11 Ways Lonely People Tell Others To 'Stay Away' Without Saying A Word
Identify the signs of someone who may feel lonely.
Darina Belonogova | Pexels Have you gone to a work event or dinner at a friend’s house and noticed there’s someone who’s the “life of the party” and someone else who hangs back and tries to disappear? Most people are in the middle of these extremes, but almost everyone has moments when we feel lonely or detached.
Loneliness is triggered by sadness and fear that is caused by their brain chemistry, which can be adjusted before the condition deteriorates. This is especially important for adolescents and young adults, when they could leave their self-imposed “prison” and find socializing much easier when they grow up once they learn what contributes to it.
Therefore, when someone appears lonely, please ask yourself, "Are they lonely or do they enjoy being alone?" Regardless of the answer, the list below can help people see how lonely push people away, often without even realizing it.
Here are 11 ways lonely people tell others to 'stay away' without saying a word:
1. They prefer to spend most of their time alone
Some people love alone time and find it rejuvenating and energizing. However, even for them, too much alone time can prevent them from forming new connections and nurturing the relationships they already have. The key is balance and learning to motivate yourself to call a friend and make plans so you don't inadvertently send the message of "Love me alone!"
2. They usually avoid eye contact
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Eye contact doesn't come naturally for everyone, so don't feel doomed if it’s challenging for you. Instead, recognize that to some people, avoiding looking at them translates to you saying, "I want to be alone" or "I don't like you".
If you practice making eye contact with your mirror and your closest friend, you will begin to feel more comfortable over time. Social skills are just that — skills — and it's OK to take some time to practice them!
A 2010 study found, "Patients with generalized social anxiety disorder, in comparison with healthy control participants, reported significantly increased levels of fear and avoidance of eye contact. Fear and avoidance of eye contact are associated with social anxiety in both nonpatient and social anxiety disorder samples."
3. They rarely engage in conversations
I met Greta Garbo, famous for her “I want to be alone” attitude, and both times she was so skittish and shy that she uttered about 5 words before running out of the stores where I was waiting on her. This extreme introversion caused Garbo to suddenly end her Hollywood career while most film stars love adulation and attention!
4. They lack communication skills
Successful communication requires skills and practice, and for painfully shy people, venturing into the “shark-infested waters” of a conversation may seem terrifying. They need encouragement, yet for their relatives and coworkers, it may be exhausting to coax them to express any opinion.
5. They physically distance themselves from others in the same room
You may find a lonely person passing out drinks or hors d’oeuvres at a party to avoid real connection. This is a great strategy, as is clearing the table after a dinner party, because the hostess feels grateful, and the lonely person has ventured outside of a safe cocoon at home. Just don’t offer to help with these waitstaff skills because you need to understand that doing the task alone is the whole point.
6. They prefer to live alone
Everyone who is “Sensitive” has told me that they live alone because the alternative is excruciating. Divorces after 50 are usually the wife’s idea, and most of them continue to live alone for the rest of their lives without a single complaint.
However, when these same women were forced into dorm rooms in college, they suffered because they needed peace, quiet, privacy, and the freedom to live a quiet and often monastic life, exactly what “sensitive” people prefer.
7. They avoid intimate relationships or long-term intimacy
Some lonely people are constantly declining invitations from people who try to fix them up. Even if there is a need for intimate connection, the guy who leaves right after being intimate may be a classic example of this lonely/shy mentality. If their mothers tried to push them to socialize when they were in elementary school, by the time they meet you, any hint of social pressure can cause them to scurry back to their cave, forever.
8. They let phone calls go to voicemail and take days to respond to texts or emails
While you are convinced that your call is an irresistible opportunity to have fun, make business connections, etc., remember that their worldview is different. Your idea of the torture of being cooped up with the flu for a week may be exactly what a lonely/shy type loves and enjoys.
9. They avoid most group activities
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Someone who has a lonely lifestyle may love watching movies in a quiet movie theater or alone at home so they can immerse themselves in a great story. However, you may love the opposite, having a group of friends visit so you can autopsy a rom-com.
Consider team sports versus the lone swimmer and the solitary marathoner. Think of the avid reader versus the book club member, and you’ll feel the difference between the person who prefers to be alone and what you enjoy.
10. They may suffer from addiction
When people work the 12 Steps and succeed in becoming clean and sober, there is an additional huge challenge most must face. Going to parties sober is a huge stressor because, for many shy people, being drunk or stoned is their strategy to overcome extreme anxiety in social situations.
I have been invited to many parties in which my friends and clients who were 12 Step grads were trying so hard to relax, and they couldn’t do it because, like children on their first day at school, they lacked the skills. Even when I threw out easy topics, only a few people could engage.
A 2014 study of substance dependence disorder "assessed emotional, social, romantic, and familial dimensions of loneliness," and found, that "loneliness is one of the psychological variables related to high-risk behaviors."
11. They stay in the same job for many years or decades to avoid new environments
Any new environment can be terrifying for someone who is extremely shy. Where you or I may feel excited to meet so many new people, assuming that we will like some of them and vice versa, a truly shy person is busy with self-critical thoughts and images of being ignored or even disliked.
Therefore, job-hunting is torture for them. Interviews begin the cycle of stress and upset, so that even if they are offered the job, meeting so many new people and getting along with them is daunting. You’ll see many experts stuck in dead-end jobs for decades because they are too shy and lack the skills they need to move to a better job.
Once you recognize and understand these 11 behaviors of lonely people, you can feel more relaxed around them and know they are doing the best they can, although they lack the key tools and skills for socializing.
If you have relatives, friends, and coworkers who are on the “Sensitive” scale, you will be able to observe them and review these 11 versions of behaviors, knowing that it isn’t you, it is them and like eye color and other traits, the more we understand one another the more peaceful our lives can be.
Susan Allan is a certified mediator and coach and the founder of the Marriage Forum Inc. and creator of The 6 Part Conversation© and The 7 Stages of Marriage and Divorce training to help people understand their own needs and their partners.
