The Light in Our Sky Series #8

A quote from Lord Byron

The Light in Our Sky

Volume #8

June 17th, 2025

“Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt in solitude, where we are least alone.” Lord George Gordon Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

ZAN: As someone who treasures alone time, I feel particularly drawn to this quote. To me, “the feeling infinite” is the connection to God/the universe/the divine/magic/mother nature/source energy or whatever you want to call it—that intangible something we all have access to simply because we’re all on this mysterious spinning ball together. That intimate connection we have to the Big Other is something we all have in common, so tuning into it is a way of tuning into each other, just at a level beyond other kinds of human interaction.

PA: I love ‘the Big Other,’ even though I’m not sure about the ‘other’ part of it. Maybe that Big Spirit is not other at all. Maybe it’s even the opposite of other. If I try to think about ‘each other’ from that angle, I wonder if it actually means ‘each same’ at the level of this beautiful quote. ‘Where we are least alone’ is such a fresh way to put it. For me, like you, solitude is, as Byron says, the place where I feel most connected to myself and so to other people. Fascinating how the appetite for solitude varies across the human community. For me, it’s a deep need and always has been, a way of ordering my interior world. I think you and I are related.

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