The wise ones say that physical solitude, exterior silence, and honest recollection are all morally necessary for anyone who wants to lead a contemplative life, face the truth about themselves, and have clear goals for their introspection and life.
My goals are self-awareness, peacefulness, authenticity, and meaning.
The question for me once I grasped the importance and need I had for solitude was this:
how could I believe that solitude is essential in the midst of lives that are increasing, frantic, angry, and disconnected from almost any spirituality or truth?
As hatred grievance grows, so does my need for a peaceful, even sacred space, to be alone and in peace and safety.
“The truest solitude,” writes Thomas Merton, “is not something outside you, not an absence of people or sound around you, it is an abyss o; it up in the center of your own soul. And this of interior solitude is a hunger that will never be satisfied by any created thing.”
It’s true. I can’t find what I need in 2121 on a computer, a cell phone, or social media. Those are the places where true evil seems to migrate and prosper. They are, in our time, businesses of distraction and dishonesty.
Solitude is everywhere, even in the time of devices. Still, I had to figure out how to create a mechanism that referenced reality, actual space, geography, and physical isolation from the towns and cities and arguments and neuroses and cruelty of human beings.
I started working on this 20 or 30 years ago when I lived in New Jersey.
Since then, my practice of solitude has deepened and grown and integrated into my daily life; it is no longer work or struggle to take the time. I can hardly imagine living without it.
I’ve been in therapy, seen spiritual counselors, read libraries full of books, and taken long walks in the woods. Nothing has helped me more than meditating and contemplating in solitude. Something about liberates truth and vision. I can see reality. I can see what’s important without the clutter, noise, and distraction.
We don’t get enough of it in our world, and we pay a dear price for that. I sometimes think it is driving us mad.
Finding a place to be alone was simpler than I thought; I just had to do some thinking and preparation. But simple isn’t easy.
I knew I had to find at least a room or some corner where no one could find me, disturb me, hear me, see me, reach me or notice me.
I had to consciously and deliberately untether myself from the world and set myself free. I cut loose all the strings and strands and echoes and cards and news of tension that bound me, by sight, sound, experience, fear, and anger to the presence of other men and women.
Once I found such a place, I was content with it; there were excellent and frequent reasons to be taken out of it, even now. Sometimes I have to leave it. I love my space and return to it as soon as possible, and the only thing that will cause me to change it for another place is to move.
My contemplative place on the farm is a soft reclining chair in the living room. In the afternoon, Maria is in her studio. I turn off my phone, but the computer is asleep in the next room. The only thing that will disturb me is UPS or FedEx (they are the world’s most aggressive detectives), and blessedly, they leave their boxes and go.
I often begin my quiet by reading passages from a book (Merton is my guide to contemplation, he was the master of it) or putting on my earphones and listening to music. Then I will sit and listen to the quiet, feel myself heal and gather strength, and begin to see clearly. And close my eyes and dive inward.
There are treasures there, many rewards for coming.
If all else fails and I am traveling, I might find a church; there are almost always caves and eaves of silence in a church.
I remember reading a poem I couldn’t find any longer. Let there always be quiet, dark rooms and corners and soft, dark, shabby cubicles in churches where people can sit or kneel in silence. Let there always be quiet spaces in our homes where people can think and be alone.
The first thing I learned about solitude is that I will never find it or feel it without making a conscious and deliberate effort to remove myself from the desires and grievances and manipulations and cares and attachments of the reality of existence in time and our tortured, fragmented world.
“Do everything you can to avoid the noise and business of men,” Merton wrote. “Keep as far away as you can from the places where they gather to cheat and insult one another, to exploit one another, to laugh at one another, or to mock one another with their false gestures of friendship. Be glad if you can keep beyond the reach of their radios [and cellphones.] Please do not read their advertisements [or bow to their marketing.]
It was good advice, then and especially for now. It has led me to almost every good thing in my life. I don’t know if there is the Kingdom of God or not
But one in a while, sitting in my chair, drinking in the silence, I feel it might be close. It might be in my room.
Jon…
After I moved half a country away from my previous social contacts, I felt as if a stranger. But it was for the best because, as an outsider, I came closest to finding myself.
I found solitude for thoughtfulness by being alone. My favorite places were outside, with nature. But there were no assurances that following visits would produce similar outcomes.
Later, somewhat more grounded, I moved back to more familiar areas. But I never forgot the vivid sensations I experienced as expressions of “nature’s logic,” those forces that could be sensed but not reasoned, related, or shared.
Here are some occurrences I can describe in words, absent their accompanying sensations.
• On a spit of wet sand, I leaned against my car listening as the solo saxophonist riffed to the last glimmers of sunlight setting across the bay.
• Along the rocky, fogbound coastline, a background of dead silence contrasted with the crashing waves. I saw the sand rich with nature’s seaborne gifts: driftwood, jade, and agates so lovely it was foolhardy to select one.
• On the hilltop, a constant wind beckoned the tallest reeds to accede to its force, revealing far below a fleet of forgotten “ghost ships” mothballed after the wars.