Tien-Jen

We’re born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we’re not alone. – Orson Welles. Our bodies are the home we live in for the rest of our lives. Feeling lonely is feeling unwanted and isolated. Whereas being alone means having no one around. The saying really expresses how we walk on our own solo journey in life. Since I was a child, I was quite a daydreamer, people watcher and prone to losing sense of presence and time. Perhaps it was a form of escapicism. It’s funny how such small things such as dining alone, can cause most people to feel lonely. I feel a peaceful kind of solitude in eating, reading, thinking, cooking, exercising or walking alone.

Spending time alone in silence is the gentle reminder of the company we have. It gives time for reflections, thoughts and memories to unfold. It allows you to understand yourself in more depth and invites you to discover what makes you happy. Truly happy. Not the kind of feeling that one wants to look like they have it all in front of others. Nor is it a superficial, instant gratification or materialistic kind of satisfaction. It’s the pure feeling of being comfortable in ones own company by doing the most simple things. The realisation that we don’t need a lot of things in order to be joyful in our lives. At the end of the day, the relationship with ourselves is one of the most important one of all.

The simple things in life give us the greatest joys. Do you remember when you were a child, the way you could spend hours playing with your toys or digging up the mud. Sometimes it can be anything from a meal or a passing ladybird that makes my day.

Spending time alone relieves stress and anxiety. If I am uncomfortable, it’s easy for me to feel ongoing stress and a need to escape. However, being alone gives me instant comfort. Listening to music, reading a book, drinking a hot chocolate, writing in a diary or simply staring out the window.

Discovering your imagination and creativity. Your inner world is boundless. By discovering more of the world inside of you, will allow you to better understand yourself as a person. It also allows a sense of self in the way that you don’t conform to ideals, but you create what comes from your heart.

You grow a certain confidence in yourself. The more time you spend alone, the more moments you are able to take in order to forgive, make peace and move on. Over the years, the sense of getting to know and understand myself more, makes me far more comfortable in ones own skin.

Thoughts are able to think with more clarity. When we are faced with many opinions from other people, it’s easy to hear different voices of something in that moment. However, time alone often gives us time to think clearly about how we might feel about something.

There is no hiding who you are. When we are in the presence of those we’re close to, we are far more ourselves than when we are with those we don’t. I believe in being yourself, but I will rarely allow someone to know what I’m completely like unless I grow closer and closer to them. Those are the moments I will gradually peel back the layers of my personality.

Silence is a powerful teacher. There is wisdom in the quiet moments. Similar to the way we can feel a certain kind of calmness with a close friend in complete silence, it is the same when we are with ourselves. We learn to breathe and live life one moment at a time, rather than rushing through the noise.

Your happiness ultimately comes from within. Never rely on someone else for your happiness. Being alone is a reminder that your choices, emotions and decisions are only affected by others, if you allow it to. In the end, when you wake up in the morning, you are the decider of a good or bad day.

Art by Carson Ellis