What is the difference between loneliness and solitude? One arrives and one is chosen, and knowing which you are in changes what you do about it.

There is a rough split worth knowing. A third of your time with people you have outgrown who keep you humble, a third with people alongside you. Loneliness is not a bad thing, only an unhealthy one if it controls you. Enlightenment comes and goes, and then there is the laundry. Say hello to the voice, thank it, and do nothing with it.

One thing to try: Spend twenty minutes alone on purpose today. Chosen, not accidental.

In this episode

• (0:03) The gift of loneliness, and the gift of solitude
• (2:56) Growing apart, and not knowing quite how it happened
• (4:51) The rough split of who you spend your time with
• (7:33) Whatever it is, even helping a family member
• (9:54) It is only unhealthy if it controls you
• (12:31) Enlightenment comes and goes, and then the laundry
• (14:41) Hi voice, how are you doing today?
• (19:42) The ego getting bored of being lonely

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Thank you for listening.

Steven

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Today, I want to talk about the gift of loneliness and the gift of solitude. And the

way I've seen them in my life. And the way,

I suppose really the easiest way of explaining it, the way the needle's completely reversed from pointing out to pointing

inwards. And it's a different quality that is completely differently nourished. And I want to share my experience

of loneliness. And my now experience of moving from the attachment to solving my

loneliness to my attachment to solitude. And it seems like there's always a never-ending task of

there's more work to be done. And I think I said this on my last podcast, when you get to

the, there's a Zen proverb, when you get to the top of the mountain, keep climbing. And that's so right.

And when I read Jack cornfield's book um At first the ecstasy, then the laundry.

And it's so true. You have this wonderful experience like, oh my God, the ego's not real. I can play

with it. I can bring it on. I can take it away. I can see that it's a chimp. I

can start to recognise that life is a stage that I can play on. Just like Shakespeare said, all life

is a stage. And then suddenly you Walk back to earth because the washing needs doing two hours later.

And the problem is we try to re-experience that moment for the rest of our lives that we had this

wonderful moment of like, I don't know, heart orgasm or our minds just like, just let go. We just stop

feeling this tension and this pulling and this relentless strive to be happy.

And I'm going slightly off topic now already. The podcast hasn't even really started, but well it has started um

I'm gonna thank people at the end. Let's carry on where we're to now let's go Let's go with the

flow and just carry on. My mind now wants to jump to I'm Steven and this is Stillness in the

Storms. And I'm the podcast host. But anyway, so I can I remember most of my life feeling

quite lonely. And the irony is, the antidote for being lonely is not to be necessarily with people but to

be with the right people, at the right time, with the right nature. And, you know, it's not necessarily even

people. Some people just find people difficult and they find the antidote to loneliness with horses

or their dog or their cat or anything like that. But really, probably the time that I was most alone.

Was in the last 18 months of a relationship I had, which my longest relationship, and I I

know Emma won't mind me sharing this, Kemba's mum. But we kind of grew apart. I don't know how, I

don't know what, I I don't know where she was, I don't don't really know where I was at the

time. But even in bed at night, I felt lonely. Even when we were cuddle I felt lonely. There wasn't

that connection. There wasn't that fulfilling of my life at that point. And there's many other times

when, even on the mayorship, and especially the mayorship, I suppose, I'd go to a networking event or I go

somewhere and I would just feel so disconnected in the room. They didn't feel like my people.

Did I enjoy being there? Absolutely. Did I enjoy the food? Yes, absolutely. Would I go and do it again?

Yeah, absolutely. Probably. Maybe. But it's funny that you can be in a room

with the most incredible people.

Really high achievers in charities in all the different things they do. And yet you can

still not find that connection that fulfills that loneliness. And it's very much loneliness. I find it's like when they

talk about the glass is half full. And I always go, we're arguing about whether the glass is half full

half empty. What's in the glass? And I suppose the analogy of being lonely

know how many people are in the room? Is the room half full? Well, you've got to ask yourself, who

are the people in your room? Who is the people in your life? And I wrote an article and I

think I've even done a podcast on that You know, there's a 33 percent rule Spend 33 percent of the

time with people that have outgrown you and you can learn something from. 33 percent of your time, people

that you've outgrown that can keep you humble and that you can help grow. And 33 of the time

with people that are with you. I'm going to change it to 25 now, actually.

Now I might be changing to 12. So I'm 12 12 and a half percent of your time with... I'm

doing basic maths on in my head now. Yeah, my advice now would be 12 and a half percent of

the time with people that... Help you to grow. And these could be people that you don't overly get on

with. These could be people that trigger you and things like that. And I would say my council friends, my

council members on the council, many of them I get on really brilliantly with. Some of them they I struggle

with. But they all teach me something. They all pull me forward. They all make me up my argument, which

is a which is a gift So I thank them all for that. And especially in dignitary events and that

is what I'm going to in a minute that

they will all way outclass me when it comes to achievement and what they've done and all. And it will

be uncomfortable. I'm kind of regretting signing up for it, but I'm going anyway. And then 12 and a half

percent of the time with people that are just... I don't know, with you, that are like you.

Your friends, the ones that play the same music that you would turn it off if someone knocked on the

door. That you can go to the concerts that you wouldn't put on Facebook because you'd be a bit embarrassed.

You know, the ones that laugh at your joke and no one else does in the room. You know a

room full of six people and you tell a joke and you know your friend because they laugh at the

joke and everyone else is like... And then you're like... Okay hey You know exactly the kind of person I

mean. They're the mirror of you in a positive way. And, you know, they hold you

accountable and all that. And they also drive out the best didn't you And then, I don't know let's add

out So that's 25. So spend 25 of your time, I suppose,

learning just with

yourself and just... I

don't know, the mass I've messed this up completely.

Let's forget mass for a minute let's Let's just move on to spend some time with the people that pull

you forward. Spend some time of your time helping people, moving them forward, picking them up, helping

in your community. Whatever you do, whether it's just picking up knitter with a group or something like that, just

whatever you're doing, even if it's just helping a family member or anything, spend some time doing that. I don't

know what time you're going to spend co-work at the moment. I haven't factored that one in, okay? Maybe this

is the percentage of time that you're not working, which is about two minutes a day at the moment. But

anyway, then we're left with 50 percent that doesn't exist anymore because we're all working 12 jobs. The other

50 percent I should have said I wrote this out before the podcast um spend in solitude

Spend with yourself in meditation. Sit next to a river. Wake up early early in the morning and just

sit.

Daydream if you want to look Look at a spot on the wall and just,

yeah, enjoy the spot on the wall. Do a gratitude list um Check in with your body.

Hi, feet. How are you doing? It's a wonderful meditation on Inner Peace Meditations podcast for that one. Hi

How are you doing? You

know? Just check in because your body's screaming and shouting at you. I was gonna do the podcast today

on um we need to listen to our body more often, but I've decided this one because I've really realised

the difference in me going from

feeling lonely a lot of the time, and that's okay,

and I'll give you a recommendation to do in a minute that'll help you if you're feeling lonely a lot

of the time. It's a wonderful meditation that you can do. And it really does help to snap you out

of it, but also not labeling loneliness as a bad thing because it's not a bad thing it's it's a

It's a way of your heart needs to open to the fact that you have people to miss. That's

wonderful. That's love. That's, I suppose, a mild grieving because if you never felt lonely in life, that meant you

never had anybody or anything. You never had a connection. So

loneliness is not a bad thing. It's only if it controls you, it's a bad thing. Or an unhealthy thing,

should I say. It's no good or bad. Practice what I invite people. It's always healthy or unhealthy.

But

solitude, that's a different story.

And I think it was Ken Wilber that says, you know, somebody said to him what how do we know

the spiritual journey is working? And he went, well, a lot less people will understand you. You'll

spend more time alone

and if you thought trying to get a date before or trying to find a partner before your spiritual journey,

try it now and you'll find it's even more difficult because you

love your time alone but you're not alone. You

realise everybody's there with you equally so's the squirrels and the river and the thing. And I have a problem

with this at the moment. I'm I'm getting so attached to this alone. I'll go out in my wheelchair now

I'll go for a drive. And I'm like well I'm gonna go live and I'm gonna interact with people. I'm

gonna do that. And I miss you guys online. I love going live. I love doing that.

But boy, don't I enjoy just walking.

Just...

Yeah, enjoying watching the river and listening and just driving somewhere not thinking. Not feeling

like I've got to live up to something. Not feel like I've got to be a performing monkey. I'm not

saying I that's me projecting. I'm not saying any of you are suggesting that I should be. But sometimes I

feel like I've got to come up with this deep profound way of helping. And I don't know how to

help you.

You've got it all inside of you. I'll put a link underneath this podcast to my Stillness in the

Storms course. And that course doesn't teach you anything that you don't already know.

It just brings back everything that we lost as we grew up.

And what the course to do is it's 10 days. It's an audio of every single day

every audio it's 10 days an audio on each day. And it just embraces your true self

to deal with anything life throws its way at you. Because it will. You know, first you actually did the

laundry. This helps you deal with the laundry. Because enlightenment it comes and goes. It's

fleeting. You

know, a car chops you up on the road. You go, that's okay. Maybe they were just didn't see me.

Maybe they were just having a bad day and you just give them a little bit of compassion. In that

moment, you're the most enlightened being on the road. You're enlightened, right? That's what it means to be enlightened.

Four minutes later, you pull up in a travelling jam and the lights are red and they turn green and

nobody moves and they turn red. And and you're like, oh, for crying out loud, can't believe what's happening.

Then you're not enlightened. So it comes and goes. Every interaction is a possibility of

enlightenment in that moment. And if you manage more in about three a day, let me know how. Because you

don't care than me and most people um It's really difficult. See, enlightenment also is the needle pointing inwards.

How do we talk to ourselves? It's almost more important when

we are alone, how

do we interact with all those voices? You should be doing this. You should be doing that. Why are you

doing this? And you know and the criticism comes out of that voice that criticizes everything within you.

There it is, loud and clear. How do you answer that voice is so important.

You know, embrace it. Go, thank you for pointing that out.

But we don't have to do anything with it. How awesome is that? If you just manage that one

thing in life from now... That when those voices come up and they scream and shout at you and they

hug you between each other and they the loudest one gets to tell you that you're an idiot, you're stupid,

you can't do this or you should have done this better or you should have said that. If you manage

to go, hi voice,

how you doing today? You

may have a point and thank you for letting me know and then do nothing.

Whoa, that's a game changer. That will change how you respond to nearly all of life because

if you can do it to your internal voice, you'll be able to do it to the external world as

well.

Why is it so much more difficult to do the internal world? And I think I'll do a podcast on

this because this is really important. The problem is when we look at the external world, we

judge it so based on no depth. We don't know what the person did around the corner. We don't know

their real life story. We don't know collectively what all these stories and all that are. But what we do

know

is everything that's gone on within us. We know our whole story. We know our background. You know, we know

whether we think we're genuine or not. When you say, I love you you got a voice inside of you

that questions those things. And that's okay. When you're really nice to someone, you open the door for them and

they go, thank you, you're a lovely person. A voice comes in there no you're not. Remember what you did

in your 20s. It's like, oh, it's tiring. So

if you can learn in solitude, just take your time out

and not engage with that conversation, but be aware of that conversation. And then you can do it in amongst

people. I

don't know if this podcast has ended up about solitude and loneliness any more than it's turned out to be

a rambling on my thoughts, but hopefully that helps um Let me know do you As

the older you get, the needle for me was always pointed outside I wanted the world to solve my loneliness.

Now the needle is pointing in. I want me to solve my addiction to solitude. And

it's balance. I need both. You need both in balance.

Like the stick I keep saying about um good experiences and bad experiences or healthy and unhealthy we're trying to

get rid of the unhealthy, the bad. We try to get rid of the loneliness. No, don't get rid of

the loneliness because if you're feeling lonely, you know you've got something to look forward to. You've got something else

in life. You're recognising that there is a connection, there is a nourishment to be had. And I promise you

that I would give you an exercise that really, really helps with loneliness. And this exercise is just when you

feel really lonely, wherever you're to, whether you're sat in the car, whether you're sat... Watching your telly or waking

up in the morning or last thing at night, which is the normal time we're feeling lonely. That's why we

pick up the phone and we message four people on messenger We check in see what people are doing. And

we're going through the phone and we're sliding through all the phone and seeing what friends are online. Hey, how

are you doing? And all that because we're feeling a bit lonely. We want to know someone else is there.

Or we put on some music and... You know, some sad music. Which is not a problem either because I

like sad music when I'm feeling sad because it brings out my sadness and I cry and I feel even

better. But I I go off on a tangent. Right. Exercise when you're feeling lonely.

Just sit on the edge of the bed. Sit in the chair you're in. Lie in bed or whatever. And

just bring your attention to your breath. And

imagine a

world full of people.

And then imagine zooming out from it

and going further and further away. And you're now outside of the solar system.

You can, you're now zooming out forever and it's getting darker and all you can see is the whole of

the galaxy.

And then you're zooming out forever and you see the whole of the universe. And you're just there floating.

And imagine there's nothing left. There's no trees, there's no animals, there's no universe, there's no planets. Nothing.

Just you.

Nothing else there.

And what your ego would do after about two or three minutes would go, yeah, I'm not really that only.

And it will start automatically reeling in and going closer to the earth and all that. And it will suddenly

start reminding you of all the friends you do have, all the friends you had, all the um events you've

got coming up, all the different things that you do, whether you're not, you have family or you go different

things. Suddenly you'll be reminded of all those things. And suddenly the ego be right, I'm bored we've been lonely

now. I'm done with that.

And you realise it's just a temporary feeling. Loneliness is just a temporary feeling. But you're not actually

that.

This is why I say, does that make sense? I

realise how much I say that. Really, I'm asking myself whether it makes sense in my head what I'm saying

and But there's my podcast for today. Solitude and loneliness. You know, the differences and...

Shared a couple of my stories and it'd be really lovely. Email me, contact me. Go to StevenWebb.uk and tell

me some of your stories. Do you see the difference? Does it change in your life as your spiritual journey

goes on? Do you find yourself becoming more lonely but enjoying it more? Are you replacing that loneliness with a

feeling of attachment to being alone in solitude?

I know I am, which means more work.

Thank you to anybody's donated this week. You guys are awesome. I want to say a big shout out to

Rachel, Mandy, Kelly, Kathy, Peter and Katie. Thank you very much. You mean

the world to me and everybody else on this podcast because your donations help to pay for it and help

it to keep going. So I'm deeply, deeply grateful to you.

Have an amazing week and... Choose loneliness or choose solitude.

And there's a definite difference between the two. Take

care. And I love you.