While not a single word, the Japanese concept of kodoku (孤独) — solitude, loneliness — carries a nuance that the English 'lonely' does not. Kodoku can be painful, but it can also be chosen, honoured, even beautiful. The monk in his cell is kodoku. The writer at her desk is kodoku. The person who walks alone through a crowded city, feeling the distance between themselves and everyone around them, is experiencing kodoku — and in Japanese culture, that experience is not always something to be fixed.

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