My Anywhere But Here Blog

Solitude does not always come from a love of being alone.

There are days when solitude arrives from something quieter — exhaustion.

Not the kind of exhaustion that sleep fixes, but the deeper kind that settles in after too many difficult conversations, too much tension, or the emotional weight of navigating certain personalities. Not because we dislike people, and not because we wish to withdraw from the world, but because certain encounters leave the heart tired in ways that are difficult to explain.

Some personalities exhaust us the way a long storm exhausts the land — through the constant emotional weather. The noise. The tension. The heaviness that lingers long after the conversation ends.

Other people enter a room or a conversation and bring calm with them, almost without effort, creating a lighthearted moment where everyone can breathe a little easier.

But others, without always meaning to, bring storms — torrential downpours, hurricanes, tornadoes, even hailstorms of words.

And after enough time standing in those storms, the soul begins to look for something very simple: a quiet corner of the world where it can breathe again.

For me, that place often becomes what I call My Anywhere But Here space.

Not a place of escape, but a place of restoration.

Solitude, in these moments, is not loneliness.

It is simply the quiet space where the mind and heart regain their balance.

There are times when the experiences that lead us into solitude feel too personal to describe fully. Not because they are unimportant, and not because they do not matter deeply, but because sharing them might reopen wounds for others who are part of the story.

Sometimes wisdom asks us to hold certain details with care.

There are moments when speaking freely might bring clarity to our own hearts, but might also place weight on someone else’s. In those moments, restraint becomes its own quiet form of kindness.

So today, I find myself writing about the feeling rather than the details.

The exhaustion that can come from certain interactions.

The quiet longing for peace afterward.

The small, necessary retreat into a space where the heart can settle again.

For me, that space has become what I often call My Anywhere But Here place — a moment of stepping inward, not to escape the world, but to restore the calm needed to live in it.

And perhaps that is part of the quiet wisdom of solitude.

Storms do not last forever. Even the fiercest weather eventually passes, and when it does, the land slowly returns to stillness. The air clears. The ground settles. The sky opens again.

Solitude can be that clearing.

A moment where the noise fades, where the heart steadies itself, and where peace quietly finds its way back.

This was not the easiest reflection for me to write today, but sometimes writing helps us sort through the emotional weather of our own lives. And in doing so, we often discover that the calm we were searching for was waiting patiently just on the other side of the storm.

And so, once again, I return to My Anywhere But Here space — not to hide from the world, but simply to sit for a moment in the quiet where peace lives.

— Susan Beth Thomas