Alias: just_a_girl
I have this lonely feeling being single sometimes, you know when you want someone you could vent out your feelings to and they would listen intently, also maybe I want to feel the touch of someone who cares about me and also whom I could shower all the love. Do you think I should keep waiting or have such expectations that this would ever happen? Thank you!
Hey just_a_girl,
Loneliness is a feeling that many of us are all too familiar with, whether we admit it out loud or not. We evolved to be a collaborative, community-oriented species. It's not bad to have these expectations or wants in your life - they are perfectly natural, and intimacy and connection is something that we are genetically wired to want and gravitate towards.
It is normal that particularly being single is making you feel lonely. Throughout our lives, we are conditioned to seek emotional and physical intimacy from just a single romantic partner at a time. This feeling of loneliness might be further exacerbated by the pandemic. You may have ignored this feeling before because you had other things to keep your mind busy for most of the day, but now, we are all stuck at home, or worse, stuck inside our heads.
Your question emphasizes parts of the human experience that we all crave - wanting someone to listen to us, to feel human touch and give our love away. These are not necessarily confined to romantic relationships in specific. Why not divide these needs onto the other people in your life?
Consider shifting focus from waiting for a romantic relationship to fulfilling these wants in life through friends and family. Maybe take this especially lonely time to re-examine your friendships and connections, and be more vulnerable with your loved ones. Parental love and affection is underrated - ask them for a hug or other forms of physical intimacy that you received as a child, but don’t anymore. Set up a call with a friend or sibling and complain about your week. Tell the people in your life you love them, or even better, show it to them in whatever way that suits you - it could be as simple as a handwritten note.
These are just suggestions of course, but get creative about how you can feel less lonely, in your day to day, and spread all this love that you have out to the people already around you. Don't lose hope and thank YOU for trusting us with your question.
Stay questioning,
The Second Puberty