"What do you think is loneliness?"

"Loneliness? I don't know, isn't it pretty straightforward? It's when one lacks companionship. When one is all alone, no friends, no one to talk to, no one to share anything with."

"Yeah, but isn't weird that sometimes you feel most lonely exactly when you have all the company in the world?"

"What do you mean?"

"Have you ever felt lonely in a crowd? Like in a party for example"

"Well, yeah, but that's just because I have no one to talk to."

"No, no, that’s not what I meant. I feel like you can get really really lonely even with all the attention and companionship in the world. Like right in the moment when you’re talking, laughing, dancing in the middle of a crowd. Right at that exact moment, not after everything is over."

"I don't get it"

"It's kinda like... with all those efforts you put up trying to conform with the crowd, with all that superficiality, that inauthenticity, you get separated from even yourself.

That separation makes you realize that even the you that you thought is you is not even you, if that makes any sense. And..

...And with that newly realized feeling of isolation it doesn’t only feel like you’re presently alone, it feels like… you have always been and will always be…

... I don't want to think about it."

"Sounds pretty scary."

"IT IS. It's terrifying. It's cold, it's dark, and I don't like it at all.