
Double Solitude - pepys
http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/double-solitude
======
aaronscott
I had never considered the difference between solitude and loneliness before.
His words helped me understand that they are fundamentally different.

"Now and then, especially at night, solitude loses its soft power and
loneliness takes over. I am grateful when solitude returns."

I went camping in an area without cell or internet service a few weeks ago,
and this helps me understand the incredible experience I had. It was a strong
dose of solitude, which had been missing in my day-to-day city life.

~~~
aq3cn
I define solitude as capacity to entertain myself with or without outside
distraction or people.

Loneliness is a phobia of what's inside of us. It is a desperation to seek
entertainment in outside stimulus.

I have gone through year long solitary confinement. It is life changing.

~~~
hueving
>I have gone through year long solitary confinement. It is life changing.

Voluntary or involuntary? I suspect there could be a drastic difference in the
effect between those two.

~~~
aq3cn
Involuntary.

~~~
hueving
How long did it take to come to acceptance with the fact that you were being
forced to stay that way?

~~~
aq3cn
I am still into phase of accepting it. I took help from two therapists and
read books by Hermann Hesse and Anthony Starr to establish sense of
authenticity and reliance in my life. I would say it is all about finding an
original voice every new day. Keeping mind active and sharp while discarding
old believes just like old cloths. A person who has multiple voices and an
enriched mind can never feel alone.

I like to share this quote which always had made be good about my experiences.
I know it extreme but this voice isn't for everyone.

“We must become so alone, so utterly alone, that we withdraw into our
innermost self. It is a way of bitter suffering. But then our solitude is
overcome, we are no longer alone, for we find that our innermost self is the
spirit, that it is God, the indivisible. And suddenly we find ourselves in the
midst of the world, yet undisturbed by its multiplicity, for our innermost
soul we know ourselves to be one with all being.”

― Hermann Hesse

------
ChicagoBoy11
Whilte the author's reflections are incredibly deep and worthwhile on their
own, what struck me most about this article was just the tremendous quality of
the writing. Is the recipe to being able to produce writing like this simply
to become a voracious consumer of similarly-excellent writing?

~~~
bradleyjg
Lots of reading, lots of writing, and a healthy dose of inborn talent. Also,
the _New Yorker_ has excellent editors.

~~~
rimantas
An editor gave an advice for the aspiring writer once: read more books.

—Will it help?

—Sure. The moore time you spend reading the less time you will have for
writing crap.

~~~
erikb
That's not the reason though. Writing crap is actually what makes you write
awesome stuff. Reading is a way to see what other people do and learn from
their crap and awesome stuff, if you take the opportunity to really take
things in beside the story it contains.

------
pcmaffey
"And to speak of solitude again, it becomes clearer and clearer that
fundamentally this is nothing that one can choose or refrain from. We are
solitary. We can delude ourselves about this and act as if it were not true.
That is all. But how much better it is to recognize that we are alone; yes,
even to begin from this realization. It will, of course, make us dizzy; for
all points that our eyes used to rest on are taken away from us, there is no
longer anything near us, and everything far away is infinitely far. A man
taken out of his room and, almost without preparation or transition, placed on
the heights of a great mountain range, would feel something like that: an
unequalled insecurity, an abandonment to the nameless, would almost annihilate
him. He would feel he was falling or think he was being catapulted out into
space or exploded into a thousand pieces: what a colossal lie his brain would
have to invent in order to catch up with and explain the situation of his
senses. That is how all distances, all measures, change for the person who
becomes solitary; many of these changes occur suddenly and then, as with the
man on the mountaintop, unusual fantasies and strange feelings arise, which
seem to grow out beyond all that is bearable. But it is necessary for us to
experience that too. We must accept our reality as vastly as we possibly can;
everything, even the unprecedented, must be possible within it. This is in the
end the only kind of courage that is required of us: the courage to face the
strangest, most unusual, most inexplicable experiences that can meet us."
[etc]

From Rilke - Letters to a Young Poet. To continue reading:
[http://www.carrothers.com/rilke8.htm](http://www.carrothers.com/rilke8.htm)

~~~
kordless
Just be sure to make a backup of your brain before you let your brain invent
those fantasies. It'll be OK.

------
aq3cn
I know a similar story from a documentary of a naturalist guy named Richard
Louis "Dick" Proenneke. He lived in Alska for more than thirty years. His life
there is equally inspiring because he never stopped learning and honing his
skills.

[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0437806/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0437806/)

[http://www.aloneinthewilderness.com/](http://www.aloneinthewilderness.com/)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2-ms5OZKC4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2-ms5OZKC4)

~~~
whak
Dick Proenneke is such an inspiration. My band even wrote a song about him.

[https://open.spotify.com/track/6IwW64zdcdAKdimJRRKjV1](https://open.spotify.com/track/6IwW64zdcdAKdimJRRKjV1)

------
ayushgta
A book titled "Essays After Eighty" by Donald Hall:
[https://www.amazon.com/Essays-After-Eighty-Donald-
Hall/dp/05...](https://www.amazon.com/Essays-After-Eighty-Donald-
Hall/dp/0544287045)

~~~
pliu
I've just started "The Best Day the Worst Day: Life with Jane Kenyon" after
discovering the authors work here. I had to take a break after the first
chapter, it is intensely sad. I don't have the right vocabulary to describe
his writing. This man truly loved his wife.

[https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B003JTHWIC](https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B003JTHWIC)

------
devuo
How wonderful those twenty years must have been.

------
no1name
They had such an amazing life! They were completely dedicated to their work.
They attained a perfect equilibrium where, by perfectly complementing each
other, they managed to focus on their work. The other spouse was never a
hindrance in one's work. Such a rapport is so hard to achieve. Nearly all
couples are bogged down by some form of family issue (raising kid, problematic
relatives etc.). In fact, he faced similar issue in his first marriage which
ultimately broke down. It would be so beautiful to have a partner like that.
Coming from a third world country where 'starting a family' (which definitely
includes having kids) is everything, I am extremely lured by this prospect as
I know how difficult it is to achieve here.

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erikb
Independent of our preference for soltitude we can miss a person in our life,
or the abstract concept of that idea. It's not really exclusive.

For instance I can sit in my living room, happy that no unknown people are
around me, while at the same time missing to be with that special someone.
Maybe being with other people would reduce that feeling of emptyness, but more
likely than not it would just be irritating.

I don't like the word lonely. Neither does it express what one actually misses
(parents? lover? just not being alone in the room?) nor does it really tell
the truth. What he has should be called something like withoutherness, not
loneliness.

------
DomreiRoam
"Un seul être vous manque et tout est dépeuplé" Lamartine, L'isolement

One person is missing and the whole world is deserted.

------
9935c101ab17a66
Documentary about Donald Hall & Jane Kenyon at their New Hampshire farm:

[https://vimeo.com/33656887](https://vimeo.com/33656887)

