Solitude
vs Isolation
Solitude is the insignia of sapience.
The fact that we can have subjective experiences and reflect on them makes us each, essentially, alone.
No matter how well you know that best friend, partner, parent, or any other loved one, neither of you will truly know the other entirely. Not completely. Not ultimately.
You might have a friend with whom you seem to think one another’s thoughts. But do you spend all of your time with them? There is some moment at which the two of you break, and there is mystery in the space between.
But even if you never broke, but were always together, your understanding of one another would only be as strong as the language you could use to represent it — language which is always rippling on the waves of meaning and never capturing it. So many diadems of displaced light which intimate an abyss of suggestion, the idea being always deep beneath.
But we can act as though we know. We can focus on what we do. Religare is one opportunity for folks to intimate oneness — to connect in some form of union in pursuit of the ideal. We relate in practice through ritual — whether that be taking the kids to soccer on Saturday or visiting the Cathedral on Sunday.
The Vedic masters (who Dr. David Klemm likes to say were philosophizing complex metaphysics while the Europeans were still swinging from trees) had all variety of concept for this oneness.
This is now, centuries too late, coming into our culture in the acceptance of yoga and meditation (although in many different shades and consumerist flavors), although it’s important to point out that both Kabbalah in Judaism, and cultic Catholic practices like the Jesus Prayer and the Rosary were doing this sort of stuff before Luther decided to be a prick about everything and break up the monasteries. (Although even Luther had his own sort of “Christian Liberty” which ultimately amounted to a mystical engagement with scripture not unlike the Catholic Lectio Divina.)
And we all know that male dominance messed everything up, too (in the religious context, I actually think the term “Patriarchy” is coherent — in fact, it’s even used by Church Fathers, and you can see it in some of what is sung in the Benedictine tradition).
What to do about all this, and why address it?
As it has been said to me, “we are both finite and infinite beings.” We are limited, but we are also profoundly capable of more. Always already capable of Better.
And Better never comes alone.
But with others, there are challenges. I welcome the new language that has come to us in the era of recognizing “the Introvert” and “the Spectrum.” Ultimately, though, diagnosis can only take us so far, and holds its own form of intellectual bondage.
If you are deeply contemplative and see subtleties in communication that others don’t understand, it hurts. It is isolating and alienating. There is no greater sense of loneliness than when one is around loved ones who cannot understand you.
And if this pain manifests as agitation, you are labeled “mentally ill” and told to go to a psychotherapist (who can help) or to a hospital (which can also help).
But neither therapy nor hospitalization can solve the problem. Medication can make some aspects of it easier. Meditation can help. Surrounding yourself with a diverse group of people (all of whom can see one part of the elephant) can allow you to make some kind of connection and feel less alone, and have at least multiple parts of your consciousness known in a mosaic of partial connections.
But you are still alone. I am audacious in using this second person, and I intend to be.
I use it because, as much as you want to be different from me and not have to associate with this kind of thinking, you are a social primate, Homo Sapiens Sapiens, just as I am. (And, for that matter, I think it’s incredibly useful to also see how we are similar to other types of animals — and even to other types of beings like flowers, insects, and trees.)
As Jeff Tweedy once wrote in a song sung by Mavis Staples “You are not alone.” Even though we are.