...solitude...

Octavio Paz once wrote:

Solitude is the profoundest fact of the human condition. Man is the only being that knows he is alone."

I’m the sort of person who needs time by myself. And when I say time, I don’t mean an hour or so, I’m talking a day at least... DAYS even! Because sometimes, one day isn’t enough.

I grew up able to spend hours playing by myself, entertaining myself without the need to have others there to keep me occupied. And in all honesty, I thinks it’s really important for a person to be able to have time to be alone with their thoughts in order to gain clarity and peace of mind. Not to mention, just to be able to do whatever YOU want to do without having to worry about everyone else. Something that we all can have trouble avoiding at times..

Although, in saying this, I also believe that being alone too much can be detrimental to ones need to be stimulated by another.

We all need companionship. It’s human nature. We weren’t designed to be alone for extraordinarily long periods of time. Otherwise we all wouldn’t embark on the life long journey of finding a life partner through a process of elimination.

Sometimes also known as going out for a night on the town, being grabbed at, nearly knocked out by girls who are trying to balance themselves while wearing 6" heals and off their faces and not to mention, my personal favourite, having vulgar comments spat at you as if you were a hooker in St Kilda...

But we all go. We all put up with the comments and expect nothing less every time we go out because really, it’s never gonna change. You meet someone you only associate with because you think their attractive (because come on, it’s not like you have anything else to base your opinion on), you get talking, you might make out and the next morning, whether you admit it to yourself or anyone else, you can’t really remember exactly what they look like... And then sometimes you stay in contact and meet up again and it works, or it doesn’t.

And don’t get me wrong, I’m not bitching or bagging it, I just find it so amusing that we all have to go through this, for some every weekend and others every other time they go out..

My question is, what do you do if you are the sort of person who doesn’t like to go out and snog random people in order to maybe pass the test and get a call the next day?

What if you’re someone who’d actually like to have a decent conversation where you not screaming at the other person in order for them to hear you, but then you can’t hear them anyway and so to avoid the horrible awkward pauses you make out...?

How can people expect to not be alone if this is the sort of thing that you have to go through in order to find someone! No wonder it’s a process of elimination!And what if there’s someone you think could be awesome to get to know, but you just can’t think of a way to create a mutual situation in which to do so? Because I know at least 6 people off the top of my head (myself included) that are in this exact position. Its easier to read a persons body language when they’re intoxicated because they lose all fear of rejection and all walls come crashing down and they have a good time. So when you’re not in that environment, how can you figure out whether you’re setting yourself up for failure or not, when you can’t read how the other is feeling?

Do you miss an opportunity that could be great or do you risk potentially ruining the relationship you already have with that person?