Thank you, Maria, for voicing your sadness. Your feelings are also mine. I also appreciate your willingness to befriend and learn from this feeling. Someone said that the courage to love requires the willingness to grieve. This sure feels like grief for the loss of the beautiful dream of a kinder world we all imagined we were slowly approaching. Perhaps we still are and this destructive backlash will soon be overpowered by courageous love and growing reservoirs of reverence for life. Knowing there are so many of us feeling this way helps me to imagine that still may be true.
Not to minimize the distress of prolonged sadness, because I am living in that like you are and it is a bear, but my current state is nearly full-time RAGE, and it is a BEAST. One triggering daily crying. I’ll echo what you eloquently said here regarding what put us here—because words both spoken and written (there’s a first for me!) get trapped in me like a printer paper jam. Except no one can fix it, and there isn’t even a glimmer of a fix on the horizon. I’ll stop now, because writing this has jammed me up again. And because if I write what I’m truly feeling, it’s likely that ICE goons will drag me from my home and send me to an El Salvador prison for life with no recourse. Because that’s almost where we are.
Oh my, again I applaud your words. I was having a conversation with a dear friend today about sadness. Sometimes we must sit with it, feel it and remember sadness means we have feelings. Love how you are planning for the future.
There are times when I allow myself three days to wallow in my own sadness and self-pity. I've earned it. There were no hugs in my family growing up either.
Thanks for putting this into words, Maria. I’m feeling the same way. Sad & betrayed by those who are trying to destroy our country. It makes me realize that I took a lot for granted.
caught up with two dozen in a day. this is a good place to stop, i think. i'm looking forward to the rest that i missed. your words are like a cup of water in a hot desert. ❤️
Thank you for expressing so well what I am also feeling. We're the same age, and I suspect have had similar developmental experiences resulting in the instinct to suppress emotion. I've been struggling to stay, well, not *happy* but at least "not sad" and keeping going with my work, but it's exhausting. Staying with the sadness is deeply uncomfortable, but I think it's going to be necessary to do. There is no around, there is only through. Sometimes you need to pause along the way through to really exist within what you're experiencing. I feel like that's where I am.
Ha! We have a weekly mindful movement session via Zoom where I work, and this week we spent some time just shaking and jiggling and shimmying and bouncing and jumping and it DID feel great!
Oh this is so wonderful. I am glad you have writing and that you can articulate so well how you are feeling because it helps the rest of us process sadness. I of course am not happy that you are experiencing this, and though I'd love to say "oh, this will pass," I'm afraid that the bigger problems with our country aggravate all of our other unsettled feelings. I finally realized last night that all the emotions about the stuff going on are just running beneath the surface at all times - constant. I am just unable to put my head in the sand about it. (Also, this New England "spring" stuff sucks - we at least didn't have the snow but it has been grey and drizzly for like the last 40 days! ugh. Totally get the hellebore thing. And all around, I see so many things that have been flourishing for years - thyme, creeping thyme, golden sage lining the back path to our door - that died in the cold this winter. big brown patches.) Anyway, just commisserating. Time to reasearch that hoop house!
You are not alone, Maria. So much to feel sad about. But I agree with another commenter that anger and even rage, if directed thoughtfully, can be empowering (and feel a little better than the sadness). I've often felt that humanity is at a crossroads: choose love and care for each other and all of Creation, or choose selfishness and greed...and its consequences. I also agree with you, that we as individuals must continue to choose what we know in our hearts is right, even if everything around us feels bleak. For my own mental health, I hang onto the belief that light and life will prevail, ultimately. Keep the faith.
Do you ever feel, as I do, like humanity has such enormous potential and chooses the chaos we live in?
Yes. All the time. That’s why we all need to make good choices.
Thank you, Maria, for voicing your sadness. Your feelings are also mine. I also appreciate your willingness to befriend and learn from this feeling. Someone said that the courage to love requires the willingness to grieve. This sure feels like grief for the loss of the beautiful dream of a kinder world we all imagined we were slowly approaching. Perhaps we still are and this destructive backlash will soon be overpowered by courageous love and growing reservoirs of reverence for life. Knowing there are so many of us feeling this way helps me to imagine that still may be true.
I hope so!!!
Not to minimize the distress of prolonged sadness, because I am living in that like you are and it is a bear, but my current state is nearly full-time RAGE, and it is a BEAST. One triggering daily crying. I’ll echo what you eloquently said here regarding what put us here—because words both spoken and written (there’s a first for me!) get trapped in me like a printer paper jam. Except no one can fix it, and there isn’t even a glimmer of a fix on the horizon. I’ll stop now, because writing this has jammed me up again. And because if I write what I’m truly feeling, it’s likely that ICE goons will drag me from my home and send me to an El Salvador prison for life with no recourse. Because that’s almost where we are.
Write it for yourself! On paper with a pen! It helps! Also, feel free to burn it afterwards. That helps too.
Lovely. Sad. Honest. Perfect. Thank you.
Aside from the sadness (not to dismiss it at all!) I'm impressed that you've stored good coffee... enough for a year! (I'm smiling at that...)
I’m a compulsive over planner!
Oh my, again I applaud your words. I was having a conversation with a dear friend today about sadness. Sometimes we must sit with it, feel it and remember sadness means we have feelings. Love how you are planning for the future.
🙂
There are times when I allow myself three days to wallow in my own sadness and self-pity. I've earned it. There were no hugs in my family growing up either.
I’m on day two. At least I did the dishes.
HUGS to us! ❤️
Thanks for putting this into words, Maria. I’m feeling the same way. Sad & betrayed by those who are trying to destroy our country. It makes me realize that I took a lot for granted.
We all did.
❤️ from me to you
❤️😢
caught up with two dozen in a day. this is a good place to stop, i think. i'm looking forward to the rest that i missed. your words are like a cup of water in a hot desert. ❤️
Thank you for expressing so well what I am also feeling. We're the same age, and I suspect have had similar developmental experiences resulting in the instinct to suppress emotion. I've been struggling to stay, well, not *happy* but at least "not sad" and keeping going with my work, but it's exhausting. Staying with the sadness is deeply uncomfortable, but I think it's going to be necessary to do. There is no around, there is only through. Sometimes you need to pause along the way through to really exist within what you're experiencing. I feel like that's where I am.
Have you seen the trend on TikTok a shimmy a day keeps the sad away? It's been cheering me up! Thank you for your comment. This one is from youtube: https://www.google.com/search?q=shimmy+the+sad+away&oq=shimmy+the+sad+away&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIHCAEQIRigATIHCAIQIRigATIHCAMQIRigATIHCAQQIRigATIHCAUQIRigAdIBCDQ2NjJqMGo0qAIAsAIA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:5c3b3fcd,vid:cOm1JZqJZnY,st:0
Ha! We have a weekly mindful movement session via Zoom where I work, and this week we spent some time just shaking and jiggling and shimmying and bouncing and jumping and it DID feel great!
Yes, it is okay.
Sometime sadness just wants to be friends.
😊
Oh this is so wonderful. I am glad you have writing and that you can articulate so well how you are feeling because it helps the rest of us process sadness. I of course am not happy that you are experiencing this, and though I'd love to say "oh, this will pass," I'm afraid that the bigger problems with our country aggravate all of our other unsettled feelings. I finally realized last night that all the emotions about the stuff going on are just running beneath the surface at all times - constant. I am just unable to put my head in the sand about it. (Also, this New England "spring" stuff sucks - we at least didn't have the snow but it has been grey and drizzly for like the last 40 days! ugh. Totally get the hellebore thing. And all around, I see so many things that have been flourishing for years - thyme, creeping thyme, golden sage lining the back path to our door - that died in the cold this winter. big brown patches.) Anyway, just commisserating. Time to reasearch that hoop house!
Most definitely! I don’t mind the cold if the sun is shining. But I think I am solar powered!
You are not alone, Maria. So much to feel sad about. But I agree with another commenter that anger and even rage, if directed thoughtfully, can be empowering (and feel a little better than the sadness). I've often felt that humanity is at a crossroads: choose love and care for each other and all of Creation, or choose selfishness and greed...and its consequences. I also agree with you, that we as individuals must continue to choose what we know in our hearts is right, even if everything around us feels bleak. For my own mental health, I hang onto the belief that light and life will prevail, ultimately. Keep the faith.
❤️
I’m sad too…
❤️hugs