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Thread: Practical strategies to cope with being alone?

  1. #21
    Senior Member Ultralight's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rogar View Post
    I’d take a hard look at the Four Noble Truths.
    Please share.

    Quote Originally Posted by Rogar View Post
    Have you ever considered intentional community or co-op living? Something that I’ve considered.
    Yes, and for a year or so I met regularly with a group of folks who were also interested in forming an intentional community or a co-op.

    No one could get on the same page. There were numerous people with unrealistic pie-in-the-sky ideas about building huge eco-villages. There were others who had more reasonable ideas -- like co-housing with shared meals and chores and some shared resources. But even getting these folks on the same page was hard! Many of them had totally insufferable personalities (perhaps others felt this way of me). But I was advocating for reasonable arrangements and compromises that would work for most people. But apparently "most people" were not in that group. haha

    We looked at old apartment buildings, big houses that couple be revamped into communes, etc. in the city and surrounding it. We looked at plots of land for new building.

    After 14 or so months the whole thing fizzled out. No one even go so much as a new roommate.

  2. #22
    Senior Member iris lilies's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ultralight View Post
    Think about the odds here. Okay, sure. 24/7 is not realistic. Heck, I probably would not want that. I like solitude sometimes (markedly more than most people).

    But let's say it is 8/7. This reduces my odds of being alone when I choke on my salmon fillet.

    Also: I like be there for someone else too. It feels good to help someone else feel and be more secure.
    A few years ago DH was choking on somethIng and he had to
    heimleich himself since my efforts were fruitless.

    When you get that companion, make sure she is competent.

  3. #23
    Senior Member Ultralight's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Simplemind View Post
    When you are alone there is always the good old Heimlich maneuver using the back of a chair.
    Practicing this right now!

  4. #24
    Senior Member Ultralight's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lainey View Post
    UL,
    have you considered becoming a Big Brother? I think you have a lot of empathy and knowledge that a boy would really benefit from, aside from them enjoying the company of an older male they could be pals with. And watching them blossom under your guidance could be very life-affirming.
    I am not good with kids at all. I have an acquaintance who did this for many years. He really liked it. But he is a far different person than I am.

  5. #25
    Senior Member iris lilies's Avatar
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    UL, it is too bad that fishing is a fairly limited hobby, ”limited” meaning you need a body of water to engage in it, that is limiting.

    If you were a gardener you could expand that interest to all sorts of volunteer and hobby groups, there is limitless opportunities in gardening.

    My theory about forming close friendships is that you need to have a core interest that attracts a lot of people, and then you work within the interest or organization to further its goals and in that role,you make friends along the way and you hook up with people who share your values, not only that core value, but secondary ones. Hey, you also make enemies! Haha, but that is human nature.

    That is why “church” is so important to many people, that is their social bonding experience. Worship of God is their core purpose and all of the church activities around it build friendships.

    Our neighborhood holds most all of our friends because our core passion was furthering this neighborhood, restoring old houses and making the City do right by us and etc. In that work we were on the board, committees, etc and worked with others to further these goals.

    We also have secondary friends in 1) dog rescue. 2) plant societies and garden clubs, but most of these latter folks are
    acquaintances.

    I have recently pondered why my brother and
    I both have a very strong social network. He, living in the same town where we grew up, married someone very gregarious and they have a wide circle of friends that started with his high school buddies. It has expanded of course over decades, but they are the social core of their friends, many single. It is not a child centered group of friends since few have children.

    It is kind of a surprise that he and I are busy socially, as I am not very needy when it comes to human interaction. Yet, I do have interests about which I am passionate and they last decades, they are in my DNA: old houses, bulldogs, flower gardeneing.

    I watched my parents sort of flit from interest to interest, especially in their old age, and other than lawn maintenance and tree worship, I am not sure my father had consistent interests. My mother was flighty, and I remember her participation in one women's group that seemed to lack a core purpose. I never really understood what their purpose was. (PEO for anyone familiar with that.j I never u derstood the core purpose of the “lodges” that dotted small town Iowa.

    wow, this is a long ramble.

    My observation about Columbus is that if I lived there I would be all over German Village, working in their garden club and neighborhood association and etc. God, that place is fabulous! And also, expensive, yowza.

  6. #26
    Senior Member rosarugosa's Avatar
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    UL: I don't click with children either, but I really enjoyed supervising high school interns at work (I supervised 53 of them over 20 years). Perhaps you could be a big brother to a teenager? I think teens are more like adults in training, and children are like aliens from another planet.
    I do also think it's worth revisiting the idea of criteria for a partner. DH and I first fell for each other when he was 12 and I was 15, so our criteria was probably along the lines of "male" and "female." We really evolved together, and so are on the same page about most things, if not all. I wouldn't think you would be happy with someone who was grossly materialistic, but maybe you could do well with someone more mainstream, and you might influence each other and both shift a bit in your ideas. You could have a "man cave" and keep it empty. I think religion could be harder because I myself cannot fully respect the mind of a religious person (I see them as essentially irrational in a fundamental way). But it works for IL and her DH, so maybe keeping an open mind to at least agnostics, or not terribly observant believers (you obviously will avoid those who are passionate about converting others).
    The movie we watched yesterday, "The Lobster" had me thinking a lot about this thread. There was an expectation that you needed to partner with someone who shared a "defining characteristic" with you such as being prone to nosebleeds, walking with a limp, or is nearsighted. Those are obviously silly, but I think a point was being made, and that we are poorly served by going around with a strict list of requirements that could cause one to rule out someone who could have been the great love of their life.

  7. #27
    Senior Member razz's Avatar
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    IL, has pretty much expressed my experience. I would add one more aspect. I have faced challenges of all sorts over my life. In each case, someone, often a stranger, has helped me work my way through them. Some of the help was spiritual support through church, other times a simple friendly hug when needed, sometimes just listening to me with thoughtful attention and empathy and reminding me of my strengths and sometimes simply making me feel cherished. At no point, ever, was sex involved, BTW, as that seems to be important to you.

    So, now I look for opportunities to practice what I have learned from each of these dear people and pay it forward loving others and offering aid where possible and appropriate. It can be on the street walking my dog, in my art group, playing cards at community centres, etc. One acquaintance was standing totally still at a mall looking confused in a familiar setting. Her DH had passed on suddenly and unexpectedly 6 weeks earlier. Her mind had gone totally blank with a sense of loss so profound. I walked over and just put my arms around her, protecting her until she recovered enough emotionally to carry on. She is now a dear friend. People need to feel valued and worthy, not judged.
    UL, give of your heart at the moment without concern for the long-term connection.
    As Cicero said, “Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others.”

  8. #28
    Senior Member SteveinMN's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ultralight View Post
    Steve:

    How did you reach this state of mind [about the possibility that I would never again be married or in a committed long-term relationship]?
    Partly reality: I know more than a couple of people who never married or had very long LTRs. Partly recognizing that I married my first wife more out of loving the idea of being married than out of loving her. Perhaps similarly, I had a couple of friends/acquaintances who felt they were not able to live alone and who married serially and often. I was not going to make those mistakes.

    I had spent a lot of time thinking about what I needed and wanted out of my primary relationship. Joint counseling indicated that we wouldn't get there in my first marriage. So we divorced. That analysis, though, became my template for thinking about future relationships. And it was clear to me that I might not ever meet someone who would have the non-negotiables and enough of the negotiables. (BTW, no illusions here on how well I would check off someone else's boxes.)

    Quote Originally Posted by Ultralight View Post
    Can you tell me how you all met and how courtship went in the beginning?
    Future-DW and I were busy with work, family, social events, volunteering, ... But work got busier (more overtime), family stuff started taking more time, and some activities (for example, volunteering where the crowd was pretty much the same people) meant it was getting harder to be free to meet new people when they were around.

    So each of us signed up for an on-line match service. It was easy to sit over a cup of coffee at 6:30 am or 10:30 at night paging through personals. We found each other, communicated a bit on-line, and decided to meet face-to-face for coffee. It went well. She invited me to a concert she was going to in a few days. I went and had a good time, there, too. We set more dates, started writing emails (this before texting was "a thing"), and contact just got more and more frequent. After a few months we decided to go exclusive. I'd say we both decided marriage was our goal before our first year together ended, but it took longer to make it formal. We were in no rush.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ultralight View Post
    I have hobbies [snip; descriptions of hobbies and familial relationships]

    My platonic friendships have all fizzled out over the years -- moving to different places, lifestyle changes, relationship changes, etc. These things take a toll on friendships from childhood and friendships from college.

    I don't have even one friend I can really count on. The friends I have are more like acquaintances who I get dinner with once a month.

    [description of social activities]
    You are mostly right above. But I am relentlessly social. I go to atheist dinners, potlucks, discussions, canoeing trips, bike rides, and so forth. I volunteer at a support group for people who have left cults and fundamentalist religions. I volunteered for quite a while at a couple bike co-ops.

    But I cannot seem to make a single close friend.
    My apologies for missing posts in which you mentioned your social activities. That does make a difference; you are meeting people.

    I've moved around a lot in my life. I have not kept track of anyone from high school or college. There are few people I've kept up with from previous employers. I lost some friends through the divorce; I lost two pals to death (from unchecked medical conditions). So I get not having lots of friends (not that I want lots of close friends).

    I learned through the divorce that it's better to be alone than wish you were. I have no problem being my own good company. Yet I've made many friends -- a few quite close friends -- over the years. Some I met through work, some have been friends of DW's for years, some were met through volunteer opportunities. I'm quite introverted but I'm pretty fearless about meeting new people (or, in days past, asking women for dates). Not everyone gets to the inner circle, though, and that’s fine with me.

    So what do you think is the show-stopper here? Do you see a pattern in how you form relationships with others that just isn't sustainable over the long term? And, if the desire for very close friendship or even an LTR/marriage is strong enough, what are you willing to change (compromise on) to help make that happen?
    Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome. - Booker T. Washington

  9. #29
    Senior Member Ultralight's Avatar
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    One practical strategy I had was this:

    I always keep Harlan's water bowl very full, and it is a pretty big bowl.
    This way, if something happens to me, he has several days of water. This should buy him enough time to be rescued by my sister, for instance.

  10. #30
    Senior Member Ultralight's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by rosarugosa View Post
    UL: I don't click with children either, but I really enjoyed supervising high school interns at work (I supervised 53 of them over 20 years). Perhaps you could be a big brother to a teenager? I think teens are more like adults in training, and children are like aliens from another planet.
    I do also think it's worth revisiting the idea of criteria for a partner. DH and I first fell for each other when he was 12 and I was 15, so our criteria was probably along the lines of "male" and "female." We really evolved together, and so are on the same page about most things, if not all. I wouldn't think you would be happy with someone who was grossly materialistic, but maybe you could do well with someone more mainstream, and you might influence each other and both shift a bit in your ideas. You could have a "man cave" and keep it empty. I think religion could be harder because I myself cannot fully respect the mind of a religious person (I see them as essentially irrational in a fundamental way). But it works for IL and her DH, so maybe keeping an open mind to at least agnostics, or not terribly observant believers (you obviously will avoid those who are passionate about converting others).
    The movie we watched yesterday, "The Lobster" had me thinking a lot about this thread. There was an expectation that you needed to partner with someone who shared a "defining characteristic" with you such as being prone to nosebleeds, walking with a limp, or is nearsighted. Those are obviously silly, but I think a point was being made, and that we are poorly served by going around with a strict list of requirements that could cause one to rule out someone who could have been the great love of their life.
    I tutored at-risk teens in college as part of an after school program. It was not my cup of tea either.

    I am much more open to dating a religious person than a clutter bug.

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