The Freedom of Loneliness
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 มิ.ย. 2024
- How can we be happy alone? How can we be happy while we are lonely? These are some of the oldest questions about happiness that humans have posed. Sometimes wisdom on this question is best found not in a straight-up philosopher, but in someone who sampled a life of solitude and wrote down how he found it. That is exactly where Henry David-Thoreau comes in. He spent 2 years in self-imposed isolation near Walden Pond in Massachusetts, and his book Walden is his account of what that was like.
Sign up to my email list here: forms.gle/TaNTyKMZ142pgMiv8
00:00 Thoreau's adventure
00:53 The Trappings of Modernity
03:27 Radical Gratitude
06:51 Connection with Work
10:00 The Value of Solitude
12:52 What Next?
If you want to work with an experienced study coach teaching maths, philosophy, and study skills then book your session at josephfolleytutoring@gmail.com. Previous clients include students at the University of Cambridge and the LSE.
Sign up to my email list for more philosophy to improve your life: forms.gle/YYfaCaiQw9r6YfkN7
As soon as i finish high school, I'm doing this for 3 to 4 months, I've always wanted to do this, Just one more year left.
That sounds really cool! Have fun!
Same bro
Sameee
It's all fun and games till "Wrong Turn"
"We might not always have the power to gain more, but we often have the power to want less".
Thank you
Thank you for watching!
This will be my early retirement. With a solar rig, my instruments,washing machine and starlink haha. Relative asceticism. We are far too comfortable indeed. Growing fruit and vegetables and foraging are so rewarding, permaculture takes this to the next level by creating your own micro ecosystem as such- endlessly fascinating, exponentially more than social media culture. Solitude is bliss!
As somebody who’s ran into health problems at the end of high school, this required me to stay in isolation for about 2 years from what I was previously used to. I was on my own personal Walden, in the hospital room, where I discovered philosophy; namely Buddhism, Stoicism, Emerson and Thoreau. Before I went into full isolation for my immune system, I went to a Buddhist retreat, where it reset my values, in much the same vein as Thoreau.
Love your videos, please keep these coming. I would love to see one on Emerson and transcendentalism if you want some input! Take care.
Thank you! I hope things are better at your end!
I loved this book, I’ve abandoned my socials & all my so called friends (all questionable) over a year now, & I’ve formed such deep relationships with certain trees & crows in my neighborhood & hills nearby. And now it’s like the reality that surrounds me has become an oracle in & of itself, numbers & symbols & creatures & stars all working in an ongoing narrative. It’s all so compelling & uncanny. Magick gets real. 🧬⚛️🐇🦉🐦⬛⚛️👽🙏🧙
From what you’ve said here you may also like Dostoevsky’s White Nights
@@unsolicitedadvice9198 I have not read that one, Dostoevsky is on another level , TY 🙏 You’re doing great content here, Happy Holidays! 🎄🙏
Many find peace & solutions to problems in their alone time. Give yourself the gift of appreciating time alone. Yes, it is sometimes very lonely ..but it is an opportunity to give thanks for whatever small grace we receive...as many in this world would appreciate the gift of peace.❤
This is a really nice thought
@@unsolicitedadvice9198 Peace be with you, you are just beginning the long adventure called life.
You're a gifted teacher. This channel will grow. Survival is triumph enough.
As always, you knock it out of the park with this one! I worked as a therapist in the NHS a couple of years ago and was there for a few years. Gratitude was always a huge part of what I tried to impart in my patients being a big fan of Seneca myself, so it’s great to see you tackle it!
Speaking of gratitude, I wanted to acknowledge your always dressing up for these videos. It’s a great way of showing your respect for yourself and for us as your audience and I for one appreciate it.
Keep it up man, your channel will blow up very soon. We are just the lucky few who get to say we knew you at these humble beginnings!
Loving this channel! Have been watching for the past hour.
I was very happy to have found this video. You brought together 3 subjects that I really admire. first, minimalism, second, a transcendentalist vision and finally, stoic philosophy.
Your videos are excellent, the way you organize these works and ideas into easily digestible content is impressive.
"the things you own end up owning you"
Tyler Durden
Ah I had no idea that was where that quote came from - I’ve definitely heard it before but I assumed it was from a Stoic philosopher or Epicurus
Thank you ❤🎉 Pursuit of more is truly draining.
Thank you for watching!
Thanks a lot for your work! Please continue, I believe this channel will have a lot of success.
Thank you! I’m really glad you like it!
This was a formative book for me, and I muchly appreciated this video essay. You did the text justice and gained a fan in this solitary persnickety nitpicker.
You're just incredible!
This came at the right time, thank you.
I am glad it was helpful! Thank you for watching
Great channel!
Keep up the awesome work!
Learning more about philosophy and the mind saved my life, I'm very grateful that there's intelligent, compassionate people like you out there to share it 🥰
Ah thank you, that’s very kind. I’m really glad you are enjoying the videos! (Though I must insist that I’m not actually very intelligent, but it is very kind of you to say so)
Whenever I hear about Thoreau's cabin, my brain starts playing "Common People" without my consent.
So incredibly informative! ♥️
Thank you! I’m really glad!
Such a great channel. Thanks for this!
Thank you for watching
I absolutely adore and love your content keep going man:)
Great video, learned a lot from it
Thank you! I’m glad!
Thank you for this video, please upload more videos 🙂
Thank you for watching! I’ll have one out towards the end of this week (family commitments permitting)
great video
I actually did this 😄 I’m currently living in the countryside. Little pleasures are my daily life (:
Walden is short and cheap, I shall read it. Thank you for the video essayl
Thank you for watching! And it’s a fun read!
Great content! ❤
Thank you!
Amazing
Thank you!
your videos are really great
Thank you! I am really glad you like them
2:35 I do Hope your physical pain has eased
Damn bro I could literally listen to you talk allllllll day long. #Charisma #JustDamnGoodLooks
Haha! That’s a lovely compliment! But my friends can attest it gets tiring eventually
My dream ❤
your timing on some of these topics is just uncanny; they're so applicable at particular junctures in life for me, quite bizarre.
many thanks for this one, happy holidays!
Thank you! Happy holidays to you as well!
same, i just changed my life radically and now i am quite isolated (again). it's necessary, you need to live with yourself, before you live with others. i can't share his exile, i'm in the city, isolated though (and with a laptop). maybe i should quit that too, for a while.
Perhaps a list of happy philosophers? Epicurus, Nietzsche, Herbert Spencer, Stuart Mill, Erasmus Darwin, Bentham? And the list is debatable and certainly not complete. Cheers
But you are so special, keep up like that
Ah thank you! That’s very kind
Oh shatter my dreams.. her we goo :D
Own you
Merry Christmas! ⛄ Walden is very interesting, why most philosophers are so 😡unhappy with life in general? Cheers 😀
Merry Christmas! And I have often wondered the same thing. Though I think a lot of them also seemed quite jolly (or at the very least, their writings are quite jolly)
This is one of the channels that gave me the courage to start my TH-cam channel 9 months ago about self development. Now I have 1,739 subs and > 1k hours of watch time. I know it’s not comparable with others but I’m still proud I started because I’ve been learning so many lessons that I could haven’t learned without getting started in the 1st place.
Can you make video on shopenhaur on Hindu upnishad
so basically bro did the ultimate dopamine detox
Ah yeah! If I had spotted that I would have made the comparison in the video
@@unsolicitedadvice9198 it is a good message but it doesn't translate in todays capitalist world. if we do that we'll get out of the competition and end up poor
Ultimately yeah it’s not like copying Thoreau one-to-one will work out well for most people. I more enjoy thinking what we can learn from these people who do things we might not be able to do
15:07 But is not the fear of abandonment, rather being powerless in a situation. We want agency, and inevitably it entails some loss of acceptance and validation (from others)
“For everything you have lost, you have gained something else”
Yes, all humans are primates, and primates crave companionship for the obvious survival reasons.
But we must ask ourselves, at what cost and burden? In most cases it is possible that solitude and solace is the (only?) answer.
Living life through the eyes of others isn’t a reasonable coping strategy while simultaneously claiming agency. There is a choice to be made.
Merry Xmas 2023. 🎄 ❤
A nice point! It reminds me a bit of Sartre’s ideas
Merry Christmas to you too!
Shit you got me 😅😅😅
I love the woodsman. He’s not smart and he knows it. He works hard. He chops wood all day; that’s all he knows and what he’s best at. He eats hungry and sleeps tired. He doesn’t ponder the endless complex paradoxes of life. He leads a simple life, and he’s happier for it.
What is Thoreau’s book called?
It is called Walden :)
do an episode about each ancient filosophers
I would like to at some point! Although there is so much already on ancient philosophers that I am not sure if I would be adding much
Ironic that the cabin in the woods is considered a luxury by modern standards
That’s an excellent point! There is a sense in which it was still Thoreau’s fortunate circumstances that allowed him to conduct this experiment, since he was (as far as I know) living on the land owned by a friend (R.W. Emerson)
You look cute...!
Very kind of you to say
This channel is useful as fuck ❤
Thank you! That's very kind of you to say!
The best way to be happy alone is to be Diogenes.
Just like Alexander the Great Said...
Also yeah that intro sentence really hit my fantasies to return to unga bunga perfectly.
Oh I have got to do a video on Diogenes at some point!
@@unsolicitedadvice9198 He's my favorite philosopher of all time, only barely beating Marcus Aurelius due to how funny it is to learn and read about him- unlike ol' Stoicism man who is usually at least a little depressing to learn about since he lived during such tough times in the roman empire- which usually hurts to think about...
I've heard that we've lost many works from Diogenes which is a crying shame, apparently he wrote 10 full length books on the subject of morality that we have absolutely no surviving documentation of- only knowing of it by references made by others about them in later works... a damn crying shame, may the sands of time reveal at least some of such treasures to us one day, I can only imagine how incredibly funny or poignantly striking they would be.
I love your videos but you have got to get some new stick photos for your thumbnails and in video use 😅
Haha! I will do at some point, but I’ve not found many that work as well
@unsolicitedadvice9198 hahaha, good luck with that!
Keep up the good work
Lonely and financial secure and happy wallowing in disgust for humanity. 10 million US dollars
I enjoyed Civil Desobedience much more than Walden. Thoreau had guts.
I would love to cover that as well at some point
Problem is people need money to buy food , warmth from the elements and pay for rent even in the forest since all things belong to someone which everyone wants something. Even women attack a man for that if they dont have which women are the biggest issue in the world for men. LOL
In general good videos.
Oh yeah, it’s not like it’s possible to live like Thoreau did for those years (even in his day it was only through a series of fortunate coincides that he could). I just think it’s fun to see what we can take from what he did
If exurb1a has taught me one thing, it’s that the answer is NOT a cabin in the woods.
Haha! It is worth noting that Thoreau did not plan to stay there forever