Blog 3801 – 04.19.2026

The Myth of Isolation 

The fear of loneliness is, I believe based upon a myth, a misunderstanding, a lie. A lie we that many of us have told ourselves so long that we believe it to be true. We are not alone. The poet has written, “No man is an island entire unto himself, each man’s death diminishes me for I am a part of mankind.” We are connected, we are related. Though those connections may sometimes be strained and even appear to completely broken we are not alone, completely bereft of connection.

I remember as a young man on a long flight to South Vietnam in the early days of 1970 that a song I had memorized as a boy in church came to me:

 “Whether I live or die, whether I wake or sleep, whether upon the land, or on the stormy deep, I shall not be afraid. I am the Lord’s I know.”

For a number of years I tried to completely discard the teachings of my youth and held there was no God no higher power. And then after seeing Rhonda Byrne’s video The Secret and reading her book by the same name I ordered a thirty-five pamphlet purportedly written by a Quantum Physicist called Beyond the Secret.

If you are unaware of The Secret, it is treatise about manifesting what you want in your life, kind of a new age version of Norman Vincent Peale’s The Power of Positive Thinking. In a nut shell what comes to us is based on the vibes we emanate or the thoughts that we dwell upon. That idea appealed to me more than the conservative fundamentalist Christian teachings of my childhood, youth, and young manhood.

The Quantum Physicist wrote early in his paper, “For The Secret to work for you, first you must believe in a higher power.” I thought, here we go the old Con-Game begins again, but he disarmed me with the following words: “But if that is a problem for you, try to think of your higher power as just your higher best self.”

After leaving fundamentalist Christianity in my mid-forties I tried many other Christians Churches even a Roman Catholic Church. I read about Buddhism, Islam, Taoism, Hinduism and concluded that all of them seemed to think they had found the one true faith and that all the others were wrong. So I kept search for some more unifying truth to believe in. Up to that point Taoism with its rejecting the Dualism of Western religions for a “not either/or but a both” approach to truth seemed to appeal to me most. 

In my reading I heard of two very long books that kept being referred to, The Way of Mastery and A Course In Miracles both of which purport to be dictated by an ascended master, called Jesus in A Course in Miracles and Jeshua Bar Joseph in in The Way of Mastery that is actually three very large volumes. After a very long build up in each they reveal who God, the higher power, and like cartoon strip Pogo’s great line, “We have discovered the enemy and it is us” both of these books conclude that we have discovered God, the great I am, and it (he/she/they)is us as well.

The childhood retort to “Who is going to make me?” Seem to fit here: “My army of three, me, myself, and I.” I suggest that we are all a bit bi-polar or schizophrenic with at least two personalities perhaps more inhabiting our bodies, possessing our hearts and minds, and moving us to think and act.

Our higher and best self is always at odds with our lower and worst self. I like to refer to my higher self, as the Universe and to my lower self as puny little ego, that lying serpent that would have me misttrust my brothers and sister and the Universe.

Well, there you have it, my theory, my thoughts, on the myth of isolation. Some people when they hear, “We are not alone” think of aliens from distant planets, others – deities, angels, or ghosts. Many small children talk to and about their invisible friends. 

My son when he was a small boy was confronted by his mother with a broken toy or piece of furniture and asked, “Who broke that?” and he sincerely replied, “It must have been that other Jonathan.”

Your higher best self always loves you as does that higher best self in all your brothers and sister both here and in the unseen world. Hey, at least that is what I have discovered in my search for truth.

Your friend and fellow traveler,

David James White

On last thought on this subject Mariah Carey sings, “There’s a hero inside of us.” I think that is true, yet there is also a coward inside of us and that coward would have us believe that we are alone and on our own. Feed the hero and starve that trembling little liar.