I think this is the first time I have felt at peace with solitude.
I mean, not in the sense of time in the day spent alone - over the past year it has been so freeing to get to know my own rhythms better and to be able to make the space to be on my own without feeling guilty. But coming back here to Toulouse - I am still asking God why exactly I am here again when I have some not-so-good memories of the place - it is strange to realise how much has changed. It's not like I suddenly don't need people any more after learning the value of church and community all year, it's not like I don't miss those who I am normally around. But there's something oddly good and alive about this time, especially this week where mostly, I really am on my own, on the roam in Toulouse.
I think it's like pulling off a plaster, solitude. You suddenly come into raw contact with the real world, after not realising you had been cocooned by a buffer layer. You become more aware of your needs and the things you have come (perhaps wrongly) to depend upon. You realise how much you value and need the people who are important in your life and you realise your love for them more clearly. You face your own bad habits more starkly, and what you are like to be around! If you are me, your overanalytical and thinkadelic tendencies can go a little haywire and have to be curbed sometimes. You are more open to passersby and to the unexpected. You notice thousands of tiny things that you normally might not notice.
Conclusion: not an easy thing but solitude, like fasting, I think is vital in small doses to find balance and to make room for God to speak and change us. Big up to my brother the monk... who absconded in the night for a week to pray and fast after feeling stuck in a rut. Worried mum to death and drank out of a fertiliser tank so not necessarily entirely recommendable, but I think a definite leap in the right direction for him.
Somebody kick me if I haven't 'retreated' for a while and am getting stale...
