Fellowship - Lesson 13 - Isolation

Fellowship – Dealing with Isolation

Lesson 13: Dealing with Isolation

Introduction

I am writing this chapter during one of the most extended periods of isolation in my entire life. During 2020 many in the world are experiencing the isolation that has been brought about by the Covid-19 virus. Few individuals have left their own homes in months; many do not speak to another individual from one week to the next. This is a period of extreme isolation. The home has become a solitary confinement prison.

Without exception the Ecclesias of Tanzania are small and remote from neighbouring Brothers and Sisters. This makes the description “in isolation” true of every Brother and Sister in Tanzania. Often it is the case that your Ecclesial synagogue / hall is many kilometers from home, often the only transport is our own legs and therefore we attend at the synagogue only very rarely. Mostly when there is a visitor from the United Kingdom.

Have you ever been perfectly content all alone? I doubt it. I have suffered from loneliness during the past several months despite living in the same house as my wife, and having a very active Ecclesia within just a few minutes walk of my home.

Loneliness is a complex mental and emotional phenomenon that has at its base a powerful emotion that has survival value. All of us have experienced some degree of abandonment, if only for a short time, and remember the painful and scary feeling that goes along with it.

Whenever we are reminded of this feeling or anticipate it in the future, we get a twinge of abandonment distress that we experience as loneliness. This can happen even among a crowd of friends. It can be pretty confusing and can put you off your game if you don’t know what’s going on.

Recognizing loneliness

Here are some tips for recognizing loneliness for what it is and dealing with it in the healthiest ways.

1. Realize that loneliness is a feeling, not a fact. When you are feeling lonely, it is because something has triggered a memory of that feeling, not because you are in fact, isolated and alone. The brain is designed to pay attention to pain and danger, and that includes painful scary feelings; therefore loneliness gets our attention. But then the brain tries to make sense of the feeling. Why am I feeling this way? Is it because nobody loves me? Because I am a loser? Because they are all mean? Theories about why you are feeling lonely can become confused with facts. Then it becomes a bigger problem so just realize that you are having this feeling and accept it without over reacting.

2. Reach out because loneliness is painful and can confuse you into thinking that you are a loser, an outcast. You might react by withdrawing into yourself, your thoughts, and your lonely feelings and this is not helpful. At its best, anticipation of loneliness might motivate us to reach out and cultivate friendships, which is the healthiest thing to do if you are sad and alone. When you are young, and your sadness causes you to cry, you may evoke a comforting response from others. If you’re an adult, not so much.

3. Notice your self deflating thoughts.  We often create self centered stories to explain our feelings, it is not unusual for people to assume that there is something wrong with them if they are not happy. If they are lonely and sad, individuals may assume other people don’t like them when this is rarely the case.

Victims of bullying may well have fans and friends, but they often aren’t aware of it because the shame and loneliness get more attention. Habitual assumptions about social status continue throughout our lives and if you are looking for evidence that the world sucks, you can always find it.

4. Make a plan to fight the mental and emotional habits of loneliness. If you realize you are dealing with an emotional habit, you can make a plan to deal with loneliness. We outline some recommendations below. Since healthy interaction with friends is good, make some effort to reach out to others, to initiate conversation and face time even when your loneliness and depression are telling you not to. Yes, it is work, but it is worthwhile, just like exercising is worthwhile even when you are feeling tired or lazy.

5. Focus on the needs and feelings of others, the less attention on your lonely thoughts and feelings. I can walk down the street thinking about myself, my loneliness and the hopelessness of it all, staring at the footpath and sighing to myself. Or I can walk down the street grateful for the diversity of people I get to share the footpath with, silently praying for them good health and good fortune, the knowledge of God’s gospel and smiling at each person I meet. The latter is more fun, even though I sometimes have to remind myself to do it on purpose, and find myself preaching to complete strangers for hours on end.

6. Find others like you. Now days there are more tools than ever before to find out where the Bible readers, knitters, hikers or kiteboarders are congregating so that you can get together with those who share your interests. This makes it much easier to identify groups with which you will have something in common, a natural basis for beginning a friendship.

7. Always show up when meeting up with others. You don’t have to run for president of the knitters society at your first meeting. But you do have to show up. I have been telling others to learn Hebrew for 30 years and promising I would do it myself for just as long, but except for the occasional coincidental Hebrew lesson, I didn’t take the trouble of finding a class I could attend regularly until a month ago I found a really good book on it. Now I am enjoying it and it wasn’t that hard. I have put a reminder in my phone to resign from the procrastinator’s society.

8. Be curious, but don’t expect perfection or applause. Each time you show up is an experiment, a micro adventure in social bonding. If you are curious about and interested in others, they will be attracted to you because you are giving them attention. So you will get attention in return. Curiosity about others also takes your focus away from those painful feelings that tend to make you hide and sulk.

9. Kindness goes a long way. “There’s nobody here but us chickens.” This is one of my favorite lines from The Lazy Man’s Guide to Enlightenment by Thaddeus Golas. Underneath the impressive facades of the high fliers are the same set of emotions we all are born with. Celebrities suffer from stage fright and depression too.

You have the power to offer loving kindness and generosity of spirit to all you come into contact with. It isn’t instinctual to be kind to strangers or people who scare you. But it is a choice. It is a choice that Jesus used intentionally. And in the long run it is a winning choice. The alternative, being mean or stingy with those you don’t know well, can get you a reputation as a Scrooge.

10. Be persistent even if a particular group does seem to be a dead end for you, try another. AA and Al-Anon recommend that everyone try six different groups to find one that suits you best. If you are persistent, challenging the assumptions and feelings that tell you to give up and resign yourself to a life of loneliness, and showing up and being curious and kind to others and more and more groups, the odds are in your favor.

And once you have a friend or two, nourish those friendships with time and attention. Don’t be too cautious about whether you are giving more than you are getting at first. If you make more friends and some of them are takers, you can choose to spend more time with the friends who reward your friendship.

The symptoms of depression - Technically referred to as major depressive disorder — are characterized by an overwhelming feeling of sadness, isolation, and despair that lasts two weeks or longer at a time. Depression isn’t just an occasional feeling of being sad or lonely, like most people experience from time to time. Instead, a person who has depression feels like they’ve sunk into a deep, dark hole with no way out — and no hope for things ever changing (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).

Who should we make friends with? - Joshua's warning to Israel: Joshua 23

In his last words to the children of Israel, Moses had commanded them that, when they entered the land they must destroy the Canaanites. They were to make no covenant with them nor marry them (Deut. 7:1-4). Moses knew very well that any agreement between the Canaanites and Israelites would only end in God's people worshipping heathen gods. Israel at last settled in the land and Joshua, now an old man, reminded them how God had driven out the Canaanites before them, just as He had promised. Joshua knew that there was only one way in which they could keep themselves separate and continue to receive God's blessings in the good land He had given them. They must do what Joshua had always done - they must read His Word every day and obey it (see Josh. 1:8).

"Be ye therefore very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the Law of Moses, that ye turn not aside there from to the right hand or to the left; that ye come not among these nations, these that remain among you, neither make mention of the name of their gods, nor cause to swear by them, neither serve them, nor bow yourselves unto them: But cleave unto Yahweh your God, as ye have done unto this day" (Vv. 6-8).

Joshua told Israel: "If you mix with the heathen nations and make marriages with them, God will no longer drive them out before you and they shall be snares unto you... therefore it shall come to pass that as all good things are come upon you, which Yahweh your God promised you; so shall Yahweh bring upon you all evil things, until He have destroyed you from off this good land which Yahweh your God hath given you" (Vv. 12-15).

Obedience would bring blessings and happiness but disobedience would make God angry and He would punish them. It was up to them to choose between good and evil.

There will come a time when we must choose whom we will serve. Idolatry is the thing that will lead us astray from God. Idolatry is not just bowing down to a statue or image. It is loving anything more than God. It is putting something or someone other than God in first place in our life.

We may, for example, love to play sport. This can be good, healthy fun - but sport can easily become the thing we enjoy doing most of the time. If we are not careful, we may soon be pushing God's Word into second place in our lives. Bible readings, Bible seminars, helping others, both old and young in the Ecclesia, by kindly actions or friendly letters - these are the things God wants us to do. These are the things that build our character, making us good and faithful servants like Joshua. If we have any spare time after that, then whatever we do must be done in a way that will please Him whether working or just doing things with our friends.

The warning from Joshua equally applies to us as it did to Israel of old. We are not saying that we need to go out and kill those who are not Christadelphian, but we do need to keep ourselves separate.

So, you will say to me; you just told me that to not feel loneliness I need to go out of my way to make friends – but now you are telling me that all my friends need to be Christadelphians or at least those with similar beliefs as I have. Now that is a hard saying...

Exactly how do I make friends when the next Christadelphian family is 100 kilometers away?

I am not saying that this is going to be easy. Life in the Truth was not meant to be easy it was meant to be a probation; but there are a lot of things that we can do ourselves to ensure that these contradictory needs are accommodated.

Reading the Bible

Christadelphians regularly talk about ensuring that every member does their daily readings; but the words of the Ethiopian Eunuch are equally true “How can I [understand the Bible], except some man should guide me?” (Acts 8:31).

It is a sad reality that what tends to happen is that a white man comes along, he gives you (at most) a sixty lesson course on the Bible is Swahili. You read it, become convinced, and are then baptized. Wonderful. But then, you are left on your own. You are left to fend for yourself. Is it any surprise that on the white-man’s return you have forgotten all that you once knew and you have reverted back to the way of thinking of your ancestors?

If you think that you are alone in this, you are not alone. Many hundreds of Brethren and Sisters have gone before you and suffered the exact same problems.

What you need, is “some man to guide you”.

Guides

There are more guides out there than you may think. A lot currently are English based but increasingly the guides are available in Swahili.

So what is available?

Books – there are now plenty of Swahili books available to read about the Bible; examples of these can be found on the internet.

Examples can be found here: https://www.christadelphian.or.tz/publications

If you do not have access to the internet many of these books can be purchased from your local Christian book store, or if money is a problem then your C.B.M. representative may be able to send you a copy.

Virtual Ecclesias – many are now discovering the benefits of the internet. It is possible to join regularly with other Brothers and Sisters using internet based applications like Zoom or Skype. These applications can be downloaded onto your mobile phone if you have one. Many Ecclesias now broadcast their activities in this way. Mostly this is currently English based, but Swahili versions are starting up. Contact me, carl@carlhinton.com if you would like to join in with my home Ecclesia via Zoom. If you cannot find something suitable, then why not start a Virtual Ecclesia yourself.

Internet – There is a very large selection of articles and audio / visual recordings to be found at https://www.christadelphian.or.tz/ - this is designed for all levels of reader. And, yes, you can even learn Hebrew from there.

Social Media – There are thousands of Brothers and Sisters that are using social media on an almost hourly basis. We had never heard of Facebook, Whats-App, or YouTube just a matter of years ago. But now, well if you haven’t got them all, then I would be very surprised. There are now literally hundreds of Christadelphian social network groups; it’s time to get involved.

Bible Schools / Seminars – On a regular basis it is intended that Bible Schools and Seminars are to be run in the new Mbeya Central Synagogue. These are self-funded. That is, you do have to pay your own way for everything. You must pay your own transport, and you must pay for your own food whilst attending. That being said, these are really excellent, and you should take yourself along. The recording Brother at time of writing is Brother Jonathan Nkombe.

No internet – If you do not have the internet, there are still some of the good “old fashioned” ways of keeping in touch with others:

• Writing letters / emails (at the internet cafe)

• Writing articles for the newsletters

• Telephones

• CiL exhortations / Sunday School lessons

Visiting Others – One thing is certain, is that we are not alone in our loneliness. “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction” (James 1:27).

Why not save up the bus fair to visit the nearest Brother or Sister? Go camp out in their garden, sleep under the stars and enjoy their company for a few days. They might reciprocate the gesture one day – you might even become friends. One thing is for sure, you will be able to discuss the Word of God together.

Being involved

The important thing here is, being involved in your own salvation. There is no reasonable reason for us to complain about being lonely and isolated if we do nothing about it ourselves. We are not in a position to complain about the lack of preaching if we do not do any preaching ourselves. Is preaching only reserved for the white-man? Are they better than us in some way, just because of the colour of their skin, or the accident of their birthplace? We must take things into our own hands and if we do this well, then, we will not be alone. We will have a large thriving community of believers in our own back yard. We will certainly not be lonely, and we will certainly not be bored. Why travel to preach when you can do it locally?

Avoiding Reversion

We need to avoid reverting to our old way of thinking. We need to retain this precious gem that we have found. We do this by actively working to ensure that we keep to the Word. We do this in prayer, always seeking Gods guidance in this important matter. Remember you are never alone, for “The angel of Yahweh encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them.” (Psalm 34:7).