Living Alone

I debated calling this one "How to Live Alone," but I honestly don't know what to tell people in the way of advice. The only thing I can tell you is to take out the trash daily and turn up the radio. Those two pieces of advice may seem scant and inadequate, but they sum up the important things that each and every loner must tend to.

The first part is taking out the trash. When you live alone, it is very easy to let shit slide. There is no one around to get pissed at you for leaving trash, laundry, and dirty dishes lying about. It is very easy to become undisciplined to the point that your living space begins to resemble one of those cluttered and infested spaces you see on Hoarders. You need to discipline yourself in this area and make it a daily habit to take care of yourself and your space.

The second part is turning up the radio. If you live alone, you will become lonely. You may even break down and call your ex to patch things up. Or you might get a roommate or decide to go back home to your parents. When this happens, you will remember why you chose to live alone in the first place. The antidote to loneliness is music, podcasts, books, movies, and television. This stuff does two things. The first is that it tricks your mind into thinking there are other people in the room with you. The second thing is that it keeps you from being isolated from the wider world.

There are certain psychological effects of living alone that you have to deal with. The first thing you notice is paranoia. When you are alone, you feel afraid. This is because we find security from being in groups. The mind finds solace and comfort from being with other people. These people will love and protect us. But this isn't the case in actuality. This is like saying that capitalist countries are more ruthless and dog eat dog while communist countries are more family like. But I think Hong Kong beats the hell out of North Korea.

It is enjoyable having a significant other in your life. It is not so enjoyable to find their text messages to their other lovers. When you realize that such relationships are a fiction and provide you no real security whatsoever, you have no problem living alone and turning up the radio.

The second thing you notice is a certain crankiness. This isn't misanthropy. Being alone actually makes people more tolerable when you encounter them. This crankiness is a disdain for other people's inability to deal with their problems and their lack of self-reliance. Because their default solution is to outsource, they burden others with their issues instead of seeking solutions within themselves. Since being alone makes you more self-reliant, your sympathy for these people drops to near zero.

The upside of living alone is that you get to live the way that you want for good or ill. You also have no problems except your own. And when you realize that no one is ever really there for you, you have no regrets about it either. You are all you have.

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