Aloneness and Companionship

I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude.

Henry David Thoreau, Walden, or Life in the Woods

Is that bad to be in a state of being alone? It might be bad when aloneness makes someone experience a powerful feeling of emptiness and isolation. Does aloneness provoke the emptiness feeling? Does everyone feel lonely only when he/she is alone? That is not necessarily correct. It is often said that it is possible to feel alone in a crowd and this is true. So, aloneness is possibly apart from feeling alone and lonely. If aloneness is viewed objectively, it probably means to survive alone. It probably becomes mode of life.

What is aloneness as mode of life? Aloneness is an isolation of heart and mind with others. Perhaps, other people don't understand what is going through deep inside of a person. They don't understand why somebody could live in that way. But, that person has conviction to live the life inside of him/her. It means that he/she doesn't live the life projected by people to him/her. There is a fundamental difference between lonely and being alone or aloneness, because everyone may be found to posses self-concern, self-occupation that has to be fulfilled, and this is the outstanding feature of human behavior. 

Sometimes, it can be seen that the whole activity of human is self-centered. People keep thinking about themselves endlessly, and they must improve themselves. Self-concern motivates all activities. The self becomes supremely important with the idea of self-improvement. Being alone can be experienced as positive, pleasurable, and emotionally refreshing if it is under the individual's control. Aloneness is the state of being alone and secluded from other people, and often implies having made a conscious choice to be alone.

There is no sad or lonely emotion connected with the absence of others. One needs to be completely alone in this situation, and such aloneness certainly does not mean isolation, it does not mean building a wall around oneself. On the contrary, this means one is not alone but represents consciousness. 

Does aloneness mean seeking the way by your own? Doesn't he/she who seeks the way by him/herself easily get lost? Remember that subjects are social in their very origin! They take their meaning and value and self-image from their identity groups, from their activities in society. So, it means that everybody belongs to the society. The voice of the society will still echo.

The problem is there are some people who might live in bad neighborhood. All voices from people around are rubbish. They see that an individual who has a lot of friends and luxurious possessions is a great person. So, anybody might try their best to get those and forget what is essential for him/her. 

Does it mean that person who chooses aloneness as mode of life must live in a bad circumstance? How about lust, ambitious, selfish, or running away from reality? Aloneness, in one sense, describes a moral, political, economical, or social view that stresses human independence and the importance of individual self-reliance and liberty. Aloneness promotes the fulfillment of individual goals and desires. The intense desire or craving for self gratification is lust or ambition. It opposes most external interference with an individual's choices, whether by society, the state, or any other group. If someone opposes interventions from people around, can he/she judge himself/herself for something he/she does whether it is wrong or not? Someone who doesn't care of somebody else's opinion tends to be selfish. A person who refuses to interact with others because he/she perceives possessing the most superiority ethics or intellect is also commonly believed as an arrogant. He/she wishes to only relate to individuals considered worthy of his/her time and attention. 

Moreover, dependence is not necessarily unhealthy since human is naturally social creature. However, the problem comes when people who know a person, and then deliberately leave that person out of their company, it is quite likely that there is something wrong, either in them or in the person (or, most likely in both). Being alone is taken to imply being unacceptable. Is that right that person who lives the aloneness is being unacceptable by people around? 

Sometimes, although there is a practical advantage that people working as a team can more easily achieve things, but not necessarily for the deepest individual goal and individual satisfaction. That would be easier for pursuing self-determination when in the state of being alone. Someone who chooses aloneness entering into society to further his/her own interests, or at least demands the right to serve his/her own interests without irritating others. This is not merely selfish of course as long as it doesn't harm others.

Each human being comes into the world alone, travels through life as a separate person, and ultimately dies alone. Coping with this, accepting it, and learning how to direct his/her life with some degree of grace and satisfaction is the natural human condition which provides self ownership. This is the condition where an individual has the exclusive moral right to control his or her own body and life. What is the contribution of person who develops self ownership toward his/her society?

Indeed, a powerful society can be established when the individuals as the members of the society are people who have strength to fulfill their own self-determinations, people who have purposes that have to be accomplished to develop their self-improvements. Individual liberty leads to economic efficiency and other benefits. So, social welfare will be easier to create.

Nevertheless, in the other side, individual liberty can be really deteriorating and devastating a society or even endangering a nation. It provokes the anarchism which favors no governmental constraints at all, based on the assumption that rulers and laws are unnecessary because in the absence of government individuals will naturally form self-governing social bonds, rules, and customs. 

It is the notion of maintaining that all persons are the absolute owners of their own lives, and should be free to do whatever they wish with their selves or properties, provide to allow others the same liberty. It is being completely free in action. The ultimate right is possessed by individual, and that compromises one necessarily endangers the rest. If individual right grows into political action, it will consider being tyranny by the majority, which emphasizes the threat of the majority to impose majority norms on minorities, and violating their rights in the process. 

Anyway, that doesn't necessarily happen if each individual glorifies moral. Moral will lead each individuals to achieve whatever their God-given talents which would allow without interference from arbitrary forces like government. It will prohibit violating others as well, since vandalism is immoral. It constitutes the freedom to do everything which injures no one else. 

Aloneness could be positive and constructive state of engagement with oneself. Aloneness is desirable, a state of being alone where you provide yourself wonderful and sufficient company. This is a time that can be used for reflection, inner searching or growth or enjoyment of some kind like experiencing the beauty of nature. It suggests peacefulness which means enjoying the quiet and whatever it brings. However, it is not the end. When capacity to resist distractions is achieved, a person could become less sensitive to distractions and more capable of maintaining mindfulness and staying inwardly absorbed and concentrated. 

What does the company mean for a person who lives the life in aloneness? Is friendship or companionship no longer essential when someone has found happiness, peacefulness, and greatness by his/her own? Is aloneness beneficial for others instead of person who lives through it? 

Does friendly relationship always bring happiness? How if you are happier when you are alone? How if your companions never support you? If your companions always say something good to you even you are in the wrong path, are they nice or bad? In the other hand, there is possibility that someone loves his/her families, lover, companions, and like being with them, but deep in his/her heart, he/she realizes that there is a place where he/she has to live all alone. If it is true, so an individual doesn't have to be socially related with his/her companion. But, can you call someone as your companion if you do not talk each other or spend time together? What are the attributes of togetherness and companionship?

A common form of togetherness or companionship is an attempt to avoid aloneness, being alone is taken to imply being unacceptable, and so being with other people (without them trying to avoid you) is seen as a sign of being joyful. Nevertheless, how if someone finds the opposite, joyful feeling is reached in the state of being alone?

If companionship seems developing the happiest and most fully joyful moment in human life, someone in the state of being alone who feels the same way, can be said establishing companionship. Happiness is an emotional that is characterized by feelings of enjoyment, pleasure, and satisfaction. Whatever the condition, whether you are having companion or not, as long as you feel well employed and overwhelmed by pleasure, it is considered as being in a companionship. 

If companionship is fulfilled in the state of being alone, does it mean that companion is enemy who can block a person from getting happiness? Deep concentration and imagination is a solitary occupation. Family, companion, and society are the natural enemies. Someone must be alone and uninterrupted if he/she wants to sustain and complete meditation. Relationships are not necessarily healthy. There can be no companionship unless there has been some attraction to draw the people together. People pretend to respect each other, but deep in their heart, they despise his/her companion. It obviously constitutes hypocrisy. A person who pretends to feel virtues toward other people values, beliefs, principles, etc., that he or she actually condemns those is a hypocrite. He/she shows actions contradict their stated or internal beliefs. 

Is companionship only hypocritical matter? Where do things called understanding, sincere, faithful, trust, love, and affection go? In the other hand, person who tries to live alone will not succeed as a human being. His/her heart withers if it does not answer another heart. His/her mind shrinks away if he/she hears only the echoes of his/her own thoughts and finds no other inspiration.

Nevertheless, in the self own quietness, someday, he/she might cry, 'I am alone!" If someone thinks that he/she might be better to be alone with his/her own aloneness and rejects companionship, it despises others. The anguish of individual justice and wisdom toward others can be something that despises him/her in the following time. 

Human being is social creature in his/her nature. Human shows affection, love, care and shares understanding. People who live in their own imaginations and wish to only relate to individuals they consider worthy of their time and attentions are arrogant and sick. Companions help each other when they are in trouble. Companions are people that can be looked up to and trusted. Companion encourages his/her best friend to make the right choice. People around are companions, they are not enemies that have to be avoided.

Note: The passage above is the conclusion of my paper (“Representing Aloneness and Companionship in Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, or, Life in the Woods by Deconstructing the Text”).  Deconstruction approach is also known as post-structuralism and sometimes post-modernism. This approach is interesting because when I try to figure out the true meaning of something, I end up finding nothing and lost. Let’s get lost then. It’s fun though. I can never imagine the facts popping up in the middle of my finding and those indeed enrich and broaden my horizons. The last but not least thanks for reading!