Episode 5: Are we alone in loneliness?
A conversation with clinical psychologist Ami Rokach
Hey Friend,
It’s exciting to have so many new readers here. Many of you must have read the article in the Toronto Star that was published this past Sunday.
I’ve been getting a lot of similar questions and I’d like to clarify a few things. I started 52 Friends after a period of loneliness in my life but the objective is not to make tens of friends. The goal of the project is to raise awareness on the stigma surrounding loneliness and to encourage us all to prioritize friendship. That could mean reaching out to a friend we’ve lost touch with, deepening an existing connection or making a new friend.
Each week I meet a new friend or reconnect with someone and I engage in meaningful conversation that usually touches on the topic of friendship in that person’s life.
Research shows that we only really need five close friends and one to two very close friends. The latter which not everyone has. From the 52, I expect that a handful will be close friends, others I’ll get coffee with from time to time and maybe a dozen will dance at my wedding. There are countless situations or relationships that can make us feel lonely but admitting to ourselves that we are lonely and talking about it is an important first step.
There is another question I’ve been getting—how do you get people to be your friend for this project? I reach out to friends of friends, people I admire, friends from my past, etc. If someone doesn’t want to be my friend, for this project and in life, I don’t dwell on it. That energy can be better spent on someone who wants to be my friend.
I recently sat down with Ami Rokach. A clinical psychologist who has been researching and teaching about loneliness, human sexuality, and psychotherapy for the past 40 years. He’s been instrumental in my understanding of loneliness and friendship and I think his insight could help many of us.
Miriam: What is the stigma surrounding loneliness?
Ami: There is a stigma related to loneliness because it is seen as a weakness. The rationale behind it goes something like this: “If I’m lonely that means no one wants to be with me. If no one wants to be with me, that means I’m a loser and I’m not worthy of being loved. Our society adores successful people and high achievers. So not only am I ashamed of my loneliness but I don’t want to advertise it for fear that other people might not want to come close to me because they may be concerned that they will be seen as losers as well.”
One of the things that hopefully you will do and that I’m trying to do is bring loneliness out of the closet so that we all understand that loneliness is just like hunger and fear and joy and sadness. It’s part of being human. It has an evolutionary benefit in that both animals and people but especially people cannot survive without a community. Loneliness is just like physical pain which is really an alarm that says, “Something is missing, pay attention to it.”
Miriam: You’ve been researching and speaking about loneliness for over 35 years. Did you ever encounter people who didn’t believe that loneliness is a real issue?
Ami: In 1980-something, I was invited to give a Sunday morning speech at a brunch in a synagogue in Toronto. I presume that most of the people were prepared to be entertained.
One of the things that I highlighted was that there are no hard and fast solutions to loneliness which is what people usually ask. I said that the main thing that you need to do is be aware and admit to yourself that you are lonely and experience it before you attempt to deal with it.
Well I got major pushback from the participants. At the end, one woman came to me and she said, “You made me depressed.” And I said, after regaining consciousness, “How did I make you depressed?” And she replied, “Well you told us to stay with the loneliness for a while and you didn’t tell us what to do about it.”
So I guess it was the first time after a long time that somebody said, “Let’s look at what’s happening with you rather than run away and think that you can avoid feeling it.” It’s the same thing with hunger. You cannot avoid feeling hunger. When you feel hunger there is an alarm that reminds you that your body needs to eat. Your body needs food.
Miriam: Is it important then that we befriend ourselves?
Ami: Yes. You need to really reflect on what’s happening with you rather than to look for a quick and easy solution which in this day and age, that’s what most of us are doing. It was found in research that babies and toddlers who are used to playing by themselves did much better when they grew up as far as loneliness is concerned.
There are people who are so concerned about being by themselves that anytime they are alone they get a big sign in their head that says, “that means I’m lonely.” Then they start to develop anxiety and stress reactions to being lonely.
Actually, being by ourselves could be interpreted as solitude. As being by ourselves because we want joy and need to be by ourselves. I mean reality is so full of stimuli that sometimes we need to rest and that rest could be wonderful and amazing unless we interpret anytime that we’re alone as loneliness.
Miriam: Because the loneliness experience is very individual, do we need to stay in a state where we reflect so that we can understand what we need specifically?
Ami: It’s a complex question. It’s like happiness or hunger. We all talk about them but really they are somewhat individual. When we are lonely, we need to stop running and we need to stay with how we feel. First, because eventually it will subside but more importantly because we need to understand what is missing.
Loneliness is just an alarm system. So I need to understand, why do I feel this way? Do I feel like this because I was taught since age zero that being by myself is bad and frightening and lonely. During the pandemic, people complained a lot about loneliness but actually the pandemic helped get loneliness out of the closet.
The only problem is that now that the pandemic is over, loneliness got right back into the closet. The difference between then and now is that then we could blame the pandemic. So we could rationalize loneliness by saying, “It’s none of my doing. It’s not that I’m not good enough for people to not want to be with me, it’s the pandemic.”
I remember that I spoke to a lot of people—with newspapers and TV stations about the pandemic and they asked me, “Are you lonely?” and I said, “No, I’m not. I go through the same thing that other people go through but I structure it differently.” It’s the same thing as craving something sweet—that doesn’t mean you’re hungry. It just means you miss something. People are too quick to put the label of loneliness.
During the pandemic, I spoke to a lot of people on the street. I would go for walks in my neighborhood and I spoke to people and it was nice because in Toronto the social network is not very cohesive. People were suddenly speaking to each other.
Miriam: How do I gauge the closeness of a friendship? Should I close the gap if I feel a friendship lacks depth or leave the friendship?
Ami: My first response would not be to leave the friendship. I pride myself on really doing whatever I can to correct the situation before I give up.
If the relationship is not satisfactory, I need to first of all, again, reflect. I need to ask myself what I’m missing and then try to bridge the gap. In human relations, usually people respond to each other. If I feel a relationship is not deep enough, I can start to deepen it by opening up, by consulting, by sharing, by asking for advice. And if I continue to do that and the other person remains aloof, it’s quite possible that he or she is not appropriate for me.
However, that doesn’t mean I need to leave the relationship. To my classes, I describe the social network. I am in the center and there are three areas around me. The most outside area is habituated by people that I know: students, neighbors, etc. They will be there to have coffee with me, they will loan me $10 if I need it, but that’s it.
Then closer to me, there is an area with close friends. These are people that I can reach out to in times of necessity or emergency. They will give me their car in the middle of the night if I need to go to the hospital or something like that.
Then there are those closest to me. Maybe one or two very close friends. These are friends that not everyone has. If this very good friendship is not working, I can say I tried and then move the person to a more distant area where good friends are and try to have a good friendship. If that doesn’t work, I can move them into the area of acquaintances. So it doesn’t mean that I need to lose them. The idea is that I tried to change the situation. Do you remember the wise prayer, “God help me change what I can. Help me accept what I cannot and give me the wisdom to know the difference.”
I try to change the situation and if I cannot change it, I must accept it. And then if I don’t want to give up on that person, I simply don’t make him a very good friend.
People ask, how do I find close friends? It’s not that difficult. You simply go to those who are good friends and acquaintances. You look at them and think with this good friend I would love to be really close and be able to open up and be a very good friend. Once you identify that person, you can work on deepening the relationship.
Miriam: Are the friends who only want to be our friends when we are on top and successful really our friends?
Ami: Of course not. There is a saying, “A friend in need is a friend indeed.” I’ve read many accounts of successful and sometimes famous people who say that only when they lost what they had did they see who their real friends were. I also once read, in a half joking manner, a description of real friendship. Real friendship is someone who knows everything about you and still likes you. In other words, somebody that you feel comfortable opening up with and letting see the scars and the blemishes and the imperfections.
Yessssssss. Old age is going to kill us for sure, but loneliness is going to make us suffer every day that you let it. Don't let it.