There are periods of time in our life where we may go into a form of isolation. We may not communicate with our friends for a while. We may not enter into a relationship for a while. We may not even speak to our family for a while. Sometimes, these periods of time are influenced by challenging circumstances going on with one’s finances or living situation. Other times, it may be a voluntary decision by that person to take the time to heal themselves and focus on maturing mentally and growing spiritually. Not every form of isolation is good but there are some forms of isolation that is taken which turns out to be for the betterment of that person.
We may need to take a few days, weeks, or even months to gather ourselves and focus strictly on where we need to go in our journey. We might be getting clouded by many different voices in our head from the people in our lives and we need to move away from all that noise and listen to our inner self. Some of us might be in a toxic or tempting environment that may pull us down if we don’t pull ourselves out of it. We might be in a bad neighborhood, have bad company, or be with a bad partner. We might need to physically move out of our environment to get to that position in life in which we need to go.
People often do not take the time to displace themselves from out of the environment that they’re in because of a fear that they might miss out on not speaking to their friends or family or not interacting with their community. Most of that fear is irrational. There is nothing more valuable than taking the time to focus on yourself and what you need to fix. You may keep in contact with your father, mother, or other family member or even friend if they can assist you in that process in improving your mindset and spirit or helping you heal from old wounds. We have to be willing to make that sacrifice to not bury our feelings with partying, socializing, and playing games and to instead face our problems head on. If we don’t choose to face our problems, we will be forced to face our problems eventually.
Sometimes, our own wounds can blind us from the quality of company that we keep. While going through certain forms of depression and emptiness, we might be too dependent on another person’s company by speaking with them and spending much of our time with them to fill that void. Our own wounds may also put us in a certain mindset to where we think fondly of the company that we keep. Once those wounds heal and our mind elevates though, we might come to find that there are things about our friends that are not good and it might actually be necessary to get away from them. Some of our trauma might have put us in a mindset to where we were too focused on blaming others for our issues instead of actually taking the task to fix our own issues and to avoid people like that moving forward. It might have made us less responsible and more prone to burying our responsibilities with partying, socializing, drinking, smoking, etc. Usually, the bigger the crowd we keep when we’re just partying or hanging out, the more the quality decreases. Some people are just there to fan the fire and they push you to try this new smoke or that new drink. They’re simply there for the edge and are not there for any stimulation of the mind or elevation of the spirit. They’re simply there for a new dopamine hit while you, whether you know it or not, are looking for healing. Once we heal and change for the better, we often begin to realize that much of our company wasn’t helping us to fix our problems but was simply there to bury our problems and neglect it. It may not mean that they’re a bad person but it means that there isn’t anything there for you that you can gain from them in that dynamic.
There is nothing wrong with saying that. We all keep people in our lives because there is something that they’re offering us. They may be offering us wisdom, knowledge, guidance, support, confidence, courage, etc. We may keep our father in our lives because he is that voice of wisdom and guidance. We might keep our mother in our lives for reassurance, support, and the confidence to move forward. We might keep a friend in our lives for knowledge and how to navigate certain parts of life such as connecting with someone for a new job or finding someone that can help us with a project that we’re doing. Even if we can do all of the necessities ourselves, we will still need someone out there who can be that voice of support or reason from time to time. Life is not always a straight line upward. It is a road filled with potholes and varying directions. We will always need at least one person to lean on for some communication for whatever it is that we may need. The main purpose of a relationship is to help build each other up. If you enter a relationship with a friend or partner and you nor they have improved or grown from the state you guys were in before you met, the relationship has failed. We need to invest in relationships that are actually going to benefit us. Keeping company with someone that goes no further than playing games or drinking or smoking is fun but there is only so much growth that can be gained from that dynamic. It has its place but we need to have real relationships to balance that out. We need to have a strong relationship with a friend or partner or family member if they’re in their right mind. A handful of strong relationships are more than enough to help you and they get by in this life. This in combination with a couple of friends that we may hang out with on occasion that is not toxic or pushy but is simply a person to have a cool time with can be beneficial. There is nothing wrong with going out with a friend simply for some food or to go see a movie. Not every dynamic has to be a super stimulating form of conversation. We all need to spare some time for mirth and jolliness in order to balance out everything. With this society and journey we’re in, it is needed. The point is that if those are the only relationships we have, then it is a problem because there is no form of growth taking place. It is only causing time to pass without any serious construction of one’s mind or spirit. We have to let both things have its presence in our life.
However, to reiterate, it is important that even those people we may be jolly with are in their right mind. We can’t be hanging out with people who might do crazy stuff like spontaneous drag racing with some person they run into while on the highway or messing with random people for giggles. We need to keep mature and respectful people around us at all times; whether it is for elevation or mirth.
Returning to the topic, we all hit bumps in the road which calls for some isolation to get things in order. We need to be able to survive on our own mentally without collapsing because we don’t have anybody. We need to be able to live with and accept ourselves first before anybody else. We are the foundation. The company we keep and the relationships we have with them build up the house. If you’re not being built up, that person isn’t for you. If you’re not building them up, you’re not for them. That might not mean something is wrong with you but it may be that a person is not receiving your message or advice and they are hardheaded which leaves with no option other than to leave them be.
Our relationship with the Most High and His Son come first. Our relationship with ourselves follows that and then with our partner if we have one. In order for us to be there for our partner and to build them up, we have to be healthy mentally and spiritually first. We can’t make our burden theirs. We must solve our problems first rather than neglect it and our relationship blows up in our face because we are forced to face our problems and we drag our partners along with us. If you have a great partner, they’ll be supportive and help you with healing. However, we cannot lay our burden on them when we haven’t done any work ourselves. We have to help ourselves first or at least attempt to before we lean on someone else. Everyone is going through their own struggles that they’re dealing with. When you add onto their issues with your own which often is mountainous because you typically court other people to share the burden that is too much for one person to handle, you are setting the stage for potential consternation and rightful frustration from that person. It is tolerable if you are working to help yourself but if you pile your own problems onto them without making an effort to fix the problem that is when it becomes irksome. Yes, our partners are supposed to be there for us when we hit stumbling blocks and low points in life. However, if those low points are avoidable and it is persistent without change of character or maturity in you, it is not their responsibility to solve your problems and to invest themselves emotionally in you; you have to do that yourself and for yourself.
Above our relationship or marriage is our bond with the Most High and His Son. There is nothing more concrete than the Most High. We are the variable but He is the constant. Our partner, friends, or family can switch on us at anytime. If we don’t have that understanding and we believe that they’re going to be with us forever guaranteed, we are setting ourselves up for a monumental struggle if we separate from them. Most people are like the moon; they show a different face every night. Other people are like the seasons; they may change from time to time. Few people will be consistent in their ways and mindset without alienating the people around them. We have to keep that in mind with whoever we’re with. There is no guarantee with anyone we are with. As much as we may love our parents or siblings or friends or partners, it would be extremely foolish to think that they could never turn on you or not separate from you. This is not to say that you need to be paranoid and to look into every little thing that they’re doing but it is to keep you in a mindset to where you will be kept stable by the Spirit no matter what happens in the flesh.
We go through all of this because we often don’t have our priorities in order which causes these painful moments we may have in life to be more painful than it should’ve been. We may have invested too much of our hearts into a person without ever expecting or imagining a life without them. We cannot push in all our chips to the center of the table on anything in the flesh because there is high risk and a one in a million chance of reward. Out of the hundreds and thousands of people you meet in life, only a handful may actually be with you to the end. We have to be observant and aware of the people that are in our lives first before we have a sense of confidence that they’ll be with us for the long run. We can’t be delusional and put all of our trust in them because they fill a void for us. That is again why we need to heal ourselves first before we enter certain friendships or relationships. Many people rush into relationships with others without considering their personality, behavior, actions, past, etc all because they cannot deal with being alone. We have to be ok with being alone first before getting into relationships because you have to be stable in your own mind before sharing your mind with another person. As for family, there is no guarantee that they’ll always be in the right place either. Someone may enter their life and they end up brushing you to the side or choosing that person over you all for the sake of filling their own void. They may use you for money when they hit hard times. They may intentionally sabotage your relationship because they’re envious and jealous that you are doing well for yourself while they’re stuck or not doing well because they haven’t taken the time nor had the due-diligence to focus on themselves to maximize their gifts and succeed in their goals. There is no telling who a person truly is until they need something that they don’t have but that you have. Will they use you to get what you have that they need or will they be honest and ask or work to get what they need? If they do the wrong thing, don’t explode over it. Yes, it is ok to be mad as we’re human but we can’t react as if it is apocalyptic. People that we love can change for the worse. People can switch. They may say that they’ll never use you or abandon you or betray you when times are good and they’re not desperate but as we should know, things are a whole lot different when they’re actually in that state of need and desperation. We must put the Most High first always. He will never change. He only changes when we change up on him.
To reiterate, momentary isolation is often needed from time to time to gather our energy and to become stronger in our journey. We may use this time to gain greater understanding of scripture, of who we want to become, of where we want to be, of what we want to accomplish, of what part of us needs healing, or what part of our life needs to be spared or cut. Isolation in supplication with prayer and fasting will be monumental in helping us make those big steps. We must have a plan on where we need to go though. We can’t just stay in isolation and wallow about what we need to get done or what needs healing. We need to take that time to get those things done. Otherwise, we’re just wasting our time. We need to have the right mindset going into these moments of isolation in which we are using it to cancel out the noise in our life to focus on ourselves in becoming better people at heart and in spirit to then come out of it better than what we were before. This is most excellently demonstrated with the Hamashiach in Matthew 4:1-2 as seen below.
Here it reads,
“Then was Yahweh Ben Yahweh led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.
And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred.”
We then see the effect of this isolation and fast thereafter here in Luke 4:13-14 which states,
“And when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from him for a season,
And Yahweh Ben Yahweh returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee: and there went out a fame of him through all the region round about.
We see here the spiritual power that the Hamashiach attained through his fast for forty days and forty nights. It was through this isolation in fasting and also in prayer that he gained the spiritual power to resist all the temptations of Satan in the wilderness which made him all the more powerful in the Spirit upon him leaving the wilderness. He became greater than he was before entering the wilderness. It helped him to ascend to that level in which he needed to be in order to be able to make the sacrifice that he’d eventually make for Israel. In order for him to be able to sacrifice himself to propitiate the sins of Israel, he had to be tempted in the flesh by Satan so that he’d resist and then be made perfect in the flesh to make that sacrifice possible.
The point being is that when we perform our isolation effectively, we will turn out to be for the better. With consistent prayer, fasting, and performance in our spiritual and physical works, we will heal where we need to heal and elevate where there is room to elevate. With this, we will be better off and we’ll thank ourselves for it when we’re out of that isolation and have become who we have been aiming to be.
On the other hand, loneliness is different. Loneliness is not the same as being alone. Loneliness is rather a condition of the mind. It is created from the conditions in our life; often from our own doing. The origin of loneliness is not having a connection with people. The question is how are connections with people established? Long lasting and beneficial relationships are created through community and culture. The stability and longevity of our relationships is dependent on the culture that is established in our circles. This could be a work culture but it has to be the culture of our community. When you have a culture that is rooted in individualism and the pursuit of one’s carnal desires at the expense of other people, there are no substantial connections to be made for the most part. The burden falls upon the natural individual to find another natural individual to connect with in an organic friendship or relationship within the sea of insensitive and narcissistic people. Most people in this society are focused on getting their money or gaining followers or establishing a certain reputation that they can brandish as a trophy to show off to others. This is often because they feel like they have something to prove or somebody to prove wrong since they were told that they weren’t good enough or they weren’t treated with the care or dignity that they were supposed to be treated with as a child.
This individualistic culture has plagued both the school environment and the work environment. The child goes through elementary school and they are told that they’re not good enough and they’re shamed because they don’t have the newest pair of Nikes or they don’t have the newest game or a gaming console or whatever it may be. Children are being taught that the things that they possess in their hands is what holds value when it is what we possess in our hearts that holds value and will stand the test of time. The child then goes through middle school and high school and they’re told that they’re not good enough because they don’t have a certain amount of followers or they’re not “fun” to party with or they’re too square to be the next social media star. So many high school kids are focused on becoming the next big SoundCloud rapper or the next big Instagram model. Progression in life is seen within an artificial lens that values physical material over mental and spiritual substance. This mindset is often carried out into the workplace and even in the highest levels of this society at the biggest corporations. Some of the most insecure people are CEOs, executives, people who serve on the board of directors, etc. They’re often constantly competing with each other over who has the faster car, the most money, the most expensive suit, who’s taller, who has the whiter teeth, etc. Where do you think this materialistic society came from? It came from the top brass that controls the wealth and communications in this society. They control the messages that this society brings to the people through the media. They are the ones that teach us to value the external instead of the internal. The super-wealthy only value the material and believe that the physical world is all that there is to life. When you let them have control over the messaging of what we are supposed to be focused on and what life is about, they’ll make you believe in what they believe matters and also what is going to make them the most money. Them telling you that all that there is to life is going to school, getting a degree, getting a job and working for the rest of your life is what has made them money. Racking up debt, being educated enough to just be a worker instead of an owner, and being trained to be a consumer instead of a producer has made the majority of people stagnate in their personal and financial growth while making the top 1% all the more powerful and richer. Much of this has been done to eradicate the culture of America to create division to establish control over the masses between genders, races, ideologies, beliefs, etc.
As for the work environment, you see loneliness with the co-workers that you may interact with or see at work. Many people try to insert themselves into your life because they have nothing else going on for them outside of work. They have no true aspirations or goals or any true desire to improve their mind, spirit, character or career. Instead, they try to drag you into their personal life by talking about their relationship issues with their friends and family or what happened to them yesterday when you are not all that interested in what they have to say because you’re simply there to get paid so you can pay your bills and leave with your mind in one piece. People often live at work mentally and spiritually because there is nothing waiting for them at home. They have nothing to look forward to other than working, talking to co-workers, or getting into their life to make something of theirs. The people who are most chatty at work and are looking to find a partner at work are usually the loneliest ones who keep pushing friends and partners out of their lives.
Nonetheless, loneliness is a condition of the mind. It is more indicative of your mindset rather than the amount of people you keep in your circle. You can be alone but not feel lonely. It is all dependent on how you view life and how secure you are within yourself. The problem is that too many people have become insecure because they care too much about the validation and opinions of others. Those who are focused on judging others are often the ones who are the loneliest. There are so many people who are left wondering these days: Why don’t I have friends? Why can’t I find a partner? Why don’t my relationships last?
It is often for the reason that we are the ones pushing people out of our life because, referring back to the original point made, is that we haven’t taken the time to heal ourselves from our issues and old wounds but also because we might be too self-absorbed which alienates the people we are trying to have relationships with. We are too focused on artificial goals set by society that’s messaging is controlled by artificial people. In our pursuit of these artificial goals or milestones, we lose sight of what’s real and what truly matters. Some of you may know what I’m about to say but it is true. At the end of the day, the Most High is all that truly matters because He decides where we go in this life and in the afterlife in the spirit world. He gives us a sense of direction in this directionless and chaotic society. This society has you looking everywhere but up. What come with the love of the Most High are rules, laws, commandments, regulations, standards, and an ultimate code to live by. This forms a community that is built together through our natural and human need for interaction and support but also our adherence to that code. Our culture is then set by the community in which we have established.
In this society, the Most High has been removed as the higher power and replaced with the government. There are no spiritual or moral laws set in stone by this government except for individualism and the pursuit of physical money. When there are no laws governing our primal nature, we then devour each other for what we want from a primal but also what we are trained by society to believe that we need. This in turn destroys the relationships and connections that we build with each other and it leads to loneliness. In turn, there is no true culture. The ideologies that we have been taught such as feminism, materialism, humanism, and others all run directly opposed to the teachings of the Most High. The government runs opposite to that of the Most High. Through the biblical law, it is meant to unify us through our love for the Highest and subsequently through our love for each other. We are servants of each other. We provide for one another to build each other as a community. When we are all hyper-focused on ourselves and the pursuit of artificial goals such as getting that perfect partner or house or car or career or status, there is no order. A community is based in order and a construct that will stand the test of time. That order comes from a strong culture which is built in the principle of a bond between the man and the woman. The opposite of loneliness is companionship. A strong culture and community creates sustainable companionships between the man and the woman. It also creates sustainable relationships between brothers and sisters. This is essentially why the Most High in Genesis 2:18 said,
“And the LORD Yah said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.”
The man and the woman were meant to be together with the woman being a form of support for him. The man in turn loves, cherishes, respects, protects, and leads his woman and the children they have together. From there comes generations of life and growth. The woman was created so that the man was not lonely and so he would have a spiritual partner to build with and be supported by. It is within our nature to be interdependent and operate from a sense of collectivism.
With the consternation built within our current society from feminism and individualism, everyone is on a race to the bottom. Nothing gets done in this society because it is an individualistic culture that has led people to be focused on what they get out of everything instead of thinking about the other person. Relationships don’t last in society because men and women have been taught to compete with each other and to go against the roles that the Most High set for them. Women have been taught to look at motherhood and marriage with disdain and to embrace this chaotic lifestyle where they hop from man to man for whatever they need at that given moment; whether it is company, sex, or whatever it may be. Those women are the loneliest because it is not within a woman’s nature to be in several relationships with all of these different men over time. When the man is in his right mind and the woman is in her right mind, the marriage is rewarding for them both from a spiritual, mental, emotional and physical level. Their roles complement each other and help to build a foundation of loyalty, trust, and love. When women and men compete with each other, it leads to separation which creates that loneliness we see today that spans generations. Never have there been more single men and women in society. It is because feminism and the antagonization of the traditional family and relationship structure have caused both men and women to go against their own nature. Women have become more masculine and men have become more feminine because of this ideology and its ardent push over the past century in this society. When you teach an ideology that runs opposed to the Most High, all that it does is that it breeds confusion and thereafter misery because things are not in its proper order.
The only ways in which loneliness is combated is by gaining a sense of humility in admitting that there is something wrong with us and that we need to fix it; whether that is our attitude, behavior, our mindset, our ability to communicate with others, or our refusal to accept and embrace our role, that is our responsibility to fix. We as men can’t keep blaming women because of our problems in finding a good woman. We have to know who is a real woman but before that we have to know what it takes to be a real man. That comes first because when we interact with a good woman, she won’t deal with us if we are not conducting ourselves like a real man. So when we know who is a real woman, we know what women to let in and not let into our lives.
The same thing goes for women. Women can’t keep blaming men because they can’t find a good man. You have to work on yourself and what needs to be fixed; whether that is narcissism, abrasiveness, selfishness, rudeness, an inability to accept being a wife in marriage, etc.
There is nothing wrong with being a wife; contrary to what this society may teach you. The man is supposed to protect, love, cherish, respect, and be loyal to his wife. Yet the man is not supposed to beat on his wife or use her as an emotional punching bag or a sex doll. There is supposed to be a dynamic in which both the man and woman treat each other with dignity and respect. Our partner is not supposed to be someone that we throw all of our problems onto. Our problems at work stay at work. We are not supposed to use our partner as a punching bag because our boss or co-worker gave us a hard time that day. If you have a problem with your boss, you confront your boss about it. You don’t project that bottled up anger at someone who had nothing to do with it. That is what you call a coward. You are supposed to confront the people that you have a problem with. A coward lacks the courage to expose themselves to the potential confrontation that they’re meant to face. So when the man and woman treat each other with respect and are honest with one another, there will be a successful marriage. In turn, there will be a successful community because there is stability in the rapport between the man and the woman and also between the man and his brother along with the woman and her sister.
To close off this post, we will refer to some scriptures to expand on what we’ve discussed in regards to lifting one another up and a sense of collectivism.
Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 reads,
“Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour.
For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe to him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up.”
It is essential for us to be charitable and to look at our brother with a loving eye. We cannot be cold and distant from our brothers or sisters. This is why in 1 Corinthians 13:2; charity is emphasized as most important to have,
“And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.”
We might be well-versed in scriptures, in great physical shape, or prepped for years with food and supplies but if we do not have love towards our brothers and we are constantly at odds with them, none of the other things that we have matters or will make a difference. Our faith and our sense of spiritual direction will crumble because we are not willing to be charitable towards our brethren. If we are not willing to be charitable to others, it is often indicative that we do not have love for ourselves. Narcissism is not about self-love but rather about idolizing yourself. When we have love for ourselves, we’ll be able to be charitable towards others. When we’re not, we push all of the people out of our lives and won’t have anyone to support us or lift us up when we need that support as Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 explains. In order for us to truly love and accept ourselves, we must heal first. We often hate ourselves and hold back our growth because we haven’t taken the time to heal which is why we talked about momentary isolation in this article.
Here, Hebrews 10:24-25 states,
“And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works:
Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.”
It is through our collective effort that we can teach one another to love and support each other rather than to push each other away for the sake of “doing it alone” or not being able to put ourselves in a situation where we focus on the collective instead of our individual self. We cannot disregard the importance of gathering with our brethren or communicating with them because if so, that charity does not truly burst out realizing its true potential within our lives. We cannot walk this journey alone without at least one or two people in our life. As we go through this life, we often struggle with the sense of finding a reason to move forward. This comes with age or a sense of indignation for what we see the world to be. However, we need that interaction with at least a few to help us move forward and realize the need to continue living and working on our mission. When we don’t have that voice of reason to help us recognize why we should keep going and why we need to continue with our mission, we grow more cynical and we then grow more depressed; eventually leading to our own destruction. This is why Ecclesiastes 4:10 states, “but woe to him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up.” This is even more important to do so now with this society continuing to fall apart. We need to realize that we must stick together, however few there may be of us, to continue working and to not be overwhelmed with the thoughts of doom and gloom.
This is the last part. Here we read Romans 12:5 which read,
“So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.”
At the end of the day, we are all one body and one church in the Hamashiach. We cannot discourage ourselves and think of ourselves as not being enough because we don’t have a massive platform or we’re not making 2 hour documentaries or don’t have a massive following. We all have our purposes and functions to fulfill within the overall church. We can contribute in our own way. It can be art, messages of support, sending in information, helping one learn about some scripture that they need help with understanding, helping to train or prep, etc. We all can do something to support each other. It all comes down to whether or not we are willing to do it and whether we believe in ourselves to be capable of doing it.
In closing, momentary isolation does not mean that it has to interfere with our connections to each other. We can maintain our relationships with our brethren in the truth, our friends and family without alienating them. Our isolation is to be used to help ourselves grow so that we can be better as individuals to help the overall collective. What is the use in acquiring skills, knowledge, wisdom, understanding, and charity if we are not going to help others benefit from it? That is the only way we grow and learn and expand from generation to generation as people. While the world at the moment is trying to destroy that connection between each other, we must do the opposite by embracing it and practicing it in a healthy and natural convention through the wisdom of the gospel and the orderly construct of the laws and commandments that is laid out within it to unify us in our love for the Most High. From our love for the Most High, we learn to love and respect each other. From that, we can build ourselves and each other up to make the church that much stronger.
-GP