Italian
An invitation to rediscover the value of solitude as an exercise in inner freedom, amidst reflection, art, and nature, to find oneself beyond the noise of sociality
ITALY – There is a quality of living that we too often forget. From birth, we are immersed in the world of sociality. We are welcomed by smiling faces, kind voices, unimaginable attentions in a world we approach and find already so crowded.
School teaches us to be in a group, to accept groupness as a biological necessity. Education is realized through this foundational principle of learning. We learn together with others.
The challenges we must overcome see us as spectators and actors, always together with others. We do nothing without others; even play, which becomes an important form of learning, teaches us to give and respect rules, because what is ours must be shared.
The child’s “it’s mine” is taken as an act of selfishness and possession. Adults constantly bring us back to the we and our. It is true, we exist in relation to others. “Je est un autre” is the phrase by the poet Arthur Rimbaud which, according to the interpretation of the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, signifies the necessity of the other to exist. “I is another.”
There is no individual in their singularity without the experience that the other has of them. The gaze of others observes and judges us, and we perceive ourselves as the other sees and perceives us. We are faced with a reflecting mirror that we cannot do without.
However, we must learn to appreciate solitude. The other is not with us; rather, they hinder our need to return to being “me”.
The same Rimbaud, in his poetic masterpiece The Drunken Boat, cries out that he can no longer endure this navigation surrounded by threatening waves of horror and pain.
Here solitude comes to our aid. Isolating ourselves to live means leading us to a safe harbor, anchored safely in calm waters.
When in the solitude of restful sleep, in the reading and listening to nature and art, in wandering aimlessly, in the gathering of prayer, we find ourselves, without others, we experience the pleasure of no longer having to be and to do.
