“Loneliness is the emotional pain of involuntary social isolation.” With these words, George Monbiot, a British writer and activist, opened his lecture at King’s Place in London. In the flyer for his talk, there was also the promise that he would not only delve into the bleak waters of loneliness, but there would be a light at the end of the tunnel too, a beacon of hope. And I must say, that optimism enticed me to be there last Saturday.
Monbiot’s infectious warmth and ingenuous message made him instantly likeable to me, and I suspect to the rest of the audience too. He started off by discussing some fascinating information taken from, sadly, unethical research on chimpanzees. Those studies demonstrated the true agony of loneliness for mammals, just like us. For instance, in one study, researchers separated a chimpanzee from his social unit by installing an electric barrier; the pain of separation was so excruciating that he chose to suffer electric shock in order to reunite with his group. Another time, both food and community interaction were withheld from a chimpanzee, and on her reintroduction to the group, the famished chimpanzee first groomed with her peers before eating. That is why, as highly social beings, we are biologically programmed for societal interactions, and we suffer greatly when we’re lonely. In fact, our survival instincts and stress hormones are put in high gear when threatened with loneliness. What’s more, physical pain and the pain of social isolation travel down the same pathways in our nervous system.
As Monbiot went on to discuss the surprising accuracy of loneliness as a predictor of grave health issues, I was growing impatient for the hope at the horizon, the secret cure and antidote he was going to share. It was worth the wait. “There are no self-made men. We are made in and by society,” he said. Hence, “rebuilding communities” is our salvation.
He had me nodding in agreement. I know this to be true from my own experience as a doctor. For many patients, I wish I could put down “friends and family” (or “God” – but that is another topic) on a prescription rather than antidepressants. Rumi also supports Monbiot’s vision in the opening verses of Masnavi:
“Listen to the song of the reed
how it wails from separation:
…ever since I was cut from the reed-bed,
my lament had caused both man and woman weep
…everyone who is parted from her bonds
yearns for the time of reunion…”
George Monbiot’s concluding prediction should give us all pause – “we either stay together or we fall.” This notion served as the foundation for his belief that loneliness is not only a personal issue but a socio-political one too.
Undoubtedly, I agree with him on this point. But his definition of loneliness and its remedy seem somehow incomplete to me.
Given that social isolation and loneliness very often overlap, it would do us a hell of a lot of good to think about them separately too. “Loneliness” is to some extent a learned emotion. That is to say, what evokes a sense of loneliness in us is socially and culturally formed. To this end, there is no denying that social isolation can be used as cultural tool to conjure up loneliness.
Since times unmemorable, social isolation has indeed been put to this use: to discipline and punish people who have been cast out by society for some reasons or another – think of solitary confinement and exile. Hence, for the sake of our personal integrity, and if we don’t want to fall prey to peer pressure, complacency and status, we might want to cultivate some tolerance for and endurance of what I would call inevitable or necessary loneliness. This acknowledges that, from time to time, loneliness bears some invaluable fruits: breakthroughs, novelty and creativity.
In the same way that isolation is not synonymous with loneliness, community, in the strictest sense of the word, won’t defy loneliness. Undeniably, one can feel lonely in a crowd. This also applies to community, because a community that values fixed ideas over people and enforces certain features upon them, implicitly and explicitly, leaves no room to truly embrace the individual. The kind of community that makes us politically strong and protects us from loneliness has to be inclusive, diverse and tolerant.
Don’t get me wrong. I am not romanticising loneliness. George Monbiot said he dreads that more loneliness likely lay ahead for him, especially when he is older. The kind of bottom-deep, raw and cold loneliness he still remembers from his past.
This perpetual fear of loneliness and the dread of the overwhelming fusion of loneliness and vulnerability resides in us all. We fear the day we plop into the abyss, when the “I” won’t be enough, when we need people for things money can’t buy. When I lost my father, I was hit more by the loneliness and lack of community in a foreign country than by the actual grief over my father itself. I know with absolute certainty that there is no substitute for the human voice, a loving touch and a kind glance. I wouldn’t trade off human warmth for any growth or spirituality. But loneliness teaches us lessons too. It is a painful thing but not necessarily always a bad thing.
Ultimately, loneliness is the pain that grows out of a sense of disconnection. And in order to reconnect, sometimes we let loneliness wash over us and other times we need other humans to act as a “bridge to ourselves and the whole world.”¹
1: “The Exquisite Risk”, Mark Nepo
