There's a lot people in the world today who are lonely because they aren't able to be around those they love. But have you ever been lonely even in a crowd of people, or even around people you know well? Do you sometimes feel like you are disappearing but you are still there, still talking, even being the "life of the party"? I hope this article helps you understand what creates and maintains loneliness, how it affects your self-worth, how it ties in with eating disorders, and how to start making small changes to improve your sense of connection and belonging.
Before we start on that though, I want to tell you about Cory, a teenage boy I worked with who has Anorexia. He is bright, entertaining, funny, caring, and always concerned about doing the "right thing" for others. In fact, he is so aware of what people around him need and expect, so preoccupied with upholding the "right" impression, that his energy flows almost in an almost exclusively external direction. (Remember, in Thermodynamic Psychology, ENERGY means attunement and action, and EXTERNAL FLOW means directed outward, toward other people). After hanging out with friends, Cory says he often feels "drained" and feels like his self-worth is down. He admitted believing that other people would not be really interested in hanging out with him, that they are too busy, and that he would be a burden if he were to ask them to get together. This combination of disappearing the self, exhausting the self, and withdrawing from opportunities to take space, has created a pattern of social isolation and loneliness in Cory's life--a pattern that I see contributing to his Anorexia.
What is loneliness really? The fact that people with eating disorders struggle with loneliness used to make me scratch my head, because in they are some of the most caring, empathic, and giving creatures on the planet. Most social scientists propose that altruistic, "socially conscientious" behaviors are how we gain acceptance, but I think intimacy and secure attachments are borne from a mutual flow of energy. Without a back and forth between self and other, a sharing of space, no connection, or sense of real acceptance, can be had. People with eating disorders, in my observation, fulfill, attune to, and accommodate the needs of others so readily, and often to their own detriment, that social connections become draining, not restorative, obfuscating rather than clarifying the self.
When the needs of the self become disconnected from the energy that flows from our environments, in this case, people around us, you get loneliness. Think of it like a phone that needs to be plugged into the wall in order to charge. You can put that phone next to electrical outlets all day long, but if you don't plug it in, it doesn't charge. Those with eating disorders might be surrounded by people (outlets), but have a hard time "plugging themselves in" (receiving energy into themselves).
So being around others becomes a if not negative, at least tiring, experience for someone who struggles to give themselves permission to be "seen", to reveal, to seek understanding and nurturing from those around them.
Why is loneliness dangerous? Without taking energy into the self, the needs of the self can't be met, and that causes unmet needs to build up. Thermodynamic Psychology states that DARK MATTER is created from unfulfilled needs, and DARK MATTER makes anti-self behaviors happen. So when we neglect, restrict, deprive, punish, and excessively push ourselves, (in anorexia, it is the "show no mercy" inclination to oneself), that is dark matter at work.
Small steps away from loneliness. If you are like Cory, you can't just flip a switch and all at once a) recognize what your true needs are, b) build up the self-worth necessary to express and solicit energy from others, and c) develop the robust internal boundaries necessary to stop disappearing yourself so that others can always dominate the space between you and them. Don't expect immediate change, because you are probably up against the force of your own personality and a lifetime of imbalanced habits. But remember Newtonian physics, what is in motion tends to stay in motion, and new motions start small. Pick the easiest thing with the easiest person first, open up a bit about your feelings, seek a compromise between your needs and theirs, tell the other person one thing they can do for you. Accepting even small influxes of understanding and nurturing from others will slowly build the self-worth necessary to make taking space in your world easier and a lot less lonely.
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