I’m an advocate of sadness; feeling it fully, talking about it openly, allowing it to flow naturally, and reducing the stigma around doing those things.

I find that when we try to block our sadness or chase it away, it doesn’t stop or go away, and our efforts only serve to hold onto the feeling longer than is natural.

I have similar views of loneliness, grief over loss, anger, etc, and find that these feelings often go hand in hand, and/or lead into one another.

This morning my playlist shuffled across a beautifully poignant song that I haven’t heard in some time, and haven’t related to so deeply in a longer time. Living alone again for the first time in 19 years. A recent brush with a friend’s tragic loss. The song plays. Then something unexpected happens. I feel joy. All of those other feelings are transmuted into joy through the solidarity I feel with this Irish guy who wrote down some feelings to share with the world several years before I was even born.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_P-v1BVQn8

Maybe this is a good agreement to make in any kind of relationship? Perhaps in society as a whole?

I am responsible for my feelings.
You are responsible for your feelings.
Don’t blame me for how you feel.
Don’t tell me how I feel.

“Where ignorance is bliss, ’tis folly to be wise.” -Thomas Gray

But what of the cost of your ignorance on other people? If your blissful ignorance causes others to suffer, is it worth it to you? What does the exchange rate look like? Does your small amount of bliss cost others a large amount of suffering?

“Out of sight, out of mind”

But is it out of existence? Or is it in the sight and in the minds of those it harms?

“What you don’t know can’t hurt you.”

But can it hurt others? And can it furtively hurt you as well?