More and more people are choosing to spend time alone after various lockdowns in the UK. In South Korea, there's even a word for it - ‘Honjok’, nminassian writes
Mel Sims 'never wanted the fun to stop' - but something changed in her after lockdown.After another whirlwind night out in the Spanish city of Zaragoza, Mel Sims hitched a ride home on the back of a bin lorry.
“I realised the reason I accepted all the party invites is it kept me from looking inwards, and there was something in me... this constant restlessness. “I felt like that was wasting time, I felt guilty,” she explained. She could work 14 hours a day without stopping and play just as tirelessly. “Now, rather than rushing around and getting distracted, I realise sometimes I just need to sit down and have tea and that isn’t a waste of time.That realisation has been a long time coming. From a young age, Mel knew she was “different” but never stopped to understand why. More time alone led her to finally seek an outside perspective.
“I feel that I had masked my entire life and I didn’t know I was doing it. If you can imagine the job of a dam to keep water out – that was like my job to keep as many distractions out as possible. Hong Kong-based journalist Crystal Tai, who co-authored ‘Honjok: The Art of Living Alone’, says Honjok is a “global phenomenon.”“In the US, China, UK, and other developed countries, we are seeing a rapid increase in single-person households ranging between all ages, ethnicities and genders.”Ismail Hamzah via Unsplash
What this all means now is Mel, whose final pre-lockdown night out was a round of festive drinks, happily spent Christmas Day alone. “Now I think, ‘do I want to spend time with you?’ I don’t mean that in an arrogant way, but I think we fill our lives with people,” she said.
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