Overcoming Loneliness And Feeling Connected!

Hey everyone!

Happy Friday! Hope you're all having an incredible week. For this week's topic, we will be focusing on another core concept that is very central to The Best Feeling Ever Movement. This week, we are taking a look at what we can do to overcome feelings of loneliness and to foster a sense of connection with those around us.

If you know my story, you know that all of this has played a huge role in my life ever since my early teenage years. As a young child, I feel blessed to say that I never usually felt lonely. I felt surrounded by the love of my friends and family both at home and at school, and that was enough for my heart to feel full and happy just about all the time. However, that all started to change around the time I turned 15 and started the tenth grade. Up until then, I was content with just hanging out with my few best friends most of the time, and never really felt the need to be part of a larger group of friends or to be at the front of my school's social scene. But due to my growing interest in getting to know more people, it was at that point that I started thinking it would be great to branch out a bit more and form some new connections.

Unfortunately, this proved to be much easier said than done. It's never easy to change the way that you are viewed by the people you have grown up around since a very early age, and I could not just suddenly become the type of person among my peer groups who loved hanging out with everyone and was seen as part of the "in crowd" in my school. Although I knew my peers did not mean to exclude me, I couldn't help but feel a decreasing sense of connection to others, and before long I started feeling extremely lonely and isolated.

I didn't know how to process these feelings or even talk about them at first, and they continued in some form throughout the rest of high school and into the start of my college years. Although I took many steps to put myself out there, make new friends, and foster a sense of true, deep connection among my peers, I just couldn't shake the feeling that I was not quite "one of them", that I did not "fit in". In the later parts of high school and the early parts of college, the loneliness grew terribly difficult for me. It started causing me severe feelings of anxiety and depression issues and school would often prove to be very emotionally painful to me. I kept seeing everyone, both in school and of course on social media, hanging out, forming deep bonds, and having a great time with each other. I just wondered why they wouldn't invite or include me.

But then I realized what I needed to do. I needed to be my own best friend. I needed to find myself again. I needed to fall back in love with myself. My psyche had been damaged from years of feeling less than, and unworthy. I knew I needed to put it back together again. Over the past couple of years, this has been a huge part of my journey, and it has been one of the hardest things I have ever done. But it has also been one of the most rewarding.

Eventually, I realized that I still wasn't where I wanted to be. But then I knew what I had to do to get there. I needed to finally open up about what was going on inside. This was one of the scariest things I could have thought of, as talking about my feelings has always been something that frightened me a little bit. Would those I love still accept me if they saw all the hurt that was really going on inside? I knew they would, but it was still hard not to worry even if it was irrational. But I knew I needed to make a change. I needed to take that leap.

So I finally did. I opened up to those closest to me, told them what was really going on. And I found such amazing and beautiful love and compassion. It filled my heart and showed me again that there is hope, that there is a way out of the dark loneliness. That I am not truly alone. I just need to let others see me for the true me. And I can no longer be afraid of that. Over the past couple of years, I have been working a lot on being more open, more true to myself, letting my unique light shine more and being unapologetically me. And it has gotten me places. Great places!

But most importantly, it has helped me to feel a new sense of deep connection like ever before. And it has taught me one of the most valuable lessons of my life: When we just open up a little more, just let others see us for who and what we truly are, for all that we are, then the beautiful miracle of human connection will find us. And it will change our lives. As humans, we want, we need to both be who we are meant to be and see others for who they are meant to be. And it all starts with taking that little chance of putting ourselves out there. Of being proud to show who we truly are. If we could all do that just a little bit more, then maybe there wouldn't have to be so much loneliness in the world. Maybe we could all connect with one another a bit better. Or... a LOT better!! :)

What do you do to connect with those around you? How do you cope with feelings of loneliness? What have you done recently to take a bit of a chance and let others see you for all that you truly are? What do you do to show others around you that they can feel safe with being their authentic selves, that you will accept them with open arms for all that they are? Please reach out and let me know, I want to hear YOUR stories!!

Please stay tuned for the newsletter coming tonight, and the new YouTube video coming this Sunday! Sign up for the newsletter on the homepage of this site if you haven't already, and be sure to subscribe to the YouTube channel which is linked on the homepage as well! There are lots of exciting things in the works for Best Feeling Ever. A couple of really cool announcements are coming in the newsletter tonight, so get excited and stay tuned!

Thank you all so much for being amazing!! Always be kind to yourselves and to others. Sending lots of love and hugs to all of you!! Have a beautiful day, and keep being YOU!!!! :) <3

Your friend,

Adam :) <3