The solace of solitude by Mark Flores Im just sick of ego, ego, ego. My own and everybody elses.

Im sick of everybody that wants to get somewhere, do something distinguished and all, be somebody interesting. Its disgusting. - J.D. Salinger, Franny I think we should reconsider solitude. Some philosophersbut particularly the advocates of collectivism, like Aristotle, Hobbes, and Marxand the public in general, view solitude with a stigma. Solitude, for them, is something bad. It is immediately perceived negatively and the state of being alone is often seen as a pitiable condition. When you are alone, people would think that something is wrong with you. Its like wearing a help me sign on your head, especially if you are alone on circumstances that you are expected to be with other people. And you are almost always expected to be with other people. And that is why solitude is also seen as a punishment, as in the case of solitary confinement, ostracisation, or excommunication. And because of all those stigmas, confusions and misconceptions about solitude happen, and, I believe, it is all caused by the identification of solitude with loneliness, thus making the state of being alone as something lonely. But solitude is different from loneliness, and identifying solitude with loneliness is a mistake. For loneliness is the sadness that a man feels when he is alone, while solitude is the happiness that youd feel when you are alone. The two are entirely different things. What binds them together is only aloneness. But they are the poles of the state of being aloneon the positive side there is solitude, on the negative lonelinessand thus, the two does not meet. Recognizing the difference between solitude and loneliness is important before we could reconsider solitude. Because if the two would still be misidentified with one another, then the stigma of loneliness would prevail. And thus, let it be clear to us that solitude is not loneliness. Contrary to that, solitude is the psychological opposite of loneliness. Solitude is not bad, it is good. It is not a punishment, rather it is a reward. And what is bad is loneliness, it is a punishment because when you are lonely you are sad, but when you are in solitude you are happy. And being alone does not automatically entail loneliness. Because solitude and loneliness are two different perspectives that you could have when you are alone or when you feel that you are alone. It is a state of mind, not a matter of proximity. But most of the time the common man is inclined to be sad when he is alone because of all the stigmas that society gives to aloneness, hence loneliness. Of course, there is abundance of literature praising solitude and its benefits, but those who denounce solitude are more powerful. The basic thesis of collectivismthat man is better off in the company of his fellow manis largely promoted in cultures and societies, and thus, the possibility of solaces in solitude is neglected.

Also, because of all that collectivist brouhaha, the bad things in human association tend to be disregarded. Human association, they make it seem, only produces good things, and if one feels bad when he is with people, he is considered to be abnormaleither hes a schizoid or someone with social anxiety disorderand no one considers how human association could be bad, too. I mean, human association has its advantages, sure, but it also gives us responsibilities and commitments (like being mindful of the people we are with, or the people near us, which means self-restriction to our freedom) that are, obviously, disadvantages. But because the alternativewhich is solitudeis stigmatized, we are left to just bear with those disadvantages, to just rationalize them, even to overlook them, and to not consider if giving up some of our freedom and individuality is always worth human association. But there is a greater disadvantage in human association, and that is the prospect of evil. For evil happens only when you interact with other people. There is no such thing as evil to ones self, but only evil to other people, because when you deal with yourself you have your own standards, and morality and immorality only begins in the presence of other people. Indeed, humans could help their fellow humans when they are associatedas collectivists would arguebut they could also harm their fellow man at the same time. A mans egoism would not be contented with the mutual benefits of association. To begin with, it is never contented with anything. And thus, behind the mutualist pretences of human association lies an unseen and uncontrolled predatory motive which is seemingly helpful but in reality harmful. If it werent for human association, evil wouldnt happen. But, of course, many things important for our survival would not also happen without human association, yet the point is the downsides of association should also be mentioned instead of being intentionally disregarded. It turns out now that not only do we need to reconsider solitude, we also need to reconsider human association. And the best thinker to guide us in this reconsideration, I think, is the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, whose reflections about life touched both solitude and human association. Schopenhauer exposed the egoistic side of man. Man, according to him, is a manifestation of an ever hungry will which lives and feeds off itself. And thus man, being a manifestation of this will, can maintain himself only by destroying other manifestations of this will, including his fellow men. And that destruction could only happen with association. Solitude, meanwhile, could be one of the most important human endeavours because solitude could liberate us from egoism and the miserable cycle of craving and boredom. For solitude, as I see it, leads us to what Schopenhauer calls the aesthetic perspective, which, at first, temporarily calms and silences the will, but, eventually, further leads us into the denial of the will. And with that perspective, genuine compassion now becomes possible, which stops our feeding off with our fellow man, thus enabling us to rather help our fellow-sufferers without any underlying malice or egoism.

Those concepts were discussed by Schopenhauer in his books On the Basis of Morality, Parerga und Paralipomena, and on The World as Will and Representation, which is his chief work. And thus, using Schopenhauers philosophy, we could reconsider solitude and human association, thereby critiquing the latter and finding the solaces of the former. * On the book The World as Will and Representation, Schopenhauer presented a twofold division of reality. [T]he world is, on the one side, completely representation, Schopenhauer wrote, just as it is, on the other side, completely will. The world as representation is the world that we perceivehence that famous line The world is my representationand we perceive it through the means of sense experience and scientific examination. It is the empirical world, bound in time, space, and causality. But the world as representation is just an appearance, a manifestation, an objectivation, of the other side of the world, the world as will. And the world as will is the inner nature of reality, it is the thing in itself, the noumenonas Kant would have called itbut unlike Kants noumenon, which is unknowable, Schopenhauers will is knowable, or, more accurately, intuitable. For man is not limited with perception and reason, he could also intuit. And according to Schopenhauer, the will, the thing in itself, is the most immediate thing in our consciousness for it announces itself through its various manifestations in our physical and psychological self. My teeth, my hands, my genitalsthey are the will objectified; my hunger, both for food and knowledge, my sexual urges, my drives, my desiresthey, as well as everything else in my mind, are manifestations of the will to life. But the will is a blind will. There is no God to give the will a direction, a rational course of action that would eventually lead to what is good. Rather, the will is directionless, purposeless, and it strives endlessly. And being mere manifestations of this will, everything in the world, including us humans, are affected by its fluctuations. Fluctuations because in order for the will to sustain itself, it needs to live off itself since outside the will there is nothing everything else is just a manifestation of this single will. And because it is a hungry will, internal ruptures essentially happen in the will, and thus the fluctuations those ruptures produces manifests in the wills manifestations, and this causes suffering to those who possess consciousness. Unfortunately for us humans, we posses consciousnessor, at least, the potentiality to be consciousand thus we are consciously aware of the pursuit, anxiety, and suffering that the wills fluctuation causes us. Because of that, human existence is a painful and recurring struggle, characterized by craving and boredom, for the will is insatiable and thus we are also never satisfied, and because of that suffering is the constant thing in life. And man is egoistic. Being a manifestation of the ever hungry will, he is also ever striving for persistence. But he is striving not only for himself as an individual, but more importantly he strives for the human species, the species he belongs to. This is what

Schopenhauer calls the will to lifeand because of this will to life, this will for the preservation and engendering of his life, man seeks to overpower all others. First, hed try to overpower the other and weaker manifestations of the will like animals, plants, and the inorganic parts of nature. Man, being a manifestation of the will, regards everything in reality as constructed for his own preservation. And thus, if the will wishes so, man could also grapple with and overpower his fellow man. From the moment of conception man is already apt to better his competitors, and thus man in his seminal form struggles to swim the fastest to fertilize the egg. And this continues until the man grows old enough for him to find and win his own mate where he could release his own sperm, towards the egg of a woman, which would engender a new man, and collectively a new generation. But before he could retire, he must first take care of his offspring, and that is why man is always seeking for knowledgeso he could better understand the world so he could better use it for his offsprings survival. Although man is not purely egoisticfor he is also, according to Schopenhauer, compassionate and maliciousthe bulk of his motivations is egoistic. In his book On the Basis of Morality, Schopenhauer says only those actions which possess pure justice and philanthropy can count as having moral value. And both justice and philanthropy, Schopenhauer argues, could only happen from compassionthat is, when man is motivated purely by his concern with the well being of his fellow man, or with the alleviation of the suffering of his fellow-sufferers. Now, most human actions might seem to be compassionate, but in normal circumstances, these actions are really egoistic, and theres an underlying selfish motive behind them. This could happen consciously or unconsciously, but most of the time it happens unconsciously, yet nevertheless the egoism remains albeit being veiled with pseudo compassion. And this is because of the failure of most people to view the world as it really is. Their perspective is limited with the world as representation, and instead of seeing this world as a world of appearances, of illusions, most people mistake the world of representation for the world as it really is. Because of that, they see themselves as individuals rather than manifestations of a singularity. Thus, they have this impression that they are the centre of the world, that their own wellbeing is most important, and they are ready to sacrifice everything else, even to annihilate the whole world, in order to maintain their own selves a little longer (for what is a hundred years in the light of eternity?). But the self is an illusion. It is a mere representation. What is real is only the will, but most people do not recognize this. And thus a man whose perspective is limited in the world as representation feels a thick partition between himself and everything outside him. Everyone else is a non-I and he is the I. But if you would view this with respect also to the world as will, you will notice that he is not an I, or perhaps he is, but other people are not non-Is, but an I once more. This is because he, as well as the people around him, and the world and the whole universe for that matter, are all but appearances, manifestations, and objectivations of the will. Yet the common man could not be blamed because to view reality as it really is requires an almost divine enlightenment.

* Let us first return to human association. Having been able to establish Schopenhauers reflections regarding mans egoistic nature, we could now use this to critique human association. While the basic thesis of collectivism remains unchallenged (and, for the record, I do not intend to challenge it), I might rather just add that even though man is better off in the company of his fellow manalbeit the underlying egoismit is not best for him to be always reliant with other people. Because of mans tendency to use and abuse anything and anyone for his survival, you are not sure if someone is really helping you or if he is just seeming to help you but in reality he is luring you into a trap. Niccolo Machiavelli, on his book Discourses on Livy, observes that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature whenever they may find the occasion for it. And thus, while human association could not be totally removed, we must learn not to be dependent on it, and also to lessen it whenever possible, for without association evil and exploitation would not be possible. On the second volume of Parerga und Paralipomena, Schopenhauer wrote a fable which is now known as the porcupines dilemma. According to the story, a number of porcupines huddled together for collective warmth one cold winter day in order to prevent themselves from being frozen. But because they pricked each other with their quills as they got closer, they moved away from one another. But as they move away, the collective warmth which heated them also went away, and thus they returned back and again huddled together. Of course, they would prick each other once more, but this time the porcupines discovered that theres a proper distance where they could not be pricked by their quills while maintaining the warmth. Now, according to Schopenhauer, the same is the case with humans. Men are driven togeth er by the emptiness and monotony of human life; but their many unpleasant and repulsive qualities and insufferable drawbacks, like a porcupines quills, drives them apart. But again there is a proper distance to this, and this is politeness and good manners. Yet, Schopenhauer emphasized that whoever has a great deal of inner warmth of his own will prefer to keep away from society in order to avoid giving and receiving trouble and annoyance. And this is where we could begin to reconsider solitude. Indeed, human associations are unavoidable, but because an alternative exists after alland this alternative is not as bad as it is misconceivedand because human associations are not really that good because of its underlying egoism, solitude could serve as a preventive measure to the dilemma of association. Sure, a proper distance between quills and coldness exists, but it would be better if wed prevent the dilemma from happening in the first place. And that is why Schopenhauer valued having a great deal of inner warmth, so one would not be subject to the evils of his fellow manfor he would rarely, if not at all, need the company of other peoplewhile, at the same time, his fellow man would also not be subject to his own evils. He is still a human after all, equally capable to do evil as any other man, as long as egoism remains to be the dominant motivator of his actions.

Yet albeit being free from the evils caused by other people, a greater evil still exists, greater than the evils caused by association, and this evil would continue to make our lives miserable and will inflict suffering whenever possible. And this evil is none other than the will itself. Because the will, as stated earlier, is an ever hungry will (this hunger, incidentally, manifests in all of nature, particularly in man), the will feeds of itself and thus it is fluctuating, having internal ruptures which are necessary for its survival. This internal rupture places man in a cycle of craving and boredom. And it begins when man would crave for something, say, owning a house of his ownand his cravings are of course also manifestations of the will to life. Now, man would strive for his goal using all the means at his disposal, but while he is still striving for it, while he is still craving, it would have been a sufferable experience because he, at that moment, does not have what he wants. But when he finally achieves what he wills for, when he finally buys a house of his own, he would be happy. But this happiness would only last for a whileand this is a very short whilebecause once satisfied, boredom happens and the negation of suffering ends. Also, at that stage of boredom, man would begin to be dissatisfied with his house, and thus he would crave for a new, bigger, and better house. And the cycle just recurs. Luckily we could escape this miserable cycle. First, we could get away from it temporarily, and that is why Schopenhauer urges us to not always yield to the whims of the will to life. If we exercise the will or are governed by it, we see the world in relation to the will to life, and thus the things we see will make us crave, and suffer if we do not attain them, or be bored after we attained them. So long as our consciousness is filled by will, Schopenhauer wrote, as long as we are given over to the pressures of desires with their constant hopes and fears, as long as we are the subject of willing, we will never have lasting happiness or peace. Our restlessness could only stop if we stop to will, because then we would see things not only as representationnot only as objects which we could manipulate for our survivalbut we would also see things as will. And this non-willing would lead us to viewing things with the aesthetic perspective. This perspective happens when we view things without subjective desires and aims, without the distortions of the will to life, and this would make us see things as they really are. To perceive things aesthetically means to stop considering the Where, When, Why, and Wherefore of things but simply and exclusively consider the What. And, according to Schopenhauer, writers, poets, painters, musicians, and those who produce art in generalif what they produce is really an arthas the capability to make us forget our individuality, to make us a pure, will-less, painless, timeless subject of cognition through their presentation of reality with the least possible degree of subjective distortion, that is, through their presentation of reality almost as it really is. Because artists, for Schopenhauer, already have aesthetic perception, aside from their technical skills, and thus they are able to create intuition-invoking pieces of art which would present not merely the world but the world as it really is.

* And here solitude could help us once again. If you are in the company of peopleeither you are physically proximate to them, or, because of your complicated relationships with the people around you (owing, perhaps, to their and your egoism), theyd make you worry and anxious and even though you are physically alone, they are present in your mindyou are most prone to the fluctuations of the will. This is because the mere existence of other people already gives us responsibilities and commitments which would require us to will, and associating and being involved with them only amplifies our responsibilities and commitments and hence our willing. For example, if you have a family of your own, both your children and your wife would give you husbandly and fatherly responsibilities which would make you crave for a better paying job to be able to buy a bigger house, a faster car, and to be able to send your children to better schoolsall of this being the dictates of the will to lifewhich will lead you willing endlessly, and youd be plunging deeper and deeper into that nihilistic cycle of craving and boredom. And could you ever perceive aesthetically in this case? Could you attain an aesthetic perspective if you are a husband, a father of three, a brother to two siblings, a friend to a dozen other individualsall persons having their own needs and requirementscould you still attain that supposed-to-be liberating perspective with all that associations and involvements? Most probably not. But, if you are alone, if you remain to be engaged with only a few men, and be reserved and inaccessible with as many as you can, and if you maintain your proper distance with the few you are engaged withnow, in this case, without being bothered by the quills of other men, or the prospect that you are bothering other people with your own quills, you are free and thus in a better position to acquire the aesthetic perspective. And by acquiring the aesthetic perspective you would begin to see the world as it really is, and you will also start to realize how everything in the world, including those which make you happy, as well as those which pain you, are mere illusions, representations, appearancesbut that wont happen not just yet. For that comes later, but the point here is you would begin to see the world as it really is. But that is just the initial process because aesthetic perspective is just temporary. Temporary it may be, nevertheless it is a relief. And by being alone, by being in solitude, aesthetic perspective becomes easier. For at least the will is calmed and silenced, even if in just a short while, and an escape from the sufferings of life was proven to be possible. But Schopenhauer says in order to attain liberation from the wretchedness of human life, we should not merely silence our will in a moment, as in aesthetic experience, but forever. And how could that happen? How could we be freed once and for all from the fluctuations of the will and from the inner ruptures of the will to life? It is tempting to say that we could attain this through suicide, for I also thought killing ones self was the only way out. But to commit suicide is not to defeat the will, because if wed commit suicide, Schopenhauer says were just merely allowing

the will to triumph over us. For we would be doing this based on the illusion that our representational self, as well as our representational life, is real. But it is not. It is just a manifestation of the willand if wed commit suicide based on this illusion, we are not freed from the will but instead we just acted according to its ruptures. How could we liberate ourselves, then? Since the aesthetic perspective already gives us relief, the key must be already in it. And indeed it is. To liberate ourselves, we must keep on having this aesthetic perspective, keep on viewing things as they really are, and eventually, as we understand reality (not only the representational aspect of reality but also reality as it really is) we would realize genuinely and permanently what we perceive during an aesthetic experience. We would realize that the world and everything in it, including us, is just a manifestation of the will, and thus everything is from the same will, and reality is just a one singularityand we are all but appearances, manifestations, representations. To achieve such level of enlightenment means to deny the will itself, and with the acceptance that we are that we would finally achieve peace, happiness, and our hearts would finally be at rest. And this is where compassion begins. By genuinely and permanently realizing that we are all manifestations of the single will, our egoism would be removed and we could now go back to the company of our fellow man and treat them without any underlying selfishness but only with pure compassion. For we, at that liberated stage, had already realized that we do not have a self after all, and neither thus our fellow man, for we are them and they are us. The thick partition that separates the I and the non-I disappears and we could now genuinely help our fellow man. And we wouldnt just see them as our fellow manrather, they would be our fellow-sufferers. For we are all suffering. And the suffering of another man is also your suffering, because we all came from a single will from which the suffering comes from. And thus, from solitude, we would acquire the aesthetic perspective, and eventually we would be able to deny the will itself, which would make us capable of compassion, and now we could reassociate with our fellow-sufferers, provide them our amplified inner warmth, and help them alleviate their sufferings, our suffering. 13 August 2013