Solitude

Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing.

Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness:

So on the ocean of life, we pass and speak one another.

Only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Many people suffer from the fear of finding oneself alone,

and so they don’t find themselves at all.

Rollo May

We live, in fact, in a world starved for solitude,
silence, and private:

and therefore starved for meditation and true friendship.

C.S. Lewis

What a commentary on civilization,

when being alone is being suspect;

when one has to apologize for it, make excuses,

hide the fact that one practices it -

like a secret vice.

Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Each of us is alone in the world.

It takes great courage 

to meet the full force of your aloneness.

When you face your aloneness,

something begins to happen.

Gradually, the sense of bleakness changes
into a sense of true belonging.

This is a slow and open-ended transition

but it is utterly vital in order

to come into rhythm with your own individuality.

John O’Donohue