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Is There Comfort in Sadness?

The one emotion we never want to feel is the one we probably need to feel the most.

By Mimo le SingePublished 6 years ago 3 min read
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Photo Retrieved From Google Images

Back when Lana Del Rey was on top of the world with her "Hollywood Sadcore" music, someone among my Facebook friends described her songs as being "happily sad." I thought about this idea again recently, and realised over the years how there can indeed be some sort of happiness in sadness itself.

Movies like Inside Out teach us that feeling sad is a normal—and even necessary—part of life, and we should be able to attest to that judging by our personal experiences.

Those of us who tend to feel sadder than others seem to have a better understanding of how the world works. We reflect harder on things. We care deeper about things. But we are also better able to come to terms with these emotions and balance them out with others when we feel it's time to move forward.

Because the reality is, sadness is really the only emotion we can rely on to keep ourselves grounded—and sane.

No matter how good happiness feels, it's nevertheless unpredictable. We can lose it in an instant. And if we're not prepared for it, it'll break us just as fast.

But this doesn't mean that we are necessarily bitter, cynical, or ungrateful—or worse yet, insane.

I am a very emotional person, but I don't think I can consider myself a trainwreck anymore for accepting the pessimistic sides of life. I haven't gone off the rails, I just acknowledge the negatives are there to help us grow stronger, be more mindful, and appreciate every moment of our lives more often.

We can still have control over what we do and how we think, even if we don't always feel optimistic about what's happening as well as our choices at that moment. We can choose to have respect for our pasts, no matter how troubled they were. We can choose to feel love in our hearts, even if we can't have everything we want. We can choose to surprise ourselves everyday with everything we're capable of, even when we hesitate to try.

We will probably never feel completely happy, but it doesn't mean we're giving up or bringing others down. It's a personal journey we embark on to uphold our values and cherish our bittersweet memories, because these things are what we leave the world with when our time comes.

They keep us connected with our surroundings; they keep us human, in a world where humanity is eternally struggling against anguish. Finding the courage to line the world with silver is a solemn endeavour. Otherwise we're not paying close attention to our linework.

Sadness is virtually inevitable, but we can take comfort in knowing that it will elicit a response from us that happiness alone cannot. The feeling can linger, but we don't have to focus on it forever. It doesn't have to be there to remind us of what could have been, but rather to shape how we perceive things in the future.

What makes sadness so comfortable is how we can always count on it to bring us back down from cloud nine or suppress our rage when it all becomes overwhelming and muddles our judgement. It plays an integral role in teaching us what to do when we're alone with our thoughts.

It can all seem confusing, nonreassuring, and ultimately, unpleasant, at first. But once we rationalise our feelings and explore the world around us a little more, we find we're able to live with these feelings and still find the strength to push forward while not forgetting where we come from and what makes us who we are in the first place.

humanity
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About the Creator

Mimo le Singe

First, there was Mailchimp. Then, there was Wordchimp. And now, you've got a “Storychimp” sharing writing-related advice and other random musings. Happy reading! All works are written by me, not by AI.

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