{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 266b/1911-10-14/p014","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"It is good that the soul has the opportunity to feel the need for solitude. The soul needs solitude at times, and it is good that it stands alone. Those who devote themselves to prayer and meditation feel the need for solitude. The need to be with other people often arises from selfish feelings. We think we want to help. There are certain borderline areas where selfishness and love are almost indistinguishable. We want to do something for other people, and basically we do it only because it gives us satisfaction. A magnetizer may think that he can help people in a particular way with a certain stroke, but in reality it only happens because the stroking gives him a certain feeling of well-being. Now one could mistakenly object: yes, but it is selfish of me to devote myself to solitude. That is not the right way of thinking, and would not be selfless in the true sense. For I draw strength from solitude, and from this egoism I draw the strength to perform acts of love. The necessity of solitude is a blessing for the soul, and it can be a happy feeling for the soul. But a feeling can also arise that says: I stand there, lonely and dependent on myself; all people are distant and strange to me, and no one can understand me. Such a feeling can fill the soul with suffering, but it must be able to rise above it.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"Esoteric Lesson","site_heading":"Maya, Spiritual Perception, and Esoteric Development","site_heading_note":"A heading the site wrote for this unit from a summary of it; not in the edition, and not the words of Rudolf Steiner or of the translator. Cite the unit by its title and locus, never by this heading, and do not quote it.","date":"1911-10-14","location":null,"word_count":245,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/266b/1911-10-14/p014","alignment_confidence":"low","alignment_reason":"count_diverges","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2025","book_title":"Esoteric Lessons 1910–1912","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA266II/English/SOL2025/19111014e02.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/266b/1911-10-14/p014"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/266b/1911-10-14/p014"}],"record":{"record_type":"listeners_notes","scope":"volume","note":"Written from listeners' notes, summaries, or memory rather than a shorthand transcript. The wording is the note-taker's as much as Steiner's: weigh a single striking phrase here far more cautiously than the same phrase in a stenographic volume, and do not rest an argument on one word.","evidence":"Gedächtnisaufzeichnungen von Teilnehmern","evidence_translation":"Participants' records written from memory","evidence_source":"Rudolf Steiner Verlag Gesamtverzeichnis 2022, volume subtitle. The translation is the maintainer's, not a published one."},"paired_german":{"status":"no_paragraph_pairing","note":"No paragraph pairing exists for this paragraph, so no German text is given. The German paragraph of the same number is a different passage or an unestablished one. Read the German unit (german_unit.fetch_unit) and find the place by its content.","german_unit":{"lang":"de","edition":"original","unit_locus":"GA 266b/1911-10-14","paragraph_count":14,"fetch_unit":{"ga":"266b","lecture":"1911-10-14","lang":"de","edition":"original"},"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/266b/1911-10-14","json_url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/ga/266b/1911-10-14?lang=de"},"pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.04,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":5218,"original_word_count":5007,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Steiner Online Library","identified_edition":"SOL2025","book_title":"Esoteric Lessons 1910–1912","publisher":"Steiner Online Library","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA266II/English/SOL2025/19111014e02.html","evidence":"lecture_page_line","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"not_checkable","note":"No verified paragraph alignment covers this passage, so its names cannot be compared with the German."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}