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When you live on your own for a long time, however, your personality changes because you go so much into yourself you lose the ability to be social, to understand what is and isn't normal behavior. There is an entire world inside yourself, and if you let yourself, you can get so deep inside it you will forget the way to the surface. Other people keep our souls alive, just like food and water does with our body.

Don Miller#88

FriendshipSelf reflectionIsolationMental healthSocial skillsSocializingSolitude

About this quote

What does it mean?
Long-term isolation can alter personality, reducing social skills and normal behavioral understanding. Other people are essential for keeping the soul alive, similar to basic physical needs.
In plain terms
Being alone too long makes you forget how to interact normally, and you need other people to stay emotionally healthy.
What can you take from it?
Human connection is as vital for the soul as food and water are for the body.

Where it applies

  • extended solo living
  • introversion turning into isolation
  • reintegrating into society

Putting it to work

  • schedule regular social interactions
  • join community groups
  • reach out to friends

Questions to consider

  • How long is too long to be alone?
  • What activities reconnect you with others?

Another view

Some people naturally thrive in solitude without losing social capacity.

More from Don Miller

  1. Tony the Beat Poet says the words alone, lonely and lonliness are three of the most powerful words in the English language. I agree with Tony. Those words say …

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  2. I think it is interesting that God designed people to need other people. We see those cigarett advertisements with the rugged cowboy riding around alone on a h…

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  3. Jesus does not want us floating through space or sitting in fron of our televisions. Jesus wants us interacting, eating together, laughing together, praying to…

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