Making a Space for Solitude

the Lake Isle of Innisfree, County Sligo

Making a space for Solitude is difficult . I'm finding that there is a distinct difference between having time for solitude and making a space for solitude.

Over the years of being deeply committed to my teaching career,  I created a pile of things for "when I have more time," I am now, of course, carving out more and more time in a day for the things I need or want to do . . . . one of which is having more interior time, but it’s easy to forget about all the "stuff" you have to hack through to carve out a meaningful space inside yourself.

I am visualizing it as a quiet bower deep in a forest, a lovely retreat but surrounded by undergrowth which keeps quickly regrowing so that every time you try to enter that bower, you have to hack your way in again.

Reminds me of Yeats' poem “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”—

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, 

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made; 

Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee, 

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, 

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; 

There midnight's all a-glimmer, and noon a purple glow, 

And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day 

I hear the water lapping with low sounds by the shore; 

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray, 

I hear it in the deep heart's core.

Gosh, how I had always romanticized that poem. So a few years ago on a trip to Ireland, when I was in County Sligo, I ferreted out the location of this island of the poem and hired a local man to row me across to the middle of the lake and leave me on the island for an afternoon. 

At first I had been disappointed that it was so small and overgrown, but after I climbed to the top of the small hill in the middle of the island and had sat there a while amongst the waist high ferns, listening to the water lapping against the shoreline, delight came over me and I thought to myself this is just big enough *smile*   Of course, this experience has become for me a wonderful metaphor for the place inside yourself where you can retreat, surrounded by the "moat" of silence.  It doesn’t take much interior real estate to be just enough.

In Anam Cara,  John O'Donohue uses an interesting word to describe solitude, ascetic (page 141).  I looked ascetic up to see if there was more to the word than what I knew . . .

              The adjective "ascetic" derives from the ancient Greek term askēsis (practice, 

              training or exercise). Originally associated with any form of disciplined 

              practice, the term ascetic has come to mean anyone who practices a 

              renunciation of worldly pursuits to achieve higher intellectual and spiritual 

              goals.

Hmmmmm ....."disciplined practice"..."higher intellectual and spiritual goals"  . . . all that sounds kinda heavy .......... when what I am after is an "unbearable lightness of being" ........ sure that's intellectual in a way and certainly spiritual ......... but it's joyous too ......... a place/space where my heart sings.

Although O’Donohue says ascetic solitude is difficult, just like all things that require self-discipline are, yet he argues for its necessity, especially in our modern culture.  Listen as he explains it here:

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Nota bene:  Anam Cara is the Gaelic for a friend of the soul, not in the modern meaning of soul-mate, but rather a special connection between two people that is formed on a mutual deep understanding and trust.  It is a bond in which each nurtures the other and cherishes the other more highly than oneself.

John O'Donohoe, who is a poet, a philosopher, and a Catholic priest, explains the anam cara relationship this way:  "You are joined in an ancient and eternal union with humanity that cuts across all barriers of time, convention, philosophy, and definition.  When you are blessed with an anam cara, the Irish believe, you have arrived at that most sacred place: home."  And if you have ever had that person or those persons who are indeed a friend of your soul, then you surely know what a blessing the anam cara friendship is.


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