Being alone is very difficult.

Host: The rain fell like silk, fine and steady, weaving the city into a shimmering tapestry of light and loneliness. The streetlights glowed amber, halos forming around every droplet, and the sound of traffic — distant, muted — rose and fell like an urban tide.

Host: Inside a narrow apartment overlooking the street, the air was heavy with the scent of wet concrete and tea. The walls were lined with scattered canvases — some finished, most half-begun — and in the corner, a record player spun quietly, Yoko Ono’s voice floating soft and strange through the room: “We’re all water, from different rivers…”

Host: Jack sat on the floor beside the window, a mug cooling beside him, his face reflected faintly in the glass — two versions of himself staring at each other. Jeeny sat cross-legged near the easel, a paintbrush twirling slowly in her fingers.

Jeeny: (softly) “Yoko Ono once said, ‘Being alone is very difficult.’”
(She looks out the window, watching the reflection of the city shimmer.) “She’s right. People make it sound poetic — solitude, independence — but when it’s real, it’s heavy. It hums in the bones.”

Jack: (nodding slowly) “Yeah. Everyone romanticizes solitude until they have to eat dinner with it.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. They forget that silence has weight. It presses on you. Especially at night.”

Jack: (half-smiling) “Funny thing is — people think being alone is just being without company. But sometimes, it’s being with yourself too long.”

Host: The rain thickened, drumming softly on the windowpane, as if the night itself was playing percussion for their conversation.

Jeeny: “You ever think that’s why people fill their lives with noise? Music, chatter, phones, endless motion — not to connect, but to avoid hearing themselves.”

Jack: “Absolutely. The world’s terrified of stillness. Stillness shows you your own reflection, and most people aren’t ready to meet their eyes.”

Jeeny: “That’s what makes being alone so difficult. You can’t perform for yourself. You can’t hide behind gestures or conversation. You just… are.”

Jack: “And ‘just being’ isn’t easy. It takes courage.”

Jeeny: “You think Yoko meant courage?”

Jack: “I think she meant endurance. The way solitude can be both creation and crucifixion.”

Host: The lamp flickered, throwing shadows that moved like ghosts across the floor. Somewhere outside, a siren wailed — not loud enough to intrude, just enough to remind them that the city was still awake, still restless.

Jeeny: “You know, she lost John Lennon, and still she created art — alone, in the silence he left. Maybe that’s what she meant: that being alone isn’t just existing without people, it’s learning to keep creating without witnesses.”

Jack: “Yes. It’s the test of authenticity. Can you still make meaning when no one is there to see it?”

Jeeny: “Or love you for it.”

Jack: “Especially that.”

Host: The music changed, the record spinning into a slow, dissonant melody that filled the air like fog — imperfect, but beautiful in its honesty.

Jeeny: “You know what’s strange? Being alone makes you honest. There’s no one left to lie to.”

Jack: (chuckling softly) “And yet, somehow, we still find ways.”

Jeeny: “Maybe because the truth, when you’re alone, is too loud.”

Jack: “Yeah. And it echoes.”

Host: The rain eased for a moment, softening into a mist. The lights from the passing cars reflected on the wet pavement below, dancing across the ceiling like liquid fire.

Jeeny: “I used to think being alone meant I was failing at something — at love, at friendship, at life. But now… I think it’s just another state of being, like the ocean at low tide. The water’s still there — just deeper, quieter.”

Jack: “That’s beautiful.”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s what Ono meant too. That loneliness is difficult not because it’s empty — but because it’s full. Full of yourself.”

Jack: (smiling faintly) “And the self isn’t easy company.”

Jeeny: “No. It never shuts up.”

Jack: “It tells the truth too often.”

Jeeny: “And remembers what you try to forget.”

Host: The record crackled, a soft static that filled the silence like breath. The city’s glow cast a pale wash across the window, the kind of light that feels like it belongs to no one and everyone.

Jeeny: “Do you think being alone gets easier with time?”

Jack: “No. You just stop fighting it. You start realizing it’s not a punishment — it’s a mirror. And mirrors are difficult because they show you what you are, not what you want to be.”

Jeeny: “And sometimes, what you are isn’t enough.”

Jack: “Sometimes it’s too much.”

Host: The clock ticked, unhurried, marking time not as an enemy but as a witness. The room had grown darker, but the quiet felt warmer somehow — like the sound of two people learning how to sit with the unspeakable.

Jeeny: “You know, the hardest part of being alone isn’t the silence. It’s the absence of being seen. You start wondering if you exist as fully when no one is looking.”

Jack: “That’s the illusion of attention — we think we’re real only when we’re reflected in someone else’s eyes. But maybe Yoko knew the secret: that to truly be seen, you have to survive your own gaze first.”

Jeeny: (softly) “And that’s why it’s difficult.”

Jack: “Yes. Because it’s raw. There’s no applause in solitude, no audience to confirm your worth.”

Jeeny: “Just the echo of your own heart — asking if it’s enough.”

Host: The rain began again, heavier now, as if the sky itself had something to confess. The sound filled every space between their words.

Jeeny: “Maybe being alone is an art — the hardest one to learn.”

Jack: “And the only one worth mastering.”

Jeeny: “Why?”

Jack: “Because once you learn to live with yourself, no one can take your peace away.”

Jeeny: “But it’s lonely.”

Jack: “Peace always is.”

Host: The record ended, the stylus resting in the groove, whispering a faint, endless hiss. Outside, the city was just shadows and light — infinite strangers passing through each other’s lives.

And in that soft darkness, Yoko Ono’s words seemed to hang in the air like the final note of a song that didn’t want to end:

that being alone is difficult
because it demands truth;
that solitude is not emptiness,
but exposure —
the stripping away of distraction
until all that’s left is the soul
and its unfiltered echo.

Host: Jeeny leaned her head against the wall, her eyes half-closed.

Jeeny: (whispering) “You think anyone ever gets used to it?”

Jack: (quietly) “No. But maybe the goal isn’t comfort. Maybe it’s intimacy — with your own silence.”

Host: Outside, the rain softened once more,
and the city exhaled —
tired, alive, listening.

And in that moment,
two souls sat quietly in the company of themselves,
finally understanding
that the difficulty of being alone
is not loneliness itself —
but the courage it takes
to stay.