It’s very clear to me that all my life I’ve been running away from loneliness. I think 99.99% of the people do it as well. All activities that we do as humans are just distractions, even the most elaborated ones like pursuing your life purpose or going on retreats with other people. Everything is designed to keep you away from loneliness. 
But what is it that we are running from actually ? Today, when I was walking in the park in the late evening with no soul around me I tried to feel deeply how it feels and it didn’t feel good. The way it feels to me is like scary emptiness and numbness covered in overwhelming craving for companionship or distraction. 
It recently hit me that my life purpose is to face loneliness, the rest is just a distraction from this main thing. The question is what it takes to actually face it and get completely comfy with it ? It’s also very clear to me that most of enlightened gurus haven’t transcended this, otherwise why would they be teaching ?