Solitude should not be synonymous with loneliness.
Loneliness is the feeling someone might have when they feel deprived of their desire for Human affection. The receptive character feels this way when they are alone. The receptive character seeks validation from the outside.
They will crave attention and Love, seek knowledge from outside sources but never develop original ideas, and will have a deep fear of losing connection or approval.
When the receptive character is alone, anxiety and despair follow. This involves obsessive thoughts, detachment and physical effects such as shaking, sweating and chest pains.
Solitude gives you access to the root cause of your anxiety and frustration and allows you to create peace in your life. Until you can find peace with yourself, you can not find peace in the World.
Instead, you are considering solitude as a choice; the conscious choice to reflect and to be at ease with yourself in the absence of activity.
The first thing that solitude addresses is your understanding of thoughts.
If you do feel uncomfortable by yourself, simply being, without distraction, pay attention to the types of thoughts which might arise.
Whatever they might be, the most important thing to notice is the lack of control you have over their presence.
If you constantly distract yourself, or spend too much time with other people, you never truly inspect yourself enough to know that you are not yourself.
Use solitude to regulate your affective states – becoming quiet after excitement, calm after an angry episode, or centred and peaceful when desired.
We are social creatures. Even those who have a deep hatred for the Human race require others for their survival.
If we were to take a child from birth and raise it in isolation, the psychological effects would be profoundly distressing; so strong is our instinctual need for connection and Love.
If we accept the strength of this need for connection, it is not surprising why in the current climate, social media has such a powerful grasp on the way people conduct their lives.
Most of what drives Human aspiration is contingent on a desire for status or connection.
People have always felt the need to be socially accepted, sometimes at the cost of someone else’s social capital.