Aloneness

A few months ago whilst doing research for one of my posts i came across this really interesting concept,aloneness. I had intended to write about it shortly afterwards but the post got lost in the sea of drafts i have here until i came across it today so here i am finally touching on it.

The article defined aloneness as a feeling of fullness,aliveness and joy of being  even in the absence of the company of other people. With contrast to loneliness,which is the feeling people get when they spend prolonged periods of time on their own,when you are alony (i literally just came up with that),you feel full,satisfied and content in the absence of other people.

Aloneness,again with direct contrast to loneliness,does not entail feelings of estrangement and antagonization from being alone. Instead those feelings are replaced by feelings of appreciation and discernment of the many advantages that come with being on one's own company.

The reason it interested me then was that i had been thinking a lot about relationships and one of the major contributing reason most seem to not work out is because people do not get into them for the right reasons in the first place. Sometimes people,after prolonged periods of not being in a romantic relationship,tend to develop these feelings of intense disaffection and alienation which eventually leads to them dabbling in relationships they were initially not even ready for which always end up in hurt feelings and heartbreaks.

So the whole concept got me thinking what if everyone got to a point where they were comfortable enough in their own company to be able to brush away those nagging feelings of loneliness?What if everyone could get to a point where they get into relationships for the "right reasons" instead of as a measure to combat the loneliness that sometimes come with being in a relationship?How many heartbreaks and hurt feelings would that prevent?

A few months ago i was reading Zen Mind,Beginner's Mind by Shunryu Suzuki and he made this really interesting point about how people develop an ego because we project ourselves as this objective thing to think about which in turn leads the development of an ego,an ego which consequently triggers the side effects of loneliness when it is not satisfied. It is impossible to think of yourself because you are the center of existence.It is improbable for a thing which exists to understand itself in its own realm of consciousness but most people base so much of their self worth on those flawed thoughts. Simply put,thinking of yourself objectively would be like trying to use your eyes to look at your eyes.Impossible right?

The minute we start looking at ourselves objectively is the moment we allow feelings of loneliness to creep in because we are giving our brains an idea of what we think we should be like and how we think people should relate with us. Failure of this happening like how we picture it in our heads leads to these intense feelings of alienation and disaffection.So in essence the reason for feeling lonely is not because you are lonely per se,but because your ego is lonely. If you did not have that ego,being on your own for long periods of time would not bother you so much to a point where you commit yourself to relationships you are not ready for.

The next couple of posts are going to be about how awesome every single one of you is how much you do not validation from anyone to support that fact so i thought talking about aloneness would be a good foundation for that.

As always,leave me a comment below about what you think of this concept of aloneness. Is it feasible or is it just reaching at straws??