Friday 4 June 2010

"No man is an island"

Sometimes I feel that the person who said this was very wrong. There are so many people i know of, so many people who go through life, being by themselves with no one to help them. The truth is, we are all islands. We are all lonely in some point in life or another.

We are all islands even if we are part of a huge family. Sometimes, the bigger the family, the more isolated we can feel.

We can have significant others and still feel like an island.

We can have the best friends in the world and still feel like an island.

We can have all the power in the world, we can be a king, queen, prince, princess and still feel like an island.

We can know all the answers to all the 'why' questions. We can have the key to unlocking the secrets of how the world works, and still feel like an island.

We can smile all the time, we can laugh all the time, we can say we are alright all the time, and still feel like an island.

Maybe the simple fact is that no man should be an island. No one should be lonely, no one should be sad. No one should face things by themselves.

In times of need, if someone has a hand to hold, he might find a lot of strength that he himself did not know that he had withnin him. Sometimes any form of human contact or touch can make the difference between surviving through a crisis or falling flat to the ground.

There are a lot of times however, in a person's life, where it is just impossible to have a hand to hold, impossible to want or crave support. That is when he realises that he truly is an island and no matter how lonely he feels, and how much he longs and craves for that support, he can never get it.

So instead of falling due to the lack of support, he has to search withnin that island of his, gain support from withnin. Learn to hold his own hand, learn to pat his own back, learn to be an island. When he achieves this, he would become a stronger person though it would not mean that he would stop longing for a hand to hold.

When those moments come crawling to his mind, he would be able to slap them away, and be strong, be an island and deal with loneliness without longing for that hand to hold.

However, we don't have to live with loneliness. While feeling lonely is an inevitable part of life, living with loneliness is not. Many require other to make them feel complete and happy. I am here to tell you it just is not so. When you find all the happiness you need inside yourself you attract like individuals. You become the beacon calling out to others and filling your own space with joy.


I by no means feel this is an easy task. Searching the depths of your soul to find the courage to become the best version of yourself takes tremendous courage. You feel as though you are putting yourself out in the world to be slayed by all the unhappy people. For every ounce of joy you will find a ton of sorrow. Perspective becomes essential. By finding the joy, relishing in it, experiencing it, soaking it up, you can dim the pain and suffering.

I know this sounds like little miss Molly Sunshine garbage, but it isn't. Our choices make our circumstance. No matter what we do we cannot control those around us, so it remains impractical to wrap your entire happiness around another person. When and if we do find a person to walk with, if we become too obsessed with them we often times are the very reason they leave us miserable. Trying too hard and not finding our own way makes a weight. Cliche as it is, being happy with yourself is the best way to ward off loneliness.