The quality of your personal relationships has never mattered more. It isn’t enough to have lots of friends on social media. Or to give ‘everything’ to work hoping that will validate your existence.    When familiar certainties are dissolving, we need to give and receive closeness and understanding to feel fully alive. But how do we open to others in a world that can seem harsh, indifferent - and unpredictable in the extreme?    Intimacy and Solitude starts with the most fundamental relationship of all: how you understand and care for your own self - knowing this will inevitably be reflected in your most essential relationships.    Using her exceptional gifts as a storyteller, as well as decades of work with people of all ages, orientations and cultures, Dr Stephanie Dowrick brings to life profound and persuasive insights to transform self-trust - and your life with others. This edition includes a new introduction to bring the book up to date.      ‘I love this book. It’s full of exactly the kind of soulful wisdom the world is crying out for right now.’ - Magda Szubanski