The warmest of welcomes to you as you pose a brilliant question, 'How to be alone and not feel lonely?'.
Based on my own experience, I don't feel loneliness when I'm feeling something else. For example, when I'm feeling a sense of wonder and a sense of excitement while doing research on my laptop, I'm not feeling or sensing loneliness. When I'm feeling a sense of entertainment on my own, I'm not feeling or sensing loneliness. When I'm not feeling people around me demanding things of me, I'm sensing peace as opposed to loneliness and the demands of others. 'Sensitives' sense (both an ability and a curse at times, that's for sure😁). As a gal who's a sensitive introvert, I've found some of it comes down to figuring out exactly what it is I want to gain a sense of when I'm on my own. Btw, while I live with a husband and a couple of kids in their 20s, I also sense alone time as a blessing or a gift on occasion😊.
Alone time can also be used as a time of 'release', while releasing stress/tension from the nervous system, muscular system and any other systems that need a form of release or relaxation. To be able to do this uninterrupted can be another blessing. I think it can also help to sense or feel alone time as a liberating choice. We can choose to stretch tension out of our body in a group (yoga class, for example) or choose to stretch it out on our own.
With being a sensitive introvert, it also pays to get a sense or where our inner dialogue's at. For example, if we've got our inner critic brutally going to town on us or some other depressing facet of ourself in play, alone time may not be such a good thing. Pays to go out and find people who'll interrupt that kind of inner dialogue. Alone time definitely requires some skillful management at times. While we can be thinking 'Why am I struggling to master this?', it's worth considering the possibility that nobody taught us how to do it like a master. Never too late to become a master.
