Dr. Edward Hallowell
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
Hello, Mike.
Lonely is a lot different from being alone.
You can be alone and not lonely.
You can be alone and reading a book, listening to music, entertaining your fantasies and favorite hopes for the future, and you're not lonely.
But you can also be lonely, and that's the active presence of absence.
It's like you're feeling what isn't there.
It's a terrible feeling.
You're feeling that here I am alone.
No one's with me.
No one likes me.
No one cares about me.
Or so-and-so died.
Or I miss my dog.
Or I wish I were back home.
You feel what you're missing.
And it's a terrible feeling.
It is really bad for you.
In fact, the Surgeon General defined loneliness as the number one medical problem in the United States today.
Not cancer, not heart disease, loneliness.
And most people don't realize how bad it is for you.