You’ve met the girl and fallen in love, and now, you think you’re going to run off into the sunset and have the life you imagine because you grew up watching Disney movies.
Right? Probably not.
You’re probably at that point in the relationship where there’s a disconnect.
You’re not on the same page anymore. The butterflies are gone. You don’t have that sense of ease around her anymore.
You feel alone, and it doesn’t feel good.
Luckily, you can overcome this loneliness and don’t have to do it through your partner. Overcoming loneliness in other ways will, in turn, strengthen your relationship.
You’ll become more assertive, happier, and the best possible man you can be.
Here are nine ways to overcome loneliness when your relationship has become less than fulfilling.
1. Find something you love that isn’t your partner
Most men reach a point in their lives where they have to distance themselves from their inner child to “face reality.”
But the thing is, distancing yourself from your inner child doesn’t make that inner child go anywhere. All it does is make you a bit more miserable.
Often in relationships, we get bored. We don’t know what to do with ourselves because we’re so used to investing energy into pursuing women, improving ourselves, and investing in our relationships.
But what if you already do those things and find it isn’t enough?
That’s when you have to invest back into your inner child.
Maybe you loved sports when you were a kid, but as you grew up, you had to abandon those passions to build yourself into a man.
This might be a good time to go to a game with your friends, play in the rec league, or do something else to invest in your inner child.
Doing this will make you feel young, happier, and more connected to yourself. Being more connected to yourself will make you realize that either your relationship isn’t working or that it needs to be improved.
You write, paint, play an instrument, or even build a business for fun. The idea is that you have to do something that brings you joy. Joy is the best medicine for loneliness.
2. Go to therapy
A lot of men expect too much from their relationships.
Maybe it’s because your mother coddled you, like a lot of the online gurus seem to say, or perhaps it’s because you were raised in a society that told you that no matter what, you have to be completely independent and non-reliant on other people.
The truth is that being a man is complicated and way more complex than most of us can figure out.
A good life is simple, but the path to getting there can be very complicated.
That’s why it helps to maybe see a therapist, at least for a while.
You’re not “sacrificing your independence” by going to a therapist. Going to a therapist doesn’t make you weak. It makes you self-aware that you need to improve your life.
It makes you a person who wants to feel better.
When you’re feeling lonely, one of the best things you can do is find someone with whom you can talk about your loneliness.
If you try and work it out in your head all by yourself, it’s going to become hard to get anywhere. This is because your brain creates something called “cognitive distortions,” where you get trapped in the way of thinking that is unhealthy.
The dangerous part about cognitive distortions is that they impact your behavior and potentially harm your life without you even realizing it until it’s too late.
3. Do Something Nice For Your Partner – Just Because You Can
Love is more like cooking than baking.
There isn’t an exact recipe for you to follow – everyone is different.
In baking, it’s best to follow the recipe and be exact.
In cooking and in love, it’s best to get to know the person and do something that makes them feel especially happy. Does your partner love movies? Surprise them with the movies. Are they a history buff? Take them to the museum.
Get to know them and take them somewhere or do something with them that they would want to do. Show that you love them, and don’t ask for anything in return.
If they love you, this will be enough to get them to address your needs. It’s a give-and-take. It’s a balance.
It’s communism, and it’s going to be equal all the time, but a healthy relationship ebbs and flows through different phases.
If you find that you start giving, and you’re always giving, to the point where you’re strung out and tired, take note of that. Don’t give too much, but don’t be afraid to give more than you receive for a while.
Giving should feel good. Love should feel good, most of the time. If it doesn’t, you and your partner might want to check out the previous point because that’s a problem with you and your partner, not your relationship.
Learn the difference between the relationship and the people in the relationship. Learn to do something nice for your partner for no reason at all.
4. Turn Off Your Phone
The worst part of social media isn’t the cheap dopamine hits you get when someone likes your post or retweets your controversial opinion.
The worst part of social media is that social media encourages us to compare our lives to others. We’re shown what everyone is doing all the time, and we get exhausted.
We follow each other lives like the person we kind of know down the street is a reality TV star, and we compare our happiness to theirs as we judge and analyze their lives with no fundamental understanding of who they are.
You should be concerned if that doesn’t sound messed up. You’re desensitized.
“It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” – Jiddu Krishnamurti
In our society today, it’s no wonder that relationships are so tricky. We are bridging the gap between a human and a cyborg, and it’s getting a little bit too close. It’s a strange time to live because much of our lives today are digital.
That’s never happened before.
The phone is in our pocket 16 hours a day. Isn’t that too much?
This can be dealt with easily, but the problem is that social media is a drug.
In the same way that drugs and alcohol can make us cut off from our partners and loved ones, social media can do the same.
5. Invest time in your friends
When a relationship starts, it’s easy to get carried away.
It happens all the time, and it’s honestly pretty normal. We find someone new who we think is attractive, interesting, and fun to be around, and we feel that we only want to be around them.
We forget about our friends.
Most of your friends will probably understand this and won’t hold it against you, but that doesn’t make it good. It’s a good idea to apologize to friends who you’ve neglected.
After that, it’s a good idea to start investing time into those friendships. Come from a space of giving and generosity as well.
Don’t blame your girlfriend, either. Accept responsibility. She didn’t force you to do anything – don’t adopt a victim mentality. You chose to invest in her and neglect your friends.
Apologize. It’s okay.
Buy your buddy a beer, take them out to a baseball game, or do something you guys used to do before you become overly invested in a relationship. It’s not a big deal – don’t make it one.
Eventually, they’ll probably ask you how it’s going between you and her, and you can be honest. You don’t need to pour your heart out to them, but you can open up a little. If they’re your friend, they’ll listen.
That’s what good friends are for. That should be enough to get you to keep investing in those friendships you’ve forgotten about while you were so invested in her.
6. Talk to Your Partner About Your Problem
Loneliness indicates that your relationship is not going the way it’s supposed to.
You’re not supposed to date someone and feel alone. You’re not supposed to date someone and wonder why it feels wrong.
This is a red flag and needs to be treated as such.
However, when you experience red flags in your relationships, you must address them.
Yes, you can talk to a therapist. You can call your mom. You can phone a friend, but the best person to talk about when you’re dealing with trouble in a relationship is the person you are in the relationship with.
They should know themselves best, and you should know yourself best. Work together to identify why your relationship is having problems and why you feel alone.
You might even find out that they feel alone too. This is a big sign that you both need to improve your relationship or consider other options, like therapy, couples therapy, or even changing the structure of the relationship.
7. Get Better at Your Self-Care
Self-care is not: bubble baths, skipping work because you’re tired, or eating like crap.
Self-care is the daily habit that helps you become better, stronger, and more self-reliant.
This is going to the gym so that you feel better, it’s sleeping enough so that you can stay focused on long-term goals, or it’s eating healthy food to fuel your daily life.
These are long-term goals with long-term effects. A lot of times, in relationships, people sacrifice their self-care. They sacrifice themselves in the name of their relationships.
This, in the short term, isn’t a problem. It’s not a big deal to skip the gym once to spend time with your girlfriend or to stay up all night with her because she’s having problems with her family or friends.
In the long term, however, this will be detrimental to your physical and mental health.
It will also destroy your chances of having a solid and healthy relationship with someone. You cannot have your best relationships when you are not your best self.
Self-care is a foundational habit for everyone, but for men in relationships, it is essential. Men often think they have to play the “dutiful boyfriend” role and be there for whatever their woman needs.
This is a lie.
Yes, sometimes you have to be there for people. That’s life.
But when you’re struggling, who will be there for you?
Often, you have to be there for yourself, especially when you’re lonely in your relationships.
8. Seek intimacy
There’s more to intimacy than sex, but that’s certainly part of it.
If your physical connection and relationship with your partner are not what they used to be, that could, without a doubt, be a reason why you feel alone in a relationship. You have to deal with this before you, and your partner makes a habit of not being intimate with each other.
Make sex a conscious act, not a habit. Spice things up in the bedroom.
Share fantasies. Listen.
If that’s too corny or difficult for you, you’re not ready for a serious relationship, and you need to visit my next point.
Beyond sex, you can also seek intimacy through holding hands, hugging, eye gazing, or starting a project together.
Don’t just “put on a show” and then call it a day. Your relationship deserves more work and nourishment than that.
Relationships are like plants – they keep going and going until they die. If you neglect your plant, it will die. The same goes for your relationship.
9. Leave the Relationship
After you’ve exhausted your options, there’s only one last thing you can do to deal with your loneliness in your relationship.
You can leave and find better for yourself.
Yes, this means it’s the end of something you have built. This will hurt. It will be uncomfortable.
You’ll experience all kinds of uncomfortable emotions and have to deal with them. You will have to say things that hurt to say and might make your partner feel hurt.
You have to do this and deal with it. Otherwise, you’re going to keep living in an unhappy relationship.
Is that worth your time?
Your time on this earth is limited. You will die one day – it’s going to happen.
Do you want to spend your precious, limited time with people who weigh you down and make you miserable?
I don’t, and I’m willing to do the work and endure the discomfort of a breakup.
Breakups hurt, but unhappy relationships will ruin your life. That’s important to recognize because many people don’t realize that until it’s too late.
That’s why the divorce rate is so high.
Takeaways
Loneliness is one of the most uncomfortable parts of the human experience.
The only thing worse than being truly lonely is suffering from loneliness and not having any outlet – not having any community.
A community can change everything for you.
That’s why I want to tell you about my exclusive coaching program, led by my team of experienced men’s coaches and me.
See, this program isn’t only going to help you break free from nice guy behaviors, build quality romantic relationships, and become a stronger, grounded Man. It will also provide you with support from both myself and my elite community of men. Our coaches provide informed professional advice on pursuing women who are right for you.
To pursue the best women possible, you first need to learn how you can grow.
With this program, you’ll be tapped into your own “band of brothers,” and you’ll also have access to the best training course for men in existence today, as well as weekly calls with my team of inspiring and determined coaches. There are no boys, no complainers, or dabblers. This program is for serious men only.
