Why Do I Feel So Alone Even Though I Have Friends?
By: Alessandro Bonvini
You’re surrounded by people and friends, your social media accounts are busy… “so why do I feel so alone even when I have friends?”
7 Reasons You Feel So Alone Even When You Are With People
1. You’ve misunderstood what loneliness is.
Loneliness is an emotional state, not a physical state. It can’t be warded off by a high friend count, or by never being by yourself.
Nor can loneliness be solved by telling yourself to ‘just get over it’. Often loneliness stems from things we learned or experienced as children that left us behaving in certain ways. These ways of being can be quite difficult to change, especially if they are connected to childhood trauma.
So first things first, accept that ending your feeling of loneliness is not about booking up your social schedule or getting on another dating site. It’s time to go a bit deeper.
2. You are in need of real connection.
If there was one magic ingredient to not feeling lonely, it would be the ability to connect to others. This is not about being able to appear fascinating, or a capacity to talk about the same subjects that someone else is interested in. In fact these can both be ways to hide from connection.
Connection means being around people we feel open and available to, and are able to bring our real self to and feel safe doing so.
[Sounds confusing? Read more in our article on “Connecting to Others“.]
3. You find it hard to be yourself.
By: Ralf Steinberger
Connection involves being yourself around others. But if you’ve spent your entire life living up to the expectations of your friends and family, you might find it hard to ‘just be yourself’.
You might even not know who ‘yourself’ is.
Lack of personal identity is often behind ongoing loneliness. If we can’t pinpoint who we are, then we are left constantly feeling misunderstood. How can others connect to us if we are always shifting our self presentation and leaving them confused?
This can happen if we spent a childhood pleasing a parent so much our true self never had a chance to develop, or if a childhood trauma meant we developed a fake self to hide our emotional pain.
4. Deep down you don’t trust anyone.
Of course if you don’t trust anyone, how can you ever relax and be yourself? This sort of fear of intimacy instead results in having many inner walls and barriers that stop people from reaching you – and leave you trapped inside, lonely.
5. You have borderline personality disorder.
Sometimes our trust was so fractured by experiences as a child we actually can’t maintain relationships, no matter how hard we try.
Are you an intense and fascinating person who attracts partners and friends easily — but the roster changes frequently? Connect with others fast, but have dramatic fallouts often? Have you been told many times that you are too emotional and overreactive?
Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is not only exhausting, it leaves you feeling unbearably misunderstood and alone in the world.
6. Your definition of friendship needs re-assessing.
Sometimes loneliness can simply be down to not understanding the key elements of adult friendship.
Yes, at school, we gravitate towards people because we are on the same sports team, we like the same music. But as adults, independent from the constant support of our family, we need to instead find people with whom we share personal values.
By: joelle L
Personal values are the things that matter most to you about life.
If you lost everything and everyone you had but still had yourself, what would matter to you?
As you can imagine, if you share these core values with someone, it doesn’t matter if your lives are a match on the ever-changing outside when you match on the inside.
Perhaps this is why social media ‘friends’ don’t stop loneliness. Instead, research now shows that social media lead right to rising levels of loneliness. We just aren’t honest enough in the way we present ourselves online, and along with personal values, real friendship is also based on authenticity.
[Suspect your friendship circle needs an upgrade? Read our piece on Toxic Friendships.]
7. You don’t know how to receive.
Do you tend to say no to any offers of help and do everything yourself? Deflect questions about you and insist on talking about other peoples’ problems only? And hide your emotions if you feel sad or down, only calling friends when you feel in a good mood?
Connection is a two-way street.
If you are making friendships all one-way, always giving but never receiving, then you’ll feel depleted instead of loved. At its extreme, this can become a pattern of codependency, where you begin to take your self-worth from helping others and can lose any sense of your own needs.
Sound worryingly familiar?
If you find you have real troubles connecting to others, and you suspect your patterns of relating relate to learnings or experiences from childhood, it is a very good idea to seek the support of a counsellor.
Relating to others is now recognised as so important to our wellbeing there are even forms of therapy that focus just on this crucial element of our lives — read our article “The Types of Therapy That Help You With Relationships” for more.
Harley Therapy connects you with counsellors who can help you form better friendships and relationships so you can finally end the cycle of loneliness. Book an assessment appointment in central London today using our online form. Not in the UK? Skype sessions are now available.
Do you find an answer to ‘why do I feel so alone even when I’m with people’ that we’ve missed? Share with our readers in the public comment box below.
Well thank you for writing this article it helped me come to terms with the reasons why I had to end the friendship with thatcone guy our values simply don’t match up plus there’s a big age difference of about eight years so I’m much more mature so that means I need deeper friendships and simply don’t have time for friends that are too busy for me
Hi Lauren, we can always find reasons if we want them. But at the end of the day, you are still obsessively thinking about this man and it’s causing you anxiety. So this means it’s a bigger issue. Please do consider calling those hotlines or booking a session with a therapist. You’ve been through a lot with losing your father, you could use real support.
All of your articles are so wonderful! I have spent hours reading them b/c so many speak to me; I can relate to numerous issues/details. I just wanted to give you a “many thanks” for your beneficial and knowledgeable online content!
That’s really kind Haley, we really appreciate the feedback. Best, Andrea Blundell (editor and lead writer, I wrote this article!).
This article really resonated for me. My inability to trust friendships, and to always expect that i will come up short, has haunted me for most of my adult life. I would dearly love to move past it. What type of therapy would you recommend? thank you
Hi Laura, we’d suggest a therapy that focuses on relating. Check out our article on therapies like this here (it’s an article purportedly about love, but these types of therapy help with all kinds of relating, not just romance) http://bit.ly/findlovetherapy Best, Ht.
When I read number 3 I started crying a bit
Moses, half the battle is understanding why we are lonely. So if three made you cry, then it is some ways a good thing, as now you know what the issue is and can work to find the answer. And the good thing is this sort of issue, having grown up in a family environment you were never encouraged or allowed to be yourself, or you had to ‘earn’ love, to the extent you don’t even know how to be yourself as an adult? It can change. It is not a permanent thing. Things that are learned can be unlearned, and we can try new ways of being instead. Of course it requires commitment and hard work. It doesn’t change overnight. Start reading books about self awareness, start journalling, practicing mindfulness, learning about yourself. And we’d highly advise you start working with a therapist. Therapy is all about getting to know the real you. There is something about the way a therapist listens and the safety of the therapy room where suddenly it’s like we see ourselves in totally new ways. Best, HT.
Hi I struggle with this a lot I’m a 25 yr old male I have zero emotional connection with my family and it hurts me my fiancé dumped me because she wanted to get to know my family , my family is very toxic I don’t want them around a woman I’m with so that
Hurt me when she left in the way she did . My cousin who was like a brother to
Me stopped speaking to me and acts like I don’t even exist it’s very hurtful I’m so scared to even connect with others . I so badly want a friend or just someone in my
Life that doesn’t do that I don’t know how . I’ve met a girl at a church I’m going to and I can tell she likes me but I’m terrified to even court her I’m terrified of intimacy I don’t trust anyone anymore it’s even hard for me to look others in the eyes I feel awkward when I talk to people . It’s effecting me very badly I even quit my job because being around others makes me so tired and scared emotionally
Hi Ryan, you’ve got to seek support. Anxiety and paranoia to the point you quit your job is serious and you need to treat it as such. You also sound like you are really struggling with self esteem. Is it possible for you to find some counselling? Use our article on finding free to low cost counselling here http://bit.ly/lowcosttherapy. A therapist will help you learn new ways of relating that help you feel safer and calmer, so you feel more able to talk to people. And can help you work on your upset around your family and past. And if you are feeling really low please consider using a free help line. The volunteers are happy to help. You can find a list of free help lines in the UK here http://bit.ly/mentalhelplines and if you aren’t in the UK google for one in your area. Best, HT.
I feel like I miss this person almost everytime because even though I seem joyful I feel empty inside, sad, lonely and like I’m not in the right place. And in the back of my head I know that if that person was here I wouldn’t be like before. But I also know that person is far away. It’s like im going outside and looking everyday for that person and sometimes I cry. I watch kdramas. Can that be because I watch kdramas? Should I stop watching? but I love it a lot too. That keeps me up. What should i do? I hate that feeling.
Hi there. Loneliness can be tough, and it sounds like you are lonely, so we totally get that it can feel overwhelming. Try to go easy on yourself. You use the word “should”. There is really no ‘should’. It’s your life, you are free to choose how you are going to live it. Whether or not you binge watch TV is up to you. But what we’d say here is that sourcing our happiness on someone else never works. Your happiness is and always will be your responsibility. It can be hard to fully accept that, but once we do, then our life really starts to change. If you only feel happy if a certain other person is around, that’s a big red flag there are issues that you need to work on, such as a sense of self, your identity, or your esteem. These are all great things to work on in therapy. If there were any red flags about the K dramas it would be if you actually think that real life is like them. Hopefully you are aware that it’s not. Movies and film are simply movies and film, they do not offer healthy interpretations of real life and real relating, not even close, in fact they often offer such false interpretations we can drive ourselves crazy if we don’t realise the difference and are waiting for life to be like a movie! Unlike movies, love does not fall out of the sky, it doesn’t save us from ourselves (only we can do that), nor is it healthy to focus our sense of self around another and nor is this love or real friendship, this is codependency, something else entirely. We have several articles on here about what love really is and healthy relating, use the search bar to find them if interested, we think they might be helpful. Best, HT.
So like I honestly don’t know how to really explain how I feel, but I see it as a type of loneliness. I have friends and stuff and my family is somewhat together but favoritism played a big part in everyone’s feelings. My friends I feel sometimes are ignorant when I’m trying to explain something even if there’s that one friend that actually tries to talk with me. You see the thing is, I’m 16 and I get it I’m young a d shouldn’t worry about dating, but it doesn’t mean that I can just follow that especially since everyone around me looks so happy and stuff. My friend, that listens to me breakdown about how I never experienced that and how I feel casted out about it, she listens and helps but goes and does the same stuff that makes me feel this way. As if she was just there and then completely ignored it the next day. And about relationships, I tend to just start liking the first person that gives me attention and it hurts because in the end, they don’t actually want any relationship further than a friend and I’m the one that’s lead on until I find out and have a full mental breakdown and I can’t sleep at night and I have “bad” thoughts, if you know. It just makes me feel lonely and that maybe no one actually really likes me or that no one cares and even just writing this I’m getting into a stage of sadness. I don’t know how I should deal with this, but I don’t want to do something I might regret later…
Hi Aubrey, first of all, it’s okay to feel lonely, misunderstood, and sad. These are all perfectly valid feelings. It doesn’t mean there is anything ‘wrong’ with you. In fact we all feel this way at some point, particularly if we are a teenager, when we are trying to figure out who we are, and are dealing with hormones, a growing brain, and the thought of one day soon being independent. So sometimes it can really help to say, this is okay. In this moment I feel sad and lonely and that’s okay. And just let ourselves feel that way without judging. It’s the same for thoughts. Thought are not who you are. They are just thoughts. Even violent destructive thoughts are simply thoughts. The other thing we notice here is comparison. Comparison to others in your family and your friends.Comparison is a nasty trick of the mind. We never actually know someone else’s reality now matter how much we think we do, and the only person worth comparing ourselves to is ourselves. How am I doing today compared to yesterday? What we also do see here is a tendency to feel different, to think in black and white, and a very strong emotional response to everything. If this all continues or worsens as you get to aged 18, it is worth seeking counselling over, particularly if you have suicidal thinking. Some people have less of an emotional skin than others, which can develop into emotional instability disorder. Again, we aren’t diagnosing you with that, you are sixteen, these intense feelings can simply be part of growing up. And we would never diagnose someone based on a comment, people are complex, we don’t know you. But we are saying support is really a good thing, even now. If you can talk to a friend or trusted adult that would be great, or a school counsellor. Also, google for a mental health help line for teens in your country. If you are in the UK, you’ll find the info here http://bit.ly/mentalhelplines. Otherwise, a useful tool you can learn by yourself is mindfulness, read our free guide here http://bit.ly/mindfulnessallabout it really helps with calming anxiety and big emotions if we can commit to doing it daily. And as for daily, take things one day at a time. It’s okay to have tough days. What matters is that we keep going. Best, HT.
I am surrounded by people who love me and a wife who adores me…I just feel so so lonely all the time.
I’m a 6.1 man with wide shoulders and a muscular build so people think I am bulletproof and anytime I try to express anything negative I am experiencing I get brushed aside and basically told to “walk it off”. I have learned to always mask and smile and act positive around others because no one could handle my true self (I tried many many times). And my own fears and emotions have often been turned around and used against me by women I trusted and loved in the past. I love deeply and I do all I can for those I care for but I rarely feel it back on the same level (probably just my perception colored by my loneliness and depression).
My IQ is in the genius range and this I feel contributes to how lonely I feel as well. I just don’t enjoy normal topics. This is not a knock on anyone and I don’t feel like I am better than anyone, infact I often wished and still do that my IQ wasn’t as high or my interests weren’t as… unique…as they are. I mean who am I going to find to discuss quantum physics, astrophysics, genetics, and philosophy on a similar level?
And worse yet I am constantly aware of my mortality. Always have been. I don’t see the point in anything as everything is going to end…so I decided to just stop trying.
I feel miserable on the inside but I’m always wearing my happy face.
Just wanted a chance to vent out some of that pressure. Thanks to anyone who took the time to read my ramblings.
Hello there LW, so we see that high potential/high IQ clients often also have high emotional sensitivity. And can be vulnerable to things like anxiety (often thinking about death can be a form of anxiety, and anxiety is thought based, when powers to think are higher than usual of course this creates a vulnerability). Although annoyingly most research seems to focus on children who are high IQ/highly sensitive and just seems to ignore the very real problems this can pose in adults. Loneliness and difficult relationships being a case in point. Therapy can be highly effective, but of course it entails finding a therapist who is also high IQ or navigates high IQ individuals or you will get bored. It also sounds like you have chosen a life for yourself where you are shut off from people who can understand you or who have emotional intelligence or emotional navigation capabilities (telling you to walk off emotions is not very skilled). But you are falling into the trap of assuming this is what the world at large is like. It isn’t. Again, it’s the world you’ve actually chosen, as an adult with free will. We aren’t saying it’s as easy as ‘just make different choices!’, not at all. It is highly likely you have strong unconscious beliefs holding you back. Limiting beliefs are seriously powerful creatures and saboteurs. For example, an unconscious belief “I am different and unacceptable” will actually, believe it or not, see you unconsciously choosing things that ‘prove’ this true then telling yourself you are powerless and that’s ‘the way life is’. It would be way too uncomfortable to choose otherwise and you’d find excuses not to. Childhood experiences of being bullied, teased, or ‘othered’ for being smart can help create these deep rooted beliefs. Therapy is again super powerful for helping you to change those beliefs and start to make choices that actually lead to a life you want to be in. Because there are ways to find community, these days more than ever. The high potential movement is quite large, and the internet gives access to many groups/forums etc. In some circles out there your interests would be positively banal. So again it becomes about the question of why you haven’t sought out these crowds, finding support to figure that out, and to overcome all your unconscious blocks to a life you feel good in. Best, HT.