Solitude and Loneliness: A Buddhist View

Fostering the capacity to be alone isn’t the same thing as self indulgence or self obsession. It’s learning to hold all that we do, and all that we think in awareness. This awareness is not a neutral, colourless thing. There is something about true awareness or mindfulness which is essentially kindly and compassionate, and loving ourselves in this way is not being weak or limp. With a kindly awareness we can’t go wrong.

Referencing contemporary cultural touchstones such as Into the Wild, the art of Edward Hopper, and the films of Charlie Chaplin, Sarvananda considers loneliness and solitude.

Buddhism suggests that solitude can bring about positive emotion and change. Exploring this idea through personal experience, psychology, and myth, the author shows how facing our essential aloneness can lead us to better understand how we are all essentially connected.

Sarvananda was born and educated in Glasgow, Scotland. He has been teaching classes in Buddhism and meditation for the last twenty years. This is his second book.