Being Alone
I’ve spent stretches of my life feeling very alone. And I have actually been alone at certain times and places. When I have chosen that, I relish in the time and the recuperation I receive from being alone. When the negative alone happens to me, it’s because I want something else to be true, not what is.
I will go to movies by myself because, like reading a book, I want to immerse myself in the story. I’ve always been one of those who enjoy books and reading, and nowadays one can also listen or watch the book too.
The choices now of how to experience the story and learning are awesome! I don’t typically socially read, so to speak, so if I want to specifically see a story; I go alone. If I want to share a story with someone, I will go with others. I feel equally buoyed up either way.
I will go on drives alone with no particular place to be. My favorite is at night. Just because of the driving; with the hum of the car in the darkness sprinkled with lights on the horizon outside. A snowstorm happening while driving at night is an added benefit to me.
To add the falling snowflakes revealed by my headlamps as they fall through the light. The particles sometimes hitting my windshield like a silent pinging. The snow seems to envelope my car. It’s as if I'm in a bubble of self, space and time. It turns into a really zen place for me and has even been cathartic before.
I discovered this mobile zen space one night after work as a teenager. I wasn’t ready to go home and I had a lot about a boy on my mind. I took a freeway and just drove. As the day fell to night I felt the settling of peace fall through me too.
As the city lights and then stars twinkled in the dark, the calm and zen ‘ness’ grew. Then when the snow first tenderly, then with growing ferocity seemed to beat hard against my windshield; I felt renewed, protected even peaceful. It was marvelous, driving at night in my car has been such a boon to me ever since.
I will go on work assignments away over several nights, so after work, my activities are mine alone. I’m around just myself and perhaps strangers who don’t know me at all. It’s even a break at work, from typical work because it's with unknown people and doing different tasks in a new environment.
It feels good. It is pleasant to me and it's sometimes even rejuvenating. Each of these examples are enjoyable moments and refreshing aloneness, unless I don’t want it to be so. These same places and experiences can be frustrating and cause hopeless lonely feelings simply because I want to either be alone or not and the opposite is true.
Often, when I’ve felt alone, it's not necessarily because I am alone. It feels worse when I am around people and still feel that aloneness. This type of alone feeling is painful in the soul, it’s conscious of disconnection with those in my space or environment.
That is very lonely indeed. It seems to be emphasized in the presence of others with whom I’m not connecting, much like at a party and not enjoying being with anyone at the party, or like watching a sports event with others and it's as if I am watching it individually.
It’s the most profound for me when I'm somewhere or doing something with my family. And yet I’m feeling like I am not in sync with, noticed by, nor connecting with whatever they are participating in seemingly together, but not including me. Being the only female in my family at the moment is its own kind of autonomy, and sometimes loneliness.
My boys joke and laugh with and tease their Dad. It’s beautiful and heartwarming to watch. The bond over some ridiculous joke or some food they are sharing. It’s not anything against me, their mom and wife, but when I want to be there and am not, it feels very lonely in my own family at that instant.
My husband and children are all guys. I am the sole gal. I’m feminine but not super girly or prissy as I understand the words. I’m pretty sure it's mostly this fact. I’m also sure that I also have triggers that help me create more of it than would be there without triggers.
And then there are the times I choose aloneness over being part because of the desire not to deal, or dislike of the ‘whatever’, or needing the time to chill alone in my own juices. When I want to be alone it’s great and when I want to feel connected with my family or friends or whomever it’s also great.
When I don’t want to and I am or when I want to and it’s not there, it’s not great; in fact it is literally the opposite. It’s interesting how the precise exact behavior or outcome has such completely opposing products in me. The difference being if I want it and if the others are actually doing things to exclude me on purpose.
Being alone is so much more deep than being ‘good or bad’. It’s more of a product of whether life is going as wanted and expected as opposed to being the actual the physical presence of others.
