Loneliness spreads like a virus

[incnic]

simple bro, teh man doesnt wash

[WhosZena]

Everyone needs a bit of loneliness from time to time.
I can't be around people non stop for more than a week.

But if I let it slip, the friends I stay in touch with are normally the less social ones as well.

[saphyre]

Ive realised recently that friends are usually just people that have had a very similar experience in life to you, if youve gone to the same school, are into the same music. Or even if you're in a foreign country and you meet someone who's from the same city you're very likely to become friends with them, its all relative. Kind of funny thinking about if i met my best friends from 5 years ago who i havent seen since, chances are there will not be the same chemistry that there used to be and after reminiscing and catching up there wouldnt be much left to do because our experiences would have drifted so far apart from eachother. Come to think of it i have friends that i dont even like that much but theyre still friends cause we've been in a lot of the same situations and had similar experiences in life. and on the other hand you have people that are on the same wavelength as you, and you might have things in common with them but your lives are totally different. Its good when you get someone who is on the same wavelength as you but has also been through the same things in life.

Usually these situations or experiences where you find friends are usually forced on you, things like family and school, or even waiting in a queue for a long time. idk and a person's 'wavelength' is just a result of the experiences so this outlook is kind of confusing

[k_k]

i think im quite a sociable creature and will talk and be in the company of people quite easily, i also reckon ive got tons of friends, but when you think about it you have to divide them into friends and like... aquiantances, like people you talk to and know and chum with and people who are real friends, like super trust etc. most of my close friends are that close 'cause ive grown up with em and we've been aound each other for years

[Genevieve]

Everyone needs a bit of loneliness from time to time.
I can't be around people non stop for more than a week.

But if I let it slip, the friends I stay in touch with are normally the less social ones as well.

Being alone =/= loneliness.

[nousd]

I don't mind feeling lonely
I can do stuff about that
i.e. socialize/ seek out loved ones/ help someone
but when loneliness begins to feel like meaninglessness
that's when I've gotta get off my arse
and initiate something that will change my mind
The most effective thing I've found is to
start or join a group to address something wrong with the world
which tends to suggest I care about someone else.
i.e. my life has meaning
Not necessarily easy
but defo works for me.

That doesn't mean I'm a desperate campaigner though...not my style.

[nicenice]

Ive realised recently that friends are usually just people that have had a very similar experience in life to you, if youve gone to the same school, are into the same music. Or even if you're in a foreign country and you meet someone who's from the same city you're very likely to become friends with them, its all relative. Kind of funny thinking about if i met my best friends from 5 years ago who i havent seen since, chances are there will not be the same chemistry that there used to be and after reminiscing and catching up there wouldnt be much left to do because our experiences would have drifted so far apart from eachother. Come to think of it i have friends that i dont even like that much but theyre still friends cause we've been in a lot of the same situations and had similar experiences in life. and on the other hand you have people that are on the same wavelength as you, and you might have things in common with them but your lives are totally different. Its good when you get someone who is on the same wavelength as you but has also been through the same things in life.

Usually these situations or experiences where you find friends are usually forced on you, things like family and school, or even waiting in a queue for a long time. idk and a person's 'wavelength' is just a result of the experiences so this outlook is kind of confusing

Yeah I agree with this to a certain extent. Most friends are just friends because they're thrown into the same thing together. They might not have anything in common but they're there so they might as well get along. The thing about chemistry is true as well, once you go through the same things you can relate to the same things as each other and when you grow apart you grow apart differently. It seems weird thinking that you'll meet so many people over time and all they do is come and go.

I wouldn't agree with the wavelengths though. You need people different then you, it helps maintain balance. It helps to share interests, humour but haven't someone on the completely same wavelength would get tedious and boring after a while.

[monica86]

this is all too real i have ptsd

[nicenice]

Everyone needs a bit of loneliness from time to time.
I can't be around people non stop for more than a week.

But if I let it slip, the friends I stay in touch with are normally the less social ones as well.

Being alone =/= loneliness.

Not really, you can be alone, and not feel lonely. You can be in with a group of people and feel lonely.

[dreamizm]

I don't mind feeling lonely
I can do stuff about that
i.e. socialize/ seek out loved ones/ help someone
but when loneliness begins to feel like meaninglessness
that's when I've gotta get off my arse
and initiate something that will change my mind
The most effective thing I've found is to
start or join a group to address something wrong with the world
which tends to suggest I care about someone else.
i.e. my life has meaning
Not necessarily easy
but defo works for me.

Is this a poem?

[saphyre]

It seems weird thinking that you'll meet so many people over time and all they do is come and go.

exactly! its kind of sad how most people at the end of the day are 'expendable' to you, even if you dont realise it in the present. obviously its a lot harder when you lose someone instantly (eg through death) rather than gradually like drifting apart from eachother.

to use an analogy say you have an xbox and you're always playing it but one day the xbox breaks down in the middle of a game, you would be seriously angry. whereas if you bought an xbox and werent really that into it and gradually you played less and less of it until finally you werent playing it at all you wouldnt even notice the loss. cause in both cases the end result it you not playing xbox... uh i dunno if that explains it right but you can kind of see what i mean

[cityzen]

.

[2manynoobs]

but when loneliness begins to feel like meaninglessness

yeah

[xarcane]

... I can't believe people actually get paid for doing this shit. What a fucking cutting edge study. It's not a condition, it's an emotion like being sad or happy. Clinical depression/schizophrena is a condition, by all means study that, but loneliness is a bloody emotion. Next up, when we see people happy/sad sometimes we feel hapy/sad.

Btw how is loneliness spreading "like a virus", when everyone who experiences it is usually alone. It's probably the emotion that spreads least, ffs.

[WhosZena]

Everyone needs a bit of loneliness from time to time.
I can't be around people non stop for more than a week.

But if I let it slip, the friends I stay in touch with are normally the less social ones as well.

Being alone =/= loneliness.

Not really, you can be alone, and not feel lonely. You can be in with a group of people and feel lonely.

I agree.

[Genevieve]

Everyone needs a bit of loneliness from time to time.
I can't be around people non stop for more than a week.

But if I let it slip, the friends I stay in touch with are normally the less social ones as well.

Being alone =/= loneliness.

Not really, you can be alone, and not feel lonely. You can be in with a group of people and feel lonely.

That's what I said.

[kay]

... I can't believe people actually get paid for doing this shit. What a fucking cutting edge study. It's not a condition, it's an emotion like being sad or happy. Clinical depression/schizophrena is a condition, by all means study that, but loneliness is a bloody emotion. Next up, when we see people happy/sad sometimes we feel hapy/sad.

Btw how is loneliness spreading "like a virus", when everyone who experiences it is usually alone. It's probably the emotion that spreads least, ffs.

It's because when one person drops out of an existing network, there's a chance that closely linked people in that network are likely to eventually drop out of it as well. And as they drop out, the dropping out spreads. Or at least that's what the article suggests.

It didn't really need a study to cover it as it makes sense to an extent. Take a group of friends. For whatever reason, one member drops out. The group dynamics change. Sometimes the group re-adjusts, other times the group might gain a new member which repairs the dynamics. Occasionally, this doesn't happen and you get more and more people dropping out of the group. So it propagates. That's not to say however that something like this would be due to solely to loneliness.

One thing that I have noticed (it might be a more common thing amongst scientists/researchers) is that people who are lonely also have a tendency to project this loneliness and sometime make it far worse than it is. There's an increased inclination to mutter and moan, even if it's to no one in particular. That sort of behaviour tends to enforce loneliness because eventually other people get bored of the moaning. Worst, the moaning can start infecting other people and soon the whole bloody place is full of people who only see the downside to everything. Morale goes to shit, no one ever talks anymore.

Edit: Forgot to add, unlike what some people have said here, I generally have few things in common with the people I consider my friends now. No shared experiences growing up together, dissimilar backgrounds and culture, only 2 people I hang with are my age. It's all about what you want to make of things. I'm not the most social of people either.

[64hz]

"The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, peculiar to myself and to a few other solitary men, is the central and inevitable fact of human existence." - Thomas Wolfe

i feel this.
the only person you can ever really truly completely know, is yourself.
and even thats hard.

[BLAHBLAHJAH]

I have rarely heard "he/she likes totally different things to us and has opposite opinions but they are around our age live near-by and might like some company".

I find that hard to believe... Maybe it's cos I grew up in a small village, but I was always very fond of the power of 'opposites attracting'. Same went for uni, had some mega friendships that the only thing in common was 'the present situation'

Ironically, the only thing I've tended to find offputting was the repulsive nature of someone with far too much misguided enthusiasm (translated : nerds) that ruin the charm

Anyway, people that have become best company to me are the ones who you can genuinely enjoy silence with. Lonliness is little more than an option to embrace, but there's so many better forms of instability to enjoy in life.

On another note, 'self indulgent misery' is the contagious bastard. Always usual suspects that choose to act this way too, moaning at anything. I just got to the point of making a sarcastic song to sing at the miserable stnuc that consists of "HEEEY MISTER! TURN THAT FROWN UPSIDE DOWN!" and they normally tend to get irritated and leave haha

[saphyre]

I just got to the point of making a sarcastic song to sing at the miserable stnuc that consists of "HEEEY MISTER! TURN THAT FROWN UPSIDE DOWN!" and they normally tend to get irritated and leave haha

lol! that doesnt prove anything except that you annoy people