Loneliness is one of the great problems of our modern culture. One of the prices we pay for affluence a is loneliness. Competitive-ness, loneliness comes with it. And it is one of the great diseases of our time. Even people in families, people with friends, people with a busy life, they can be deeply lonely as well. And believe me, meditation is the cure, the antidote for loneliness. And the reason is that it introduces you to solitude. Solitude is the opposite of loneliness. Because solitude is you discovering your unique identity, your unique being. Every one of us here is utterly and totally unique. Irreplaceable, uncloneable, we are unique. And that uniqueness sometimes frightens us because we don’t want to be too unique. We all want to have some letters after our name. Or we all want to have something that we can identify with other people. We like to belong. But actually we need to encounter that uniqueness in order to be able to make deepest relationships. That’s the paradox, that’s the mystery, that’s love, that’s life as well.