“You’re not alone.”
We hear this a lot. But is it true? Is it always true?
Because sometimes it doesn’t feel like it is. I know some people feel alone. They don’t have friends. Their families aren’t supportive. They’ve been abandoned and abused and forgotten. They feel like they don’t have anyone.
Are those people alone?
If you feel that way, are you alone?
I know it can feel like you are.
But you’re not. You’re not alone. Here are six reasons why:
1. You’re not alone in how you feel.
Things like loneliness, pain, anxiety, regret, shame, not wanting to be alive, being unable to control panic attacks, the feeling that your heart will never be light, will always be burdened, will never be loved — these are things other people have felt and are feeling. They may not feel exactly the way you feel for the exact same reasons and to the exact same degree, but they have felt it. They feel it.
2. There are people who want to help you.
Counselors, psychiatrists, religious leaders, teachers, family, friends. There is someone out there who can help you. You might need to take the first step, though, and I know this can be scary. It takes a lot of courage to reach out for help. You have it in you.
3. You don’t exist in a vacuum.
Step outside and you will see that at the very least it is you and the trees. It is you and the grass. It is you and the mountains and the frosty ground and the sun that keeps coming up. At the very least, it is you and all the splendor and intimacy and rawness that nature has to offer.
4. You are someone else’s reason for not being alone.
Right now, there is someone else in this world that feels alone. Who thinks no one understands what they’re experiencing. But you do. You are the other person who can’t stop hurting. The other person who suffocates in crowds. The other person who keeps being left, who can’t communicate how you feel, who wants to disappear. And that person who feels alone — they need you. You are the reason they are not alone.
5. Your life is important.
You have power to give love, to create beauty, to expose truth, to exemplify vulnerability, to bring light to dark places. And that’s what the world needs. Maybe you feel too wounded or tired to do any of that today, and that’s ok. But your woundedness is exactly what makes you needed by the world. The world needs people familiar with pain, who have stood up to demons, who have fought dragons and monsters and the ghosts that won’t stop haunting. The world needs you, just as you are and everything you will be. You have a role to play.
6. You are loved.
This might be the hardest one to believe, and even harder to understand, and harder yet to feel. Some days it might not be a love you can touch. Some days it might not be a love that calls you in the evening or wakes up with you in the morning. Some days it might be a love that is on its way. A love that you don’t know yet but is coming for you. Some days it might be the love of a friend, or an online community, or a therapist who sincerely cares about you. Even if you don’t believe it or understand it or feel it, you are loved. You just might not have found your lovers yet.
You are not alone, even if it feels like you are.
You are not alone, even if that’s hard to believe.
And maybe after hearing all this, you still won’t feel it. Maybe you still won’t believe it. That’s ok.
Instead feeling or believing or understanding, just hear. Just listen.
You are not alone.
You are not alone.
You are not alone.