Embracing Solitude and Vulnerability

Hello, welcome to my blog. My goal is to post weekly about issues I find important or commonalities I’ve observed that I’ve found interesting and thought-provoking. I hope you enjoy and hopefully think about everyday occurrences in a new light.

All right, for those of you who don’t know I am in college (“really? Wow, I remember when you were a little curly haired baby, dancing in your diapers... oh you were so cute, how time flies” yes mom, I agree. Time does fly.) I am constantly surrounded by people, and recently I have noticed something, people hate being alone. Okay, maybe that’s a generalization, but recently I’ve started paying attention to other people in public and it is a rarity to see people by themselves. Walking to class, or getting food, I walk past so many groups of people. Friends laughing and talking, how great. In the dining halls people will wait for one another before sitting down so that they don’t have to be seen sitting by themselves. Just the other day I was (ironically) waiting for my friend in one of our dining halls and I took a moment to look around… wait sorry to disrupt the story, but it’s important to note that I enjoy spending time by myself, and I’m comfortable with it, (especially because it gives me time to people watch and I really enjoy people watching). Ok, continuing the story… so I was in one of the dining halls and I looked around and I noticed that besides myself there were only two other people in that hall that were sitting by themselves! Two!! Out of like the 50+ people in the room, three people were alone. That’s not all, out of the three people sitting alone in the dining hall, I was the only one who didn’t have headphones in and using his/her phone! Wow!!! This made me think: why? Why are people so uncomfortable with being alone? Why do they have to distract themselves from the fact that they are alone, by acting as though they are occupied? And I think I’ve (partially) figured it out. People fear seeming vulnerable. It’s somewhat of a social pressure, I mean if you’ve seen any 90s teen movie, you’d know that being alone is usually a connotation for being weird and a freak. And by being alone, people believe that they stand out as… well lonely. As if being lonely is the worst thing in the world. Well I have good news for you! Most people will not give a hoot if you are eating lunch alone or not, because they are too focused thinking about themselves and their image (we, as humans, are pretty egocentric, aren’t we?). Now that I’ve noticed it, I can’t stop. It’s like when someone is giving a presentation and you notice that they say “um” as an audible pause and then that’s all you notice for the rest of the presentation.

That being said, I think it’s important to spend time alone. It gives you time to find out more about yourself. Don’t get me wrong, it can be really awkward at first. I remember the first time I went to the movies by myself (because my friends were either busy or not interested in seeing the movie) and I felt very uncomfortable. I felt as though everyone was scrutinizing me, judging me, thinking that I was a lonely loser. I realize now that in fact nobody cared, or even paid attention to me (I, myself, suffer from egocentrism at times). And to be honest it is still one of the best movie experiences I’ve had, mostly because I didn’t have to worry if the people I was watching the movie with were enjoying themselves, but also because I was able to take my time after the movie and walk around (the oh so luxurious) downtown Bremerton. Since that experience I try to spend (conscious) time by myself, to do something I enjoy while being disconnected from social media, at least once a week.

So now I challenge you: Try taking yourself out on a date, whether it’s dinner and a movie, or taking an evening stroll. Take some time for yourself, do something you enjoy. People watch (it’s more fun than it sounds). And don’t worry, while you might feel like everyone is watching you and thinking that you’re a lonely loser, I can assure you that people probably do not (egocentrism, if you haven’t guessed).

As the great President Obama once said, “Ella, out.” *mic drop*