Silence and solitude

On being an introvert and going to weddings alone

Photo by Toni Reed on Unsplash

Recently I’ve been really enjoying my time alone. I think I’ve just been struggling with how loud the world is right now, and although I don’t go out that often, if and when I do, I often find myself desperate to get back home. Back to the peace and silence of my home. It is so quiet here. Most of the time I can only hear the clock ticking away in the kitchen, or the house settling as it warms up and cools down. I might occasionally hear a plane passing overhead, or someone coming up the gravel drive, but for the most part it is deathly still and I have come to love it.

A recent trip to Tesco to pick up a few things resulting in me feeling more than overwhelmed and as I walked around trying to find what I needed I found that everything was suddenly too loud, there was too much going on around me and my brain shut down. It seems to do this more and more now. I left feeling completely overstimulated and I was exhausted. I had probably only been in there for about 10 minutes but that was more than enough.

Perhaps I have become too accustomed to staying inside, or only going to places that feel safe. My tolerance for these things seems to have decreased over time since the pandemic, and perhaps maybe I’ve always been this way. Always longed for the silence, and stillness because anything else is too much. But somehow we get by. Or maybe it’s just a case of exposure. Exposing ourselves time and time again until things are not so much.

We had a lifetime of doing those things before we were all shut away for a couple of years. I think the only difference now is that I’m more comfortable with my own silence and introvertism. I no longer feel like I need to pretend that I’m ok with being somewhere that makes me feel uncomfortable, or that I always have to have something to say. I’m more comfortable being myself, and being authentic about it too.

This weekend I went to my friend’s wedding reception in Oxford. Tom was meant to come too, but being deployed put paid to that. So I went by myself, and this ended up being the third wedding I’ve attended completely alone, without really knowing anyone else except the bride who is understandably too busy to spend time with me.

It doesn’t particularly bother me anymore, and I’ve grown quite used to taking care of myself. I find somewhere nice to sit peacefully by myself and I just observe. I struggle with small talk but I’ll never turn anyone away who wishes to speak to me, but I also won’t deliberately go out of my way to seek out others to talk to. I am simply happier by myself. Sometimes I wonder if people feel sorry for me, being at a party with no friends, but I don’t mind it so much. I feel more myself sitting alone in silence and contemplation than I do when I’m trying to find interesting things to say to people.

I don’t think there was a moment of silence on our table, and if there was it would be filled so quickly. Almost as if the guests I shared the table with were frightened of it, and wanted to make sure it couldn’t find an opening. I embraced it fully and sat listening attentively to what everyone else was saying, without the need to offer any of my own thoughts. There simply wasn’t room for those amongst the people who had to fill every delicate pause.

I find this happens a lot, and I wonder if it’s true of all introverts. I can have something I’d like to say but I’ll often never be offered a window to share it. I won’t ever interrupt anyone or interject, and by the time there’s a natural pause or a break, someone else will have filled it, or I find that what I want to say is no longer relevant to the conversation. Most often I just listen, because it is easier to, and other times I simply don’t have anything to say. Perhaps I come across as shy, or even aloof, but I have grown more comfortable with the silence and the stillness and I wrap it around myself like a cloak. It is comforting to be so internally still amongst the noise of the world and not concern myself with what others might think of me for it.

I yearn for the silence when conversation trickles away. To be so deeply immersed in it in the company of others. Silence seems to say so much more than what words can convey. It is the quiet shared enjoyment of a meal, the shared space of support when difficult emotions are too painful to express. It is peaceful reflection and remembrance.

It is a time to pause and to listen, because it is in the silence, that we can really hear our innermost selves. They are often the loudest of all of the pieces of us put together, and it is oh so important to listen because those voices in the silence will tell us everything we ever need to know.

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Currently

Reading

I have almost finished The Wise Man’s Fear and I may move onto The Slow Regard of Silent Things by the same author - which seems quite apt right now.

I also loved reading this post from

Whitney Barkman

this morning which says so much about how I feel about being social.

I'm Just Not Great at Being Social

Watching

I am completely in awe of Nicola Kilner. This interview was so raw and I think there is something we can all learn from her story.

Listening to

My ‘Girl Power’ playlist. It’s full of feisty fiery voices and I just loved belting out every song with them (badly) on my way up to Oxford. So much so in fact that I nearly lost my voice!

Loving

Beautiful weddings. Catching up with old friends and teammates. Getting outside. Sunny days. Picking blackberries, and eating more of them than you end up taking home. Getting more and more confident jumping with Skye. Home cooked meals, and especially the ones that are cooked for you. Morning workouts and early nights.