Lonely

I’m lonely.

There. I have said it. Now that I have said it, I wonder why it was so difficult to say those two words. Because of ridicule…. It is presumed that lonely people are losers. It is presumed that winners have a gaggle of people (who are called friends) around them 24/7, talking, laughing, bonding, chatting, you name it. Lonely people just HAVE to be sad people. Because of the perception of a sense of failure…

People who cannot keep a gaggle of friends around them are perceived as failures. In a world where being popular is perceived as the path to success and happiness, people who are loners just HAVE to be failures. Because of the family setup….You have an immediate family, you have an extended family, you have a nuclear family, you have a joint family…you just cannot be lonely. If you have a family setup and you still feel lonely, there is something wrong with you. You should feel guilty just saying ‘I am lonely’.

Raised eyebrows, heads shaking, tongues clicking in shock and disapproval. You probably have aspirations that you should not be having anyway. You are not ‘family’centric enough, probably. For this, you should flog yourself mentally a few times, then maybe your loneliness would ‘disappear’. Because of space filling illusions…. How can you be lonely when the world is full of people ? Happy people, laughing with the joys that life can give them endlessly ? There are malls to go to….full of attractive things…but empty, empty, empty otherwise. There are movie halls to go to…where you can watch movies which do not touch you at all, and you sit through them with a sense of detachment. The world is bustling with space filling things, if you find them empty then all you deserve is some cold glances.

And the worst is... Because of people whom you love and who love you so much in return....How CAN you be lonely if you are loved that much ??

Because... No one says ''I am lonely'' without having the risk of people reading too much into your words, without people labelling you as something you are not, without you yourself wondering how you could let yourself down in this way, without close relatives and ‘friends’ wondering how this could happen.

Yet as I watch the world moving around in slow motion and I stand there, detached, alone I shall say it. I’m lonely. But I am a contented person. And I am not apologetic about it. Just saying those two words has lifted a burden from me, a burden that was getting heavier by the minute. Now I fly alone, in timeless space. And I travel light.