From the very start of my childhood, I have always been independent; I marched to my own beat and did things unexpected. Despite my love for play dates when I was younger, I always managed to occupy myself when I was alone. Even though I lived five feet away from my brother's room in my tiny suburban home, I still was at ease doing my own thing, without his company when I sat in my bedroom.

While in high school and middle school, I realized that as my age grew and the homework load rapidly increased, I found myself being alone during most weekdays, while my weekends were filled with friends and adventures. Am I wrong to say that I didn’t really miss seeing people during the week? Is it not normal, or mean to say that I genuinely wanted alone time, and that I liked not having the company of others?

It’s not that I enjoyed being alone more than being with my friends; my room wasn’t more exciting than going to the movies, a party, out to dinner…it’s just that those moments spent alone enabled me to learn things about myself that I wouldn’t have necessarily discovered if I was surrounded by people all the time.

I think this notion of being alone, comes with a negative connotation; just because we are alone, it doesn’t mean we are lonely. In fact, I feel like those two words shouldn’t even be in relation to one another. When I am lonely, I crave to feel something (affection, the warmth of someone, a good conversation, etc.), but when I am alone, all that means to me is I am physically not with someone; I am by myself and that is OK.

People often avoid being alone because they don’t understand the concept. Some people think they're “loners,” or even “losers,” if they aren’t surrounded by people 24/7, or getting texts and phone calls from their friends every five seconds. They often feel guilty for enjoying their alone time or craving the occasional isolation, so they opt out and surround themselves with people. However, I truly believe that solitude is necessary in order to fully understand yourself as a person; you begin to see things different, understand concepts you may have not understood before and practice activities you can’t necessarily do while with others.

I recognized my passion for art, writing and singing during the time I spent by myself. For example, I never liked the idea of singing in front of friends —I’d get too shy and would feed off of their reaction when I finished. But, when I’m in my room, I belt and take risks with my voice without a care in the world what other people would think, simply because I am alone. I used to not be able to hit higher octaves, and now I can with practice and without the pressure of people listening to me.

I think we should embrace the term with open arms and accept it for what it is. Liking the idea of being physically alone is not weird or pathetic (as some people may say), rather it is accepting the idea that you are capable of taking care of yourself, comfortable in your skin and open to opportunity.

In college, we are more susceptible to hanging out with friends every moment of the day, and never giving ourselves the time to actually be alone. But, college also gives us an equal opportunity to be in isolation. After all, it wasn’t designed for us to be constantly partying, embarking on the hook-up culture or to be a runaway from home; on the contrary, it was designed for us to gain more knowledge, to help us build a degree so we can get a job once we graduate. The workload, the constant studying can be those opportunities where we isolate ourselves while sitting at a desk, drinking a cup of coffee, while blasting our study jams in our ears hoping to get an A on whatever you are working on.

This summer, I have had many moments of being alone—whether they were moments where I read on the beach, moments in my bedroom watching something on Netflix, moments in my shower belting out a cover I am composing, or moments where I simply walked my dog up and down the road, I found that those moments were delightfully peaceful and they put me at ease.

Solitude is bliss; you should learn to love being alone, because sooner or later we will all be forced to experience it.