Combating Loneliness with Human Connection

SPEAKER 07 : 0:00

welcome to the good news with angie austin now with the good news here’s angie hello there friend angie austin here with the good news really excited about today’s topic and uh today’s uh author cindy mcmenamin she is the author of the new loneliness nurturing meaningful connections when you feel isolated welcome cindy hi it’s great to be with you today Okay, so I talk all the time about the Harvard Happiness Study that’s going on for decades. And the biggest indicator of happiness is connections, relationships, family. And so for the last year, I’ve really been finding those old connections, like my best friend in high school. I’ve seen her now twice in a year, like cousins I’m close to that maybe I don’t see enough. And then I went to another high school and moved a lot. And I found those best friends and I see them now. And I just it’s so wonderful. And so I love the topic of this. So give us kind of an overview about the new loneliness, nurturing meaningful connections when you feel isolated. Give us kind of a synopsis.

SPEAKER 05 : 1:09

OK, well, loneliness has always been with us and it always will be as long as we’re together. searching for something outside the realm of what God has already made available to us. But there’s this new loneliness that I refer to, and that’s a deeper ache we feel from our reliance on technology, the diminishing element of human interaction and touch that’s happened as we continue with a lot of our post-COVID isolation habits. Social media is supposed to make us feel more connected. That’s the whole idea. But we can feel less connected as we scroll through people’s highlight reels and we think, wow, this is not going on. I’m lonely. I’m not out there doing all of this. And we’ve been told AI is a great help, but it’s another alternative to human interaction and human compassion too. and human touch. So that new loneliness people are feeling today is even greater than it was prior to COVID, than it was maybe 10 years ago before we were so in front of our devices, maybe sometimes even more in front of people.

SPEAKER 07 : 2:18

You know, I think about, I’ve got teenagers and I think about when I was a teenager and like being on my, you know, middle school friend’s bed, you know, with my feet up on the wall and she had to do all the laundry for her brothers, which I was like, ugh. what a ripoff. Like, why aren’t they doing the laundry? Because you’re a girl, you know? And so I’d have my feet up on the wall and I’d be like, you know, or sometimes I’d be doodling or whatever. But what we were doing was talking and laughing and cracking jokes. And then her mom would come in and tell us to be quiet. And then we’d tell her something outrageous. And she’d be like, you girls, don’t you dare do that. And so it was all like conversation, you know, and just like, giggling and laughing and I still when I talk to her or I’m on Facebook with her I still feel that connection of the hilarity like that that and same with my best friend from high school like when we met we laughed and she told me stories I didn’t remember and it was because we didn’t have the new loneliness because we actually were conversing with each other and I think about my kids when their friends come over there they all have their devices and in general they’re on their devices

SPEAKER 05 : 3:26

Yes. I looked into a lot of studies that have been done on this. And today’s typical teenagers spend a Friday night in their room on their device in group chat, but they’re not rubbing shoulders with one another. They’re doing things. And while they said that they take less risks today, they’re also growing up less independent, less responsible, more scared. It’s just It’s really amazing the impact of being on screens. And a study even found, a study of adults, found that more people used a social media site or several, the more they used it, the lower their mental health and life satisfaction at the next time they were assessed. And so there is something to be said about what you said earlier, connecting with people that you know, going to a deeper level. Because the U.S. Surgeon General declared, let’s see, May in 2023, this new epidemic of loneliness in this country. And it stated that continued isolation or failure to connect at a deeper emotional level with others is leading to a 50% greater chance of dementia, a 60% greater chance of premature death. That is a serious health statistic.

SPEAKER 07 : 4:47

That is scary, but it makes sense to me. I have a friend that does Meals on Wheels, and he talks about it’s more than the nourishment of the body. It’s the nourishment of the mind and the soul of life. Just, you know, maybe that’s the only person that that person that’s kind of a shut in getting their meals on wheels delivered. And it’s funny. He was an attorney in the military and he had like a big career. And when he retired, his family laughed. His kids were like, he’s not really retiring. Like he’s just going to full time, you know, volunteer now. And he works with Special Olympics. He coaches. So his whole life is around that. this nurturing of people’s souls and that new loneliness. He’s trying to keep some of these elderly people healthy by, it’s more important, I think, to be their friend, to connect with them so they have someone. Also, they don’t have anyone in some cases that if they fall, et cetera, they might be alone for a week if it weren’t for the Meals on Wheels guy. Yeah.

SPEAKER 05 : 5:49

Right. And we were created to live in community, not to isolate. And in that U.S. Surgeon General report, it said that that failure to connect with other people just socially and at a deeper emotional level was not just emotionally and mentally unhealthy, but it was physically unhealthy. It was comparable to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Oh. So it is impacting our physical health that much. and not have close connections in our lives.

SPEAKER 07 : 6:22

You know, talk about your experience, because I know you’ve written a lot of books, not quite 20, but you’re up there.

SPEAKER 06 : 6:29

Exactly.

SPEAKER 07 : 6:30

So talk about your experience with loneliness that, you know, obviously you have to have something that prompts you to write all these books, and in this case, The New Loneliness, what spurred you on, what gave you the passion to write this book?

SPEAKER 05 : 6:45

Well, there were a couple factors. First of all, I wrote my best-selling book 22 years ago called When Women Walk Alone. And that was all about the alone times in our lives, you know, and how we can draw closer to God through them. And at that time, I felt alone in different areas as a pastor’s wife, as a young mom, just as a person who felt that maybe people don’t understand how I feel. And so while that information in that book is still relevant today, I met with my publisher the day after this U.S. Surgeon General’s health alert came out on the new epidemic of loneliness. And my publisher had asked, if you were to write When Women Walk Alone today, would you write it any differently? And I said, absolutely, because there was no social media back when I wrote that book. There was no post-COVID isolation habit. There was no ultra-reliance on our devices. Women… And men, too, in some ways are so much more feeling alone and lonely today than they used to be. And then another aspect of that, as I began thinking about writing this and researching and talking to other people, is that I realized as much of an extrovert and a people person that I am, I was doing a whole lot less in-person interaction with others. And my daughter even told me one day, Mom, you don’t have any friends anymore. And I said, what do you mean? I have tons of friends. She goes, I’m not just talking about your writing clients and the people you meet within ministry and stuff. Friends, do you go out and do anything with anybody? Do you have any more lunch appointments that are not business related? Do you just have somebody to talk to when you’re lonely? And I thought, well, you know, I talk to God. And yet I realized what she was saying is true. Because we can become so busy. And if you work at home like I do and you’re on the computer a lot, that can take the place of, you know, we can become so productivity oriented that we prioritize productivity over people. And I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing. And I had to start being intentional about that. Reconnecting with people like you said you did, people you knew long ago, people you were close to at one point, but busyness or just that idea that we have everything we need in front of us on our screen was just kind of being a distraction or an obstacle to maintaining and developing those relationships. And then another side note of what happened, I learned as I was writing this book, I learned that my mother… had less than six months to live and immediately i thought who will be here for me in this yes i have a family but i had heard through the years certain friends and people who had said a daughter losing a mom is unlike anything else and that frightened me a little And I thought, my husband, you know, is there for me, but there are things he will not understand. And there are things I’m going to need to be able to talk to. And I immediately got out my phone, called and texted most people because it’s easy to text, right? Right. And I said, pray for me. I’m losing my mom. I remember you were there at one point. It will be good to know you’re there for me now. And immediately I got responses immediately. precious people some of them women’s ministry directors who booked me to speak years ago things like that they they were constantly in touch letting me know they were praying for me and that last week of her life I didn’t have time to let people know what was going on but somehow they knew because the body of Christ is kind of like we get connected through the Holy Spirit and they had just started texting me and saying I’m here for you I’m praying for you and Just laboring in prayer for you as you labor to help your mom leave this earth as she labored to help you enter it. I mean, they said beautiful things that just kind of kept me going. But I needed that human.

SPEAKER 07 : 10:58

interaction with people well and what a simple solution to your loneliness to initially you know reach out to people that you knew that you would need you know even via text in a simple way to kind of do that initial you know reach out so let’s talk about some of the solutions that you’ve found to loneliness that was obviously one but you know to help other people maybe make that trip out of loneliness possible

SPEAKER 05 : 11:24

Yes. You know, I think one of the things that makes us feel lonely is we feel that nobody can relate or nobody can understand or people are busy and they don’t want me to burden them with how I feel. And we crave that sense of sameness. And I think it’s why, you know, certain grief support groups or small groups at church or moms groups are just so prevalent today is because we kind of crave that interaction with other people that are going through the same things or have been there before. And so one of the things, the first thing I suggest is to surround yourself with growing believers, with people who have been through things that you have or people that you can just open up with because sometimes when we begin to talk about what we are feeling we will immediately discover that other people have either been there or are feeling the same now and that’s a huge comfort so you know surrounding yourself with people and then seeking out one or two accountability partners to help you grow you know seeking a mentor I’ve always been, you know, looking toward older people in my life who have been through seasons before me. I’m the old person now. And yet that third step. start pouring into others and God will pour into you, I’ve found that even as I say, God, show me who is lonely, who I can pour into. As I begin to invest in others, that ends up just kind of filling a need in my own life, too, because there is companionship and there is that sameness and that oneness that we can experience with others. So while we sometimes think, oh, poor me, I’m lonely. Nobody is reaching out to me. When we take the initiative to reach out to someone else, what goes around comes around. That’s often when God ends up encouraging us simply because we encourage someone else.

SPEAKER 07 : 13:23

I love that. I love that idea. All right, I want to make sure that people can find you and find your books. And so give us a good website.

SPEAKER 05 : 13:33

Yes, I’m at strengthforthesoul.com, strengthforthesoul.com. You can contact me there. All my books are there. You can read about my ministry. Even short video clips you can find there of speaking I’ve done and just moments to encourage you.

SPEAKER 07 : 13:48

Wonderful. The new loneliness nurturing meaningful connections when you feel isolated. Thank you so much, Cindy. You’re welcome. Thank you.

SPEAKER 01 : 14:01

We’ll be right back. We’ll be right back. They always need donations, so why not start out the new year with downsizing the items you no longer need? You can find any Arc Thrift store or donation center on their website at arcthrift.com.

SPEAKER 03 : 14:53

Hudson, thanks for tuning in to KLTT, the Mighty 670.

SPEAKER 07 : 15:02

Hello, it’s Angie Austin and Jim Stovall with the good news. And we are talking about the arrogance of ignorance. That is the winner’s wisdom column we are discussing with Mr. Jim Stovall. Hey, Jim.

SPEAKER 04 : 15:14

Hey, it is great to be with you as always.

SPEAKER 07 : 15:16

I thought about this topic a lot. I used to work with an anchor, and she was a really beautiful young Hispanic girl. Her career just went through the roof, right? She was in Denver by her 20s and in Chicago still in her 20s, and I don’t know where she went from there. Very nice, but she would say things like, who is this heart group? Are they new? I want to wish happy birthday to… And it would be someone famous, you know, like the Beatles, you know, someone who died. And then she’d wish them happy birthday. And we’re like, oh, he passed away. You know, he was murdered or, you know, I mean, she just said everything with such confidence. And she never second guessed herself. And in a way, I kind of admired her. Like my daughter, Hope, she’s very fearless when it comes to if she doesn’t know something, she just blurts out the question. And my youngest one, Faith, who’s like the honor student, she laughs at her. The fearlessness of people who maybe, you know, I’m sure that’s not what this column is about, the arrogance of ignorance. But I’ve always admired people who are fearless about trying to obtain knowledge and not embarrassed or pretending they know the answer. Because most of us pretend we know it or we’re quiet and we Google the, you know, the answer later. So we’re not embarrassed.

SPEAKER 04 : 16:38

Yeah, you know, that’s kind of what it is about. I mean, you know, it’s OK to not know something.

SPEAKER 07 : 16:45

Well, not knowing John Lennon has passed away, that was a little surprising.

SPEAKER 04 : 16:48

It is, but yeah, you need to check it. At the Stovall Center at the university, I deal with a lot of international kids. Ironically, you mentioned Lennon. I was talking with one of the young ladies. We were having dinner, and she was from China. She’d never been outside of China until she got out of there to come here to go to college. And she said, would you help me understand something culturally? I said, certainly. She said, why is Paul McCartney famous?

SPEAKER 06 : 17:18

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER 04 : 17:19

There you go.

SPEAKER 07 : 17:20

I’m glad. See, she had the courage to ask you.

SPEAKER 04 : 17:24

And I recommended a book that I had read not long ago entitled The British Invasion. And then I said, and you can get on your phone and listen to their music. But, you know, and you can only understand their music in the context of of what else was being played at that time. And, you know, it was all done in a four-track analog studio, and it’s basically a live performance, is what you’re hearing, is them actually playing live. And, you know, and here we are all these years later, and their music holds up. It is still… Yes! New artists are still recording their stuff. So it’s okay not to know… But then there are people who act like, if I don’t know it, it’s not important. I don’t care. I don’t want to know it. And that’s what the arrogance of ignorance is about. I was reading about 2,500 years ago, 500 years before Christ. There was a great library in Alexandria, Egypt, the greatest library in the world. And it came about because Alexandria was at the… at the intersection of the three great roads. There were very few roads to travel on 500 B.C., and there was one that went to Asia, there was one that went to Africa, and there was one that went over to Europe, went around to Europe. And the travelers that came there were the people who had been around the world, and there were very, very few of them, and many of them were scholars, and their scrolls were kept in this amazingly huge library. And at one point, they estimated there were somewhere between 400,000 and half a million of these literary academic scrolls that people had put there. Well, a king came into Egypt, and he was one of these arrogant of ignorance. He didn’t know, and if I don’t know it, I’m the king. If I don’t know it, nobody needs to know it. And he decides to destroy the library. And they actually burned these scrolls for a number of years to heat the bath. They heated the water by burning these scrolls. And it is thought now that the plans for building the pyramids was in there. Many of the great discoveries from Asia were in there. Early Anglican writings from what we now know of as Europe were in there. And they’re gone, and they can never be replaced. And And it’s really rather amazing that just the arrogance that people will hold it. And now, you know, Angie, there is just no excuse for not knowing something. I mean, we all walk around with a computer in our pocket. It gives us more access to information than people could have ever imagined. I mean, the NASA scientists that put men on the moon, 60 years ago didn’t have a tenth of what you have in your pocket right now. And, you know, we can find out anything. We can know everything. And it’s just amazing. And, you know, I remember when I started writing before the Internet even. And if you wanted to know something, it was a trip to the library.

SPEAKER 07 : 20:45

Yeah, or the Britannica, the encyclopedias that we had in our living room. Like, I thought we were so cool because I could look up everything in the Encyclopedia Britannica.

SPEAKER 04 : 20:57

Yeah, and then I discovered the wonderful ladies on the research desk at the library. And I would send them all candy and flowers and everything. And then I would call them periodically and, look, I’m writing about this. I need to know this or that or the other thing. And they would look it up for you. And what an amazing thing. I didn’t have to waste half a day going down to the library. Well, now it’s just amazing. But the key to this is we need to revere wisdom and always be seeking wisdom. There’s no benefit at all to arrogance. And to somehow embrace that or think we don’t need that. Or there are people who think that their faith… is somehow threatened by knowledge. And, you know, nothing can be further from the truth. I mean, if your faith is threatened by science, you really don’t understand what you’re talking about. I mean, you know, you worship a creator that made everything that science studies, and there’s no problem in that other than people see this and So it’s a laziness, it’s an arrogance, and it’s just, you know, you always need to be seeking and trying to find something. And, you know, my dad ran a retirement center for many, many years, and people in their 80s, 90s, and a number of people over 100. And he said the people that do the best are active, they have a great personality, they are always in a good mood, and they’re always learning something. You know, they were in… You know, I talked to a woman the other day. I’m writing a piece about the Dust Bowl. And I found a woman who’s 102 years old, and she lived through it.

SPEAKER 06 : 22:47

Wow.

SPEAKER 04 : 22:47

So I got to talk to her. And she’s… I said, how much time do you have? She said, well, I have 20 minutes before my class.

SPEAKER 06 : 22:55

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER 04 : 22:56

And I said, are you taking a class? And she said, oh, yes. I said, what are you taking? She said, 20th century history. I said, ma’am, you lived through it. I mean, you should be teaching the class, not… But I think it’s amazing that people just want to continue to learn. So that’s the takeaway from today.

SPEAKER 07 : 23:14

You know, I know you were friends with John Wood, and we talk about him a lot. And one of my girlfriends, she was a teacher, and she was talking. Well, first of all, I was fascinated. I tell you about her, how she takes field trips now. She and her husband are teachers, and they’re in their 80s.

SPEAKER 04 : 23:31

Yes.

SPEAKER 07 : 23:32

And so she takes field trips all the time and she posts them on, but just them, just the two of them.

SPEAKER 06 : 23:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER 07 : 23:37

And she said, well, John Wooden said, you know, if you’re through learning, you’re through. Like if you’re not learning, you’re dead. And she said, I just believe that. And so she takes these little field trips and it really has inspired me. Like I do that with trips. Like we just, you know, got back from Arizona and we saw my mom who’s, 83 and we took her as many places as we could like the pima air museum and the history and the planes and you know just having i love having an expert take you around and explain like i didn’t know about the japanese suicide bombers per se like i didn’t realize that they were basically a living missile and that they were just using their bodies to guide in a missile and that they were expected to die like i didn’t quite understand the phenomenon or we went to the titan missile it’s like the the one that you can go to, I think it’s one of the only in the country, if not the only, it’s decommissioned, but like everything’s the same, right? And so my kids got to go through the protocol to like, quote unquote, launch the missile. But I didn’t realize when they did that, like you’re kind of trapped in there and they have air for 24 days, right? And then I’m like, oh, well then what do they do in 24 days? She goes, well, if they can get out, you know, if they can get out, because, you know, I mean, They might not even be able to dig out. Then they might die from, you know, the radiation. But if that area wasn’t hit for some reason, if there was a fault, because they’re obviously aiming for all of our, you know, nuclear, you know, areas. Then she said then they would go to the mountains and there was a place where they would meet. But basically she said if you push the button, you’re dead. But as they went through, like, the scenario and my daughters were turning the keys and all the different codes, they had to do this, that, and the other. it didn’t dawn on me. They don’t just say like, oh, this basically they’re killing themselves too. But then when you start asking a few questions afterwards and just the amount of money we put into it and how many billions would be to do it now and the new ones they’re building, like, I don’t know. I feel like some, and then we went to the Mexican border and we went into this prison and my husband who’s tall, like you six, six, he laid down in one of the, you know, prison bunks. It was only about, I say I could reach out three or four, I’m sorry, four to five feet wide. And then the cot that he laid down on, it was like for me, like a five foot five person. Right. And my husband, you know, a six six couldn’t even fit in the thing. I mean, he was like crouched up, you know, to lay down on the cot. I don’t know. I just I’m fascinated by learning. So my teacher friend really inspired me about these field trips, you know, and so we we’ve always turned our vacations into something educational. But I think this last one is in Phoenix and Tucson, we, you know, we learned a lot. We spent at least, you know, I’d say half of the vacation, not just in the lazy river and on the pool slides, but going places that I thought would be educational in the kids gym. They were like, the Titan missile, going to the air museum. And then they loved it, but they would not have chosen those locations. And my brother went to West Point. So we’d go by a plane and he’s like, oh, that’s a such and such, you know, whatever. I jumped out of that. And then my daughters are like, What? Yeah, when you go to West Point, you do training, and then I went into the military as an officer, and he said, your first jump’s always a night jump. I think I told you this. I said, what does that, what do you mean? You have to go at night? He goes, no, because your eyes are always shut.

SPEAKER 04 : 26:54

There you go, yeah.

SPEAKER 07 : 26:58

But yeah, just the learning, I love it.

SPEAKER 04 : 27:01

I think, you know, if I… You know, I get asked quite often because my book, The Ultimate Gift, which started all the movies that have been made based on my novels, and I picked out these 12 gifts that this grandfather wanted to give his grandson, and people often ask me, well, have you ever thought of, were there any others? And I have, and if I ever wanted to add a gift to that, I would add the gift of curiosity, the desire to know. I just think… And Carl Sagan said it best, somewhere there is something waiting to be known. And all of the great things. And the arrogance of ignorance goes back. In 1900, there’s a letter actually that you can probably find online, but it’s out there. It was written by the guy that ran the trademark office in Washington. And he was recommending that we shut down the trademark office, the copyright and the patent office, because obviously everything of significance had already been invented in 1900. And, you know, there was no reason to have it anymore because obviously there wasn’t going to be any more great inventions. And I’m thinking, wow, you know, I wish he could live in 2025.

SPEAKER 07 : 28:20

Yeah, I, gosh, I always run out of time when I’m talking to you. So, jimstilwell.com. Can’t wait for next week. And just thanks for always inspiring us, you know, to do more. Like, you know, there’s so much living to do out there and so much learning.

SPEAKER 02 : 28:34

Thank you. Thank you for listening to The Good News with Angie Austin on AM670 KLTT.