Scared To Be Lonely

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you. If you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you. I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence, first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Welcome to today's episode of the show. Today we're going to be talking about a topic that, that pretty much every human has experienced, will experience, and may actually experience on a semi regular basis, which is loneliness. And this can show up in, you know, we often think about in dating and relationships or maybe friendships, but really anytime in any setting, and it's something that I think is often kept private. People don't necessarily talk about it a lot, and yet it's such a common experience. So to today, I'm gonna be breaking down loneliness with my master coach, Jonathan Hernandez.

You're not alone in this.

Good. Right now. Right now I'm not alone.

That's right.

I'm with you. So I can't feel lonely.

That's right. My shift ends in a few minutes, though, so don't leave me. Come back. I think it's really interesting. I was listening to all the other podcasts we do and I was like, man, I always feel like I bring up existential shit. This is some deep stuff. You go deep, I go deep in this.

Well, yeah, that's an interesting. We'll probably go there in today's episode too, because. Right. I mean, isn't loneliness and connection that's coming right to the core of existence and how connected we are, but we won't start there. Blow people's minds.

Yeah.

They're gonna be like, oh, I gotta hang.

I'm done.

Doesn't even make sense. Yeah. Okay, so let's talk about the experience of loneliness, because I think it's a word that people think of. But as we were talking about it and preparing for this episode, I realized, like, it's kind of unclear what that really means and when people say it. And so, you know, what. What is that? What have you seen for yourself, for clients? When does that arrive, Arise in your life? And like, what is that experience? Like?

Yes. Yeah. I feel like for me, loneliness comes when it's kind of when you're bored, there's usually like at the end of the day or at end of the day, meaning like you're about to go to sleep. And then probably like in the morning, right before, right around, like waking up out of bed, unless you're awesome like Tony Robbins or Dr. Aziz, waking up and just like jumping into the shower. I leap out of bed, Leap out, just jump in the shower, take the dogs out, then run to the gym. That's like piss and excellence, you know.

Crack three raw eggs into a glass.

Drink them out of your shoe.

That's how I do.

That's right. Then if you're not like those people, chances are you have these thoughts or I know I have had experienced these thoughts. Usually at night, in the morning, sometimes when, like after I finishing hanging out with a group of friends, there's a moment where you just kind of. I don't know, it's like a notion of feeling, like, empty or something.

Yeah. Which is really interesting because that can occur. I feel that too. That can occur. It's in the transition from being with someone to being not with them. And that could be on a phone call, that could be in person. And I noticed this myself, and I think this is pretty common now in our society is like, you're with someone and you're talking to them in person, and then they go to the bathroom. Or you end your time together and people immediately pull out their phones. And I noticed this urge, like, I'm on a date or something with Candace and we're connecting really deeply and we're talking and it's really, you know, intimate. And then, you know, she goes to the bathroom or whatever. There'll be a super strong urge inside of me to be like, I gotta check something on my phone. Even though I don't. There's nothing to really look at on there. Right.

Stats.

Right stats. And it's really about a knee jerk, unconscious, habitual reaction to going away from that little feeling of. I don't even know if it's necessarily loneliness as much as, like, separation. It's like there's this full merger or connection we can experience in a way. And then there's like a little bit of that, like. Oh, distance or separation.

Yeah.

And that feels uncomfortable in some way.

Yeah. You know, we do our. This is a plug for our events, but we do our events. I love being at the events. We had that retreat in the summertime for our Year two Mastermind folks. That was so much fun. And there's a few people that will have to get on the plane. They'll have to head back home, whether it's Texas or Virginia or something. And I'm just like, oh, my God, I miss them. I just feel so, like, missy, you'll leave the office, and I'll be like, good.

That's how I want it. That's how I want it to be.

And talking to some of the members in the Mastermind, like, they'll. They in particular in, like, searching for a partner in their life, they're just kind of like, I desire this type of connection with somebody, and I'm feeling. They might be feeling loneliness on a larger or a wider spectrum than how I'm actually feeling it.

Yeah. So that's really interesting. It's almost like the longing. And I know anyone who's single and wants to be in a relationship can absolutely relate. I've definitely been there in my life. That those moments of longing are just more frequent and. Or more intense. So it's not just like, oh, I'm hanging out with my partner and now they went away for a little bit, and I'm feeling that transition longing. It's like there's no time where I'm really deeply connecting with someone in that way right now. And that hurts. And you know what's really interesting is there's this idea, though, that when we get that when you have the partner, that that kind of aching will stop. That's the fantasy, anyway.

Yeah.

And what I found is, you know, being with Candace, and it's not like, oh, we're in a marriage where you're distant and alone. You know, it's like we're really deeply connected. I mean, the most connected I've ever been to any. Any woman in my whole life. And sharing anything, deep intimacy, connection, physical touch, sexual, like, all of that. And what I will find is that there can be this aching feeling I'll feel in my heart often before going to bed, and sometimes in the morning, you know, if I'm meditating or something like that. So there's a story. It's like, well, if I have all these people in my life and all this love, you won't feel that. I won't feel that. And it's really interesting as I've been on a. I mean, it's been like a mini year journey of inquiry into my heart to be like, well, what is that? What's happening? And I've explored and continue to explore deep aching and longing and loneliness from childhood, longing for a certain kind of relationship with parents or family. You know, these things that as I work with them and feel them, they seem to shift and move and lessen, but it doesn't seem like there's this, oh, I reached the end of that and now I'm done with.

I don't feel it.

I don't feel that anymore. And I'm like, oh, to me, it almost feels like there's some part of the human quest or journey. And for me, it keeps guiding me into, like, oh, what about deeper connection? That's not even with my loved ones or other humans. What about this, like, deeper connection to oneness or God or source or. To me, it feels like there's this aching to merge with something. Yeah, that's part of it. It's not the only thing. But. So my point of sharing all that is that this feeling of longing might be kind of built into the human experience and might not be instantly solved by meeting Mr. Right or Mrs.

Right. Yeah, I went on this retreat and I had this meditation moment where I just realized I am missing this longing for this feeling of being held the way that a child wants to be held by their mother, or this sense of safety or trust. It makes me think of kids. Your kids, for example, is. It's like, when I see them or when they. We hang out, there's, like, absolute, like, joy, and they're having fun. Even when they're sad or something happens and I, like, hold them, they. They feel that they're cared for. Like, they feel the care. And I think as we get older, that goes away, or we think that goes away. And so there's like, there's nobody holding me. There's nobody, like, looking at me in those parental eyes.

Well, you know, that's another thing is I think in our. We're kind of, in a way, almost ignorant in our culture of what some of the basic human needs are. And if you're ignorant of what the needs are, you don't notice when it's not happening. You know, it's almost like we don't. Why should you imagine a culture where people didn't know. Think about, what was that movie Idiocracy? Where they're like, everyone should drink brano, which is like this Gatorade drink. If you haven't seen the movie, it's set in the future where the human iq, through basically selective breeding, has led to a decline in the human IQ significantly. So basically, everyone's an idiot.

Yeah. The people who have a higher IQ were focused more on their career and their success. The people with the less IQ Were just interested in fucking making babies. That's right.

So, you know, flash forward like a couple hundred years and there's this character who's an average Joe in his time, goes into a cryo tube and comes out 200 years later or something. He's Luke Wilson, right? Luke Wilson, Yeah. He's like the smartest man alive. And in there, the society is degraded to the point that they don't know that they need water. Everyone thinks all you need is brano, which is like this mega corporation Gatorade kind of substance. And they're even feeding it to the crops. And the crops are all dying because it's got like salts in it.

We're almost there.

We're pretty close. There's a lot of similarities between what was the president? Camanchu.

Yeah.

Wrestler president and current president.

Current president. It's interesting, it's uncanny.

But so they don't even know that they need water. And we watch that movie and we laugh like, ha, ha ha. How stupid they are. But then we look at our own time and our own society and something like touch. I don't think we realize how essential primary and frequent humans need touch and how starved we are for it and how much it's gonna significantly impact feelings of loneliness or feelings of heartache or feelings of wanting to be held. And, you know, if I look at how much touch we share in my family with our kids and with Candace. With Candace versus, like when I was, say, single, maybe I would touch if I was only using the context of a woman. Right. And sort of intimate and sexual. And it wasn't until I discovered, you know, the community that Candace taught in Solsara, where they advocate or invite like, like non sexual touch, like you can go rub someone's shoulders when they're sitting there. Or even like men would be like sitting near each other, put their arms around each other. And to me I was like, oh, I've only done that with my brother. I've never done that with anyone else. So it's pretty eye opening for me. And that started to meet that need before I was, you know, created the family that I have now. But I just. On a physiological body level, I think there can be this deep craving that can come from something as simple as missing touch.

Yeah. I think also too is crying. We've been programmed or conditioned to not express emotions, whether it's crying or anger, in some capacity. But mainly I think of crying because I remember when I was a kid, if somebody like my dad would say, like, stop crying, or like, I would try to, like, hold it in. And like, you said that hyperventil, like, because you're trying to, like, shutting your face.

Like, trying to block a sneeze.

Yeah.

Your body's like, what are you doing?

Yeah. And a kid's like. When you're a kid trying to do that, it's like your body's going haywire. And now when I feel emotion, I. Or I actually first, what happens is I notice I'll get frustrated at myself because I shouldn't be feeling that emotion. Or I'll get frustrated at myself because, like, didn't I already process that emotion? Why do I still keep feeling it?

Yeah.

So then what?

Two, like, random, arbitrary conclusions of our minds that say, like, you shouldn't be feeling it and it should only have a certain amount of processing time.

I have no idea. It happens to me. Like, so I do the same thing so fast.

Yeah, I get it. I'm kind of marveling at that right now.

That's why I think it's. It had to have happened when I was a kid. Or being conditioned by, like, societal. Cause it doesn't. My mind doesn't think like, oh, like, don't cry. It's like the body automatically knows to, like, shut down. And it's like, hold it in. Hold it in. And I remember dating somebody really dear to me who was like. She would express her emotion, but she would, like, hold it all in, and you could just see it in her face. And I was like, hey, it's okay. And I got this catchphrase from my mom. All you say is, what's the matter? And then it's just. It's like. Unlocks the gates, the floodgates. But you gotta do it in this cadence, like, what's the matter? And then it's just like. It just floods out. So. Yeah, but there. But I can't say it to myself. Cause for some reason, it just doesn't come out.

And.

Yeah, it's really fascinating with the memories that you've locked in that have conditioned your body to keep it together.

Yeah.

I mean, I guess that's how military works, right? In a sense, it's like, we're going to condition you so that way you're not emotional during the face of terror or fear. And so, yeah, you just lock up. And so I feel like crying. And that's not dismissing anger. I'm sure anger is the same thing. I just know in my life, I cried more than I was angry or when I was angry. I did cry too. I'm A very sensitive boy. And so that could be another condition on top of the other thing that we see.

So you're saying maybe suppressing of the crying and the tightening around that contributes to that feeling. Feeling of loneliness. Because we're not able to emote.

We haven't. Yeah, we haven't emoted that. So it's just, it's like the reason why. It's not the reason why you're lonely, but it's the reason why you're ruminating in the loneliness.

Yeah, you're extending it. Because really, I mean, any feeling is temporary and is episodic. It will come and then it will increase and it will go and then it'll come. And so even like grief, which we consider like intense loneliness or intense longing, you know, when people are in grief, one of the ways to work through it is become mindful of the waves of grief when it comes, how long they are. Otherwise the mind says, ah, I've just been feeling this way. I always feel this way, I always will feel this way. I've been feeling this way for months. And the truth is, you've had episodes of that grief, maybe sometimes multiple times a day, but even that they're not literally all day long.

Yeah, literally.

And it's like you might even feel like you've had it for an hour straight and you're like, oh my God. And the only time they can get really locked in is when you get in this super pattern of resistance or constriction. And that could be like physical, like you're talking about, or a lot of that mental noise.

I can definitely say that. Yeah. I have not achieved a loneliness, a 24 hour period of loneliness feeling.

Yeah, or any feeling. Right. I mean, what you could sustain that?

I've laughed for 24 hours straight.

Physiologically, it's like your body just has to reach a different homeostasis after a little while.

Yeah, so that's a good point too. A lot of people, clients that I've worked with, they are afraid to go into their emotions because they think if I get caught up in the emotion, I will be like that for the whole, like, I'll never get out of it.

You know, that's like the biggest false belief story that it's like there's a doorway and if you go into the doorway, you will go into the emotion and something beautiful will happen. Maybe not at first, but it's this experience of letting go, surrendering to it and it moving and shifting and you actually getting transformed in that process and wiser and Deeper and more loving and more patient and more free. Like, so much good is behind that door. But then there's, like, this bouncer who's sitting in front of the door with his arms crossed. He's like, don't go in there. Yeah, you go in there. You just. You never gonna come out.

You're never gonna come out.

It's terrible. You know, and then we're like, all right, I guess. I guess. I guess they're right. And it's like. It's just all that is. Is safety police, like, not wanting to go there.

And the bouncer is your dad.

Don't steal.

Yeah.

And I get it. I mean, even after doing this work for so many years, it's still a process for me to really, really open to feelings.

Yeah.

And to do it, you know, sooner rather than later. And because when you really open to that feeling, especially of loneliness, because loneliness is gonna be a feeling of longing, a feeling of aching. Sometimes people call it heartache. It's often centered in the. In the heart, if you pay attention to your body. But maybe also there's a squeezing in the throat, an urge to cry, tears, tension around the eyes, you know, all.

That in the jaw.

Yeah. It's such a. And if you. If you really go into. Can actually intensify in its physical sensations and become extremely, from my experience, very painful in the heart. I mean, to the point where sometimes I'm meditating or doing breathwork or something, and I'll just be saying, like, ow, Ow. This is like getting kicked in the stomach or something, or cut. It's just a very strong sensation. Although it's, like, one of those things where, like, nothing alarming is happening, nothing damaging. There's nothing wrong with me. This is just strong emotion. And often it's this reservoir of years or decades of all these suppressed things.

Right, right.

And if we're willing to feel it and kind of slowly, bit by bit, be processing it, that intense feeling of the emotion is actually extremely healing and does lessen it over time.

I noticed in myself the triggers to help me bring. Break. Break that pattern of, like, from holding it in the. You're talking about breath work and meditation. And it's like, sometimes I'll have a great meditation to where I'm like, oh, right, I'm. I'm in this moment. I feel complete silence. I can hear. I can hear, like, what's going on outside. I'm present with my body. But then other times, I'll feel, like, so caught up ruminating in things that it's like I'm just spiraling. I can't even focus. And so I love when you were saying breath work, like the Wim Hof breathing. If you don't know what that is. YouTube Wim Hof. There's a tutorial on that. But also there's like deep, like chanting, like the alms and stuff. I noticed that when I'm sitting there and I'm using my voice to resonate the body and my belly or my heart, like instantly I just start to. To feel emotions. And that's probably why all of my favorite songs are about loneliness or something like that. Cause they're singing it, you could hear their pain. At least I do. And then I get emotional and it's kinda like a catharsis.

Yeah, It's a way of kinda accessing that feeling and dislodging it so it's not stuck in there.

Yeah.

Yeah. The chanting and using voice too, I think, is a really interesting way. And I just feel like it's so unfortunate that because of our conditioning, we're so restricted and I'm just like. I mean, emotionally so un. Like, it's not even a combination of immature, ignorant, like our understandings around emotion. It feels like in the culture are so young and underdeveloped.

Yeah, don't cry and don't sing.

Yeah, don't cry, don't sing. Don't get angry, don't have feelings.

Go to work.

You know, it's just like, what this is like the level, you know, so, you know, so this is definitely an area where you don't want to focus on fitting in. I mean, probably almost every area of life, you really want to be aware of that urge to fit in. It's probably not going to serve you and being your boldest, freest self, but especially in the area of like, well, I want to. I want to look about as emotionally muted as everybody else. And, you know, and that prevents people, even in the privacy of their own home, from doing a chant sound or from, you know, making weird. Just like using sounds to move emotions. Like, well, that's weird.

It's like.

Like no one's around. Yeah, it's your home.

It's your own home.

And it's like, well, I don't want to. I don't want to do anything.

It's walls of paper thin. You don't understand.

They'll hear me moaning. But it's funny because one of my good friends, Landon, and he's a psychologist and also a farmer and just a really amazing kind of multi A pharmacologist. Pharmacologist, that's right. He's an amazing man. And he went and spent several years at Esalen, that retreat center and Eco Farm, whatever else they do there in the Bay Area in Big Sur. And he just did a lot of inner growth and healing work there. And he said he went to some workshop that they had there and tapped into some stuff around his dad. There was a lot with him and his dad. And after the workshop, he went back to his little cabin or wherever he slept there. And he said he just, like, sat there and did he have his hand on his chest, I believe. And he said he rocked and he just, like, moaned for like an hour straight or maybe more. I'm not sure I remember the story exactly. And land. If you're listening, you can let me know. Text me. Like, dude, you got it all wrong. You got it all wrong.

This is what I remember.

I was in Mexico.

Yeah.

But anyway, it's like, just moaning. And I remember, like, really appreciating hearing that story.

Yeah.

You know, and like, oh, yeah. When you're lonely, you can put your hand on your heart and you can moan. And there's, like, so many different ways that we can take care of ourselves and feel such that we're able to move through that temporary experience of loneliness, which will then recede even. And it will recede before you find your partner or before you throw on the mic stand, before you find your partner, before you get those friends. Like, it doesn't mean you don't want to move towards that in your life and try to create that. It's just that the solution to loneliness is loneliness is occurring in this moment, and it needs to be felt and experienced and then moved through. And as you feel and experience, you might also notice sometimes what creates loneliness is a story in our heads. And we see this a lot in the mastermind, like, I'll never be with anyone in my life. Basically, that's saying this feeling of loneliness will last forever.

And they're using the past to. To define their present state. Their future state is like, hey, I had something great with this person. It will never happen again. Something like this will never happen again. Even though some of the stories that they tell me or tell us in the call is like, I don't know. That's not a great fit.

You could probably do better if you don't want that to happen again. And isn't it amazing how. And I think we're all guilty of this, how we predict the future with such certainty. Especially when it's negative and it's just, it's kind of comically mind boggling that we stand by that with such like teeth gritted certainty that we will not.

Experience anything, it will not happen again. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's like this hardening inside.

I felt that.

Yeah. Well, good. Maybe that means people, if you're listening, you can be letting things go. And that's really what we're pointing towards a lot. Right. It's just softening and letting go. And maybe a good thing to close on would be. So how do we. We talked a lot about working with the feeling. What else can we do to work with loneliness other than kind of be with our feelings and process them?

Yeah, I was just doing some thinking about this. I noticed that when I'm in a deep work, either focusing on something like cooking or. Cause when you get a. You have like a recipe, you have to like follow the steps.

You gotta pay attention.

You gotta pay attention. Yeah, there's, there's a system there. And so I noticed that things that I do that require like systematizing or paying attention, procedural stuff. I don't think about anything like ruminate about loneliness at all. So I love going to the gym, working out, being in your body and imagine like if you're carrying all that weight, the emotional weight, like doing a, I don't know, maybe a 10 to 15 minute purge of like emotional letting go can really open up your body into feeling like, oh wow, I feel so much better. I'm gonna go for a run or I'm gonna go for a hike. And that could be just like really powerful. So definitely some sort of fitness activity, clearing your mind. I would avoid definitely like social media, television or radio, like the news for a time while you're doing emotional work. Just outside influences that can kind of. It's so quick to fall into other stories or.

Sure, yeah. You're just gonna feed off of that and kind of build up your whole narrative of like look at all those other people that have love that I don't have.

Yeah, yeah.

I knew I'm a loser.

And so I would say start off with, with that. Working on doing something that's more systematized. Find out what you actually enjoy. Like as a hobby. Could be just reading a book or could be going to the movies. But yeah, that's kind of where I would start off with.

I love that. And I think one of the most loving things that you can do for yourself is to see the truth that you don't know the future that the past does not equal the future. And that when you're looking and you're saying X will happen or X won't happen, you are entirely referencing the past and just overlaying it on the future. And if anything, can you choose faith instead of fear?

Yeah.

And just say, you know what? I do want to create that in my life. Like, I'm gonna work with the loneliness right now in this moment, and I will have that connection in my life. Why? Because I deeply want it. And what I deeply want and focus on and pursue over time, I will experience. And just choosing to believe that, choosing that and then that. I mean, just think about that just from a functional perspective of what you're gonna do in life, forgetting about the whole metaphysics of it. Right. Just think about it from a functional perspective. It's never gonna happen. I'm never gonna have that in my life. That's person. A, person, B. I'm gonna have that because that's really meaningful to me. And what I really meaningful. I'm gonna create in my life.

Yeah.

Like, who is more likely to take actions and show up in the world in a way that's gonna produce the outcome, you know? Well, actually, both are gonna do that, and both are gonna get the outcome.

That they're proclaiming destined to have in the sense of, you know, you can. That person who's gonna be like, I need to do this. I need to do this now. They'll never know for fulfillment because they'll all just be. They'll just be pursuing the next thing to avoid feeling. And then you have someone who's like me, confident badass, who's, like, processing feelings and taking the time to go through their goals and, you know, each. Each day. I like this phrase of, like, one step at a time, one punch at a time, one round at a time. It's like, very present.

Apollo Creed.

That's Creed, baby.

Yeah.

Dun, dun, dun, Dun, dun.

Number one or number two?

That's one.

How many times have you seen number one?

Probably about 38 times.

I'd say, like, really sitting down, watching. You just have it on the background.

No, no. Sitting down, watching it. Wow. I can't even have, like, a. Like, sitting in the. Like, in the background. That's a diss.

That's like, oh, you got it.

You do that with proper tears.

I do not have that level of. I guess I have, like, more novelty seeking in me. Like, I get it was repetition. I. I cannot think of a movie that I could. I could maybe watch movies a second time. If I'm like maybe a third time, actually. Okay, that's not true. Episodically, I can rewatch Pacific Rim and Dread.

Those are dread? Yeah, yeah.

You know, like once a year sometimes. It's true, but I just can't. Anyway, we digress. That's how you deal with loneliness. You watch dread.

You watch dread with some friends and then as soon as it's over, you put it back on again, rewatch it.

And say, don't ever leave me. Alright, let's steer this into our actions.

Time for action. Action. Action.

Do you have an action step?

I. Oh, man, I was just listening to the playback and so I thought. I thought you were gonna have.

I don't know, I mean, I. We kind of gave a lot of action steps. All right.

Hey, everybody.

And we're back. We gave a lot of action steps. I mean, there was a. There was probably at least a dozen in there. What do you want another one? Just pick one. Okay, so your action step for today is to pick.

Come to a live event.

Come to a live event.

Get some coaching with Jonathan. Those are your actions.

Those are the two acts. Those are the only two things you need. Jonathan will take your loneliness away. No one ever feels lonely.

I'm like a sponge.

I'll just absorb it and I'll squeeze it out and purge it out later. Beautiful. Action is gonna be. Find some way to work. Okay, here's actually one that I have an idea for is pay attention to loneliness for you this week in your life. When does it arise? Certain times of day, Maybe after you're with someone in the morning, whatever it is. And just be very curious about it when it does arise and just notice like, oh, where do I feel it? How strong is it? How long does it last? Kind of make a more observational study of it as opposed to kind of a reactive one. And if you notice, you get in stories about loneliness, like there's a loneliness. Oh, God, it's so awful. And see if you can soften some of that and just become an observer of that loneliness for this week.

Yeah, I like that. That's good.

It's a good one. I totally had that one pre planned. We didn't just make it up right now.

That's right. All right. Damn it, man, you've done it again, dude.

I'm unstoppable. All right, everyone, thanks for joining us today and until we speak again, may have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. You're awesome.

Yeah. That was close. That was good.

Nailed it. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit.

From what you've just heard, please let.

Them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to socialconfidencecenter.com it.