Solitude is very different from a 'time-out' from our busy lives. Solitude is the very ground from which community grows. Whenever we pray alone, study, read, write, or simply spend quiet time away from the places where we interact with each other directly, we are potentially opened for a deeper intimacy with each other.
Finding some quiet time in your life, I think, is hugely important.
There are three reasons why I live in Scotland. First, I like silence, and you have to be a millionaire to buy silence in Italy. Second, I like cold weather. Third, in Italy I have too many relatives and know too many people, so I never get a quiet time.
We need quiet time to examine our lives openly and honestly - spending quiet time alone gives your mind an opportunity to renew itself and create order.
I'm an early bird, partly because I like to have some quiet time and partly because by 9am emails begin arriving, the phone starts ringing and I have dragons to kill of one sort or another.
Aeroplane journeys give me quiet time to read and sleep; it's like being unplugged from the earth.
It's important to have quiet time and isolation.
Well, it's a nice quiet time for Iron Maiden, and I'll be releasing a new solo album next year, so this is a really good time for the managing out my solo career, which is quite well.
I love that quiet time when nobody's up and the animals are all happy to see me.
I try to get in quiet time and book time, but really, the only time I ever get that is when I'm on an airplane - I have a fear of flying, but I actually love flying because it's the only time I can sleep, and it's the only time I get to read.