THE SPACE OF ISOLATION:

[Pravin Kumar]

The Space of Isolation:

When the mind settles the need to reach for something lessens, in the process the space of isolation disappears and it’s simply because an “I” story of separation isn’t being created...

The space of isolation seems to get wider as one ages, but it doesn’t really, what happens is there’s just less busyness so “I” takes more of a hold. The natural process of life seems to be to stay busy trying to figure things out, and regardless of what exactly the figuring out manifest as it certainly creates a lot of noise. There are periods in between the busyness where there’s some idle time as the space of isolation arise, but it doesn’t usually last very long because the busyness of trying to figure out life returns. This busyness last most of one’s life, but there does comes a time that the natural process of being busy lessens. At this stage many people experience an isolation that hasn’t been noticed before, it will either be addressed by looking inward or one will get busy again trying to figure out how to fill the space.

Eventually the busyness will end for whatever reason, but unfortunately for most people without the busyness the space of isolation rears its ugly head. Many elderly people struggle with this because there just isn’t a lot going on. Kids are grown, retirement, house paid off, more time behind you than what’s in front of you, and the list goes on; I was busy for many years. There were very brief periods of not needing to reach, but these periods were far and few in between. That is until eleven years ago when I hit an emotional bottom. I began sitting and simply looking inward which allowed me to see the busyness story of “I”. As I sat the mind settled and thus the “I” needing to reach for something lessened. In the process the space of isolation disappeared and it’s simply because an “I” story of separation wasn’t being created...

MICHAEL CUPO