– Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal was a 17th century French
mathematician. However, it is his Penseés (Thoughts) for which he is
primarily know today. In today’s mad, chaotic, and hypervigilant world there is
a constant expectation that we will be instantaneously available for contact
and communication. When and where do we find “time to sit quietly alone”?
Pascal suggested that all our problems stem
from not being able to find solitude. Presumably he meant not just our personal
problems, but also our social ones as well. Most likely, too, he was referring
to our environmental problems. For in Penseés, one of his thoughts is: ‘Nature
is an infinite sphere of which the centre is everywhere and the circumference
nowhere.’
As a result of not finding “alone time,” and not being
able to “sit quietly,” our soul becomes disregarded and unhealthy. How can our
souls heal from the pains inflicted by the world?
Solitude is one way.
The very word – solitude – alludes to the possibility.
Have you ever noticed that the words SOUL DIET are an
anagram for the word SOLITUDE? Solitude is Diet for the Soul: anagrammatically,
figuratively, psychologically, and spiritually.
Before proceeding too far, it may be worth saying what
solitude is not. Solitude is not; isolation, loneliness, exile, banishment,
confinement, or alienation. All these forms of “aloneness” can engender
negative emotional, psychological, and/or physical damage.
Solitude does not create such harm. In fact, solitude
and the consequent attention to our soul is likely to help us heal from such
harms.
And soul? What is our soul? Philosophers, theologians,
poets, psychologists, and mystics have pondered this, and provided definitions,
for millennia. The definition I like to use is that provided by the
eco-psychologist, wilderness guide, and writer, Bill Plotkin. Plotkin grounds
his definition of soul within the Earth community, thus not privileging soul as
an uniquely human phenomenon. Plotkin’s definition is succinct. For him,
‘Soul…is
a person or thing’s unique ecological niche in the Earth community…A thing’s
eco-niche – its Soul – is what makes it what it is on the deepest, widest, most
natural level of identity.’1
This is the understanding of Soul that resonates most
clearly with me, and is the definition that I use throughout this blogpiece.
Note that Soul is; ecologically embedded, unique and personal,
characterises identity, and fits with and alongside other ‘souls.’ Furthermore,
soul is not synonymous with spirit. Spirit could be thought of as an all-encompassing,
infinite, net, which transcends all. Soul then, could be thought of as the
individual, unique, nodes of that net where the warp and weft of the net
intersect. The net cannot exist without the nodes, and the nodes exist because
they are part of the net. In this depiction, spirit is transcendent, soul is inscendent.2
When understood this way, it is possible to recognise
how, and why, solitude is a powerful means by which our soul can be healed and
nourished.
In solitude one is not distracted and is fully
present, fully aware of themselves and their unique place in the world. Sitting
quietly (in a room or elsewhere) one is able to fully and deeply reflect.
Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr is a Ngangikurungkurr
woman from northern Australia. She has written an exquisite explanation of the
process of sitting quietly in solitude and contemplation. In her language this
is dadirri which she describes as,
‘…inner,
deep listening and quiet, still awareness. Dadirri recognises the deep spring
that is inside us. We call on it and it calls to us… It is something like what
you call "contemplation". When
I experience dadirri,
I am made whole again. I can sit on the riverbank or walk through the trees;
even if someone close to me has passed away, I can find my peace in this silent
awareness. There is no need of words. A big part of dadirri
is listening. Through the years, we have listened to our stories. They
are told and sung, over and over, as the seasons go by. Today we still gather
around the campfires and together we hear the sacred stories.’3
Here, we notice too that
Miriam-Rose locates dadirri and solitude within a world deeply connected with
ancestral roots.
This is what solitude has
to offer us. A deep connection with ourselves (our soul), with the present
ecological world, and with a temporal identity.
There is a caveat to all
this, however. What has so far been described sounds lovely, peaceful, and
harmonious. It may not always be like this. Solitude, and deep
self-contemplation, may take us into a darkness where we encounter our demons
and our Shadow side (as Jung refers to it.) Indeed, for many Jungian
psychologists and eco-psychologists (such as Bill Plotkin) this encounter with
darkness and the depths is necessary for the true adult human to emerge.
Plotkin, for example,
likens this to the stages of a butterfly. The caterpillar eventually enters the
cocoon, where as a pupa it enters a darkened space, “dies” to the caterpillar
stage, and metamorphosises into the adult butterfly.
Some of our best known
“teachers” knew this experience well. Muhammed spent many nights alone in the
Cave of Hira in prayer and contemplation. Jesus spent time alone in the desert
where he faced his demons (in the form of Satan.) Buddha, similarly, was
tempted by Mara (personification of demons) during his time of solitude and
deep meditation.
Yes, during solitude we may
be tempted, we may be frightened, we may even want to quit; yet the benefits of
this soul diet are enormous. We finally get out of our own way,
so that our ego-centric perspectives dissolve away, to be replaced by an
all-encompassing eco-centric perception.
This has benefits for our
soul and the souls of all other beings.
We find, via this solitude,
and our emergent soul, that we become better able to connect with others,
including other-than-humans. We become able to truly love the world. We become
fully connected.
Yes, let us nourish
ourselves with a Soul
Diet, via Solitude.
Notes:
1. Plotkin, Bill, The Journey of Soul Initiation, New
World Library, Novato, California, 2021
2. The term inscendence is borrowed from: Berry,
Thomas, The Dream of the Earth, Counterpoint, Berkeley, 1988
3. The
word, concept and spiritual practice that is dadirri is from the Ngan'gikurunggurr and Ngen'giwumirri
languages of the Aboriginal peoples of the Daly
River region (Northern Territory, Australia).
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