Nietzsche on Solitude

http://www.hermitary.com/solitude/nietzsche.html#

by pmoriarty • 11 years ago

88 37 11 years ago

kfk• 11 years ago

For the first time in many years I found myself in a big group of friends in a new city. Good social life is something I always thought I was missing and now I have it. I realized, though, that my problems are still there. Maybe I had put too many hopes into this, but I am rather disappointed. In fact, lately I came to appreciate again solitude and my alone times. I still think friends should be a top priority in life, but now I also think you need to reserve time to do stuff on your own, it gives you the chance to always try out new things.

thirdsun• 11 years ago

Sure, it's always a question of balance - I enjoy spending time with my friends, but I need frequent and long breaks, which sometimes leads to confusion and misunderstandings ("Why would stay in alone tonight?"). Maybe it's an introvert thing but I'm often surprised when I see people that need other people around them constantly and rate time spent alone as wasted.

TeMPOraL• 11 years ago

I couldn't put my finger on the phenomena until I read that comic one day: [0]. It's about energy generation and expenditure - extroverts gather their energy from human interaction, introverts have to expend it on those social moments.

I keep sending this picture to people who know me personally and are surprised I consider myself introverted - after all, how someone who is seen publicly speaking so often and finds it easy to make friends can possibly be introverted? The answer is simple: I like people, but spending too much time with them exhausts me, and I need to "waste time alone" to recharge.

[0] https://danineteen.wordpress.com/2013/05/08/dr-carmellas-gui... - first link I found, it's been floating around the tubes for some time already.

ionised3• 11 years ago

That's basically just introversion and it's a perfectly normal way to think and behave for a large section of the population.

Introverts reacharge their batteries by engaging in solitary activities.

yannis• 11 years ago

go into solitude so as not to drink out of everybody's cistern. When I am among the many I live as the many do, and I do not think I really think. After a time it always seems as if they want to banish my self from myself and rob me of my soul.

I always liked this piece, as it fits with me being able to be alone for days on end, without missing anyone's company.

a8da6b0c91d3• 11 years ago

The flip side of this is people tend to get weird and ornery without a proper community enforcing standards of behavior. It's pretty common to not even realize how unacceptably eccentric you're getting. Bear in mind that Nietzsche wound up totally insane.

The traditional christian teaching is that solitude is bad. Man is a social animal and can only properly develop joined to family and community and church, fulfilling duties and obligations to each.

mafribe• 11 years ago

But is it always clear that the community sees as "proper [...] standards of behavior" is actually a proper standard of behaviour, or the sign of a dysfunctional community?

anonydsfsfs2• 11 years ago

Nietzsche was likely driven insane by CADASIL leading to frontotemporal dementia[1]. CADASIL is a genetic disorder and has nothing to do with being solitary.

[1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18575181 and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17087793

ionised3• 11 years ago

The traditional christian teaching is that solitude is bad. Man is a social animal and can only properly develop joined to family and community and church, fulfilling duties and obligations to each.

I wouldn't ascribe too much significance or meaning to 'Christian' teaching. It has no basis in science or empiricism.

jqm3• 11 years ago

Christian teachings that man needs to be joined to a church in order to be whole may have less to do with what a man really needs and more to do with what leaders of churches think they need....

On separate (but related) note: I understand cults generally very strongly discourage solitude and periods of deep introspection. Keep everyone busy so they don't have time to figure out what we are doing with their money and their daughters. Or something like that.

brakmic• 11 years ago

No solitude no peace of mind. No peace of mind no innovation. No innovation no future.

I think it was Goethe, another great German thinker and poet, who once said: "In der Einsamkeit geschehen die größten Dinge." - "In Solitude the greatest Things happen."

P.S.

I'm not sure if my 'tanslation' reflects the original meaning of the sentence. Please, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

dEnigma• 11 years ago

Your translation seems good enough to me, but on the other hand I can't find a source for your quote using Google

will_work4tears• 11 years ago

Closest that I could find was: "Talent is nurtured in solitude … A creation of importance can only be produced when its author isolates himself, it is a child of solitude."

Kenji• 11 years ago

Solitude makes me insane. Yes, I am more productive, but I also become highly unstable. It's a tradeoff. At the end of the day, I value my mental wellbeing more than my productivity. But good friends are hard to find, and I'd rather be alone than put up with the wrong people.

Edit: Now I really feel like reading Nietzsche again.

ak39• 11 years ago

I relate to this. I like the way you make it clear that given a choice between sanity and productivity, you choose the former. But is this not a false dichotomy, I wonder? I hope!

For me, prolonged absence of close company quickly begins to feel like low-grade depression ... or general melancholy. I used to enjoy solitude, but the years and the birth of my children has shifted most of the time I used to crave for myself. I don't crave solitude as badly anymore. In fact I fear being left alone. Also our recent financial set backs and a few deaths in the family has left me questioning the idea of being productive entirely.

The funny thing is that I'm not entirely honest when I get the company I crave ... I begin to display fickle emotions of wanting solitude immediately because I feel I'm not productive.

I'm really in purgatory right now with exactly that: sanity vs productivity.

dmoo• 11 years ago

This makes me think of "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" by Robert Pirsig. I don't know if its your kind of think but there is a link here somewhere http://projectavalon.net/forum4/showthread.php?9963-PDF-book...

ThomPete• 11 years ago

It's all about enjoying your own company.

I have always seen the ability to endure solitude as one of the primary reasons why some people are successful.

The ability to enjoy your own thoughts, process, reflexions and the self-discipline to stay with them no matter what they are is what build up intuition.

dhimes2• 11 years ago

Perhaps that is the advantage offered by a trait like narcissism.

adventured• 11 years ago

No, because narcissism does not mean: self-reflection, introspection, consideration for one's own thoughts, pondering ideas, inwardness, etc.

Rather, it would be more like this: I think I'm the greatest. I'm so much smarter than everyone else. Whatever I do will be extraordinary.

Narcissism tends to be empty of substance, because by definition it means an exaggeration.

It doesn't take long to realize that's of no benefit to a process of thinking when it comes to problem solving, invention, or innovation. The more time spent on congratulating yourself on artificially inflated views about your own abilities or accomplishments, the less time spent actually doing. Narcissism is a detriment to achieving great output, to the extent of the narcissism, as it's wholly a waste of thought and time.

somberi• 11 years ago

“All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” ― Blaise Pascal, Pensées

rapha22_1• 11 years ago

Out of curiosity, Nietzsche and Pascal had many intersection points.

See http://nietzscheasfisherman.blogspot.com.br/2010/07/nietzsch...

sravfeyn• 11 years ago

Solitude and Silence are foundation for individual growth as per Indian philosophy. In the words of Sri Aurobindo (1), a modern Indian philosopher and mystic,

"The love of solitude is a sign of the disposition towards knowledge; but knowledge itself is only achieved when we have a settled perception of solitude in the crowd, in the battle and in the mart"

1 - http://nptel.ac.in/courses/109101002/16

jqm3• 11 years ago

Although preferring solitude, I have found that long periods put me at competitive disadvantage socially. I start forgetting how to make small talk and engage in all the social grease.

I once believed it didn't matter and the time saved could be better spent engaged in productive activity. But as I get older and have carefully observed what works and what doesn't, I have noticed that a good command of the social language is crucial to success. One is extremely unlikely to make much of an impact nor achieve big financial gains without it. That isn't to say one has to be nice to everyone... assholes with a good perception and practice in manipulating social situations often do very well for themselves. But you have to have command of the language. And you don't get this being by yourself all the time. I find this unfortunate because in my experience the vast majority of people aren't that great to spend a lot of time around. Most people aren't curious. Most people have little myopic views of the world that are badly mistaken. Most people are frankly pretty dull and I'd rather visit the dentist than talk w/ them at length. But I've come to realize this is a counterproductive view (even if it's technically true). The world we live in is made of other people and we do well when we learn to navigate the river we find ourselves upon. But truth be told, I'd still rather be locked in the closet reading an interesting article.

webmasterraj• 11 years ago

Taking this one step further, I wonder if increasing urbanization leads to more and more groupthink, because of increasing proximity. If solitude is key for forming a unique creative perspective, in effect to make sure you don't 'drink out of everyone's cistern' as Nietzsche says, living in cities would be a bad thing, rather than good.

jqm3• 11 years ago

"He who would keep clean among men, must know how to wash himself even with dirty water. "

Nietzsche on Solitude

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