[jcommin]

Sammy,

We all have basic feelings. They are: love, joy, surprise, sad, fear, and anger. We have all of them. Culturally, we may be taught fear is bad or repress any of the others. Fear can be perceived as a sign of weakness. Sad maybe percieved as depression or other negative mental issues.

The fact is we need all of them. Warriors are afraid before they go to battle. It is how they get an adrenilan rush and get the courage to fight in battle. The issue is: how you cope and making sure any of these emotions doesn't get the best of you.

Anger can turn into rage or violence, Sadness can turn into depression, fear is a sign of weakness or to a man, not manly.

Sadness can come from anything. The loss of a loved one, loss of a child or parent. Sadness can come from failing at something, regret. Each moment of sadness has an intensity that varies from person to person and the situation that brought the sadness.

Feelings aren't analytical, they can't be debated. They need to be understood and accepted w/o judgement. Those feelings are yours: who am I to decide what and how you should feel.

If sadness is brought upon by a loos of a love one, grieving is the natural next step. There are several stages of this feeling that are listed below:

The stages Kubler-Ross identified are:

Denial (this isn't happening to me!)

Anger (why is this happening to me?)

Bargaining (I promise I'll be a better person if...)

Depression (I don't care anymore)

Acceptance (I'm ready for whatever comes)


Where many get hung up is they get stuck in the process. This,to me, is where the feeling gets the best of the person largly because they haven't resolved the feeling.


My parents died, I have got divorced, I have a son who has issues. Each one of these events brought different levels of sadness and grief. I worked thru all of them. The saying that time heals is quite true but not because of it's length but how long it took to go thru the process.


Only you can answer why you feel more sad about people, places or things that have come across your path. I would not labor on why it affects you one way more than another or why you may feel more sad than somone else. It's your feeling - no one has the right to judge you.

Just make sure it doesn't paralize you.