Loneliness in Midlife Years – How to Avoid it
Learning how to keep your own company is paramount when working to fight off loneliness in midlife years. It is especially important in these trying times.
Experiencing loneliness is a lot more serious than we thought! According to statistics, having long periods of loneliness can lead to health concerns such as heart problems and mental issues. It was also mentioned that it could bring on challenges with dementia.
Feelings of loneliness is not bias when coming to age groups at this point. Years back, it was the norm for the elderly (70’s and 80’s) to experience loneliness because of change (divorce, death of a spouse, kids leaving the nest, etc.). Now, loneliness is hitting us in our 20’s and 30’s. It is noted that it can even be brought on by items such as social media where the likes achieved by one can impact the other and so on. Strangely enough, the amounts of likes for one person can cause loneliness in another if he or she is not as popular.
In this article, we are focusing on individuals that are over the age of 40, simply because midlife men and women are more susceptible to hitting rock bottom when things spiral out of control.
As mentioned above, it is important to be able to enjoy your own company. This ability provides benefits that keep us grounded – reasons being, it affords us the opportunity to sort out who we are as individuals, giving us a sense of self and purpose. During these private moments, we are also able to identify with ourselves, our environment, likes, dislikes, etc. When we become keen on these items, we can control our inner thoughts and emotions a lot better and are able to cope with any kind of situation.
Conversely, if we don’t possess the above-mentioned skills, we can begin to create private talk shows in our head on what we believe are taking place. This is where we get ourselves into trouble by depleting our social circle and, ultimately, becoming isolated.
Although the quiet-me times are good for building self-realization skills, it can take a negative effect when the wrong stories are being silently discussed. This vicious cycle is when the damage of becoming secluded begins.
Taking time to understand what we need to make ourselves happy is key. Once that is in place, paying attention to having the right circle of family and friends will be important to avoid getting involved with competition and envy issues. These are some of the main reasons why one may decide to become isolated, so it’s best to pay attention to the group that will induce these energies.
This may all sound selfish, but if you really want to have a good approach to staying centered and balanced within yourself, this is the route to take. Including some form of exercise to this package will also help in keeping you focused to move through your midlife years in a more joyful and pleasant manner, so that you can avoid having challenges with loneliness and maintain good-overall health to lead a more fulfilling and happier life.
MLR
