***Ways to Turn Being Lonely into Being Comfortably Alone

If we think of being alone as being lonely, then fear of loneliness can drive us into the company of people who will not contribute at all to the quality of our lives. It is possible to turn loneliness into comfortable aloneness, so that when we socialize it is by choice, not because we are driven. Which of the following will work for you?

1. Enjoy the person you are. If you don't like yourself, then figure out why and start work on becoming a person you do enjoy. You can do it, and you'll be too busy to be lonely.

2. Arrange your surroundings so that they give you pleasure.

3. Choose a field you want to learn more about, set up some form of study of it. If you don't like/can't afford classes, check out the internet – or the library, where there will be people around you. Make yourself a reading list on your chosen topic, set yourself a schedule.

4. Make a list of people you haven't called/written to lately. Don't worry that they haven't contacted you either. Catch up.

5. Get yourself a dog, cat, bird, something that will respond to you.

6. Grow things - flowers, indoor plants, herbs on the window-ledge. Take care of them.

7. Volunteer. You are needed somewhere, and will be emotionally repaid a hundredfold.

8. Visit your chosen place of worship, wherever and whatever it may be, church, synagogue, mosque, far away in nature…

9. Put yourself among natural things. If you live in the city, visit a safe park, conservatory, zoo, even a florist's shop.

10. Celebrate the fact that you can choose your own schedule, do your own thing. It is a luxury many people pray for every day, and have no prospect of getting.

© Diana Gardner Robinson