Image via Wikipedia Enforced loneliness has been a punishment throughout history. We are social animals and most of us need the company of others for a lot of our time. I remember my mother, the eldest of ten children, feeling horrified at the prospect of one night alone when my father needed to visit a relative and they couldn’t spare the time to go together. Robert S. Weiss has categorized loneliness into two ways: emotional loneliness and social loneliness . Emotional loneliness feels like the pain we feel when a romantic partner is missing. Social loneliness is when you feel like you are not part of a community and you feel you do not have friends to rely on. The other important distinction is between transient or chronic loneliness, also known rather cruelly as state and trait loneliness. Transient loneliness passes and is often caused by something external to us – it is ...
Your Happiness Factor: celebrating happiness, prosperity, hearth and home with coaching and writing from Wendy Mason Smith