Tragically, Romantically, and Eternally Sad.
Let’s understand the lore of sadness…
Don’t mind me asking but, are you sad?
The answer might not be ‘yes’, but it won’t be ‘no’ either. Right?
Sadness as I have seen, is a whirlwind of emotions. A little bit of hopelessness, some grief, a pinch of longing and a whole lot of love with no place to go.
To me, sadness holds diverse connotations.
Sometimes it’s the fear of failing, sometimes the hurt of losing, often times the pain of missing, many a times a craving for understanding, and almost every time a comfort in the darkness.
Sadness is weirdly comforting. It’s painful, yet peaceful. Once you have experienced sadness you wouldn’t be able to enjoy the happiness for long.
You’ll simply be drawn back to the sadness again.
Sadness is that powerful. No, I’m not romanticizing sadness. Maybe I am, but we can ignore that.
Let’s try to understand what causes such profound sorrow.
There could be a lot of attributing factors to the sadness/sorrow. Sometimes even one reason is enough, but often times it’s a mix of a range of emotions; disappointment, stress, worry, or even anger.
Sadness in day-to-day life is common. We are emotional beings with a range of varied emotions. Sadness is just one of them. It’s easy to feel dejected by small problems and minor inconvenience.
It’s not really a problem to feel sad every now and then. But it becomes a problem once you remain sad for a prolongated period.
Mental illness is one of the most common reasons behind the prolongated sadness. Depression per say, is a terrible thing to go through.
The hopelessness, the void, the darkness consumes you. And in that darkness, sadness is the only companion.
It becomes difficult to enjoy the rain when you can just cry alongside the clouds.
We become so accustomed to the sadness that it takes over our whole person. We forget who we were before the sadness.
It is also a frequently seen aesthetic among gen-z.
Yes being sad is cool now. Wait it always was…remember the ‘Punk and Goth’ era?
Pained, hurt and sad. A whole personality.
Maybe sadness has always been romanticized, it has always been an aesthetic. And to be frank, I have been a part of it too!
You are not sad, but clearly not happy either. And you don’t even want to be happy anymore. That’s your mental illness lying behind the sadness.
“Sometimes we become so attached to the battle of the illness that we don’t want to heal anymore because that battle gives us meaning.” -Unknown
And that’s how the era of the eternal sadness starts unfolding.
The ease, the comfort and the familiarity keeps us hooked to the same sad emotional state. It becomes really difficult to move on from the comfortable homely feeling.
At some point you might even start recognizing your behavioral pattern regarding your emotional state. You might even take actions.
But then what?
Back to the sadness after a day spent in happiness.
We start to believe we’ll achieve absolute bliss once we accomplish something, maybe after earning a lot of money, after finding that one true love, etc. etc. (I won’t emphasize on it; we all know what I’m talking about)
But that mentality is going to take you nowhere. Nothing will ever make you instantaneously happy. Your sadness is not going to end one day just because you are in love now.
It is a slow process.
A process that starts with self-awareness, in some cases excessive self-awareness only leads to more sadness. So don’t do that.
And for not doing that you need to stop overthinking.
Introspection and self-reflection are important to understand what makes you sad, and why are you so attached to it.
Take small actions without thinking too much. Like maybe bake a cake, don’t worry about how it’ll taste. If it turns out tasting good, then don’t start thinking about opening a bakery. It’s still too soon for that.
And if it tastes bad then don’t think about never trying to bake another cake again.
It’s the smallest steps that you need to take mindfully, without overwhelming yourself. Without thinking of the journey or the outcome, just moving. (and that’s how you stop overthinking)
In my case, the one simple action that helped me with not only my eternal sadness but also became a steppingstone for overcoming clinical depression was a morning walk.
I started accompanying my dad for morning walks without thinking much of it. After a few days I started waking up early even on Sundays, getting some sunlight also became a part of my daily life.
Once I started getting some sunlight regularly, I started to see its effect on my mental health. And slowly I started taking more actions to improve my overall wellbeing.
You’ll do the same once you start seeing the simplest changes within yourself once you take a step forward.
You’ll start showing up for yourself. You’ll start building that broken trust within yourself. You’ll start loving yourself in all true senses.
And for that to happen adapting a positive outlook and some self-compassion is all that is needed. A little bit of hope and a little faith in yourself…try it…won’t you?
