Dear Joyce… Afraid of Being Alone

Dear Joyce,

I am so willing to forgive that when people do me wrong no matter what, I always accept them back into my life no matter when they choose to come back. The problem is that I have a hard time letting go of what has happened. I believe that my hard time letting go started with my father abandoning my family but whenever he came back I still let him just for him to leave again and come back over and over, even though it always hurt. Now this is happening with my friendships and my relationships. I obsess over why things went wrong and how I could make it better and everytime they want to be my friends/lovers again I let them come back into my life even though I still havent let go of the pain of what they’ve done to me. My mom thinks I have a fear of just being alone. How can I help myself to be ok with being alone?

From Lola

RESPONSE FROM JOYCE

Dear Lola,

It seems your problem with easily accepting back the people who hurt you is related to your fear of being alone. Deep within you, even if you said you already forgave them, you may still feel the pain of what they did to you. Deep within, something still felt unfair. However, since you’re afraid of being alone, you prefer to have them back.

Lola, forgiving someone doens’t mean you have to automatically restore your relationship with the person. Forgiveness is to no longer seek healing from the same person who caused you pain. It’s no longer demanding anything from them. But to be able to restore a relationship means a lot more. It means a restoration of trust and of respect. It means being able to understand at what terms you’re going to continue your communication, and how you’re going to meet each other’s needs and expectations. We can forgive in an instant, but it takes a lot of time to really restore what has been lost in a relationship.

As to our fear of being alone, I believe it is connected to our fear of living a meaningless life. Without a witness or a company who will join us and whom we can love, we fear that our life would be worthless, that there would be nothing to look forward to anymore.

If we want to overcome this fear, we have to be secure first in God’s love. God’s love is not an abstract thing or a mere theory. And God is not a distant spirit or an impersonal force. God is personal, which means you can communicate with Him, you can ask Him questions and He will respond. He is aware of you, of all the hurts and fears going on inside of you. And He cares for you most of all.

It doesn’t mean we should no longer have interaction with other people around us. It only means our anchor should be in God’s love. We let that love fill us until it overflows. And then we let that love overflow towards other people. Do have some quiet time with God, you will know you are never truly alone!

Yours In Prayer,
JOYCE

Check Jocelyn's books:

"Of Waves and Butterflies: Poems on Grief", "Mend My Broken Heart", "Questions to God", "To Love an Invisible God", "Defending My Catholic Faith", and more - click here.

(You may freely quote excerpts from this website as long as due credit is given to author Jocelyn Soriano and the website itakeoffthemask.com)