feeling alone

I think I feel this type of feeling more than anything else. Loneliness. That feeling that I'm disconnected from everything and everyone around me. On a fundamental level.

At my age, most people are connected by one of a few life experiences. Since most of the people I interact with are not Christian, that involves sex, alcohol or drug use. I am able to be with them and share many things, but I don't connect in a certain way.

Among my brothers and sisters in Christ, there is always the rumor of a dark past or skeletons in the closet; the things we share in small groups behind closed doors and occasionally with nonbelievers in the hopes of getting them to understand that we too are human. In the midst of that there are those times that we break into groups at church or a similar function and during that time, we talk about those skeletons. They may seem familiar to you: sex, drugs, alcohol.

Mind you, there are other things that I run into - worldviews, philosophies, schools of thought on varying subjects, experiences - but I don't connect to them in the ways I need most. I don't find many people that fully share my interests (although, to their credit, some take an active interest in my interests). I seem to get along well with most people (for the most part, I do), but there are sometimes that the combination of my thoughts, beliefs and so on lead me to believe that I can be connected to anyone in a way that I cry out for, yet remain unable to articulate.

If I could articulate it, it would sound something like: "I want to know and be known", but even that doesn't tell the half because I cannot explain to you what that would look like; I've never known it...