How lonely are you?

May 1, 2018July 13, 2020 / Laura Lee Carter / 8 Comments

According to recent research, Americans are a pretty lonely group, and the younger you are, the lonelier you feel.

A nationwide survey by the health insurer Cigna underscores that fact. Their survey of over 20,000 American adults age 18 or older, finds that loneliness is widespread in our country, with nearly 50 percent of respondents reporting that they feel left out always or sometimes.

The Cigna results offer some alarming findings:

Nearly half of Americans report sometimes or always feeling alone (46 percent) or left out (47 percent).
One in four Americans (27 percent) rarely or never feel as though there are people who really understand them.
Two in five Americans sometimes or always feel that their relationships are not meaningful (43 percent) and that they are isolated from others (43 percent).
One in five people report they rarely or never feel close to people or feel like there are people they can talk to.
Americans who live with others are less likely to be lonely (average loneliness score of 43.5) compared to those who live alone (46.4). However, this does not apply to single parents/guardians (average loneliness score of 48.2) – even though they live with children, they are more likely to be lonely.
Only around half of Americans (53 percent) have regular meaningful in-person social interactions, such as having an extended conversation with a friend or spending quality time with family.
Generation Z (adults ages 18-22) is the loneliest generation and claims to be in worse health than older generations.

Is social media part of the problem?

Social media use alone is not a predictor of loneliness; respondents defined as very heavy users of social media have a loneliness score (43.5) not markedly different from the score of those who never use social media (41.7).

More time online and social media may be causing a rise in depression and suicide among American adolescents. People who spend less time looking at screens and more time having face-to-face social interactions are less likely to be depressive or suicidal.

It appears that how people use social media determines its influence on one’s sense of isolation.

Members of Generation Z, born between the mid-1990s and the early 2000s, had an overall loneliness score of 48.3. Millennials, just a little bit older, scored 45.3. By comparison, baby boomers scored 42.4. The Greatest Generation, people ages 72 and above, had a score of 38.6 on the loneliness scale.

I have been what I consider to be a loner for most of my life, and enjoyed most of that time alone. Even though I moved here with Mike, I feared moving to rural Colorado because I didn’t know if I would find friends here. As it turns out, I do have a few friends who understand the value of a great education, deep friendship and healthy solitude.

I also find I enjoy spending more time alone when feeling so connected to nature as I do here.

GIVE YOURSELF A BREAK!

April 29, 2018May 1, 2018 / Laura Lee Carter / 6 Comments

One lesson we can all learn by travelling to other countries is that Americans are awfully busy. I have lived in southeast Asia, China, France and Italy, and can find no other group of people who feel the need to be constantly busy. My favorite country was Italy. They seem to have such a generous sense of time compared to us, and an ability to enjoy the process of living without guilt over stopping to enjoy each moment.

How did we ever get so busy and guilty about simply relaxing?

I really don’t know how we got so driven as a culture, but I do have a few tips on how to give yourself a break from all of that internalized pressure: Take days off from your ‘normal’ life where you can truly do whatever YOU want to do. No rules. No guilt. Be lazy. Watch trashy TV. Eat mac and cheese. No food shaming either. Try really hard not to judge yourself or others for just a few hours. Celebrate having the time to just be yourself!

Let your mind wonder on a regular basis. Free thought is where all creativity comes from. How could your life be better? Free your mind to consider ALL of your options. What barriers would you need to bridge in your own mind to have a much better life?

What rules do you need to get rid of right now?

For some reason, aging can be quite the catalyst in freeing your mind. Being perfectly clear on the fact that your years are numbered can clear your head! What do you want to do before you die? Stop all the daily busyness long enough to do those things now!

Stepping out of the busyness, stopping our endless pursuit of getting somewhere else, is perhaps the most beautiful offering we can make to our spirit. — TARA BRACH

A Study of Vigilance in Rural Colorado

April 28, 2018April 28, 2018 / Laura Lee Carter / 4 Comments

Vigilance: the action or state of keeping careful watch for possible danger or difficulties. Synonyms: alertness, attentiveness, watchfulness

As a psychologist, my natural tendency is to observe changes in my own and others’ behavior. By living in cities for most of my life, and then moving outside of even the smallest town recently, I have had a marvelous opportunity to observe how my consciousness has changed. One area I find particularly interesting is my level of vigilance.

This is a state which most are not conscious of, because it can often be barely felt on a conscious level. Simple thoughts like “Are my doors locked?” “Do I feel safe now?” and “Am I safe?” can come up constantly. I became much more aware of these feelings after moving away from cities. In this way I discovered that we all experience varying degrees of safety in any environment.

I see now that while living in cities I felt the need to be constantly vigilant. Especially living as a single woman there, I was always quite aware of locking my doors, noticing strange sounds or things going on around my home, etc. Cities offer such a tight concentration of people everywhere, with traffic, lines at the store, etc. They seem to require a heightened level of vigilance at all times.

MY COMMUTE TO TOWN

However, I didn’t become aware of my city-inspired heighten state of vigilance until I tried living away from others. When I first moved out into the country I felt isolated and concerned about that sense of isolation. How would I make new friends? What about emergencies?

But in less than a year or so those fears turned into a new sense of security and safety. We live among others who have three to six acres of land, and most keep completely to themselves. In this new setting I found that I needed to train myself how to mellow out. I was still hyper-vigilant, a trait that no longer served me.

Each year I live here, my level of deep security and relaxation increases along with my level of introversion. Some might see this as a bad thing, but I must say it feels really good to feel truly safe for the first time in decades, both in my home and in my life.

Should a seeker not find a companion who is better or equal, let him resolutely pursue a solitary path. There is no companionship with a fool. – The Dhammapada

How do we get “good with money?”

April 23, 2018April 23, 2018 / Laura Lee Carter / 1 Comment

When I recently saw the headline: “Money Habits Established by Age 7” on PBS, I was astounded! Could we really be that set in our ways by seven? But then I thought back to my earliest saving habits and I could pretty much believe this. While my older brother could never hold on to money for any length of time, and my big sister also struggled with high finance, I was a born saver from way back.

I can even prove it:

We took a family trip to Disneyland the summer of 1967 and wouldn’t you know, I documented every penny I spent on that trip. I was twelve years old! I started out with a little over $15.00 which sounds like nothing, but this was back when postcards were a nickel and rides at Knott’s Berry Farm were 35 cents. I ended up with a dollar left. I also had a savings account by then. I loved to watch my money grow, while my siblings didn’t. I’ve always wondered why.

I read an article yesterday that predicted that the oldest sibling would be best at finances and the youngest fairly bad at saving. Nope, that’s not how it worked in our family. How about yours? Where does the desire to save money come from? Why do so many boomers have nothing extra saved for retirement, while some of us saved like crazy starting at age 20? That is a mystery to me!

Earth Day in the USA: Love Your Mother

April 22, 2018April 22, 2018 / Laura Lee Carter / Leave a comment

On January 28, 1969, a well drilled by Union Oil Platform A off the coast of Santa Barbara, California, blew out. More than three million gallons of oil spewed, killing over 10,000 seabirds, dolphins, seals, and sea lions. As a reaction to this natural disaster, activists were mobilized to create environmental regulation, environmental education, and Earth Day. Among the proponents of Earth Day were the people in the front lines of fighting this disaster, Selma Rubin, Marc McGinnes, and Bud Bottoms, founder of Get Oil Out.

Earth Day 1970

The first Earth Day celebrations took place in 1970 at two thousand colleges and universities, roughly ten thousand primary and secondary schools, and hundreds of communities across the United States. It also brought 20 million Americans out into the spring sunshine for peaceful demonstrations in favor of environmental reform. It now is observed in 192 countries, and coordinated by the nonprofit Earth Day Network, chaired by the first Earth Day 1970 organizer Denis Hayes, according to whom Earth Day is now “the largest secular holiday in the world, celebrated by more than a billion people every year.” Environmental groups seek to make Earth Day into a day of action to change human behavior and provoke policy changes.

Why Earth Day Today?

Because the earth needs us now more than ever! And since we’re fresh out of other planets to live on, now is as good a time as ever to do everything we can to preserve the miracle of this green and blue planet. Go solar! Use wind power. Change old habits that hurt the earth. You could probably name ten things today that would benefit Mother Earth immediately. Do it instead of just thinking about it!

What does the future hold? It’s all up to us!

Rediscovering your heart

April 17, 2018April 17, 2018 / Laura Lee Carter / 5 Comments

“Who knows why you start rediscovering your heart you just do it again and again…” – Jimmy Buffet

Midlife is such a marvelous time to rediscover yourself and your earliest dreams and goals. It is the time to look back and see how well you have achieved those goals you treasured as a child, and what else needs to be done to make your life complete.

Here’s a short essay from my book Find Your Reason To Be Here: The Search for Meaning in Midlife, about how this process might proceed:

What Defines You? Rediscover Your Heart

Your first step in this new action plan will be to let go of your previous reality, which was built on unrealistic goals, rules, expectations, and perceptions. This will require that you first find a way to believe it is possible for you to change your life.

How will you do this? First you must rediscover your heart, your inner wisdom, and your belief in your power to change perhaps everything in your life. Do you remember your child’s-mind and heart at age seven or eight? When you were that kid you had a pretty good idea of what you loved to do and what you were naturally good at. Back then you were still listening to your inner wisdom and paying more attention to its truths. That was before authority figures began sharing their truths with you, convincing you that your own truth was silly, unrealistic, and not worth listening to.

Now is the time to check inside again and excavate that child’s wisdom from the decades of outside advice and beliefs you have accumulated in your head and heart. Yes, there were many practical concerns that drove you to choose the major you pursued in college, the career you have dedicated your life to up until now, and even the love partner you may have spent the past 20 or 30 years with.

No need to judge the choices you have made up to now. Know that you have always done your best to survive and thrive, but also respect your present need for a mid-course adjustment. Constantly racing towards some sense of security is quite human, but not realistic. Find new respect for your changing self and the many new perceptions you will gather as you attempt to turn off the safety-seeking, security-oriented feedback loop in your brain. Security can only take you so far, but to grow and evolve you must take new risks. Your overall goal is to have no regrets as you look back over your life from the age of 70 or 80.

Change in midlife requires that, like never before in your life, you begin to believe in yourself and your power to change. This exercise will require that you develop your highest levels of self-love, self-respect, and self-compassion.

As you begin to recall your past interests and dreams, think about what happened to them. Did they hold any validity? Do you miss those dreams or have reasons to believe that you would still like to pursue them? Were they vestiges of your authentic self, which you have tried to delete or ignore for decades? Would this be a good time to allow them back into your heart, if only for a bit of new consideration?

Midlife is the best time to question again why you are here and become crystal clear about what needs to happen in your life before you die.

Laura and Rasta the view 2014

Open to your vast spontaneous creativity, give yourself the freedom to try new things, let go of your innate fear of failure, and finally feel free to experiment, perhaps for the first time in decades!

According to recent research, Americans are a pretty lonely group, and the younger you are, the lonelier you feel.

A nationwide survey by the health insurer Cigna underscores that fact. Their survey of over 20,000 American adults age 18 or older, finds that loneliness is widespread in our country, with nearly 50 percent of respondents reporting that they feel left out always or sometimes.

The Cigna results offer some alarming findings:

Nearly half of Americans report sometimes or always feeling alone (46 percent) or left out (47 percent).

One in four Americans (27 percent) rarely or never feel as though there are people who really understand them.

Two in five Americans sometimes or always feel that their relationships are not meaningful (43 percent) and that they are isolated from others (43 percent).

One in five people report they rarely or never feel close to people or feel like there are people they can talk to.

Only around half of Americans (53 percent) have regular meaningful in-person social interactions, such as having an extended conversation with a friend or spending quality time with family.

Generation Z (adults ages 18-22) is the loneliest generation and claims to be in worse health than older generations.

Is social media part of the problem?

Social media use alone is not a predictor of loneliness; respondents defined as very heavy users of social media have a loneliness score (43.5) not markedly different from the score of those who never use social media (41.7).

More time online and social media may be causing a rise in depression and suicide among American adolescents. People who spend less time looking at screens and more time having face-to-face social interactions are less likely to be depressive or suicidal.

It appears that how people use social media determines its influence on one’s sense of isolation.

I also find I enjoy spending more time alone when feeling so connected to nature as I do here.

How did we ever get so busy and guilty about simply relaxing?

Let your mind wonder on a regular basis. Free thought is where all creativity comes from. How could your life be better? Free your mind to consider ALL of your options. What barriers would you need to bridge in your own mind to have a much better life?

What rules do you need to get rid of right now?

For some reason, aging can be quite the catalyst in freeing your mind. Being perfectly clear on the fact that your years are numbered can clear your head! What do you want to do before you die? Stop all the daily busyness long enough to do those things now!

Stepping out of the busyness, stopping our endless pursuit of getting somewhere else, is perhaps the most beautiful offering we can make to our spirit. — TARA BRACH

Vigilance: the action or state of keeping careful watch for possible danger or difficulties. Synonyms: alertness, attentiveness, watchfulness

However, I didn’t become aware of my city-inspired heighten state of vigilance until I tried living away from others. When I first moved out into the country I felt isolated and concerned about that sense of isolation. How would I make new friends? What about emergencies?

Each year I live here, my level of deep security and relaxation increases along with my level of introversion. Some might see this as a bad thing, but I must say it feels really good to feel truly safe for the first time in decades, both in my home and in my life.

Should a seeker not find a companion who is better or equal, let him resolutely pursue a solitary path. There is no companionship with a fool. – The Dhammapada

I can even prove it:

Earth Day 1970

Why Earth Day Today?

What does the future hold? It’s all up to us!

“Who knows why you start rediscovering your heart you just do it again and again…” – Jimmy Buffet

Midlife is such a marvelous time to rediscover yourself and your earliest dreams and goals. It is the time to look back and see how well you have achieved those goals you treasured as a child, and what else needs to be done to make your life complete.

Here’s a short essay from my book Find Your Reason To Be Here: The Search for Meaning in Midlife, about how this process might proceed:

What Defines You? Rediscover Your Heart

Your first step in this new action plan will be to let go of your previous reality, which was built on unrealistic goals, rules, expectations, and perceptions. This will require that you first find a way to believe it is possible for you to change your life.

Change in midlife requires that, like never before in your life, you begin to believe in yourself and your power to change. This exercise will require that you develop your highest levels of self-love, self-respect, and self-compassion.

Midlife is the best time to question again why you are here and become crystal clear about what needs to happen in your life before you die.

Open to your vast spontaneous creativity, give yourself the freedom to try new things, let go of your innate fear of failure, and finally feel free to experiment, perhaps for the first time in decades!