Loving kindness meditation is a response to loneliness. Loneliness is a common phenomenon these days, affecting somewhere between 30 and 50 percent of Americans.
Those of you struggling with it may wonder how in the world sitting alone and meditating can help you feel less lonely. The instinctive cure to loneliness is to be with other people, which can, indeed, help. But if you aren’t connected to yourself, being around others may not penetrate your loneliness.
We learn to be less lonely by first learning to be with ourselves. And one of the ways to practice being with ourselves is to meditate. Meditation helps you focus on your aliveness—your very existence. By bringing your attention to your breath, sensations in your body, your emotions or your thoughts, you become of aware of you.
Meditation elicits an observational stance instead of a reactive one. Instead of being embedded in your lonely feelings or self-deprecating thoughts, you compassionately observe them and begin to differentiate from them.
Meditation can increase secure attachment
Research shows that meditation facilitates an internal connection with yourself as it raises your awareness of your thoughts, feelings and physical existence.
In meditation, you learn the art and science of meta cognition, that is, the ability to watch your mind. And when you watch your mind with compassion and non-judgment (two key components of mindfulness meditation), you increase confidence or what psychologists call secure attachment to the self.
When you have a secure attachment you are sturdier in your sense of self, you don’t take others personally, you believe in yourself and support yourself with kindness and consideration. With a secure attachment, you value yourself and, therefore, take better care of yourself. This more secure relationship with yourself helps you believe in yourself and have optimism about your life.
Loving kindness meditation promotes well-being and connection
Loving-kindness meditation in which you practice compassion for yourself and others has shown to have powerful benefits on the psyche. In particular, LKM increases positive emotion (usually the antithesis of loneliness), increases social connection (which helps you with relationships) and increases empathy for others (which, releases you from ruminating about yourself).
Because lonely people often assume that there is something wrong with them, they tend to isolate more. If loving-kindness meditation can break through the myth that you are flawed and unwanted, not only will it increase your sense of well-being, but it will help you be in the world with presence and compassion.
Conclusion
Taking the time each day to sit quietly and meditate can increase your awareness of yourself without judgment. This allows you more clarity of mind as the negative thinking about yourself gets observed instead of believed.
When you aren’t held hostage by your own judgments and ruminations, you are freer to be you, more likely to feel connected to yourself, and more likely to interact with others confidently. In particular, loving-kindness meditation in which you practice compassion for yourself and others, will increase positive emotions and empathy—antidotes for loneliness. For one of my recorded loving-kindness meditations, click below:
Loving Kindness Meditation
Dr. Van Deusen received her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology in Los Angeles in 1992. She has cultivated deep knowledge of attachment theory and stress and has worked with various populations over her two and a half decade career. Her practice is in Seattle, Washington. Buy her book Stressed in the U.S.: 12 Tools to Tackle Anxiety, Loneliness, Tech-Addiction and More here