A remedy for isolation

In a recent conversation, a friend mentioned something she occasionally hears about from fellow employees who work from home: professional isolation. It’s a disconnected feeling sometimes experienced by people who aren’t in a traditional workplace, with in-person meetings or opportunities to socialize with colleagues.

Feeling isolated isn’t limited to remote employees – or even to people who live alone. No matter what the setting, we may feel that no one needs us, no one cares for us, no one understands us.

Odd as it may sound, I’ve found that one way to end feelings of isolation is solitude. Although solitude does refer to being alone, what I’m talking about is more of a mental state – a quiet, gentle environment for reflection, for prayer.

Such quietness, shutting out distractions and turning our attention to God, helps us be receptive to divine guidance. “Be still, and know that I am God,” the Bible says in one of the Psalms (46:10). Getting to know God, and what God is revealing to us about spiritual reality, brings a greater awareness of the fact that we’re always comforted, cared for, and needed by divine Love, God. There’s no distance between God and each of us, because we are God’s children, the spiritual reflection of His nature, inseparable from Him.

Granted, if we look at things from a human perspective, we might think that because of limited human contact, we’re not as needed or cared for as we’d like to be. But the spiritual perspective gained through prayer elevates that view. It reveals what the physical senses are incapable of grasping – the holy messages of God, which bring comfort, direction, and healing to our lives.

Christ Jesus made the presence of divine messages apparent to his followers. The discoverer of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, pointed this out when she wrote, “When he was with them, a fishing-boat became a sanctuary, and the solitude was peopled with holy messages from the All-Father” (“Retrospection and Introspection,” p. 91).

The ability to discern such messages wasn’t unique to those people or to that period. We all innately have the spiritual sense to discern them.

But does this mean that human contact and interaction are unimportant? It doesn’t. We all can benefit from interacting with others, learning from one another’s insights and life experiences. But it’s vital to acknowledge that wherever we are, God is sending inspiration to us – messages that help us know our true, spiritual nature as God’s cared-for, never-alone, needed, worthy, and valued children.

I recall a time of desperate searching for direction in my own life. I felt isolated. Though there were several people close to me who offered compassion and guidance, I felt that no one truly understood what I needed. Sitting in a park one afternoon, surrounded by a lot of happy but noisy schoolchildren, I opened my heart to God.

A message came to me with such clarity it was as though the words had been whispered into my ear: “Commit thy way unto Me.” I knew that “Me” was God. And He was as much with me then as He is with all of us always. But it took an honest willingness to look elsewhere than the physical surroundings, to wholeheartedly listen to God, to discern this more fully.

The message that came in the solitude of prayer totally destroyed the feeling of being cut off from someone who really understood what I needed. God knew. He always knows – and provides all we need, including opportunities to bless and to be blessed through living out from our God-given nature. And a few days later I was contacted by a large organization that needed my particular skills, which led to fulfilling interactions and work with them for over 25 years.

Great comfort comes in realizing that we aren’t left alone. We can’t be. Ever. And as we open our heart and mind to what God is telling us, we find ourselves overcoming feelings of isolation.