Hurt People,hurt people.
Thoughts on Living alone & Generational Trauma. Together it can be weirdly called a Green goddess dressing all things sour,bitter & green but with a lil hope & love anything can look (taste) better!
Living alone can be quite intimidating to many, but its increasingly becoming a norm with the Gen-Z folks. Why? Since many of us are experiencing different things that our previous generations didn’t have to.With social media & the constant digital presence all of us are lonely in one way or the other, since we are all living multiple lives with the one life we have. A life within a life. You know what I mean?
Living alone (OR) Not living alone but still feeling lonely…
Loneliness lurks around in everyone’s life, no one can completely abstain from it. Certain lonliness is inevitable, it kinda bobs out of water from time to time. Subtler ones that fade away with time or is present on an everyday basis that you’ve grown a thick skin to. A lonliness that you have to face for a given amount of time & be done with it for the day.
Feeling lonely when in school? Considered normal, since one might feel alone at different points & it could be self-imposed or one could be shy of making friends or even a starting problem?
Feeling lonely at workplace? Totally understandable. People work in teams, and are busy with their own hectic schedules,ticking tasks & reporting to their higher-ups.Can’t be entertained by people all the time can we?
I get it … But what happens to the ones that stay there like a giant piece of old furniture in your living room that no one is using? What would you do, when you feel lonely in a very familiar setting? say someplace called “Your own home”
Living alone sounds a lot better to my ears at this point.To be trapped in a place that you call home, to be in it with the people you know from the time you were born & still feel like being oceans away is hell breaking loose to many.Its not easy to digest this & to continue to live as if everything is just right. “To adjust” is the biggest lie that we’ve ever been told.
Shift in mindsets
Generational gap is & has always been a part of every era, although in my opinion the one between Gen-X & Gen-Z/ Millenials have been the roughest. This day & age teaches us new things everyday, it’s the era of information. Emotional wellbeing & mental health issues are just spoken widely now, maybe within a five or a max ten year time frame? What happened to the times before that? All of what I’m talking about could be a matter of laughter back then. People restricted themselves & built imaginary constraints around them & lived within it. Their cumbersome ,immensely taxing emotional baggage was passed on tax free to the next generation, which was undoutedly too much to handle. The passing on, on the other hand, wasn’t smooth either its more or less like parking in the right place & driving out within the stipulated time & yet receiving a parking ticket. Its just that you were a little too late to notice that this slot was earmarked for two-wheelers just yesterday. Your bad.
How do we Align then?
Alignment within families is what I tend to have in conversations off late with people my age & the ones who are a little older than me. Out of all the conversations I’ve had, the older ones are mostly inclining towards behaving stern and acting towards feeding their ego monster. I’m not usually the one to ask anyone to adjust for the sake of family or any other reason, but listening to people open up about instances filled with unruly,hurtful words & regretful behaviour made me go silent in my mind. I’m trying to go back to the same question…. Why this behaviour in the first place? Why talk so immature despite living almost half a century on this planet? Haven’t they learnt anything at all, all these years?
Simple question & hence a simple answer…
Troubled Childhood
Adults & their Traumatic Childhood
I’ve realised one thing off late, Adults carry hurt & trauma till their grave, even after knowing its going to be heavy for themselves to carry. A rough childhood has a person always on their toes. As if in a survival mode most of the time, unable to trust easily, lacking confidence in demeanour & taking wrong (one-sided,not well thought of) desicions even when in 80’s. You know what else they can be?
A Two sided Parent… Incredibly dangerous & pitiful..
This is a spectrum , that we are talking about here. Everyone’s experience can fall within the ranges of the scale. Yours could be supportive & loving at times but when triggered they can also be egotistic & unreasonable. Mine could be happy go lucky & cheerful on the outside but a terrible violent monster within closed doors. I’ve heard people talk about physical abuse in the worst case & my heart just cant it take it any longer.
Closing comments
I believe this generation is carrying unnecessary weight on their shoulders that can be easily eliminated with both parties coming together to have real, raw & open conversations that’s going to be extremly difficult but can be & should be done for the greater good. If anyone in the equation is wanting to mend a strained relationship , this might be the only way. To sweep the dirt under the rug could be the easiest, low cost, temporary end to a problem but to actually pick up a broom & go in search of the dirt by one’s own will is what will be the game changer. This is what is going to stir real yet a positive change in the situation that had once gone so stale. Anything can be fixed in this world, but there must be will. A will to see a change, a will to stop the hurt, a will to save that was thought to be lost, a will to hold on & not let go.
A will so strong, that it can guide you when you are so lost. A will… So strong, nothing else… Do you have it?
Love,
Madhu <3
This really resonated, Madhumitha. I lived with my parents for most of my twenties too, and that kind of loneliness can really hurt. Feeling lonely amongst your closest people. I’ve never lived alone, and sometimes I wonder what that kind of solitude would feel like.
What you wrote about generational trauma and emotional misalignment really spoke to me. I’ve felt that too... The quiet ache of realizing your parents are still carrying their own childhood wounds, and often spilling them onto you without even realizing it. Hurt people, hurt people. That sentence holds multitudes.
As someone who struggles with loneliness since the age of 15-16, this piece spoke to me on levels I can't exactly explain..but thank you 🥹