Feeling more single and lonelier during the great lockdown?
This instant cure will help you
It’s been a month since the lockdown started. I live alone but since I am used to working from home, I did not feel that big of a difference at first.
It was not the first time I spent my birthday alone. No big deal! I quite liked the Zoom parties. Wine has been my best friend.
Gradually I found myself paying way too much attention to others’ lives. Everyone is trying to outdo everyone else with how well they are coping.
Suddenly everyone happens to be awesome musicians. Instagram stories are flooded with lovers cooking together. TikTok is full of partners’ dance routines. And of course, those couples’ gravity-defying flying warrior yoga poses.
My god, people are doing great! (or so it seems)
I am so, damn, jealous!
It’s always been my choice to be single and live alone, and I am generally very happy about it. But since freedom was taken away from me, I felt lonelier than ever!
Am I the only one who’s glued to my phone all day long?
Am I the only one who’s talking to my plants?
Am I the only loner in the whole world?
Chinese media reported in mid-March that the divorce rate has skyrocketed across the country post-lockdown.
In Shanghai, divorce registry appointments are fully booked for the next two months. In Wunan province, the pandemic epicenter, 13,422 couples filed for divorce in the last 33 days*.
Once the outbreak tapers off, Chinese citizens have been expecting a “retaliatory rebound”, a term coined by Chinese netizens (報復性反彈). However, no one would have thought the first “retaliation” was not the economy but rather the divorce rate.
If this happens to China, it sure will happen to the rest of the world.
The ugly truth: Everyone is faking it
No one raves about their sexless nights on Instagram. No one dares to admit they secretly wish to throw their kids out of the window. No one tells you they are annoyed to their cores when their partners talk with a mouthful of food.
I am not suggesting everyone is unhappy, lonely and depressed, I am suggesting everyone, even happy couples, have their own problems behind the curtains.
Then I realized, it’s actually not too bad to be single and alone during this madness.
It’s not like my isolation jealousy turned into schadenfreude. It’s not that I am trivializing my own emotions. It’s more like framing my perspectives differently so I can stop self-victimizing by my singleness.
We only see what people want us to see, through their snapshots on our tiny screens.
Comparing our whole reality to other people’s fragments of reality is unfair, and can create unnecessary sulky feelings that can spiral uncontrollably.
Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional
Loneliness, jealousy, and even depression are normal human emotions people feel, coupled or single, especially during a crisis.
As the Buddha says “Everyone suffers”, there is realistically no what-if scenario that does not have a downside.
We have to recognize our reality and make our sufferings work for us.
I found it very helpful to take a step back and assess my reality, without comparing it to anyone else’s, and list out what the actual reality is:
Me: Single and living alone during the great lockdown
Yay: Abundant personal space. Peace. Free to do whatever I want (inside the house of course). No need to fear my partner bringing the virus home because god knows what he touches in the supermarket. Bra-free. Total control of what to watch on Netflix…
Nay: Can’t go out. No one to talk to. Cook and eat alone. Snack uncontrollably. Rarely laugh. No human touch. Hard to follow a routine…
With an impartial view and the right frame of mind, I instantly uplifted my mood and stopped the downward spiral. The reality is really not all that bad.
Gratitude is the best cure
There is a mind-opening quote circulating online from an Indian doctor, the gist of it goes like this:
Social distancing is a privilege, it means you live in a place large enough to practice it.
Hand washing is a privilege, it means you have access to running water.
Lockdown is a privilege, it means you can afford to be at home…
Most of the ways to ward the coronavirus off are accessible only to the affluent.
In essence, a disease that was spread by the rich as they flew around the globe will now kill millions of the poor.
All of us who are practicing social distancing and have been imposed a lockdown on ourselves must appreciate how privileged we are.
Many Indians won’t be able to do any of this.
Very sad but true.
We easily get obsessed over small negative details of our life that we forsake all that is good.
I am grateful that I am healthy. I am grateful that I don’t have family or friends being affected by the disease. I am grateful I live in a comfortable home with internet, electricity and water, and an abundance of food, wine, and chocolate.
Gratitude is really the best cure.
Stay strong.
This too shall pass.
*Source: ctwant.com March 17, 2020
