Take a Walk In the Park Day - Live Deliberately: Experiencing Solitude
Today is Take a Walk in the Park Day. This isn’t exactly
about a park, but since I have 15 acres in the mountain of my own, I like to
take walks there. This is from my book Life in 20 Square Feet: The Essays.
It’s a collection of essays from my tiny house blog that includes a series I
did on living more deliberately.
September
9. 2013
Today's installment of the Live
Deliberately series focuses on the idea of solitude. Solitude isn't a perfect
word for what I mean. Rather, I suppose, it’s more a “quietness.”
Before we moved into our tiny house I was someone who needed constant external
stimulation. I would watch TV and surf the internet at the same time. When I
was working I needed the radio on in the office or I would go out of my mind
with the silence. I was ready to move into the tiny house but I wasn't sure how
separating myself from the noise would look like. In any case, I was going to
throw myself into the woods and see what happened. Instantly, everything
changed. Our house is on a mountain pretty far from even our closest neighbors.
We are surrounded 356 days a year by the seasons and suddenly I realized that
this connection to silence was the very thing I was missing in my life.
As I have mentioned, tiny living was a platform to change our lives.
Silence and meditation aren't included in most tiny house building plans and
you don't need it to be a bona fide tiny house dweller, but I'll tell you that
it can't hurt.
In my own solitude, I found a deep
well of creative inspiration that wasn't able to be heard over the noise of my
previous life.
Solitude and silence don't have to have a spiritual or religious overtone, but they
can. Silence is something that can be very personalized for you and your own
journey.
In many ways, this kind of quiet solitude goes hand in hand with the simplicity
of my new way of living. I can find meditation in my chores or a walk in the
woods. I can work without the radio and I'm surprised at how easily the words
flow.
I can experience this quietness when I am not alone, too. Matt and I have
learned that we don't always need to fill the silence when we're together. We
can simply enjoy each other’s presence.
Are you comfortable in the silence? How can you reach into solitude and find
yourself?
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