Is your family the most precious thing you have?
Can you live without relying on the outside help?
Are you heavily reliant on the emotional support of others?
Do you depend on their love and understanding in your daily activities, short and long plans and goals?
Are you living the pains and pleasures of your daughters, sons, parents, spouse or friends?
These are the questions you must ask yourself, if atma-yoga defines your spiritual path.
If by any chance you are following bhakti-yoga, the devotional path, then you may happily continue with your bhajans, worshipping, and the usual rituals. And the more people you have around you, family included, the happier and more fulfilled you’ll feel.

If however, you define yourself as a spiritual seeker aspiring to a jnani status, then be prepared for a long and lonely road ahead. After all, atma-yoga is all about expounding knowledge only. And although the inspiration will, in most cases, come from without, the ultimate realization that “you are that which you are seeking” will come from within.
Yes, the knowledge which you are will realize that it is the knowledge; nothing else. There’s no room for exuberance, outbursts of joy and moments of exultation. They may come your way, they may not.
In any event, they mean very little to a serious spiritual seeker; just some spontaneous movements in consciousness.
And your family and friends have no role to play in your spiritual progress.
Yes, it helps (a little) if you have a sympathetic person living next to you, who “understands” your behavior. This “plus” however, will always be obliterated by the negatives of your exposure to the turbulences of the lives of others.

Those close to you will “leak” their emotions and personal problems – all ego-driven, into your living environment.
When you are realized, emotional problems of others, no matter how close they are to you, will not affect you at all. However, when you are still in the process of realizing your true nature, every distraction will slow you down and redirect your attention from within to without.
Always remember, you have only this live at your disposal.
Don’t be like one of the many “caring” family members, who spend their entire lives on taking great interest in the lives of their siblings, children, friends, etc. These kind souls celebrate and commiserate with others,
They share and are robbed at the same time. Some of them even know that the greatest achievement in life is to make progress in the spiritual path to Realization. For a realized one is the source of power and love to all around him. Yet, many will choose to help others, deceiving themselves that they are doing something of a noble nature.
The ultimate in cowardice and treachery, for done to themselves!
You are betraying your own self.
Never forget it, and don’t dare to bring your karma into the equation!

Wise sages tell us that taking care of ourselves is the best way to help others. When your needs are none, you are not a burden on your family and the world. The truth is, you care for others only because you want them to care for you when the time comes… Your ego expects something in return. Unless you are egoless, this will always determine the false economy of the so-called family life.
Want to be a jnani? Then stop trying to hang onto the apron strings of others! True spirituality doesn’t depend on others, giving and receiving; for there are no “others.”
There is One Universal Consciousness and there is One Absolute. And you are That, and so all the “others”!
May the following Nisargadatta Maharaj’s words empower you in your “loneliness”: “One has to look at oneself as to what one is, it’s not necessary to worry about others.”