Things As They Are: Some Thoughts on Solitude and Loneliness

"The Life of a Zen Master is one continuous mistake."— Dogen Zenji (1200 - 1253).

“There is an ancient peace you carry in your heart and have not lost “

These past few weeks – months even - I’ve had occasion to confront and explore the difficult ideas of solitude, loneliness and transitions. Mine and other people’s.

Some people spend more time alone than others. That’s solitude. Loneliness is when we feel like there’s nothing or no one – even when we are not alone, and often when we go through transitions in life.

We probably have companionship and support during transitions, either from family or friends – work colleagues maybe - because most of us have some connectedness with people throughout our lives in one way or another. But ultimately there comes a time when we are left to face the transition alone. Transitions such as changing or ending of friendships or relationships - perhaps divorce or death - moving, changing jobs - can all create a feeling of loneliness.

“Our language has wisely sensed the two sides of being alone. It has created the word “loneliness” to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word “solitude” to express the glory of being alone.” (Paul Tillich theologian and philosopher)

Maybe some people think its ‘kinda cool’ and Zen to spend time alone. Sometimes being alone – solitude – is wonderful, even necessary, and we try to fit it in if we have a busy life. A couple of hours, perhaps a day, or a longer retreat even. But after a while – and for some people the while is shorter than for others :) - after a while, being alone, not having anyone to share things with, might not feel so good. Humans evolved as social creatures, and all of us can feel disconnected from others if we don't have interaction with people in person.

Which is why people find loneliness so uncomfortable – in themselves - and in others. People tend not to admit loneliness, even though loneliness is part of the human condition and we all experience it at some point in our life. (There are currently more people on the planet than ever before - and paradoxically more loneliness.) Loneliness can have an association or feeling of failure because social media depicts beautiful people with perfect lives and thousands of ‘friends’ or followers. “So what’s wrong with me?”

Loneliness can feel depressing, painful sometimes. Difficult. So it's is not something we’re really going to feel happy to pick at or examine too closely. Our first reaction to feeling lonely is not to sit still, look at it or explore it because there is a feeling of suffering. But that’s part of our practice. “Meditation provides a way for us to train in the middle way – by staying right on the spot. Our practice is about making friends with yourself, with full intention” as Pema Chodron says.

When faced with difficult feelings, we often run fast in the opposite direction and get busy with whatever our favourite distraction is – a glass of wine, shopping, online gaming, going out somewhere, picking up a phone, checking Twitter. Distractions. Which is why we hardly know ourselves.

But once we get comfortable with the idea of ‘staying on the spot’, there’s something really magical about sitting with difficult things, because often when we sit with difficult things, looking at it isn’t as scary as we first thought it would be. And when we sit long enough, we can "let thoughts come and go as if touching a bubble with a feather. This discipline prepares us to stop struggling and discover a fresh, unbiased way of being."

Some time ago I had a sense of loneliness – settling into a very remote spot, I had to relinquish a number of things, and shortly thereafter some of my closest friends were moving away. I felt a great sense of loss.

After sitting for a while I noticed my thoughts of loss and loneliness were based around the idea that my life isn’t perfect, it isn't complete, there’s something lacking. And I discovered that behind all my feelings there was a sense of fear and a strong resistance. “This is not what I want, not how I want my life to unfold.” And that struggle was most of my problem. Those thoughts were creating my difficulties. Not the situation. You can’t have peace in your life unless you make peace with imperfection.

The ancient teaching in the Upanishads says:

Life isn’t perfect or complete, and it should not be because imperfection and incompleteness means there’s room for change, room to manouvre and use our knowledge and wisdom to make or create the change we want and the world we want to establish.

From the Upanishadic perspective it is important to remember that we can pursue our ideals, but without hating their opposites. We should treat the opposites and the dualities of life with sameness and make peace with the imperfections of our life. Life is unpredictable.

The Zen masters say: if life is complete, perfect, nothing lacking and you're not making any mistakes, you're not really practicing. Even “A Zen Master's life is one continuous mistake.” — Dōgen Zenji (1200 - 1253).

The point of this discussion is not to discourage us from pursuing our ideals or stop us from seeking perfection, but to suggest that we must seek them without detesting their opposites.

Life is unpredictable and can change in a moment. Sometimes we will feel happy, sometimes not. Sometimes we will feel compassion, generosity, sometimes not. Sometimes we will deal with change well, sometimes not. And we can find great strength in being able to take it all in our stride, taking the good and the bad equally – that is sameness. Things are as they are.

This is the message.