Standing Alone
STANDING ALONE Mario D’Couto Eric Fromm once said, “Paradoxically, the ability to be alone is the condition for the ability to love”. Sometimes there is the misconception that the words ‘alone’ and ‘lonely’ are to be understood synonymously but the truth is that they are actually two different phenomenon. Being alone means being by one’s self (solitary) while being or feeling lonely could imply feeling unhappy because of feeling isolated from contact with other people (desolate). The former is positive while the latter is negative. We celebrated Valentine’s Day about two weeks ago and while some of you reading this, may or may not be in a relationship, the focus of this blogpost/article/reflection is about what it takes to be ourselves before getting into a relationship. Speaking about relationships, the common perception that comes to mind at prima – facie is some...