comes from feeling seen, heard, and valued.

Do you feel seen and heard when your heart is braking and you tell someone you’re “fine”?  Do you feel seen and heard when you talk to someone about the weather or TV shows or who your ex-BFF is dating this week?  I’m not saying you can’t talk about mundane things.  Sometimes that’s fun.  Ya’ll know I gotta tell somebody about the latest on This Is Us!  (FYI: From the first commercial I saw, before an episode ever aired, before I even knew what it was about, I told Greg, “This show is my new Parenthood.”  I’ve got a 6th sense about these things, I’m just sayin’.)

We don’t feel known and connected when we skim along, only sharing the surface of our hearts, only showing the airbrushed aspects of our days.

I would never have told anyone I was lonely before.  First of all, I was afraid you’d feel sorry for me and try to do something to help me out of sympathy.  Second, I didn’t know how to tell people what I needed.  I was good at providing things for others before getting sick, but not receiving.  I’ve since taken a different perspective on receiving help and care from others.  (Shout out on another amazing book Nothing to Prove by Jennie Allen.)  And let me tell you, receiving … without begrudging it, can be amazing.  It also makes you give from a much deeper place in your heart with a sense of connection and compassion for those you give to.

Releasing Chronic Blessings into the world was terrifying.  It is personal and oh-so vulnerable.  But you know what?  People have come out of the woodwork to share their stories with me.  Stories that are also personal and vulnerable.  Some much more so than mine.  And I’ve been touched and honored.

What if we stop spit-shinning our lives for each other?  What if we let each other into the mess as well as the mundane?  Yes, it feels counter-cultural.  Not many people really let others in anymore. 

But someone has to go first.  When someone is willing to crack the door and shed some light on the skeletons inside, it often gives the hearers courage to unlock their closet as well.  We imagine that everyone else’s closet is filled with Marie Kondo quality organization and cute Ikea baskets with chalk labels.  Meanwhile ours is overflowing with 2-week-old pizza boxes and I swear there is a dead mouse in here somewhere!  But the truth is, no matter how beautifully we decorate our closet doors, every last one has some skeletons in it.  If we allow each other in on this fact, we are free to share … well, our lives.  Our true lives.  The joys and the heartache.  The mundane and the mess.

Being able to share it all, with no need to whitewash it, knowing that you’re being accepted as you are, and trusting that your friends are sharing all of themselves with you—wouldn’t that make you feel seen, heard and valued? 

Seen, heard and valued.  That sounds familiar doesn’t it?  Oh yeah, that’s the definition of connection right there. 

Being vulnerable is a great antidote for loneliness.  This works best face to face, if possible, but phone calls work too.  And obviously, a caring person is needed.  (No know-it-all jerks allowed.) 

When God was crazy mean and made me do something so frightening as write an incredibly vulnerable book, I didn’t know that He was also letting me in on a little secret.  Vulnerability is the key to connection.  And our God created us for connection.  He himself was not above vulnerability.  He provided for our salvation in the most vulnerable way possible; by becoming a human baby, a homeless adult and dying naked on a cross.

Our God provided the greatest example of vulnerability imaginable.  We recoil from vulnerability, but we adore Jesus while feeling lonely and longing for connection.  The answer is staring us in the face.  His example provides the solution.

As always, Jesus is the answer.  Those words alone are such a cliché, but somehow, in my life, they keep proving themselves to be true.