Have you ever noticed how, when you’re happy, the world laughs with you, but when you’re sad, you cry alone? It’s as if the mere presence of sadness pushes people away, leaving you to bear its weight in solitude.

For a long time, I lived with the fear that if I showed people my true self – my sad, struggling self – I’d lose everyone. And the idea of being alone scared me. So, I masked it. I buried it deep and tried to exist as someone the world found easier to embrace.

Nevertheless, for a while now, sadness has been my closest companion. It wasn’t a choice; I’ve had to learn to embrace it to survive. All I could do was endure. I’ve had to sit with my sadness and hold space for it. And while I feared it at first, I’ve come to realize that sadness isn’t my enemy.

My sadness showed me truths I wouldn’t have otherwise seen. It showed me love in unexpected places and exposed the lack of it where I thought it should have been. It revealed support in surprising corners and shone light in the emptiness in others. It showed me the strength I never knew I had – and humbled me in the moments when I had none at all. Most importantly, sadness has shown me the genuinity that surrounds me.

Everyone fears being sad. Everyone fears the loneliness and hopelessness that accompany it. But when we sign up for emotions, we don’t just sign up for a few, but for all of them – joy, sorrow, love, anger, hope, despair and a whole lot more.

What if sadness is simply a part of the human experience, one that has just as much to offer as happiness (or more) if we only but allow it to exist and to teach us what all the societally accepted emotions can’t?

I don’t want to pretend that I enjoy being sad or that I embrace it with open arms or lie that its presence makes me feel alive. But I choose to see it for what it is: that feeling sadness is a sign that I feel deeply, that I care, that I am alive. And isn’t that what we’re all here for? To feel – to truly feel – every ounce of this messy, complicated, chaotic, beautiful thing called life?

So, if you find yourself sitting with sadness, know that you are not broken. You are human. It’s okay to allow yourself to exist in that space, without judgment. There is wisdom in sadness, and if you let it, it can teach you more about yourself and the world than joy ever could.

And if your sadness drives people away, let them go. Good riddance! You’re worthy of so much more anyway – relationships that can weather every emotion and not just the sunny ones.

Anyone who cannot truly understand or embrace sadness and chooses to walk away because you do, is someone who has a longer path ahead of them because all your emotions will eventually find their way to you and all you can do is accept them as a part of you in order to move forward in this journey called life.

Love always,