Alone in a crowd

Sitting at Birmingham Airport over half term, where my flight was delayed by a couple of hours, I berated myself for not bringing my Kindle. It also gave me time to people watch, something of a passion for me. After the initial pleasure of watching children excited to be going on holiday, and couples clearly relaxing before flying off somewhere hot, I came to appreciate a very different group. This group was made up of individuals, sat or walking alone, and seemingly lost in the blur of activity. It struck me as odd; that a person could appear alone in such a melee of people and activity. So much happening, to be part of, and yet these individuals stood apart, alone in the crowd.

In our crowded world of open plan offices, social media, family and friends, to list just four pressure points of ‘busy’, can it really be conceivable that any of us can feel alone? It begs the question, what does alone really mean to us? Many of my clients talk of a crushing sense of being lonely and how this makes them feel when no one seems able to understand. They are always part of a group and yet that very fact makes the loneliness seem more gnawing, the impact so much greater and the result, to amplify the sense of being alone.

To understand that is to have experienced it. Loneliness is a state of being, a sense of self that denies context and logic. It simply tells us where we are in relation to ourselves and often without reference to anyone else. That is why it seems inexplicable to others, perhaps. That being alone cannot be cured by more people can be a revelation. It is certainly a first step to finding ourselves in this crowded world. Not being alone starts with the individual; it starts with ‘I’.