Loneliness or Solitude

What is the difference between solitude and loneliness?

If you google, you would get the following reply.

”Here’s a great quote by Hannah Arendt about the difference between solitude and loneliness: “The lonely man finds himself surrounded by others with whom he cannot establish contact or to whose hostility he is exposed.” The solitary man, on the contrary, is alone and therefore “can be together with himself.”

ā€˜All manā€™s miseries,ā€™ wrote the French mathematician Blaise Pascal, ā€˜derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room aloneā€™.

ā€œThere is robust evidence that social isolation and loneliness significantly increase risk for premature mortality, and the magnitude of the risk exceeds that of many leading health indicators,ā€ according to lead researcher Holt-Lunstad.

Increased levels of cortisol, a major stress hormone, as well as higher vascular resistance, which can raise blood pressure and decrease blood flow to vital organsā€¦ [and] the danger signals activated in the brain by loneliness affect the production of white blood cells; this can impair the immune systemā€™s ability to fight infections.

I always felt that loneliness can be cut down to a great extent if you had local or even on line friends with similar interests.

I being a poet and fiction- writer enjoy talking about art and literature for example on line. I also love to play chess and word- games.

Some of you may like to discuss cooking, films, old songs, dramas etc.

Sites such as ours are in fact doing a yeoman- service in helping people get together.

Let me kindly know what do you think about the subject?

Recommend0 recommendationsPublished in Senior Health

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Responses

  1. I think you can be alone without being lonely. You have to be enough for yourself, at peace with yourself.
    There is a poem and a part of it says
    Be faithful to yourself and to others, then the narrowness is wide enough.
    I think if we are busy with our minds we shall never be lonely

  2. Loneliness and Solitude the same in so much as they refer to the state of feeling alone but one is chosen and one imposed. Loneliness is a bit different in that people can experience a sense of loneliness while being in a crowd although could that be more alienation than loneliness? You rightly point out Abhilaaj, that there are lots of research papers just now on loneliness, they point out that loneliness is a contributing factor for mental and physical illness, stating the obvious in my opinion. Could also be a factor in some kinds of crime too I say. In Western countries loneliness is endemic amongst older people, most often these lonely elders are the collateral damage of highly mobile societies, families split by long distances. Modern architecture with homes built too small to accommodate extended families. Different generations have fewer occasions to socialize together these days, church is rejected, pubs closing, life is changing. These older people feel cheated of a family life and perhaps do not have the funds or energy to chase up a social life.This is tragic and so easily, as studies show, leads to depression etc.
    Not that loneliness is confined to the elderly by any means, college students can be hit and there are alarming suicide numbers of young lives wasted. It is also true that some people are lonely for a reason, their social skills are fractured, they repel others in some way or they are just too difficult or they are takers rather than givers. I mean they do not give of them selves, we all all know the kind of person that you could know for 30years and know them no better at the end of that 30yrs. than you did in the first month. The person who you are with for an hour and they drain you.These people absorb your energy and give nothing back, Then there are those people who have the reverse effect……you leave them feeling energized, they are the givers. None of these lonely people chose to be like this they just are.
    Solitude, is also a state of being alone and solitude could be imposed, if you were a prisoner for example.Torturers know well the power of solitary….it amplifies fear, dehumanizes it plays with the mind confronting it’s self, opening it to brain washing or suggestion. How ever I chose to think of solitude as a sense of balance within life. Happy is another of these concept words, ask someone…are you happy? perhaps you can only recognize your own happiness in the the past and the components of a state of happiness are different for each person. I like to be alone in my garden or out in nature somewhere feeling at one with the universe. Or being alone with an art project I’m working on it and everything is going well…….I don’t make a wrong move, my brain seems to be on automatic, time has no meaning, it is totally absorbing.
    We have to learn to accept solitude it is refreshing and restorative and you can learn this . Thanks Abhilaaj.

  3. I am usually alone. I am never lonely. There’s far to much going on around me for me to bother even considering loneliness.
    Observation is the key I find. Everything takes a back step to observation.

  4. I must admit I have never felt lonely either, I thought I might have when my marriage broke up after 30 years, but I truly didn’t. I luv the peace and solitude of being by myself in this overcrowded world, and seeing as I still drive trucks and often get caught up in all the traffic mayhem on our overcrowded roads, there is nothing better than a walk to a secluded beach, cliff top,. or river bank,. and watch the world go by…without me ! ,… to restore my spirit !

    Unspoilt by Progress !.. ( here)

  5. Oh thank you, I can speak a few phrases of Punjabi, but don’t know how to write them down , I used to work with some Punjabi Ladies back in the 70s, and picked up a few words etc. if I were to say to you,.. Its a nice day . I would say ..aaj atcha dineh hey ,.. if you can understand the sounds from my writing.

    Changa Munda eh ! ( grins)

  6. I am going to post an explanation here From a respect Psychology Magazine.
    One interesting thing is that solitude can lead to self-awareness.

    What Is Solitude? | Psychology Today
    https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/articles/200307/what-is-solitude
    Jul 1, 2003 – Loneliness is marked by a sense of isolation. Solitude, on the other hand, is a state of being alone without being lonely and can lead to self-awareness. … From the outside, solitude and loneliness look a lot alike. Both are characterized