A curious paradox of the social media age is that we have so much human connection right at our fingertips, yet so many of us feel lonely or isolated.
One in three adults in the US aged between 18 and 29 reported feelings of isolationexternal link, opens in a new tab in 2025, as did just over half of college studentsexternal link, opens in a new tab that same year. In another study, about 40% of US adolescents reported experiencing at least some lonelinessexternal link, opens in a new tab by age 14.
Millions of young people in the US and around the world are struggling with loneliness and isolation. Maybe it’s partly because of technology, from smartphones to remote working and learning—it’s a lot easier to cancel plans at the last minute with a simple text, for instance—and perhaps spending more time at home during the COVID-19 pandemic played a part, particularly for people who were children or young people at the time. We’ve also lost a lot of third spaces, places to socialize or simply exist alongside other people, that aren’t home, work or school, like clubs and libraries.
Whatever the reason, you’re definitely not alone.
What are loneliness and isolation?
Loneliness and isolation have been part of the human experience for generations. Many of us experience one or both during our lives.
Loneliness is a gap between the social relationships and connections you have and those you want. It’s something that can affect many of us, from a child trying to settle in at kindergarten to a celebrity flying around the world.
Isolation, meanwhile, is the state of being disconnected or separated from others. This might be in physical distance—if you’re at college in a different state or country to your family and friends, for example—or in an emotional or social sense.
It’s important to remember that there’s a difference between being alone and being lonely. Two people could have the same levels of emotional connection and intimacy with others, and one could feel content while the other might feel lonely.
Some people struggle with loneliness for a long time. They may feel like they have a hard time with making friends, or that nobody around them shares the same interests and hobbies. Loneliness isn’t always dramatic or obvious. It can be scrolling through Instagram and seeing friends hanging out without you, or realizing that your friends only message when they need a favor.
It might sound illogical, but it’s very easy to feel lonely even while you’re part of a group, so don’t feel weird if you’re having this experience. Maybe you have friends, but feel replaceable in your friendships—that you’re the second choice, or you’re always the one to message and reach out first. You might move cities or states for college and drift apart from friends you’ve had for years, realizing that proximity was what kept you together.
But for others, loneliness can happen suddenly, because of something that happens. If you fall out with your group of friends at school, or your social life is intertwined with your partner’s and then you break up, or somebody you’re close to dies or moves away, loneliness can hit out of nowhere.
We often feel lonely during life changes, too. Moving cities or graduating high school or college can lead to loneliness as we adapt to the transition. Becoming disabled, recovering from trauma, starting medical treatment—they can all make us feel lonely. If you’ve decided to go sober but your friends want to party every night, that can make you feel lonely. Leaving a religious community, ending a toxic friendship or relationship, even coming out or transitioning—these are all changes that can leave us feeling lonely.
The contrast can be difficult to adjust to. If you find yourself without friends, or realizing that your relationship with your friends isn’t fulfilling—you might not stumble upon a new social circle right away. But it could be a good time to discover some of the positives of spending some time alone.
How to enjoy spending time alone
There’s nothing wrong with spending time alone sometimes; in fact, it can be quite good for you. One studyexternal link, opens in a new tab from 2023 indicates that solitude can have both benefits and drawbacks, with the benefits most often coming when we actively chose to be alone. Solitude can leave us feeling less stressed, and more comfortable with being ourselves, researchers found.
Another studyexternal link, opens in a new tab from the same year found that when people view spending time alone more positively, they’re more likely to feel the benefits from it.
Modern life seldom gives us room for quiet, between social media, streaming platforms, group chats and breaking news notifications. It’s easy to get the feeling that we should always be engaging, interacting, responding and consuming.
As a result, being alone can feel unfamiliar, uncomfortable, and even frightening because we’re just not used to it. Spending time by yourself isn’t inherently bad, but we can perceive it that way because we so rarely get the chance to experience it positively.
As useful as this constant connection can be, it can be overwhelming. Seeing everyone else having what appears to be the time of their lives on social media can amplify feelings of loneliness, although you should remember we’re only seeing a curated part of their lives, not the whole picture. Messaging apps can make it more difficult to enjoy being by ourselves in the moment, and emails and file-hosting services on our phones can mean we struggle to switch off from work and school when we should be relaxing.
Have you ever taken happiness in being alone? Not doomscrolling or bedrotting after a long day (we’ve all been there) but in doing activities and enjoying your own company? So many of us just haven’t developed the skills to be alone in a positive way, without feeling like we “should” be hanging out with others, or feeling like we must be lonely if we’re alone.
Why not simply sit with your own thoughts the next time you have an evening to yourself? Don’t reach for your phone or the TV remote—just sit with yourself for a while and see what enters your mind. It might feel weird or uncomfortable at first, which is totally understandable. If you are finding it tricky, you could journal instead, or write down anything that comes into your head.
You could also come up with some things you might like to do alone; things you’re used to doing with other people, whether that’s going to the movies, sitting in the park with a book, taking yourself out to eat, or going for a walk.
If you’ve ever missed out on seeing a movie or a band because you had nobody to go with or your friends weren’t interested, why not try doing it alone?
If you live alone, you could try doing something like planning and cooking a new recipe rather than ordering takeout or making a sandwich, or working on a piece of art or writing. You don’t have to leave the house or drain your bank account to have fun alone.
One of the best things about learning to be alone can be remembering, or learning, what you like. If you’re used to adapting to other people’s tastes just to form connections and spend time with other people—maybe you’ll go ahead with other people’s plans, but it’s not always reciprocated—you can lose track of your own likes, passions and hobbies.
Consider taking a class to learn a new skill, exploring a craft that interests you, wandering around a bookstore until something catches your eye, or rediscovering a sport or musical instrument you liked when you were younger.
As much as learning to be alone can be really valuable, it’s not a substitute for connection all the time. We all need that connection, but we don’t always get it.
Finding connection
Even if you’re at school or college, you have lots of work colleagues, or you live with lots of people, there’s no guarantee you’ll have lots of friends. Building relationships takes work. And if you live alone or you work from home, for example, forming and maintaining those connections might be even trickier.
So what can you do?
Something we often hear on social media is “You don’t owe anyone anything.” And while that might be true, in theory, doing things for people and showing up for things, even if you might not always want to, is how we build community. Connection rarely happens by accident. If you don’t want to be lonely, you’ll have to put the effort into forming and maintaining bonds.
It’s important to reach out to your existing friends and acquaintances if you want more social connection, rather than just wait for them to get in touch with you. It might take effort sometimes, and it can even feel daunting to put yourself out there, but socializing is a two-way street.
Even just reaching out to say hello can mean a lot to a friend you’ve not spoken to in a while, and you don’t know where reaching out could lead.
Similarly, if we always turn down invitations to hang out, stop replying to people, and refuse to help friends out, there might be fewer opportunities for connection in the future. Friends seldom fall out of thin air.
In order to form relationships with people, we need repeated, reciprocal, contact with them. That might be keeping in touch with old friends over video call, or seeing friends who live nearby on a regular basis. It means being open to invitations and activities, including taking opportunities to go a little outside your comfort zone, like going to a friend’s partner’s birthday party or joining a group at the beach even when you’re not feeling super social. And your friends aren’t mind-readers. If there are things you prefer to do or want to try instead, say so!
Think of friendship and socialization like a muscle group: You need to use it to benefit, and once you start moving it, you often start to feel stronger. You might be surprised how much you enjoy a social obligation, even if it’s not something you were really excited for to begin with.
If you’re in high school, clubs and extracurricular activities can be great if you want to meet new people or turn acquaintances into friends. The great thing about these clubs are that people aren’t there to make friends in itself. They’re there for the thing, and friendships can grow organically from this shared passion or interest.
If you’re at college, you might decide to go to class in person rather than joining on Zoom. You’re more likely to bump into a friend of a friend and get talking, or arrange to get food with a classmate, if you’re there in person. Or, even if you’re part-way through the year, it’s usually not too late to join a club or group.
Whether you’re in high school or college, you might consider part-time jobs, youth groups, local sports teams or even volunteering as ways to meet like-minded people.
If larger groups feel daunting, you could reach out to someone you get on with one-on-one to ask if they’d like to hang out—perhaps after school or after your club or group. You never know, they could be in a similar situation and be looking for a friend.
If you have a full-time job, things can be different—there are power dynamics in place between people of varying seniority levels, and your coworkers might not be at a similar life stage. But there are still opportunities for connection, whether it’s saying yes to group plans after work once in a while or asking someone if they’d like to go for lunch or a coffee.
Make the most of your time away from work, too. If you work a nine-to-five, are there any evening classes you could join, or is there an interesting group that meets up at the weekend?
Particularly if you’re new to work and you’re struggling without having school or college there to do some of the heavy social living for you, adjusting to the new normal of working life can be hard. So don’t be disheartened if your social life feels like it’s in transition for a while.
If you want to find more friends, regardless of your stage in life, one of the best options is to join some sort of society, group or club where you’ll repeatedly see the same people. The aim isn’t to make a friend in your first 15 minutes. Rather, it’s to create the conditions for friendships to grow and develop over time.
Say yes more than you feel comfortable doing, for a while at least. You don’t have to say yes to everything, but a bit of discomfort is totally normal. You’re gradually building important habits. And remember, you aren’t looking for a new best friend at first. You’re looking for acquaintances, and close friendships can build over time.
If you’d like to make more connections but it’s difficult in person, you might be able to make connections online. Some people find really good friends on social media platforms and forums like Reddit, while there are apps out there that help people find friends and events nearby. Of course, the usual advice applies around meeting people in real life for the first time if you choose to meet people IRL.
And some people are perfectly content remaining online friends, too, and form such meaningful connections in this way. There are plenty of people who are “unseen,” almost, offline, but have a vibrant social life online.
Building and maintaining community isn’t necessarily easy, and it’s not a personal failure if you feel lonely sometimes. Putting yourself out there, agreeing to things and asking people to hang out, can make you feel vulnerable. Rejection can be uncomfortable, and putting the effort in doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be successful every time, but it’s still worth it to make connections with other humans.
I know that for some people, forming these relationships in person might be more difficult. For folks with disabilities or chronic illnesses, it might be less practical to join in with in-person social obligations at short notice, you might work or study from home more often, or you might have to cancel or postpone plans more often. You might not have the money to do things with friends on a regular basis, or you may have responsibilities like work or caregiving that have an impact.
If you can’t make something for whatever reason, but you’d still like to hang out, why not suggest an alternative activity. Maybe you can’t afford to go out for dinner now, but you’ll be able to two weeks down the line. Or, you could suggest going for a walk or getting a coffee the following day.
If you can’t meet up in person because you’re unwell and staying at home, you could suggest a phone call to catch up the same day.
After all, if you’re invited to do something, it’s because the other person, or people, actively wants to connect with you and spend time with you—if you work together, you’ll likely be able to find a solution that works for you all.
Of course, these factors can’t be helped, and you aren’t being a bad friend if you need to cancel plans or require more notice before agreeing to commitments.
But at the same time, if there’s a pattern of cancellations, no response and lack of effort, people can begin to feel like they don’t want to make the effort either. It works both ways, too. If you feel like you’re the one putting in all of the effort, you might want to see if your friend needs some extra support, but you’re also well within your rights to take a step back and reconsider the friendship. Their needs matter, but yours do, too, and it’s fine to put yourself first in that situation.
Finding your balance
Building community, finding connections, and making space is something you do on your terms: You know what makes you happy. Don’t feel obliged to make friends for the sake of it if you’re happy spending time by yourself. It’s important to connect with other people; there are health benefits, even. But our desire for connection can coexist with the quiet comfort in being alone.
We’re all different. Some people may be content with their online friendships, or to see friends once or twice a month. Others will need more frequent contact. That’s an important conversation to navigate with friends; some might be fine hearing from you once in a while, while others might be hurt or expect more.
And remember, friends are not the only antidote to feelings of loneliness and isolation. Even just leaving the house and speaking to a cashier or becoming a regular at a coffee shop or a library can help you feel more connected. Same with volunteering or joining a club. You might not find your closest friend in the world, but you might make some acquaintances or simply enjoy being around other people.
And remember, everybody will feel lonely or isolated at some point. It doesn’t mean that you’ve failed as a person or that you’ll always feel this way. Human connection can be complex; it can be messy. A lot of people are more lonely than they let on, and many of the most important or meaningful relationships can begin slowly.
Loneliness can feel embarrassing sometimes, but it’s nothing to be ashamed of. It’s a human experience we can all relate to, not a personal failure—despite it sometimes feeling like everyone else has got it all figured out. Even people who seem to have the busiest social lives can feel lonely.
Learning how to be comfortable with your own company while also staying open to connecting with others, can make those lonelier times feel less frightening—and remind you that they’ll only be temporary.
But if your emotions feel bigger than regular loneliness, there are resources out there for you. You can text CONNECT to the Crisisexternal link, opens in a new tab text line at 741741, use Scarleteen’s services, take a look at our external resources, or speak to someone in your life like your doctor, parent or teacher.
And remember: no matter what, feeling lonely now doesn’t mean you’ll feel lonely forever.
