YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

Friends!

I am by no means unhappy today, or angry. I have saudade, sehnsucht.

(Also, I don't claim that I am using any of these terms correctly: like any good saudade, it is a mood. Nothing that follows is true, but it is real.)

Defining my terms
A brief tale from college, of what we call today Dunning-Kreuger
Yoga yesterday and sehnsucht
I choose saudade over nihilism
I accept experiencing saudade today

Defining my terms

Dunning-Krueger: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
Saudade: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudade
Sensucht: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sehnsucht
Weltzschmerz: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weltschmerz

A brief tale from college, of what we call today Dunning-Kreuger

In the early 90s, at college, I had a friend who was such a good guy. So kind, so sweet, so generous.

Three semesters in, due to a change in major and some bad luck, he was somehow further from graduating than when he started.

Yoga yesterday and sehnsucht

At yesterday's evening yoga class I had a profound sense of sehnsucht.

After over a year of kettlebell and yoga, I know far I have to go. Like my dear, beautiful friend at Kent State, I am further from my goal than when I started.

I choose saudade over nihilism

Why keep going back to yoga? I am objectively bad at it, and seemingly getting worse at it.

My man Viktor Frankl said: "Nihilism does not contend that there is nothing, but it states that everything is meaningless."

Here, everything I'm writing is awash in nihilism and a bleak hopelessness, but my actions betray a vigorous repudiation of weltschmerz:

I like French cruller donuts. I could buy a whole lot of them for what I paid for a month of unlimited yoga. A lot.

Yet I chose yoga over donuts. This month.

I accept experiencing saudade today

Saudade is a human experience. That's where I am today. Not angry, or even sad. Just saudade.

Beautiful, beautiful words

Beany Boo wrote: ↑November 26th, 2022, 7:27 pm Beautiful, beautiful words

Thank you, Beany Boo. I hope you're doing well!

Friends, at yoga this morning, I considered the following that feeling itself, physical and emotional pain, is a courageous choice. To wit: I'm not deadening the pain through alcohol, or transferring to an innocent third party through abuse.

To tie this back to this thread's title of melancholy/saudade/sehnsucht:

Saudade is only saudade when I have lost something.

I can only long for something that is worth longing for.

I couldn't hide my physical limitations at yoga this morning, and I don't want to hide my emotional pain in this forum.

Yet, in my weakness, I'm welcomed at both. Admitting lets the sunshine in, and there is no space any longer for shame and stuffing down secrets. I can't hide, so I won't hide.

Admitting that I am not strong means that I am strong.

oak wrote: ↑November 27th, 2022, 8:16 am Admitting that I am not strong means that I am strong.

i am getting closer to accepting something like this, closer than i have ever been before

it is scary, because one of my deeply held beliefs is "you gotta hate yourself to motivate yourself to be a good person"

take good care, Oak