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Post by pfviento on Jul 6, 2016 11:41:04 GMT -5
No matter how bad things are at a place they can become familiar. Patterns develop and you sort of know what to expect.
The unknown can be scary because it's not familiar. In a sense people tend to be creatures of habit.
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Post by DryCreek on Jul 6, 2016 12:37:42 GMT -5
"Why does the thought of being alone for the rest of my life, scare me so much?" None of us can be infinitely stable - physically, emotionally, financially. When we are not at our best - sometimes at pretty low lows - we need someone else to help us through. Having a partner means a dependable quid pro quo arrangement to help smooth out the potholes in life. And highs are much higher when you can share them with someone. Being able to look back in 10 years and relive the experience through conversation with them - this makes the experience so much more than a fleeting moment in time. So much more is possible with teamwork. The challenge is to keep acting like a team, not a collection of individuals. |
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Post by bballgirl on Jul 6, 2016 12:47:08 GMT -5
I think you are doing all of the right things. I think the key factor is time. I think it can take a different amount of time for everyone.
I don't know if I can have the right answer for you as to why you worry about being alone? And how one can liberate themselves?
I can answer it for me though because I don't worry about being alone for the rest of my life, and by alone I mean in a long term relationship.
I don't worry because I had been lonely for 2 decades and lonely is worse than alone. I can handle alone. I did work hard on all aspects of my exit strategy for years, a lot of it was subconscious work. I built a support network of friends for myself and I know you have friends and activities you do too.
Funny because I'm so used to being alone. I went out with a man last night and I wasn't into him so walking out of the restaurant towards the parking lot I guess I was walking fast but subconsciously. He said wait up then I guess you are used to being alone. I said yes to be polite. Of course if I were interested I would not have done that because I am a people person.
I guess I'm not afraid of being alone because I'm used to it.
I have different men in my life, platonic and not platonic. I have a better relationship and more authentic conversation with these other men than I ever did with my husband who was not capable who was a child. I guess I feel like if I will have a future love interest one day then that's not going to happen today but I don't know when. I guess the unknown or hope (but I hate the concept of hope) keeps me from feeling fear. Hugs.
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Post by greatcoastal on Jul 6, 2016 13:31:43 GMT -5
Loneliness was something I learned about when I drove an 18 wheeler for three years. Gone 6 days a week, home to a roommate who was sometimes there, home for 16 hrs and back to living in a truck cab. In some ways I was never really alone. Other people on the road with me. A dispatcher to call every morning, other drivers parked beside me at night, guys on the loading docks.. All complete strangers
A few lonely events that helped change my priorities at the time.
I remember coming home one Fri evening. It was 7:00 pm I was heading south down the Jersey turnpike, only 450 miles to go. When I saw off in the distance a man sitting on his back deck, two kids with him, and a woman bringing out dinner. I asked myself, " what are you doing here? That's where you out to be!"
Another time I was parked a block away from Virginia Beach. I went walking alone down the sand at sun set. Seeing couple after couple. I told myself, " this is no fun with no one to share it with" I walked back to my cab and called it a night!
Once I found myself on the dock next to a nuclear submarine at sunset. I could reach out and touch it! I had the place all to myself, with no one to share it with?
Then there were days when I was loaded the sun wise rising in front of me, my windows were down, I had a 700 mile run in front of me across the Appalachian mountains! My radio was jam in', hardly any traffic. And I would think about my roommate. Stuck in his 4 wall no window office, in his shirt and tie doing his number crunching. I felt very free those days! Content too!
One day though, I found myself alone parked way in the back of an empty truck stop. My fever had reached 104. There was no one to call, I was running out of water. A scary time.
Another was when I arrived at my front door, alone in the middle of a Sat. My body was so week from over driving on so little sleep, that my legs could not move! I had to pull myself through the front door by my elbows, and sleep on the floor.
All of that comes back to " the green grass syndrome". Many times it is mind over matter, it's what you make of it! Alone has a place in our lives. Good and bad.
Always learning, growing, gaining strength and wisdom. Try to make the most of your journey. As you read this let me say, " thank you for being with me today, and my words!"
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Post by 3000more on Jul 6, 2016 13:57:50 GMT -5
"Why does the thought of being alone for the rest of my life, scare me so much?" This is a note from my journal, after returning from a relatively long trip I took in June. I got back home, I had missed my place, my own bed as and my way of life the way I'm living it now. I can't say that I'm unhappy, because there's many things in my life that are pretty much ok. I know that if something good is going to happen to me, it will. There's nothing I can do to accelerate it or make it happen. All I could do, is to make sure there's no obstacle. I'm free and I can make my own choices. Why should I worry? I read somewhere an article about the inability of many of us to live in the now. Feeling nostalgic or overly critical about choices I made in the past, while being apprehensive about the future, is keeping me from enjoying the present. How can one liberate oneself from such thinking? I am spending time with my friends, my family, I am traveling, I am training for my next marathon and I keep working as hard as I always do. Why does the thought of being alone for the rest of my life, scare me so much? Have you looked into or studied the practice3 of Mindfulness? It's all about living in the now, there are some books out. I haven't read them. I did take a 6 weeks class on it and I believe it can be very useful for getting calm and sure of yourself. My $.02 |
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Post by Caris on Jul 6, 2016 15:10:20 GMT -5
Mindfulness meditation. Pick up a short read of one of many Thich Nhat Hahn's books. "True Love," The Miracle of Mindfulness," and many others. It's a good, and simple way to learn and live in the moment.
Being on my phone, I can't see the other posts, but it was either Z or Ball girl who wrote about being alone and not lonely. The thing about this, is she lives alone, but has Connections to others. She has men, both platonic and non platonic in her life, so those needs are met, even though she is single...yet not really alone in life.
The difference is in "needs being met" and having "connections" with others. Having needs satisfied whether in a relationship or not is really important to not feeling unbearably alone. Even those who don't have our physical and emotional needs met will find ways to connect. Even if it's reading or watching the news, or relating to characters in a book, it alleviates some of the loneliness. Not all the time, but we do what we can to feel connected to something more than ourselves.
I was terrified of growing old alone, and yet here I am doing it. I am doing what was one of my greatest fears. I sometimes feel scared thinking I could die, and no one would know for a while, and dying alone doesn't fill me with joy, but I've gotten to the point where, I mostly accept what is. What happens is what happens, and I'm learning to accept that. My personally fashioned Buddhist practice has helped me a lot with this.
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Post by obobfla on Jul 6, 2016 18:21:56 GMT -5
Funny, I do like the pleasure of my own company over others. I have no qualms about doing things by myself. Going to restaurants or out to a movie by myself is no big deal.
But when I was single, I had nightmares about dying alone. I would get a panic attack in the middle of the night and wonder who would call the hospital if it were a real heart attack. Then I got married. As I have said many times here, I needed to go to the emergency room twice last year, and both times my wife was reluctant to take me.
While I like my space, I want somebody there. Maybe it's because I come from a big family and have always been used to having people around. I can handle having sex with only one person. But I chose wrong the last time, and this time I want to be sure to get it right.
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Post by GeekGoddess on Aug 21, 2016 22:06:35 GMT -5
In my support group, we call it "future tripping" - worrying about things that we have no proof will happen. I do it and am bad about it but less bad than I was before getting sober. Try meditation practices. I liked yoga class because we did work our body first before a few moments meditation to end the class. Otherwise, my internal voice wouldn't quiet down enough (if I tried meditating w/o exercise first). Now our group does a weekly meditation meeting and it's 10 minutes that my mind does stop and slow down and be quiet for some minutes. Within some weeks or months of making that meeting regularly, it finally spilled over into other days and I am pretty "in the now" most of the time of most days. I only commit to loose plans usually. I try not to worry or even think of too far in the future. It really mostly just takes practice.
We tell each other too -- - if you have one foot in yesterday and the other foot in tomorrow, you're bound to just piss on today. So don't do that. :-)
Be here now. Usually helping someone else or being involved in something engaging are major contributors to getting out of my own head and into the now. So I do as much of that as I can without causing myself resentment.
Good luck with it!
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