Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes

So it is that Lonely Places attract as many lonely people as they produce, and the loneliness we see in them is partly in ourselves.

The trouble is not really in being alone, it's being lonely. One can be lonely in the midst of a crowd, don't you think?

If I can't be my own, I'd feel better dead

Let him who cannot be alone beware of community. Let him who is not in community beware of being alone.

The individualism of the Arab has been erased from this society.

American poverty is darkened by lonliness: poverty in so many poor countries …. Is brightened only by community. Helping people gain other people to lean on—not just offering cheaper health care and food stamps, tax cuts and charter schools—seems essential to making the American dream work …

Loneliness is a huge issue for both individuals and for society. It's taken a long time for the issue to be treated seriously and for us to begin to understand the impact it can have.

Isolation is devastating to the human psyche.

Human groupings have one main purpose: to assert everyone’s right to be different, to be special, to think, feel and live in his or her own way. People join together in order to win or defend this right. But this is where a terrible, fateful error is born: the belief that these groupings in the name of a race, a God, a party or a State are the very purpose of life and not simply a means to an end. No! The only true and lasting meaning of the struggle for life lies in the individual, in his modest peculiarities and in his right to these peculiarities.

I used to want to kill myself because I had lost so much of who I knew I was because of all the other invalidation from people. It sends you spiraling where you're like, Wait, I know I have this quality, I know what my integrity is - until you're being fed all this false information about yourself. You start to wonder why. You don't feel good about yourself because you no longer believe in yourself.

Loneliness as a situation can be corrected, but as a state of mind it is an incurable illness.

A guy goes nuts if he ain't got nobody.

I couldn't say who I am, I haven't the remotest notion of myself; I am someone without antecedents, without a history, without a country, and on that I insist!

No man is an island, as they say. No. I've tried it. I've gone on retreats at various times in my life for three or four or five days. I was desperate to get out of there and talk to somebody. But I fly fish a lot, and I can only do that really by myself. I find I'm never lonesome when I'm on a river, far from it, but it's a lonely practice.

Any business or enterprise that shaves away loneliness is going to last forever. And like it or not but we've got a lonely society.

No one can be happy in eternal solitude.

Of all the diseases I have known, loneliness is the worst.

Man was born to live with his fellow human beings. Separate him, isolate him, his character will go bad, a thousand ridiculous affects will invade his heart, extravagant thoughts will germinate in his brain, like thorns in an uncultivated land.

loneliness has its own needs!

I don't doubt that a man can live perfectly well on his own, but I'm convinced that he begins to die as soon as he closes the door of his house behind him.

Individuality is different than isolation. Isolation is trying to do everything on your own, living life by yourself. Isolation happens when you choose not to be involved in any communities, making sure you keep a safe distance from people in your life. I’m not recommending isolation. Science, psychology, and religion all suggest long term isolation is dangerous and unhealthy.

There is nothing worse than solitude. Solitude can help a man realize himself; but it destroys a woman

If economic progress means that we become anonymous cogs in some great machine, then progress is an empty promise.

We are hardwired to connect with others, it's what gives purpose and meaning to our lives, and without it there is suffering.

In the absence of touching and being touched, people of all ages can sicken and grow touched starved. Touch seems to be as essential as sunlight.