Despite being surrounded by friends, I often feel this distinct sense of loneliness.  Perhaps you know this feeling too: the feeling that you are an outsider, although all logic assumes you fit in. Now don’t get me wrong — for the most part I am satisfied with my affiliations here at UCLA — but occasionally, I find myself alone, even while with friends. 

I try to stave off loneliness by filling my schedule with people and events. I attend recruiting events and weekend retreats, go on adventures with dear friends, and plan to work almost daily in finance. My attempts are successful: in my busy haze, I am satisfied, even happy, and the loneliness slowly etches away. 

But it often comes back when I least expect it. It comes when I witness something amusing that nobody else finds funny, when I don’t understand the latest pop culture reference, or when I do something that is simply me and get teased incessantly. To some extent, this loneliness may be self-induced, a cycle of me hoping that others will understand me and feeling alone when they do not. In another respect, I hesitate to speak about my deeper thoughts with most friends, which leaves me feeling that many of the conversations I have are on a simplistic level. To talk about mutual acquaintances, teachers and classes is so much easier for me, and presents none of the disconnect that often comes with deep discussion. 

This inability to share myself emotionally with most people leaves me sometimes feeling isolated. I still don’t know where I belong or how I want to identify myself. I have joined many clubs and organizations, and flitted around different events in the hopes of finding things that I am passionate about. But while I have gained many friends that I wave to while walking to class, I have few genuinely close friends, nothing like the close-knit, diverse “group” I had throughout my high school years. Perhaps this is because in high school, I committed myself passionately to two activities and was consequently defined and befriended by individuals in those groups. In contrast, I have tried to avoid defining myself simply by my participation in any one organization here at UCLA. For the most part, I am satisfied with this: up to this point, I have explored what I enjoy, tested my beliefs on a variety of levels, and found myself growing as a person exponentially. But perhaps because of my individual exploration, I have never cemented a core group of close friends. This makes me sad, and also brings me to somewhat of a conundrum. If I do not want to commit myself wholly to any one organization, how do I find the close-knit group that truly understands me, as an individual? I really don’t know. 

To an extent, sharing my feelings of loneliness here means redefining the person who I’ve appeared to be. I have written fairly optimistically up until now, and to show my doubts is to reveal a layer of vulnerability that I rarely let show. I’m scared to admit that I often feel alone in groups of friends, that surrounded by people, loneliness can ensue.  

But I have also come to realize that loneliness is a part of life. I’m not always going to have somebody to hang out with in my spare time. I’m not always going to know the lyrics to the most popular song. I may never find a group of people with whom I feel perfectly secure. And that’s just how life is — I am, and must be, okay with being alone.