A Woman of Significance: Finding Meaning in Times of Loneliness Sampl

Reach Out to Others 

How wonderful it is to know that Jesus will never leave us or forsake us! The assurance that He is always with us just might be the loveliest and most comforting promise in the entire Bible.

But honestly, there have been situations where I felt isolated and just needed another person to touch me. There have been circumstances of solitude where I have throbbed with the desire for someone to audibly say a few kind words to me. Please don’t misunderstand me. I certainly had the sweet reassurance that Jesus was indeed with me. But oh, how I longed for just one empathetic squeeze of the hand from a friend who cared about me!

My prescription for your lonely soul is this: make an assertive and definitive attempt to reach out to someone else at least once a day. Passivity is not a remedy for loneliness. So, don’t grovel in your solitary pain while staying at home watching television with a box of tissues by your side. You have the power to proactively change your life, knowing that the choice to give to someone else is always the cure for loneliness.

The challenge that we all face is that of vulnerability. When you reach out in friendship to someone, you take the risk of being rejected, and that is always a possibility. There are few things that are certainties in this life, but one of them is this: you will make friends when you become a friend. If you are lonely, instigate a friendship with someone who is lonelier than you are. Listen to someone else’s pain rather than talking about your own.

You will conquer your loneliness when you learn how to give while everyone else is living a self-centered and selfish existence. You will no longer feel abandoned if you can learn the secret of being assertively friendly when everyone else is merely passive, or by having a cheerful, positive heart when everyone else seems uninterested. Remind yourself on a daily basis that love is something that you do, not something that you feel. If you can reach out in love and kindness to someone every day, regardless of how you feel, it will change your life.