EVERYWHERE — So what if January was National Introverts Month? March is very close to January, when you look at it just right.

Apanthropy, or a love of solitude, isn’t necessarily introversion, and it might need its own month. But it’s enough of a hook for this story, so let’s sally forth.

But first: Many thanks to the Dictionary Diva on TikTok for the word!

The benefits of solitude

“Solitude is good for our natural development to recharge our energies,” writes Nicole Tetreault, Ph.D., at psychologytoday.com. “We need to… have alone time to develop healthy relationships with ourselves and others.”

It helps people “define and nurture our character and grows our resilience and independence… and nourishes our creativity.”

When we are alone with ourselves by choice, Tetreault writes, the mind “is freer to engage in creative expression,” and we can take time just to exist, and to let our thoughts flow. 

Cells not required

A love of solitude doesn’t mean we have to embrace our inner anchorite, the people who willingly lived alone in prayer-focused lives in the desert, or in small cells. Our World in Data notes (courtesy of the Bureau of Labor Statistics) that Americans aged 15-29 spend about 45 percent more time alone in 2023 than in 2010.

“Those aged 30 to 44 spend about 20 percent more time alone now than in 2010,” the site added, “while for people 45 and older, the increase is about 10 percent.” Those aged 60 and up are spending about five percent more time alone. 

A quick perusal of Google suggests that most modern solitaries live among other people. They make phone calls, they buy groceries, they go to the library. (Even Thoreau, tucked away at Walden Pond, got out and about.) 

Solitaries are just more content with their own company. 

Who you calling lonely?

There’s been a lot of talk about people feeling more lonely. Chosen solitude is far from loneliness: it’s the relentless call of the stillness within oneself.

Is there an uptake in apanthropy? Bella DePaulo in Psychology Today back in 2022 wrote that in a Canadian study of 100 people aged 50 to 85, they were alone 70 percent of the time and 86 percent of the time, the solitude was chosen. 

Do you crave solitude? What books inspire you? Let me know at copyeditor@riverreporter.com.