The Art of Being Alone

My understanding of this world is that human beings are, in essence, completely alone.

The word ALONE itself reflects this truth — when we connect AL / ALL (everyone) and ONE (a single being), we get “ALONE.” Although it seems as if we live together with others, in the end, we are merely collections of solitary consciousnesses, each experiencing the world only within its own field of awareness.

The traits that shape a person’s character are often not their virtues but their flaws. Many people try to eliminate their weaknesses, yet I believe those very imperfections are what make us human.

When we hold an image of ourselves, we are merely observing fragments of countless waves and identifying a certain portion as “me.”

Both our strengths and our weaknesses might simply be the result of that selective observation. So the differences between ourselves and others are not as vast as we imagine. Even if we try to separate ourselves from others, they often return to us in another form. Our relationships, then, are nothing more than mirrors for deeper self-reflection and understanding.

Even when unpleasant things happen in life, they are ultimately just events—stimuli meant to reveal how our being perceives and reacts within this world.

To clear this game of life—this solitary play we are all engaged in—it is essential to go beyond the basic settings within ourselves. Without anyone telling us to, we develop certain mental habits that define how we think: “This is how things are.” If we can take a step back and observe these fixed ideas from another angle, that shift in perspective becomes the key to truly understanding this solitary play.

If this world is made of black and white, then black exists precisely because white does—and vice versa. They may appear to oppose one another, but in truth, they sustain each other and maintain balance as a whole.

This world, at its root, has no inherent meaning. And yet, because it is meaningless, we strive to expand the possibilities of our own thought.

Each person is a separate point of observation. It is through the existence of others that we come to understand the relativity of our own reality.

Life seems to unfold as if events are happening externally—as if we are living on autopilot—and yet, no matter how we think about it, we are always alone.

Life is like a long dream seen by a single consciousness. Each of us gazes upon the waves of this world from a unique point of observation, and all those observations overlap within one great consciousness. Perhaps, in the end, it is simply the light of the self, changing form and playing with itself.

The world takes shape only when it is observed. We live within the waves we choose to perceive. And even if those waves seem lonely, they are in fact resonating as part of a greater whole.

That is why I wish to watch this solitary play until the very end.