“Don’t you get lonely?”

“I know someone who would be perfect for you.”

“Just give some of them a chance and you’ll come around.”

“You can’t be so picky.”

Everyone has heard these famous one-liners somewhere, and they surface when you’re talking to someone who believes that you’d be better off if you weren't single. Then, you get preached to, as if whoever is lecturing you has some sort of divine response of deliverance that comes from their own personal experience.

But that’s the thing – it’s their life, not yours.

Continue reading if you wished you could have said one of the following:

a) “I don’t need anyone else to keep me content.”

b) “I’m not looking for anyone.”

c)” I’m already happy.”

Inspired by Henry David Thoreau’s Solitude chapter in "Walden," this will confirm your belief that you aren’t really alone even if there’s no significant other in your life – and maybe you’ll have something new to say to those who put you down for being single and nowhere near ready-to-mingle.

Aloneness and loneliness are not only two different words, but, by definition, two very separate entities. The philosopher Osho outlined this point under the following pretext:

“Loneliness is a negative state, like darkness. Loneliness means you are missing someone; you are empty, and you are afraid in this vast universe. Aloneness has a totally different meaning; it does not mean that you are missing someone, it means that you have found yourself. It is absolutely positive.”

While it is easy to throw words around and claim that “alone” and “lonely” are synonymous adjectives, the simplicity of it does not make it correct. The state of alone is rather a direct choice. Loneliness is a byproduct of another circumstance. One cannot drift through life in “aloneness,” because he has made that decision to stand by himself and find perfect contentment in doing so. To be lonely emphasizes a want – a need, even – to be rescued from one’s loneliness. Indeed, nobody wishes to be lonely, but many may very well attain happiness by living alone.

That which makes aloneness such an achievement, as it were, to some is the complete detachment from everyone and everything that circulates around us. We remain independent and satisfied being isolated from the rest; it comes close to a luxury rather than a nuisance or pain. To enjoy oneself and the company of oneself alone is a fantastic privilege, and a vast amount of us wish to always be accompanied by another. They hold a fear of never being loved or being able to love and, subsequently, a fear of becoming lonely; here, they frequently interchange being lonely with being alone.

Living in solitude, for however long or short a time, has its benefits. There is no one but oneself to please, to talk to, to argue with, to love. It is the happiness that one can discover within himself that makes being alone so extraordinary.

Even with one’s closest confidant, there is some border, some obstacle between the two that prevents each of them from knowing and understanding the other entirely – whether this boundary is a spiritual one or if it is the physical limit, our bodies present to protect the soul, that remains to be seen.

Everyone wants love and compassion, companionship and connection with those who mean the most to them. And in truth, what some do not understand is that they can have the love that they aspire to attain and still be alone and gratified with themselves. Contrarily, being lonely and being in another’s company can never simultaneously occur. The feeling of loneliness is immediately assuaged once someone is there to fill the gap.

In regards to simply being alone, there is no gap to fill.

Check out Osho's Love, Freedom, Aloneness: The Koan of Relationships