Where exactly does loneliness live in your body? Sit with it and find out, because that is more useful than any advice about getting out more.

They tracked people for decades, took bloods, checked their health, asked how they felt. What came out was not about diet. It was about connection. So is loneliness only evolution punishing us, or is there something underneath it? Usually what we are missing is security. Somebody there. A safety net, and somebody to bounce ideas off.

One thing to try: Sit and ask where you feel it in your body. Just locate it. That is the whole exercise.

In this episode

• (0:03) Two podcasts in one, and where this one goes
• (2:57) Everything being part of something bigger than ourselves
• (4:55) The bloods, the questionnaires, and what they found
• (7:04) Is it only evolution, or is it deeper than that?
• (9:57) Sit down and ask which part of the body it is in
• (11:48) Usually it is security, and having somebody there
• (14:20) Pull the curtains, lock the doors, I need out

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Thank you for listening.

Steven

Links to Steven Webb's podcast and how you can support his work.

• Donate paypal.me/stevenwebb or Coffee stevenwebb.uk
• Steven's courses, podcasts and links: stevenwebb.uk

Hey, welcome to this week's podcast. I'm Steven Webb, and this is Stillness in the Storms and Living Deeper Lives.

It's kind of two podcasts in one. So some of them we're talking about getting some inner peace. And other

ones we're talking about living deeper lives and going deeper into what it means to be a human.

This week I want to talk about being lonely and I want to really talk about it doesn't matter whether

you're in a relationship or whether you're not in a relationship or whether you're just elderly or

feeling alone as a teenager. There's something about humans that every now and again we feel alone

and You can be with somebody, you can be literally, I was in a relationship and my partner would crawl

into bed and even some nights we would cuddle up, but I felt alone I They were there, but they

weren't present. And I'm sure all of you can relate to that at some point.

So how do we deal with loneliness? What does it mean to be lonely? Why do humans feel lonely? That's

what I want to talk about on this podcast.

So let's get on with it.

Let's face it, even if you're a child, when you're like maybe five, six years old, at some point you'll

feel lonely. You'll feel like you don't fit in. And we spend so much of our lives after we develop

the ego at the age of one, one and a half years old, trying to find out where we fit

into the world. And when we become, when we're at school, we're trying to fit in with the in crowd.

We even change ourselves to fit in. And all of this is to avoid the the pain and suffering of

feeling alone. We don't like feeling alone. And it's, it's funny because why

is that? What? Why do we have to feel like we have to be with somebody or we have to

feel like we're part of something? There's some kind of, whether it's self-love or self-respect there's

something about when you're in a relationship or when you're in that gang or when you're part of something that

you almost feel more whole. And I'm paralysed just below the neck and I'm in electric wheelchair and being

a, being a man and being a male macho man, I thought that being in a relationship, having a girlfriend,

made me into more of a man. There I was I I've got a girlfriend, you know, I'm not paralysed,

I'm not useless. I'm you know, I'm manly here, so I thought having a girlfriend showing people that I was

something. And I guess that's the same with trying to fit in with whether it's into a gang or in

with the locals or whether it's Hell's Angels or Mafia. You know, I know that's a stretch from in the

relationship to the Mafia, but it's all been part of something bigger than ourselves. And when we're at

home alone, we don't feel part of that bigger picture. Who are we? What are we um Why do we

feel so lonely? Why is it so. Why is it so painful to feel alone? You know,

humans. Humans have evolved to be separate creatures, to live a separate life. You know, on the spiritual

sense, we're trying to be part of the bigger picture. We're trying to be finding our way home. Wayne Dyer

would say, so what what is the real big issue with just sitting in loneliness

for a while? But we don't like it. It's really painful. The older we get now, more people are living

alone. More people are not in relationships later on. You know, I'm 47. I'm not in a relationship at the

moment. I have been most of my life. You know, this is the first time in my life that I

really lived alone um I have carers, they stay at night. They don't stay if I've got friends over and

things like that. But it comes down to more and more of us are living single lives. We're in

our 40s, 50s, even in relationships, we're living in separate houses.

And there's this great future generation or our generation when we get to older age,

we're going to be living alone. There's going to be more loneliness than ever. And I remember the biggest study

ever in human history that they were.

They found over 2 000 people and they followed them year after year after year. And they took

their bloods and they looked at their health each year. They also done a questionnaire of how they felt and

everything. And when they got to their 70s 75s obviously there's a lot less of them because some of them

have passed away and moved on. They lost contact. The ones that were left, the healthier ones,

they decided to look back in the 50s and see what. See what led to them being more healthier. And

they thought it would be exercise, they thought it would be eating healthier now And it wasn't. It was the

fact that in the 50s, when they were 50s, in their 60s, they had people around them, they had people

that they could talk to that they could bounce off that they could spend time with. They had someone around

that made them feel secure and safe in life. And I think that's one of the main reasons about why

we don't like to feel alone. When we're alone, we feel as if nobody's got our back. We feel as

if nobody's going to be there for us. And that's why you can be in a relationship and perhaps that

partner is disengaged. Perhaps there's something going on. Perhaps they're not interested in being in a relationship with you anymore.

I don't have any reason why, and I don't want you to. If you're in a relationship and you're feeling

a little bit alone, I don't want to put thoughts into your head to what your partner is thinking. But

we can certainly be in a relationship and feel alone. And what is that loneliness? Is it really just the

fact that we haven't got no one to talk to? Or is it something deeper? That we feel as if

loneliness is an evolved state in order to help protect us? Because in groups we're safer.

When we have someone to have our back, we're safer. If I was going to go into a forest that

I did not know, I'd much rather go in with two or three of us as a group than I

would alone. So it makes sense to evolve this fear of loneliness that a feeling of uncomfortable to

be alone. But is that all it is? Is it literally just something that's evolved and now we're suffering because

of it? Or is there something deeper down on the spiritual sense that means we have to have this real

connection with people, or even if it's not with people, with animals and dogs. My little bounty passed away last

year, and I miss him greatly. What do I miss? I miss the companionship. I miss the fact that I

woke up in the night and he was there. I

used to wake up every night and I put my arm out and I would stroke him a couple of

times because I got two single beds next to each other because it's so much easier to dress me when

we move one of the beds out. And carers can get either side.

So when my partner moved out, literally he had a whole single bed to himself. So I would reach out

my arm to him and I would stroke him in the night. And I always thought I was comforting him.

And I maybe Maybe I was, I don't know. But when he'd gone, I realised it was comfort for me

knowing he was there. What could he do? I Don't know, but just knowing he was there. And

in the morning when I used to sit up and do my meditation at six o'clock or 6 30 he

used to hear the Insight Timer

and a plug. Now on Insight Timer, there's my meditations if you ever want to check it out, just type

in Insight Timer on Android or Apple so when he, when whenever the bell

used to go on Insight Timer he used to come and plonk himself right next to me and I always

wonder whether it's because he knew nothing was going to happen for 30 minutes or maybe he come and plonk

next to me because he knew I wasn't going to move and he felt safe and he wanted to relax

and he wanted to feel that connection. I don't know. I remember lying there and breathing the same time as

he was breathing a little bit difficult because he was a little westy and I had great big lungs that

I've got. But I could breathe for so long, same breath as him I'm gonna have my hand on him

there was that connection. I don't know whether he felt it but I felt it and I miss that. I

really do miss that. So what is it about this loneliness? What is it we're longing and I really do

think it's that sense of safety, that sense of someone's there to have my back.

So what can we do about the loneliness well What is there we can do in our lives on a

practical sense? Well, we

can rephrase what loneliness is. Instead of making loneliness a part of who we are and saying I am

lonely, we can say I'm feeling lonely and we can recognise it as something that comes and goes. So

if you're feeling lonely you could do this exercise and you can sit down and take a few deep breaths

and I'm feeling lonely.

What part of the body is that loneliness felt in? And you can identify where it's to in the body

And you could give it a colour. What colour is that loneliness? What

texture? What's it look like? So

you've now got a part of the body, a texture and a colour. For me loneliness really is more in

my chest. It's

like a square shaped, it's quite smooth, not totally smooth, not silky smooth, but like a matte smooth

and

I would say it's like a purple colour.

And when you identify it as an object you can go, well bring this loneliness in, let alone in let

the loneliness fade I'll say that quickly when you're drunk. Let the loneliness so

you can like bring the loneliness up and let it fade away. And you can imagine the object inside of

you doing that. And it gives you control over the feeling of this loneliness. But

if you recognise what it is, look at it and go, well, I'm feeling lonely because of this.

Nothing wrong with feeling lonely. There's nothing wrong with having these feelings. You

know, very often the advice is, well, if you're feeling lonely, get out, Phone someone, do something. No, sit in

it. And you'll realise it's not the fact that you're missing someone very often, it's the fact that you're missing

what that someone. You feel that someone gives you.

And it's very often security or a sense of somebody's there, a safety net, you

know, to have someone to bounce ideas off, to chat, to to reinforce and say, you're okay, you're doing okay,

and you're right. We always like someone to say we're right. I certainly do. It's like having that

conversation. I know, I totally agree. It's like, yes, we got a connection um Very similar to the enemy of

my enemy is my friend, when I was more of a teenager, used to sit around the table and go,

I can't believe how they were. And they would go I know it's exactly the same.

Especially in this really politicized world at the moment, you sit down with someone and they dislike the same politics

as you. Oh my God. It's like, it's like their connection instantly in it It doesn't. It doesn't matter what

they look like or what they're doing. They just instantly. You instantly bond with somebody that disagrees

or dislikes the same things you dislike. That's very, very powerful. But

this thing with loneliness, you know, we really have to sit with it and be okay with it. We can't

change it. You can't push it away. Because like all feelings, the more you push them away, the more they

arise. And I always, I always look at feelings, whether it's anxiety, loneliness, anger, whatever

they are. It's. Imagine you're on a beach and when you were a young child, you always used to.

Or it doesn't even have to be a beach, just a river or something somewhere. And you tried to do

a little dam. Maybe it's a man thing, maybe it's a boy thing, but you used to build this little

dam and you used to try to redirect the water or even stop it. And you have great big ambitions

because you don't realise there's never-ending amount of water. And at some point you're really successful

and you can block it out. And you can stop the water for just a moment, and then before you

know it, the water overflows you. And that's the same with emotions. If you block them out or try to

push them away, at some point they will drown you you know At some point, that loneliness or at some

point that anxiety will put you on your ass on the kitchen floor over your head between your knees. I

can't cope. Can't deal with this anymore. Pull the curtains, lock the doors, get everybody out of my life. I

need time out and That's because of the overwhelm. I took that overwhelm on other shows and I might

revisit again in the coming weeks.

But we very often try to push away these feelings. Loneliness is a beautiful feeling. And when we when

we change our reflection of the way we see these things, the way we can handle them changes.

And loneliness is one of the great ones that if we look at loneliness as a beautiful feeling

that comes and goes. You could never be lonely unless at some point you had someone. Unless at some point

you had that security and safety of someone being there for you.

Which means at some point it can be returned. It can be there.

Even if it's just in your heart, sometimes it can be there. You don't have to be with people to

be not lonely. You just have to believe you're not alone in this. Thinking you're not alone in this

feeling and perhaps grief. Very

often someone just saying to you, I feel the pain too. Sometimes I'm lonely as well.

Sometimes that's enough

um I don't know if you can hear my belly rumbling, but it's rumbling. So. I'm Steven Webb and this

is Stillness in the storms and Living deeper lives podcast. And hopefully you subscribe. If you can, leave me a

review, that's brilliant. If you go to stillnessinthestorms.com you can support me, download free meditations, you can

download a book, finding your inner peace. Most of all, you can. I can help you through some difficult times

in your life and I can help you through loneliness. And if you are particularly suffering from loneliness at the

moment, head over to Stillness in the storms and click the chat button. Book in a chat with me

totally free, just 20 minutes. And they'll come with a little page that'll say only do this as Steven told

you to. Well, I'm telling you to book in a chat with me. If you're feeling lonely and you'd like

me to help in some way reframe it for you.

Take care. Love you guys and thank you for listening and thank you for being here today with me. Have

a great week.