Photo credit: approachingjustice.net
When it comes to trending topics, loneliness is not one of
them. If I were strategizing about which key words would garner me the most clicks
and likes, the word lonely wouldn’t be at the top of the list. No one wants to
talk about, think about, or admit to loneliness. We’ve come a long way in our
cultural willingness to talk about depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and
addiction, but loneliness is a topic that remains, well, lonely. As a subject
for discussion, it’s the guy who’s never invited to the party. We think that,
if we admit we are lonely, it will make us the social equivalent of lepers. We
assume “everyone else” is well-connected. I mean, just look at their Instagram
and Facebook feeds! They’re all livin’
the life! So we just post the highlights of our lives, put on our nice suit,
cute dress, and make-up, and act like everything’s great.
Except it isn’t. “According to estimates by University of
Chicago psychology professor John T. Cacioppo, PhD, coauthor of Loneliness:
Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection, at any given time at least one
in five people, or roughly 60 million Americans, suffers from loneliness.”
Cacioppo says, “By this I mean both the acute bouts of melancholy we all feel
from time to time, as well as a chronic lack of intimacy—a yearning for someone
to truly know you, get you, see you—that can leave people feeling seriously
unmoored… Indeed, while social media has given us more ways to communicate,
many experts believe it may also leave us more alienated. It's the
deteriorating quality of our relationships that concerns researchers like Harry
Reis, PhD, a professor of psychology at the University of Rochester. ‘We need
to interact with other people on a fairly deep level, and that's what many of
us are missing,’ says Reis.” (http://www.oprah.com/health/just-say-hello-fight-loneliness#ixzz4c4BqBeTv)
We humans are wired to act like we’ve got it all together.
We learn this at a very young age. On the playground in elementary school, we
all saw what happened to the awkward , shy, or “different” kids. They got
picked on. Even the kids who would never pick on someone on their own are
forced to choose between joining in or
being ostracized themselves. It is social self-preservation. It’s instinct. Those kids who buck this
instinct are often the exception that proves the rule. Adulthood should make us
kinder and gentler. And sometimes it does. But it can also make us just really good
actors. Henry David Thoureau observed that most people were “masses of men leading lives of quiet desperation.” Our tools
for curating a façade of happiness may be more sophisticated, but the
statistics don’t lie. 60 million of us here in the U.S. are leading lives of
quiet desperation. We’re just too afraid to admit it.
The good news is, statistics don’t prescribe our behavior,
they just describe it. We humans are nothing if not adaptive. Just like we
learn to cook, knit, meditate, dance, or play an instrument, we can learn to be
welcomers. Jesus said, “Whoever welcomes
you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. ”
(Matthew 10:40) The most miraculous thing Jesus did is to set a table and eat with
people. He set a place for everyone. He didn’t just break out the “good china”
for the holy, pious, and popular people. He broke it out for the people no one else would
let within 100 feet of them: the prostitutes; the lepers; the greedy tax
collectors; the widows. He even set a place for his fearful, confused,
self-centered, and wildly imperfect disciples. He didn’t teach people to welcome
strangers by charging a consulting fee and prescribing 7 steps to success. He
taught people to welcome strangers by setting a table and inviting them to come
and eat, day after day, week after week, and month after month. He set the kind
of table where the guests, who may have had nothing in common, had to sit
across from one another, look each other in the eyes, pass the hummus, break
the bread, and pour the wine within inches of one another. They sat close
enough to smell each other’s deodorant-less dusty bodies. They sat close enough
to see each other’s deep scars and press up against each other’s shoulders. He
served the same food to the rich and the destitute, and gave no preferential
seating. In our post-scientific world, we have a hard time believing Jesus’
healing miracles. But we now know that doctors and neuroscientists alike link
loneliness and isolation to epidemic increases in disease and mortality. The
centers of the brain that are associated with pain are much more active in people
who are lonely and isolated. So we
shouldn’t be surprised that Jesus healed. His healing wasn’t magic, it was
love. It was connection. With each place he set, he was telling people, “I know
you. I get you. I see you. I welcome you.”
Welcomers are healers. Welcomers change lives. Welcomers are
miracle-workers. We don’t need therapists and consultants to tell us what we
already know. We need people to know us, get us, and to see us. We are social
creatures, wired for connection. It doesn’t take special training or certification
to become a welcomer. It just takes the discipline and commitment to smile, to
say hello, to set a table and invite
strangers. It just takes a willingness to practice welcome the same way we
practice knitting, meditation, dance, or music. So go out into the world today
and be a welcomer. Get to know someone. Try to “get” someone who is different
than you. Make someone feel seen. Real miracles aren’t that complicated, we just
have to be willing to set a place for them. Blessings and love, welcomers! Here's a song to inspire your welcoming: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNjH8rEJjDc
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