We humans are social creatures. There’s no doubt that spending time with family, friends, and neighbors can be deeply satisfying for our health and wellness. However, I also believe we become more well-adjusted when we also prioritize solitude. In fact, when we avoid being alone, this says something negative about our relationship with ourselves. Read on, or watch the video below, to learn the 5 reasons why you need to spend more time alone – all of which will greatly improve your life.
What Does It Mean To Be Alone And How Much Solitude Do You Need?
To me, being alone doesn’t just mean being away from other people. Solitude means being free from people, places, or things that influences your energy in any way. What I’m suggesting to you is to spend some time away from:
- people (even crowds of strangers)
- media in all forms, even guided meditations
- stimulating music that has words
- and even having time away from pets (no, walking the dog doesn’t count)
This may seem strict, but when when you read the list below, you’ll see why I insist on truly be alone. And it doesn’t mean that you have to spend this period of solitude meditating in a cave. You can still be doing activities – just lessening distractions as much as possible.
You’ll gain so many benefits getting regular periods of alone-time, even just 10 minutes a day. I believe this is much better than getting larger chunks of solitude less frequently.
5 Holistic Benefits of Alone Time
Why do you need to spend more time alone? These are the main reasons from a holistic perspective – how this period alone will affect your body, heart, mind, and spirit.
1. Hear And Honor Your Body’s Messages and Needs
When you are alone – away from any other input – you’re able to hear and feel messages from your body. You notice how well you’re digesting, where you have pain, when you’re hungry/thirsty, when you are tired and ready to sleep. You may miss these messages if you’re constantly moving from one activity to another or always surrounded by people needing your attention. It’s also important to spend time alone to know what feels really good in your body. What feels pleasurable? Alone time is necessary to exploree this without inhibitions!
Becoming still and quiet – alone – on a regular basis can strengthen your awareness. You can then determine what your body needs to function even better. With practice, this builds confidence in your ability to care for yourself which is really empowering!
2. Get To Know Your Own Energy And Emotional Waves
On a deeper level, time alone can help you feel energy in your body. This is one of the many reasons why I am a huge proponent of practicing Yoga alone at home. It’s rare to have a deep experiences in a crowded class – especially with feeling energy flow and how it’s not only affecting your body, but your emotions as well.
For people with empathic abilities, who can sense and feel the emotions of others, becoming familiar with oneself is necessary to function well! You usually know whether you’re empathic or not. But learning your Human Design chart can validate it. If you have an Undefined or Open Solar Plexus in your HD chart, you are highly empathic. You not only feel the emotions of the people around you who have a defined Solar Plexus, but you actually amplify their feelings. This can leave you feeling crazy, if you don’t recognize that they’re not your emotions to begin with!
And yes, it’s possible to pick up on your pets’ emotions too, so it’s best to be completely alone quite often so you can tell the difference!
3. Expand Your Creative Potential
It’s true that hanging out with inspiring people, exposing yourself to interesting content, and constantly learning new things from experts, can give you great ideas. However, when you’re heavily influenced by others, you might start comparing yourself with others and try to fit the mold that worked for them. You might think it’s necessary to adopt a certain system or strict rules. Time in solitude helps us fully integrate our ideas and to dream even bigger than others. This leads to feeling more expansive and blows the lid off your creative limits!
So whenever you feel like you’d like to come up with new ideas – try going on a nature walk instead of taking a class. At least look to yourself FIRST as the creative authority in your life and then see if wisdom from others can help you expand on the ideas you already have. I don’t know about you, but I have much more satisfaction with my work when it’s truly unique!
4. Develop Greater Self-love
Some people go to great lengths to avoid being alone. This usually points to issues with self-love or just avoiding their feelings. They may also need to learn how to be alone without feeling lonely. It’s so important to resolve this issue, otherwise they may try to find happiness through someone else which never really works longterm. In the healthiest relationships, couples come together as whole, healed people who are love themselves first.
So how do you do you develop self-love?
There’s no universal process that’s recommended. And you might need individual help to get to the heart of the issue (I LOVE to help people with this!).
Committing to time alone and investigating why it’s so uncomfortable is the first step. Then perhaps you can lead with doing something pleasurable. Maybe you can engage in some new hobbies or try to master a skill that you’re proud of? Eventually it’s helpful to find something that only you enjoy and you’ll be begging for some alone time to engage in it!
5. Receive Wisdom From Your Higher-Self And Spirit Guides
The funny thing is that when you spend more time alone, you realize that you are never really alone. Time alone leads to self-reflection and greater connections in your spiritual life. These are times when you can communicate with your creator, your higher-self, and your individual spirit guides. Just like it’s important to spend time alone to recognize your own energy & emotions, you’ll also be able to sense when you’re surrounded by your spiritual allies. Allowing yourself this depth of connection can lift your out of the darkest times, adding greater meaning to your life.
Do you prioritize time alone? How do you spend it? And how does it benefit your life? Please let us know in the comments below! And feel free to reach out to me if you would like my 1:1 support.
