In this trailer of We Are Lonely, we’ll meet nine young Australians who are keen to understand loneliness and find connection in their lives, and we link them up with mentors like Ru Paul superstar Kween Kong. It’s normal to feel lonely, but when we stay lonely it can be worse for us than obesity, smoking and substance abuse, so let’s find out how to reconnect. We Are Lonely is funded as part of Medibank’s ten year initiative to combat loneliness.

Grief is something we will all experience, but it’s also something that can feel very lonely. Supported by Medibank, ‘We are Lonely’ is a podcast that seeks to demystify loneliness and this bonus episode shares participant Charity’s experience with grief and loneliness, and how creativity can help with healing and connection. 

This episode brings together singer songwriter, Alice Skye, Aunty Bea Ballangarry and Charity to talk about grief, and to work on a piece of music as a form of healing. There's no typical, or right, way to grieve. There is also no proper time frame for grief. It’s important that you allow yourself to feel what you feel and not try to suppress it. Reaching out and connecting with people, sharing memories, listening to music, meditating, writing about how we feel and taking the time to care for ourselves are all ways through grief. 

If you are feeling overwhelmed, it’s important to reach out for help. Thirteen Yarn is a national crisis support line for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. They have a dedicated crisis support on Thirteen Ninety Two Seventy Six. Or you can contact Lifeline on 13 11 14 or ReachOut dot com, which offers dedicated support for young people.

Host: Jemma Sbeg

Participants: Charity

Mentors: Alice Skye and Aunty Bea Ballangarry

We’ve had a chance to get to know our participants pretty well by now, but they still haven’t met each other. So we do the thing that is most practical when it comes to loneliness - bringing people together. 

Charity, Tim, Aleks and Holly all head to Melbourne to meet and share their experiences with each other.

Host: Jemma Sbeg

Participants: Charity, Aleks, Tim and Holly

Mentors: Dr Deidre Anderson, Barry Conrad, Sean Szeps and Tessa Blencowe

Experts: Professor Ian Hickie and Dr Lisa Mundy

It’s pretty common to blame our blooming loneliness on technology. In this episode we tease out that theory and look at the ways technology is both helping and hindering our connection with other people.

Tim also meets with a psychologist who is part of a gaming research program to talk through the impacts gaming has on our brains and how to control our relationship with technology.

Host: Jemma Sbeg

Participants: Tim, Holly, Aleks and Charity

Mentors: Dr Deidre Anderson, Barry Conrad, Sean Szeps and Tessa Blencowe

Experts: Professor Ian Hickie and Dr Lisa Mundy

Guest - Shane Southwood

Reaching into where you feel joy, where you feel accepted and happy is a powerful way to build connection. Holly does something she would never have faced just months ago and heads to a yoga retreat alone. Tim reignites his passion for drag and Charity steps into the world of study.

Sometimes connection doesn’t have to be with people just like us, it can be with people who like the same things as us.

Host: Jemma Sbeg

Participants: Charity, Tim and Holly

Mentors: Dr Deidre Anderson, Barry Conrad, Sean Szeps and Tessa Blencowe

Experts: Professor Ian Hickie and Dr Lisa Mundy

How does our relationship with the world and the people around us make us lonely? And how do we fix it? Aleks, Charity, Holly and Tim are getting ready to step into the world, and find their people. 

During our 20’s our relationships are changing a fair bit. Only a few years ago we were at school, we each had our school identity - sporty, academic, musical, popular. Then we left school and the world felt a bit bigger and the options for how we presented to the world expanded. Naturally, alongside those changes, a lot of our friendships might be adapting as well. There can be a lot of rethinking of who we want to be with and what we want from our relationships. 

We cover a heap in this episode, from the impacts of racism to communication skills and how to have the courage to step out.

Host: Jemma Sbeg

Participants: Aleks, Charity, Tim and Holly

Mentors: Dr Deidre Anderson, Barry Conrad, Sean Szeps and Tessa Blencowe

Experts: Professor Ian Hickie and Dr Lisa Mundy

Guest - Aunty Bea Ballangarry

What does your relationship with yourself have to do with being lonely? When you think about loneliness it’s easy to focus on how many friends you have, how connected you are with the outside world. But loneliness isn’t that simple - you can feel lonely in the company of others and you can feel content alone. In this episode our participants and their mentors take a moment to look inwards and work out who they are, and who they want to be.

This question of self discovery, of understanding our place in the world, is part of why we can feel particularly disconnected in our twenties. We’re trying to find the answers to those questions - Who am I? Where do I fit? Where do I want to be? Who are my people? And at the same time we’re sorting out the practicalities of living in the world outside of our family.

It can be exhausting, and it can be isolating. 

Host: Jemma Sbeg

Participants: Charity, Holly, Aleks and Tim

Mentors: Dr Deidre Anderson, Barry Conrad, Sean Szeps and Tessa Blencowe

Experts: Professor Ian Hickie and Dr Lisa Mundy

Why are we lonely? Holly found herself in a habit of being alone after experiencing years of illness; Tim moved into a studio apartment in Melbourne just as the second lockdown hit; Charity is working through generations of disconnection forced on her family through Stolen Generations; and Aleks finds the pressure of managing a multi-faceted career and study life can overtake his downtime and peace. We join our participants as they each meet their mentor and start to understand why they’re feeling lonely.

It seems as quickly as we’re filling this planet we’re each becoming more isolated. One in three people in Australia are experiencing high levels of loneliness; the UK has a Minister of Loneliness; and the US Surgeon General has declared loneliness a health epidemic. This matters, because while loneliness is a normal human emotion, if we allow that feeling to become chronic, it has serious health consequences. It can be worse for us than obesity or casual smoking.

Host: Jemma Sbeg

Participants: Holly, Tim, Charity and Aleks

Mentors: Dr Deidre Anderson, Barry Conrad, Sean Szeps and Tessa Blencowe

Experts: Professor Ian Hickie and Dr Lisa Mundy

It seems as quickly as we’re filling this planet we’re each becoming more isolated. One in three people in Australia are experiencing high levels of loneliness. The UK now has a Minister of Loneliness and the US Surgeon General has declared loneliness a health epidemic. And whilst it can seem like a simple human emotion, loneliness can have serious health implications. Being consistently lonely can be as bad for us as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. And so we built this podcast to break the loneliness cycle.

We’ve connected four people in their twenties with mentors to help them reconnect. We’re calling it a reality documentary podcast. We are Lonely will be available where you get your podcasts from August 8th.