If we’re coping with a heavy, complicated problem, we’re often too busy to feel lonely. But sometimes, loneliness itself becomes our major problem. What’s happening is that our monkey mind is zooming in on the feeling, exaggerating it. Sometimes we think, “I don’t really have any good friends,” when what we really mean is we do, but they’re not around, or we don’t feel connected to them at that moment. Sometimes we think, “Oh, I don’t want to be around other people,” and we isolate ourselves. Later on, when our mood has shifted and we want company, we forget that we ourselves created that environment, and we feel lonely.