Isolation
The Strength in going it alone
The isolation found at the peak of a hike or the damp corner of an abandoned factory, calls to us with different aesthetics but the same whisper. Deep in our daily routine, we are overwhelmed with trying to please friends, family, and colleagues. Although it's not always intentional the sacrifices we make daily, impact our lives and often drain us and leave us in a desert stranded from meaningful fulfillment - in an otherwise bleak existence.
In seclusion, I often find the deepest and loneliest spaces of my psyche. The place where I can love the most, cry the hardest, smile the realist. Leaning into seclusion opens a portal to the soul that can only open ever so often, and the windows close as quickly as they seem to open. Like glancing into a mirrorball you see your life as a fly on the wall. Here is where, the painful memories of a broken heart as a child, or the playback of a relationship skidding to its end without the control of anyone involved lives. The hardest part of reliving our painful past is the feeling of helplessness and not being able to change the outcome.
It's here deeply confined in our emotions that we are weightless - longing, missing something, or someone who floated out of reach. As time passes and everything changes, your past creates a parallel life that is only visible through the rawest part of your subconscious. The beauty and the pain intertwine here like Caduceus as we attempt to negotiate with ourselves on how to proceed through life's journey in knowing what we have left behind and the future most certainly holds our journey in contempt.
Learning to embrace solitude and making time to understand your true self is not for everyone. The rawness and judgment found at the root of your actions would buckle the knees of even the strongest of men. If we’re unable to recognize our mistakes and sit in our pain we have no hope for better days. So, in those quiet, vulnerable moments— whether in a car, under the stars, or in the silence of our thoughts—there lies a courage we often overlook. Even the slightest amount of bravery to sit quietly with ourselves is an important step in the evolution of our darkness.