?Dearly beloved Child of my Heart, we are probably standing at the end of our beautiful and rich life together. Because tomorrow the People?s Court intends to sit in judgment on me and others. I hear that we have been expelled from the army. They can take the uniform from us, but not the spirit in which we acted.??Peter Yorck vonøWartenburg, in a letter to his wife. Marion Yorck von Wartenburg was involved in the Nazi resistance group known as the Kreisau Circle, whose cofounder was her husband, Peter. The Kreisau Circle participated in the assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler on July 20, 1944. Peter?s cousin Claus Stauffen-berg and other members of the military resistance carried out the attempt. When they failed, hundreds of people were arrested, tried, and executed, including Peter. Marion and other members of the conspirators? families were also arrested and spent months jailed under miserable conditions. In this memoir Marion recreates the terrifying reality of her life as the wife of a resistance fighter and at the same time conveys the depth of the bond that existed between her and her husband.

Married, happily single, recently divorced - all of us can learn that solitude offers a unique opportunity for personal growth and encounters with God. In the hustle and bustle of modern life the word solitude may provoke a sigh of relief or the slight anxiety of being lonely. But what Dr. Kidder and other wise guides have found is that a major dimension of our spiritual lives is richly encountered in solitude.

As the author of "The Power of Solitude: Embracing Alone Time for Self-Discovery and Fulfillment," I invite you to explore the transformative benefits of solitude. In this book, I share personal stories and insights, as well as research and wisdom from experts, to inspire you to embrace alone time as a tool for self-discovery and growth. Through the pages of this book, I guide you on a journey of self-reflection, introspection, and personal growth. You will discover how to create a healthy balance between solitude and social interaction, and how to find joy and fulfillment in both solitary and social pursuits. You will learn practical strategies for incorporating solitude into your life, and how to use it to deepen your relationships, creativity, and overall well-being. My hope is that this book will inspire you to embrace solitude as a powerful tool for personal growth and fulfillment. May it encourage you to take time for yourself, to explore your inner world, and to connect with the world around you in a deeper and more meaningful way. May it empower you to live a life that is both authentic and fulfilling, and to become the best version of yourself.

“What does it mean to be lonely?” Thomas Dumm asks. His inquiry, documented in this book, takes us beyond social circumstances and into the deeper forces that shape our very existence as modern individuals. The modern individual, Dumm suggests, is fundamentally a lonely self. Through reflections on philosophy, political theory, literature, and tragic drama, he proceeds to illuminate a hidden dimension of the human condition. His book shows how loneliness shapes the contemporary division between public and private, our inability to live with each other honestly and in comity, the estranged forms that our intimate relationships assume, and the weakness of our common bonds. A reading of the relationship between Cordelia and her father in Shakespeare’s King Lear points to the most basic dynamic of modern loneliness—how it is a response to the problem of the “missing mother.” Dumm goes on to explore the most important dimensions of lonely experience—Being, Having, Loving, and Grieving. As the book unfolds, he juxtaposes new interpretations of iconic cultural texts—Moby-Dick, Death of a Salesman, the film Paris, Texas, Emerson’s “Experience,” to name a few—with his own experiences of loneliness, as a son, as a father, and as a grieving husband and widower. Written with deceptive simplicity, Loneliness as a Way of Life is something rare—an intellectual study that is passionately personal. It challenges us, not to overcome our loneliness, but to learn how to re-inhabit it in a better way. To fail to do so, this book reveals, will only intensify the power that it holds over us.

In a time of social distancing and isolation, a meditation on the beauty of solitude from renowned Buddhist writer Stephen Batchelor “Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it. A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.”—Kirkus Reviews “Elegant and formally ingenious.”—Geoff Wisner, Wall Street Journal When world renowned Buddhist writer Stephen Batchelor turned sixty, he took a sabbatical from his teaching and turned his attention to solitude, a practice integral to the meditative traditions he has long studied and taught. He aimed to venture more deeply into solitude, discovering its full extent and depth. This beautiful literary collage documents his multifaceted explorations. Spending time in remote places, appreciating and making art, practicing meditation and participating in retreats, drinking peyote and ayahuasca, and training himself to keep an open, questioning mind have all contributed to Batchelor’s ability to be simultaneously alone and at ease. Mixed in with his personal narrative are inspiring stories from solitude’s devoted practitioners, from the Buddha to Montaigne, from Vermeer to Agnes Martin. In a hyperconnected world that is at the same time plagued by social isolation, this book shows how to enjoy the inescapable solitude that is at the heart of human life.