Need Help Facing a Lonely Holiday Season?

 

11.20.2020 NEED HELP FACING A LONELY HOLIDAY SEASON? While the holidays often conjure images of sharing in good cheer with one’s family and friends, for many people the season signals a time of loneliness. This year may mean an extra helping of loneliness for some. U.S. states are debating shutting down, and families find themselves struggling with the dilemma of making memories and nurturing togetherness without spreading the coronavirus, which could hinder them from marking the holidays with loved ones.  This time of year can also bring back memories of previous holidays spent with family members lost, or bring up feelings of sadness thanks to relationships that have been broken during these past stressful months. All these elements conspire to make the end of this year one of isolation and difficult emotions. “Usually we regard loneliness as an enemy,” writes Pema Chödrön in “Six Kinds of Loneliness.” “Heartache is not something we choose to invite in. It’s restless and pregnant and hot with the desire to escape and find something or someone to keep us company. When we can rest in the middle, we begin to have a nonthreatening relationship with loneliness, a relaxing and cooling loneliness that completely turns our usual fearful patterns upside down.”  Below, we offer Pema’s full teaching as well as two others that might help you or someone you know survive the holidays and form a better relationship with loneliness.  May these wise words accompany you in the upcoming days and weeks. —Ross Nervig, audience engagement editor, LionsRoar.com

Six Kinds of Loneliness To be without a reference point is the ultimate loneliness. It is also called enlightenment. In the middle way, there is no reference point. The mind with no reference point does not resolve itself, does not fixate or grasp. How could we possibly have no reference point? To have no reference point would be to change a deep-seated habitual response to the world: wanting to make it work out one way or the other. If I can’t go left or right, I will die! When we don’t go left or right, we feel like we are in a detox center. We’re alone, cold turkey with all the edginess that we’ve been trying to avoid by going left or right. That edginess can feel pretty heavy.

All the Lonely People You may be lonely, but you’re not as alone as you think. Sometimes, says Jane McLaughlin-Dobisz, you have to put your phone down and stop to taste the cookie dough. A long time ago in Korea, a student asked Zen master Man Gong, “What is the most important and precious of the three jewels? Is it the Buddha, the dharma, or the sangha?” Without hesitation, Man Gong answered, “Sangha.” When I first heard Man Gong’s answer, I was surprised. The way I saw it, without the Buddha there’d be no dharma, and without the dharma, there’d be no teaching at all.

All Alone or One With Everything? Are we all alone in this world or at one with everything? Nick Walser shines a spotlight on the paradoxical nature of loneliness. Is Buddhism’s bottom line the oft-quoted “Be a lamp unto yourselves?” This may be a lovely, liberating thought when we are casting off reliance upon external authority. But sometimes being our own illumination can feel lonely indeed. I have felt most lonely when I have weighed the very smallest idea of myself against the vast grandeur of the universe, and found myself wanting. On many occasions, I haven’t put the time into connecting wholeheartedly with others; I have held myself aloof from life.

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