When I’m sad and disappointed, I always tell myself that there are so many other people worse off than me. I should be grateful and happy for that.
And I know it’s true.
So, why doesn’t it work? Why do I still feel sad and disappointed?
I try to dissect my feelings to analyse them away. I imagine myself reaching for my heart, where bad feelings seem to congregate, throbbing and wanting to burst out of their prison, and I grab hold of it.
I grab hold of my heart and pull it out my chest and look at it.
It’s red and bloody and little. Yet it holds so much. So much disease and darkness and fear and pain.
I give it a squeeze. I put it under a running tap. I cut it in half. I slice it in pieces. I say, “Whatever’s in there, it’s just feelings. Intangible and invisible and nothing. So how could it possibly hurt me?”
It’s a nothing, my heart. Whatever’s in it, it’s nothing.
I put it away, in a corner of my room, in a shelf, in a box, wherever. I don’t want it anymore.
I dissociate myself from my feelings, from the pain, from the bad stuff. Because the heart, bearing all that hurt, isn’t in me anymore, therefore I’m not hurt.
I’m free! I’m fine! Life is absurd, anyway, so why let it bother me?
But I can still feel my heart inside me. It’s still there no matter how many times I take it out and put it away. It still provides safe harbour for my feelings, good and bad. It’s part of me and I can’t shed it.
So I get angry and I say to it, “You’re just an organ. A bloody, throbbing tool whose function is to keep me breathing and walking. Therefore you can’t hurt me.”
It’s silent. It continues to throb. And with every throb, hurt spreads out of it and travels in every direction until every part of my body is filled with the hurt, so that my body becomes weak and helpless.
I have removed so many hearts from me. There are so many hearts sitting around in shelves and boxes and bins. And yet it’s still in me, stubbornly beating away, wickedly gleeful.
Hah. You can’t get rid of me. I’m you as you’re me.
Defeated, I sit in silence and feel the pain, live with it.
Next time. Next time it’ll work and then it won’t hurt anymore.
dont be sad!!!
You can always have me in your time of need, sis. I is very fair, oso is have very black hair, oso the hair is long and curly and I just bought a bottle of sparklies.
And I can wait in the sun, but. for a few minutes only -I is has allergic condition to sun-induced cancer – sorry hor. :-)
Take care! Cheer up! Give yourself a break! Live isn’t and shouldn’t always be about our individual selves. Lots and loads of fun in appreciating others as well.
aww . u deserve better babe. hope your life gets better from here on !! =D
What the heck was in that drink you had Friday night?? :P
Just kidding.
The sunrise is just over the hill, Sheylara
((Internet hug))
“When I’m sad and disappointed, I always tell myself that there are so many other people worse off than me. I should be grateful and happy for that.”
It’s good that it doesn’t work. Because if it did, it would mean that you’re grateful and happy for being better off than other people. :P
Personal happiness shouldn’t be measured against how happy other people are!
*too much alcohol talking*
“Personal happiness shouldn’t be measured against how happy other people are!”
Now this is the beast piece of advise I have heard in a long time. Amen Kim!
theperthcouple: Thanks for dropping by again after that first nice comment you made on my blog. :)
RoRK: Haha… that’s funny. :)
Pacman: Thank you for the well wishes. :)
RLM: Awwww. :) Well, the problem is that the sun keeps rising and setting, you know?
Kim: I know what you mean, and what you said sounds logical! But then I also don’t mean that I should be happy for being better off. It just means that I should appreciate what I have because many people don’t have the same things I do. :)
Sheylara,
Wow, what a graphic entry! Thank you for your candor. I think you described a very human feeling and gave words to difficult feelings that most only feel, but can’t quite pin down.
You wrote about wishing pain to go away. Kahil Gibran, author of The Prophet, gives a slightly different piece of advice:
“The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.
When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.
When you are sorrowful, look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.
Some of you say, “Joy is greater than sorrow,” and others say, “Nay, sorrow is the greater.”
But I say unto you, they are inseparable.
Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.”
Thank you, I appreciate your post!
Sharon
Sad?? but you has a noo hat…
Why? (as in why are you so graphically sad?)
Sharon: Thanks, cousin, that’s quite profound and great food for thought!
Alex: But many people donch like my noo hat. :(
abraxis: Your question doesn’t really make sense you know. O_o
Hi! I’ve been following your blog. Not too sure what happen but do cheer up! =)
It’s the sad things in life that makes you appreciate the happy things even more =)
You have to make the effort to chase the run and hunt it down…
You have to make the effort to chase the sun and hunt it down… All the way:)