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Loneliness: No Need for Introduction

hroughout society today people feel great loneliness,” the Dalai
Lama said as we began our discussion after tea.
We were talking about loneliness and alienation and some troubling
recent statistics. A study by sociologist Lynn Smith-Lovin had found that
the number of close friends people report having has reduced from three
to two. While we might have hundreds of Facebook friends, our true,
close friends are decreasing. Perhaps most concerning of all, one in ten
people said they had no close friendships at all.
“Actually, in America and in India also,” the Dalai Lama continued,
“people in the big cities are very busy, and although they may see each
other’s faces or even know each other for several years, they have
practically no human connection. So when something happens, people
feel lonely because they have no one they can turn to for help or support.”
Having grown up in Manhattan, surrounded by seven million New
Yorkers, I knew exactly what the Dalai Lama was saying. As a boy, I
never really met the people who lived on our apartment floor. I would
occasionally hear their doors close with an empty metallic clang, and
locks turn behind them. If we did see them while waiting for the elevator,
few words were spoken and eyes were averted. I was always bewildered
by this willful avoidance and finally concluded that it must have been a
defense against the crush of so many people crowded together.
“In rural areas, farmers have had a stronger sense of community,” the
Dalai Lama explained. “So, when someone or some family is facing a
problem, you have the feeling that you can ask your neighbors for help.
Even in big cities with millions of people, we still have the responsibility
for each other whether we know each other or not.”
I thought of the locked doors on our apartment building floor. How
could we have responsibility for people we did not even know? Those
closed doors, and the unseen people behind them, were like a constant