Responding to the Loneliness Epidemic

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water…

This morning, I received a news alert saying, “WHO says Covid-10 is no longer a global health emergency.” Hooray!  It’s just that earlier this week, the U.S. Surgeon General declared a loneliness epidemic.

Dr. Vivek Murthy announced the release of “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation,” an 81-page report from the Department of Health and Human Services. Murthy noted that about half of U.S. adults say they've experienced loneliness and that social isolation’s effects on mortality are equivalent to smoking up to 15 cigarettes every day.

The surgeon general called for changes that will boost the country's connectedness. People should join community groups and put down their phones when they're catching up with friends; employers should think carefully about their remote work policies; and health systems should provide training for doctors to recognize the health risks of loneliness. “There's really no substitute for in-person interaction,” Murthy said. “As we shifted to use technology more and more for our communication, we lost out on a lot of that in-person interaction. How do we design technology that strengthens our relationships as opposed to weaken them?”

Judaism knows this to be true. “It is not good for humans to be alone.” (Bereishit 2:18) Judaism also provides strategies to respond: We face loneliness, and we fight loneliness.

In The Lonely Man of Faith (pp. 4-5), Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik faces his loneliness:

“I am lonely because, in my humble, inadequate way, I am a man of faith for whom to be means to believe…Apparently, in this role as a man of faith, I must experience a sense of loneliness which is of a compound nature.”

The Rav describes having friends and family, yet still feeling lonely. It is an existential loneliness, a realization that we need to strive to move beyond our current condition. There is always a deeper level of faith or knowledge to explore. We are lonely. That is a fact, yet it need not define us or cause us to despair. It is a place from which we can grow.  

Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the late Lubavitcher Rebbe, wrote a letter to a young person who complained of feeling lonely while studying away from home. The Rebbe encouraged the student to take the bull by the horns and to proactively seek out friends. He invoked the teaching of Yehoshua ben Perachiah (Avot 1:6) to “acquire a friend.” One might find companionship without effort, but, when one feels lonely, get out there and connect with someone else.

Judaism also fights loneliness by placing a premium on being there for someone else. This has a powerful impact on both the lonely individual and the one who steps forward to ease the loneliness of others.

Last week, at the opening plenary of the World Orthodox Israel Congress in Jerusalem, Natan Sharansky spoke, and he mentioned that he really found religion while in prison in the Soviet Union. He used Tehillim for comfort and strength, and it was in the gulag that he fully understood the verse in Psalm 23, “Lo ira ra ki ata imadi - I shall fear no evil, for You are with me.” Sharansky said that in prison he understood the word “ata” as referring to not only Hashem, but also to the Jewish People. He gained much strength when he realized that he was not alone, that he was never alone.

Loneliness can be overcome when people step up to be there for other people. We must be the “ata”’s for others. We must be sensitive to situations when we can fill the emptiness someone feels and seize opportunities to be of assistance and make people feel connected. If society is suffering from a loneliness epidemic, we can provide an antidote by connecting and assuring each other that, even if it may feel like it, we are never really alone.

Shlomo Carlebach loved the teachings of Reb Kalonymus Kalmish of Piacenza, also known as the Rebbe of the Warsaw Ghetto. He desperately wanted to meet one of the Piacenza’s students. Finally, near the beach in Tel Aviv, he happened upon an old hunchback Jew sweeping the street, and he had a premonition.

Reb Shlomo said: “Reb Yid, where are you from?” The hunchback said, “Piacezna.”

Shlomo was thrilled and asked the old Jew to share a teaching of the Rebbe.

The old man replied, “Look at me. I spent five years in Auschwitz. I am broken. I have nothing. Do you think I remember any of those teachings?”

Shlomo said, "Yes. The words of the holy Rebbe penetrate you forever."

He stopped sweeping. He looked at me and said, "Do you really want to know?" 

“Please share with me something that you learned from the rabbi! Whatever you tell me I shall tell all over the world,” Rabbi Carlebach begged.

After some coaxing, the hunchback replied, “This is what the rabbi said to us over and over again: ‘The greatest thing in the world is to do somebody else a favor!’”

The man continued, “I’m here in Tel Aviv and I have no one in the world. Sometimes I’m at my end, but then I hear my rabbi’s voice saying, ‘The greatest thing in the world is to do somebody else a favor.’ A person can do favors anywhere at any time. Do you know how many favors you can do on the streets of the world?”

The greatest thing in the world is to do somebody else a favor.

There is loneliness. There is an epidemic of loneliness. There is the loneliness we, at times, feel, and the loneliness faced by others. Our loneliness can be the characteristic that motivates us to be more than we currently are, and we are the ones that can help ease someone else’s loneliness. If we don’t have someone to connect to, create the opportunity to connect with others. Call a friend you haven’t spoken to in a while. Reach out to a shul member you don’t know. Volunteer with an organization that matches people with those who can use a call or visit.

Our awareness that loneliness exists coupled with the commitment to ease it for ourselves and others is exactly how we counter the loneliness epidemic.