Rising loneliness

I read that loneliness is on the rise, with seven in ten of 18 to 24 year olds saying they feel lonely and 29 per cent saying they feel a fundamental separateness from other people and the wider world.

That surprises me because I don't often feel lonely. I may feel bored or out-of-place or weird, but not lonely. I don't feel separate from other people because I know I have lots in common with them, even if we're not actually face to face or talking to each other.

Even when I lived on my own, before I met Jenny, I didn't feel lonely because I got out and about and didn't feel a need for other people's company as I had plenty of company at work.

Not that having company is necessarily the answer to loneliness. I can be in a crowd of people and still feel lonely because I don't feel they understand me or that they're on my wavelength or they share my interests.

The feeling of loneliness has many causes, in particular not being happy with your own self and wanting other people's reassurance or support or appreciation. I suppose it also includes the feeling of missing out, that other people are having a better time than you are. I guess every lonely person has their own definition of loneliness and what it feels like.

It doesn't help that the prevailing view of human beings is that we're social creatures and need other people around us to feel good. That ain't necessarily so.

Wandering minds

I'm extremely forgetful, but not because I'm old - I've been forgetful my whole life. And a new study says amnesia and scattiness are actually more common in young people.

We're all showing reduced attention and concentration spans and having more memory lapses, the reason being the sheer pressure and complexity of modern life.

A quarter of us regularly forget the names of close friends or relatives, and seven per cent even forget their own birthdays. Household accidents through carelessness are rising, and the average attention span has dropped to five minutes from twelve a decade ago.

But despite the stereotypes, the survey found the over-50s can concentrate better than young people, presumably because over the years they've learnt how to apply themselves and how to deal with pressure.

The decline is all due to the constant demands now being made on us - heavy workloads, urgent deadlines, endless emails, mobile phones, multi-tasking and new technology to name a few.

I certainly find myself that it's increasingly hard to concentrate on anything for any length of time without being distracted or my mind wandering to some essential task I need to do.

One cause of the growing distractedness is the nagging fear of "missing out" - that if we aren't constantly checking our emails, mobiles, TVs or our workmates' conversations, we might miss something vitally important or wildly exciting - or just someone's birthday. We don't want to be the gormless git who didn't know Britney had broken her leg.

I'm as prone to this anxiety as anyone else, being a news junkie, but it certainly doesn't do much for my peace of mind. Or my memory either, as I struggle to separate all the gossip from the shopping list and the bus timetable. What are we, human beings or sniffer dogs?