Have you ever just got to the point when lonely was okay…..

Sometimes it is just okay to be by yourself; is this lonely or just being alone; is it okay for just a while or is there a danger of it becoming a habit.

I suppose it comes down to that old saying that you come into this world alone and that is how you go out (I think the actual saying is about coming and going in and out of the world naked… But, that strikes me as a bit of a perverted picture of not only sitting around alone, but also naked!).  If you can’t bear to be with yourself, who else can you bear to be with, and who else can bear to be with you?

There is nothing, quite as lonely as being in a room full of people and being alone.

I remember a long time ago when I was just a young bloke and I split up with my girlfriend.  I noticed that not only didn’t I have sex anymore (except of course when I was alone and naked!) but that I didn’t have a whole lot of places to go, or a whole lot of people to go with. I was in that really strange age group, or rather life stage, that falls differently for all of us. Everyone else was married, or was about to get married, or had partners (we used to call them boyfriends and girlfriends!) or just weren’t available when I was. I didn’t include the group of people that always seem to be surrounded by people;  I dont know about them because I have never been one of them.  (I just thought that perhaps the people surrounded by people all the time might be the loneliest of us all…. I dont know?)

So, am I now a better man at being alone, or am I over being lonely, or do I just accept lonely.

Yes, no.

(Incidentally the ‘yes, no’ beginning to sentences which appears to have become part of our everyday vocabulary is really beginning to shit me beyond believe.   Is it yes or no.  Why would you start a sentence by saying something positive and then negative, in agreeance and then in no-agreeance.  It is just weird, lazy, unthoughtful, non-speak.  It reminds me about the phrase that was going around a few years ago when you would ask someone a question and they would answer ‘pretty much’.  What the fuck does pretty much mean anyway… I suppose it means yes, no.)

Notwithstanding (which is a word that I love), things change over the years and ‘pretty much’ is replaced by ‘here’s the thing’ (which I might claim originality for as it was about 6 years ago that my lovely wife told me that after a few too many wines I would preempt most sentences with ‘here’s the thing’.  I think it has a bit to do with the wine but also a bit to do with the fact that I thought I knew everything and everyone should listen to me!   I also think it was a time before this blog and before my Being a Better Man project when I spent a lot of time talking without thinking and a lot of time thinking without thinking.  My ‘heads up display’ (see My Religion) in those days was more like heads up my own arse – and while I’m looking at me you look at me!)

So, where was I, lonely.

I have experienced periods of being alone when that is not only what I wanted, but what I needed.  I have experienced periods of lonely that weren’t really ‘sad’ lonely, but just that I wished I had someone to share that moment with.  Upon reflection, I suppose I wasn’t really lonely in those moments I was just disappointed that there wasn’t someone else there to have that shared experience.  I have experience moments of lonely which have nothing to do with being sad, but being in a different time in my life when I wished I was in another (perhaps that is melancholy and not lonely?)

But, the lonely that trumps them all is the lonely I have felt when I haven’t felt like I was one of you, when I was really lost and didn’t know why I was even here?

This is the Black Dog Lonely (see Better with the Black Dog).

I sort of like the sound of Black Dog Lonely (“BDL”) because it really is in a category of its own. Having the BDL explanation, description and now acronym, also makes it a bit easiery to perhaps ask a mate, or tell a friend  – I am feeling a bit BDL today mate?  Oh, shit mate, that sucks, I’ll pop over for a beer.

I have also experienced lonely when I was not alone.

I have experienced lonely when I was siting on the lounge with the girl I loved. Maybe I didn’t love her that way any more and the being lonely was the knock on the theoretical door in my head telling me it is time to let go, or maybe just time to go.

and

I have experienced lonely when I was realy alone, really really alone. In a time before BDL was invented (which factually is any time before today really), but BDL was still just as real.  It was only about me, only me, with me, lonely… and it didn’t pass…. and the Black Dog was not just stalking me but was a part of me.  This is the BDL were you feel like an alien in your own world, in your own house, in your own life, in your own skin.

But,

I have another mantra about that, which is not only a mantra for me, but is a mantra I share.  I share it with you wether you want me to or not.

It is also a mantra that on a couple of occasions I have said our loud to myself or when I have rung a mate who was in the grips of BDL.  This is a time in life when you have gone down the lonely lane, to lonely place, to sit at lonely cafe, to wait for the Black Dog to arrive.

I have spoken to that mate, who is sometimes me, or sometimes another bloke who no one else has rung because they don’t know what to say, and, I tell them the truth.  That is, that doesn’t matter what is good in your life, it is not.  It doesn’t matter how much you look around you and realise how lucky you are, because you are not.  It doesn’t matter how many of your friends and family love and care about you, because you can’t feel it.  It doesn’t matter how much of a great and bright future you have, because you cant see it.  You can’t feel any of it.  It is all tainted, and sad, and lonely and black.  You know this is not true, but, now, it is.

I have spoken to them (and I have spoken to me.)

They were hard phone calls to make (but, I will make them again), hard coffee meetings have, or even arrange.  They are times when you know you are going to talk about things that you don’t talk about.

I ring up, they are surprised I have called, often I don’t know them very well and I tell them a story and it starts with, “I heard you were a bit crook”.  This is not a real ‘question’ about how someone in Australia is going.  We can be anywhere between being on our death beds, having a squirting arterial bleed, or just a bit of a cold; all which falls into the category of feeling a bit crook.  The funny part is that we often greet each other with “how are you going” and reply “Good, thanks” and that is the passing of our connection.  I must admit it is sometimes a relief in comparison to asking “how are you going” and they actually tell you!   When I make the call, or greet them for the coffee, I don’t ask then how they are going because I know, and I know, they can’t explain it.  So I explain it for them and I tell them a story.

I tell them about BDL.  I tell them about all that is good in their life, that feels bad.  I tell them I understand the woman (man) you love, the one you you love with all your heart, doesn’t matter.  I tell them I know they love their kids, but that doesn’t matter.  I tell them I know the hurt, regret, hate, love, questions, confusion, blackness they are feeling and don’t understand.  I talk to them about the feelings that if you have never had those feelings, you can’t explain.

I talk to them and I tell them the story:
about the tough guy crying.
about the fearless being afraid, for no reason, about nothing, about everything.
about letting everyone down, when you’re not.
about, lonely, lonely, lonely.
about never seeing how you will ever be better.

But is is not about that, it is about another thing…

I ring them up and I speak to them about all those things,
There is venom in my voice, because those things are here now and the hurt and they are to be despised.  If they are not here now then they are waiting around the corner to ambush you.  I speak to them, I throw it at them, that this is shit, their life is shit, it feels too bad, it feels to black, it feels too lonely.  I do this because they don’t think anyone else knows and if they do they definitely don’t speak about it

And I say to them. I cant make it better.
And I say to them. I know you. I have been you.
And I say to them, I only ask only one thing of you.
And you have to promise, before I ask you.
And they always say yes, because they don’t have anything else.

I tell them, you only have to do one thing.  You have to promise..

Survive.

If you survive the next minute, survive the next 2 minutes, survive the next 5 minutes, survive the next 15 minutes.

Survive an hour, a day, a week, a month, a year.

If you survive, you may not feel better, but you will feel,
If you survive, you may not get it all back, but you will not lose it all,
If you survive, you may not find the love, but you wont lose any that’s left,
If you survive, you may not find the answers, but you still get to ask,
If you survive, you get to survive,

and

That, can just maybe, be okay in its self, for now.

and

I think, when they realise that it is not about everything, and in fact may all be about nothing.  Then, they may not be so lonely.

Sometimes, you can’t be a better man, you just have to survive.