There’s a difference between feeling and being alone and feeling or being lonely. When we feel lonely, we are at a loss. The loss could be of several things but it is at least a loss of connection. That connection is often social, a loss of connection with other people, but it can also be an existential loss–a loss of connection with meaning, with a sense of who I am, what I am doing and why I am doing it. When we are feeling lonely, life is inviting us to reach out and make some meaningful connections.

Feeling ourselves to be alone, on the other hand, is a different kind of space. When we find ourselves alone, we have an awareness of ourselves with a view to all the other beings around us with whom we may–if we choose, if we need, if we are asked–connect. Aware of ourselves alone, we may also not choose, not need, or not be asked to connect with others. There is this flexibility in being alone that allows us all kinds of freedom. 

When we become aware of ourselves alone in the world, free to make connections, free to remain alone, this may be a sign that life is ready to reveal more to us than we thought was ours to know. That thing which reveals itself is most often already within us, waiting to be found.

There is a way that I love to work with my being and feeling alone. It might come at the last minute before I go to sleep. It might come to me while waiting in a grocery line or at the doctor’s office. It might come while sitting in traffic. It might come over that first cup of coffee while the house and the world are still quiet. I grow aware of my life, and I reach out to some future version of myself and I say something like this: you have the wisdom (health, insight, understanding, etc) that I want in my life. I call on you to show me how to get there. Alone, and with my Self, the prayer is heard, and the next movement of my life begins.

~Robert Patrick

If these kinds of questions and experiences sound familiar, you might find spiritual direction a good way to explore them.  Here’s how to get started.