Freya Stark Quotes

My 'aloneness' is extremely valuable to me.

Study requires solitude, and solitude is a state dangerous to those who are too much accustomed to sink into themselves

I was never less alone than when by myself.

Language... has created the word 'loneliness' to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word 'solitude' to express the glory of being alone.

Solitude vivifies; isolation kills.

People think being alone is a luxury, but it's crucial: Whatever you're not down with about yourself gets loud and in your face.

You may not enjoy loneliness, because loneliness is sad. But solitude is something else; solitude is what you look forward to when you want to be alone, when you want to be with yourself. So, solitude is something we all need from time to time.

There's a difference between loneliness and solitude. You pursue solitude, I think. But loneliness is a completely different isolating thing.

You may never be less alone than when you are alone.

In solitude, where we are least alone.

Then never less alone than when alone.

The great omission in American life is solitude; not loneliness, for this is an alienation that thrives most in the midst of crowds, but that zone of time and space, free from the outside pressures, which is the incubator of the spirit.

In certain areas of my life, I actively seek out solitude. Especially for someone in my line of work, solitude is, more or less, an inevitable circumstance. Sometimes, however, this sense of isolation, like acid spilling out of a bottle, can unconsciously eat away at a person's heart and dissolve it. You could see it, too, as a kind of double-edged sword. It protects me, but at the same time steadily cuts away at me from the inside.

Woe unto him that is never alone, and cannot bear to be alone.

It was not often that she was alone like this and she did not like it. When she was alone she had to think and, these days, thoughts were not so pleasant.

True happiness is impossible without solitude.... I need solitude in my life as I need food and drink and the laughter of little children. Extravagant though it may sound, solitude is the filter of my soul. It nourishes me, and rejuvenates me. Left alone, I discovered that I keep myself good company.

No man is an island, as they say. No. I've tried it. I've gone on retreats at various times in my life for three or four or five days. I was desperate to get out of there and talk to somebody. But I fly fish a lot, and I can only do that really by myself. I find I'm never lonesome when I'm on a river, far from it, but it's a lonely practice.

Isolation is the indispensable component of human happiness.

I have not a desire but a need for solitude.

People who grow bored in their own company seem to me in danger.

Of all the conditions we experience, solitude is perhaps the most misunderstood.

Solitude never hurt anyone. Emily Dickinson lived alone, and she wrote some of the most beautiful poetry the world has ever known... then went crazy as a loon." Lisa Simpson

All the unhappiness of men arises from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly in their own chamber.

People don't acknowledge loneliness in themselves, and don't appreciate its benefits, the reflection and attentiveness that come with it, the deepened acquaintance with oneself.