Loneliness has become such an epidemic today…many people are even calling it a crisis. And the hard part is, when we feel that way, we don’t feel like we can talk about it…we feel like will understand or like they’ll judge us.    And loneliness is no longer a problem with not being around people as I shared before. You can be surrounded by your friends; you can be surrounded by a large group of people and still feel lonely.  According to the Christian Research Institute, loneliness is not just a social isolation issue, loneliness is caused when we feel unseen, we have trouble connecting with others, we don’t feel valued, and we don’t feel like we have a purpose.  God created us as relational human beings. We were meant to have real relationships with people, not just surface level friendships. This was my biggest challenge growing up. I had the same close group of friends from Kindergarten all the way through college, but honestly, I don’t think any one of them ever took the time to really get to know me. Our friendships were always surface level…and I felt the heavy dread of loneliness. “Nobody likes me.” “Nobody cares about me.” “What’s wrong with me?”   Feelings are very real, but we shouldn’t follow our feelings, because they can often lie to us, telling us things like, “there must be something wrong with me?” “why am I so different?” “why can’t people just like me?”    But how do we build those true friendships? How do we break past those feelings of loneliness or that nobody likes us into the joy and encouragement true friendships can bring us? The Beautiful Movement now has the March box available for pre-sale! Grab your box before they sell out! The theme is “He is Risen,” a box to prepare your hearts for Easter! You don’t want to miss this one! Go to  www.jointhebeautifulmovement.com to sign up! Use discount code: uncommonteen for 15% OFF your 1st box! Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and you all haven't been able to ask your questions for our Ask Me Anything podcast episodes...so to make that easier for you, we added a brand new RED button at the top of the UncommonTEEN website that says, "Ask Me Anything!" If you want to submit your questions for upcoming Ask Me Anything episodes, be sure to head on over to UncommonTEEN.com and ask your questions there! Connect with Us! Website: UncommonTEEN.com Instagram: @uncommon.teen UncommonTEEN Live Conference: UncommonTEENlive.com