The Power of Time Alone
A mind steady and unwavering, a love of quiet places and no taste for noisy crowds, and a constant watching over the knowledge of one's true self — this is wisdom.
Unable to bear time alone, do I keep fleeing into noise and crowds?
📝Reflection
The old teacher names loving quiet places and having no taste for noisy crowds as a condition of wisdom. Not that we should hate people, but that we should build the strength to face ourselves alone. Left alone, I grow anxious and flee endlessly into screens and noise. But knowing the true self does not grow amid din. Thoreau going to Walden woods, the Buddha sitting alone beneath a tree — this is that ground. Only one who can bear being alone keeps from losing the self within a crowd.
🌱Apply It Today
Turn off every screen and sound today and sit alone for fifteen minutes, doing nothing, simply being with yourself.
This verse is read as universal humanistic wisdom, not religion — no faith is promoted, and the reflection is 100% original ONGO content.
