#solitude

Anyone can retire into a quiet place, wrote Evelyn Underhill, but it's the shutting of the door that makes the difference. Solitude is a time for stripping away everything in order to focus on God. (Matt 6:6) ↗

— Sue Monk Kidd

#love

My aloneness had never bothered me; I hadn't even been aware of it. But now it overwhelmed me. The awareness washed over me with painful sharpness and deep grief. Now that I had company. ↗

— Linda Olsson

#solitude #love

La solitude qui enveloppe les oeuvres d'art est infinie, etil n'estrien qui permette de moins les atteindre que la critique. Seul l'amour peut les appréhender, les saisir et faire preuve de justesse à leur endroit: ↗

— Rainer Maria Rilke

#art

CORNELIA: -Sit down. Don't leave the table. GRACE: -Is that an order? CORNELIA: -I don't give orders to you, I make requests. GRACE: -Sometimes the requests of an employer are hard to distinguish from orders. [She sits down] ↗

— Tennessee Williams

#orders #requests #solitude #love

I love to be alone. I never found the companion that is so companionable as solitude. We are for the most part more lonely when we go abroad among men than when we stay in our chambers. ↗

— Henry David Thoreau

#love

Here must thou be, O man, Strength to thyself — no helper hast thou here — Here keepest thou thy individual state: No other can divide with thee this work, No secondary hand can intervene To fashion this ability. 'Tis thine, The prime and vital principle is thine In the recesses of thy nature, far From any reach of outward fellowship, Else 'tis not thine at all. ↗

— William Wordsworth

#solitude #nature

She preferred the quiet solitary atmosphere, to create in her own world of paint and colour, the thrill of anticipating how her works would turn out as she eyed the blank sheets of paper or canvas before starting her next masterpiece. How satisfying it was to mess around in paint gear, without having to worry about spills, starch or frills, that was the life! ↗

— E.A. Bucchianeri

#artist #artistic #artists #artists-life #arts

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. ↗

— Charlotte Brontë

#defiance #empowerment #independence #individuality #self-assurance

Let me tell you this: if you meet a loner, no matter what they tell you, it's not because they enjoy solitude. It's because they have tried to blend into the world before, and people continue to disappoint them. ↗

— Jodi Picoult

#loneliness #loner #solitude #people

We must become so alone, so utterly alone, that we withdraw into our innermost self. It is a way of bitter suffering. But then our solitude is overcome, we are no longer alone, for we find that our innermost self is the spirit, that it is God, the indivisible. And suddenly we find ourselves in the midst of the world, yet undisturbed by its multiplicity, for our innermost soul we know ourselves to be one with all being. ↗

— Hermann Hesse

#solitude #spirit #alone