If You Are Sad, Ask Yourself These Questions
Sometimes you are just sad. You are looking for patterns but you cannot find them. You feel like life is passing by in a way that fails to arouse your interest, let alone your enthusiasm. So you just let yourself be transported, as if the weather was just a newly waxed parquet floor.
At other times, you are sad. However, you know why you are. It can be loss, failure, disillusionment, etc. The presence of this fact in your life is so strong that you cannot let go of the feeling that it has left you.
There are times in life when sadness is inevitable. At other times, however, we might leave it behind. We don’t succeed, however, because we don’t know how or why we are unwittingly feeding it. So, if you are sad, asking yourself a few questions is worth it to give you clues to get out of that state.
Did I do something I feel guilty about?
Cases where sadness does not go away are very common. Indeed, the guilt that feeds it does not allow it either. The worst part is that very often this guilt is only imaginary. It does not correspond to a negative result, the fruit of our responsibilities, but rather to a fantasy that we have not identified or developed.
Guilt often surrounds something that has negatively affected others or ourselves. That’s when we start thinking about what we haven’t been able to digest, what we don’t know how to fix.
Am I true to my desires?
Another reason for sadness, especially when we don’t identify a particular cause, is dissonance. For one reason or another, we have betrayed our desires, our dreams or our goals.
This causes a feeling of deep ill-being with ourselves. Sadness would then represent more than the way to express this inner reproach. Basically, more than sad, we are angry with ourselves. We keep ourselves trapped in a duality in which we want something, but we do something else.
Am I loyal to my beliefs?
In this case, although similar to the previous one, the emphasis is on the contradiction between what we consciously think and what we do in practice. For example, we may have witnessed an injustice but we did not face it, out of fear, neglect or insecurity.
We may have followed another person’s idea, just to go against the grain. Basically, however, we know it goes against our beliefs. This causes discomfort with ourselves. As in the previous case, the reproach turns into sadness.
Did I sleep well and eat well?
Being sad is not always about emotions or thoughts. Quite often this is associated with a lifestyle in which one exhibits some type of overexertion or lack of self-care. Fatigue and a poor diet can also lead to sadness, especially when it is prolonged.
Lack of sleep greatly affects our emotions. The mere fact of not getting enough sleep gives us an opaque perspective on everything around us. Likewise, when we don’t eat properly, our brains resist the deficit, making us more irritable and depressed.
What would make me feel better?
This is perhaps the most important question when you are sad. We sometimes do not find the other answers easily. It is nevertheless easier to access. In the short term, maybe a simple action like taking a little breath, taking a walk, or stepping away from a certain environment. In the long term, change jobs, solve problems with your partner, or seek professional help.
Sadness as such is neither good nor bad. It is a reality that we all live, that we know and that we will know. However, if it is a feeling that is more or less present, in a recurring form, you need to do something to identify its origin. There is something struggling within you to come to the surface and let go of it might rekindle your mood.
Our thoughts Popular language tends not to differentiate sadness and depression when they are two very different things.
