For the few
Thoughts on Loneliness
Hi friends,
Here is a short essay I wrote after a late night sulk about a late writer who I connected with.
TL;DR: A positive reflection on feeling lonely despite seeking solitude.
There's certainly something to the idea that we, in the West, champion individuality while discreetly selling our souls for some semblance of connection with someone else.
-Okori
Very recently, I had a sort of deep epiphany.
The epiphany being that in some deep way, I feel incredibly alone. Ironically, I never really understood what people meant when they said that they feel lonely. I've always thought that was weird. To me, being alone, solitary, or independent was always our primary mode of existence.
Of course, we're all part of something, some family, class, race, organization, group, etc., but I always thought that you have to be "you" before you can be a part of anything. (There's a clever counter-argument to this that most of you will pick up on quickly). I’ve come to see that it’s probably far more nuanced than that.
Anyways, I've always been pro-independence. I encourage those close to me to live their own lives, for them and not me or anyone else. I make it a point to do what I want to do and am deeply upset when I feel like I'm capitulating to someone else's dream/desire.
To some extent, I think that this desire for independence is some attempt at being comfortably and forthrightly alone. If I had to be alone then i better be “good” at it. I never grew up thinking about a partner, never took any friendship for granted, as something that will last forever. I very much saw all of these things as very valuable attachments, for which I'm deeply appreciative but not wholly attached to. Fortunately, I’ve been able to foster deep platonic and romantic relationships - although this hasn’t been straightforward.
I read & write for many reasons: to be articulate, to better myself, to have fun, to understand people a bit more, but also to feel seen. I feel like a lot of people, at the end of the day, want the same thing - we just don't all agree on how to get it.
Independence is for the very few; it is a privilege of the strong
- Nietzsche, Beyond Good & Evil
The artwork for “For the few” is intentionally ironic. There’s a lot of people in the picture. The idea is that we’re all alone in this together, unable to recognise ourselves in each other.
I think that’s what’s so funny about it all; to the degree that we feel we’re all alone, and uniquely ourselves, we’re just like everybody else. I think that we’d see this better if we spoke to each other more.
Not to say that we aren’t unique, in both our properties and problems, but just that there’s vastly more overlap between, and proximity to, us than we think that there is.
- 2:06AM, Notes
Hope that made you think
-O