I quote, therefore I think: The easy insight

And I think:

While Rilke is referring to solitude in his words in his Letters to a Young Poet, he’s also commenting on the busyness of our lives, where we constantly attempt to eliminate pausing for anything, least of all ourselves.

For as long as I can remember, my introverted nature has demanded I remove myself from the world as often as I can, not as a nice-to-have, but as a necessity for my own sanity. Only in my adult years could I articulate how essential being alone is for my well-being, and the world will just have to wait. Does it come attached with the guilt of not doing enough? Almost always. It is still worth taking a pause? Absolutely.

The idea of solitude may sound like a charming and romantic concept, befitting poets and the like, leading lives of leisure in times gone by. And from many, it elicits a sarcastic chuckle or a derisive smirk. In modern times, it is not an easy notion to ponder, and more difficult still to implement.

How easily are we drawn to the easy. But why not? Why even contemplate holding ourselves to the difficult? Why entertain this antiquated notion of solitude when the world wants us on our toes 24/7?

Because a rushed life is not a life well-lived. Because it is in solitude you commune with your self.

We would rather obsess about goals and deadlines, the efficiency of time and motion, the rationale of means and ends, and bow to the almighty god of productivity than carve out time to be with ourselves and tune in.

In a busy life, choosing the easy and convenient is not without trade-offs; we trade our lived experience, and often a sense of self. If this were not true, we wouldn’t find ourselves contending with dissatisfaction or emptiness, or questioning our purpose, as often as we currently do.

If you desire a life well-lived, add in more solitude. And have no fear; if you’re not a poet, or don’t happen to reside near a meadow along a babbling brook, you can still find ways to step away from the world and catch your breath, be in the present moment, and in fact, just be. Do it often, and you might just find life isn’t passing you by, but that you are living it.