Together and alone are often seen as binary opposites, and quite often connected to whether you’re an extravert and introvert. Either you’re alone, or you’re together with someone. Either you’re an extrovert or an introvert.

Yet, there are a lot of signs telling us that they’re not opposites in a binary system, rather they’re on a scale.

You can be completely alone, and you can be completely with one or more others. But you can just as well be with people when you’re alone. All from “What would X think about this?” to having made up conversations with them in your mind, to having real conversations with them on the phone or in a chat.

Just as well as you can get energy both from being with yourself and being with others. You might be energised from texting with someone, sitting in your home with no other physical being there. Or you can need to be around a large group of people in a café, but with your headphones on.

In the past months, I’ve been much less alone in a physical sense than ever since I moved out from my moms place. I’ve enjoyed being alone heavily before, and now I don’t feel the need to be almost at all. It’s been an interesting thing, finding someone that I actually want to spend most of my wake hours with, almost every day of every week.

Now, she’s on holiday abroad and i’ve found myself alone every single evening for three days, finding it hard to come up with things to do. So I’ve filled the afternoons up with time with other friends, family and work outside my home.

Together and alone

Together and alone are often seen as binary opposites, and quite often connected to whether you’re an extravert and introvert. Either you’re alone, or you’re together with someone. Either you’re an extrovert or an introvert.

Yet, there are a lot of signs telling us that they’re not opposites in a binary system, rather they’re on a scale.

You can be completely alone, and you can be completely with one or more others. But you can just as well be with people when you’re alone. All from “What would X think about this?” to having made up conversations with them in your mind, to having real conversations with them on the phone or in a chat.

Just as well as you can get energy both from being with yourself and being with others. You might be energised from texting with someone, sitting in your home with no other physical being there. Or you can need to be around a large group of people in a café, but with your headphones on.

In the past months, I’ve been much less alone in a physical sense than ever since I moved out from my moms place. I’ve enjoyed being alone heavily before, and now I don’t feel the need to be almost at all. It’s been an interesting thing, finding someone that I actually want to spend most of my wake hours with, almost every day of every week.

Now, she’s on holiday abroad and i’ve found myself alone every single evening for three days, finding it hard to come up with things to do. So I’ve filled the afternoons up with time with other friends, family and work outside my home.

Yet, there’s a creeping loneliness every single one of those evening, when I get in to bed, or start getting ready for bed. It’s like all of the social interactions that I’ve had previously throughout the day are blown away by the fact that I sleep alone.

In all of this, I started evaluating myself, and the feelings I’m having towards that loneliness. Or rather than loneliness, the feeling of being more alone and missing another person so deeply.

Some realisations from this process for me are:

I rarely feel alone. I feel lonely at times. I get energy both from being with others, and from being with myself. I can feel lonely whilst being with people. And I truly, deeply feel an urge to be with my girlfriend as much as I can. Even if it’s just to fall asleep beside her.