Painting it Black

I went to bed thinking about this whole sadness thing, and woke up thinking about it too. The thing is, I already know the answers to many of these issues, which is why it's frustrating that I go through the cycles over and over again. It's like some emotional rollercoaster which I am not in control of.

Firstly, there are plenty of things in life to be sad about, war, diseases, poverty, injustice, abuse, etc. Many of these do not directly affect a lot of us, for which we should be grateful (but not beat ourselves up for being so lucky and not deserving it). Some of these things do affect us, and they legitimately cause us to feel unhappy. Of the things that do affect us I figure there are two types of things.

The two types of things that we can legitimately get upset about are 1) things that we cannot control (e.g. deaths, accidents, wars, illness...). And 2) Things that we can change. Tragedies happen all the time. But that's the thing: They just happen. We are right to feel upset about it I think, because it's important to allow yourself to grieve. Everyone has their own way of dealing, but I think the ultimate goal in case of these things is just to survive them. Sometimes even death is complicated. For instance, a girl I know who is doing a PhD at my University recently returned to her home in Africa because her brother committed suicide. She is understandably depressed about this, and feels like perhaps she could have prevented it. In another case, someone I was living with at one point received news just before Christmas that his mother had committed suicide. And I think he felt the same, like maybe there was something he could have done. So it's complicated. But this brings me to the second kind of thing we get upset about: The things we CAN change.

There are some things we can change. The difference between these things and the things that we cannot change is the difference between present and past. In the situation above, there was nothing that anyone could do about the fact that the person in question was now dead. All anyone could do is try to carry on, try to share the burden of grief with the other surviving family members and friends, and try to banish the feelings of guilt and forgive themselves and find a way of moving on with life.

This might sound really harsh given the examples, and of course this is never simple or easy, and in fact I didn't mean to use such extreme examples, but the message is the same. In fact, I think the first few lines of the 'Serenity Prayer' sum it up well:

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

I first heard this prayer when attending an AA meeting in a supportive capacity, but felt that it applied to me as much as anyone. I may not have a drinking problem but I struggle with frustration at my own shortcomings and failings (as I perceive them at least), and a lot of this has to do with not knowing the difference between things I can change and things that I can't. I might add to that there is a question of things I 'should' try to change or not, which opens up a can of worms over morality and ethics, authenticity and responsibility. Though I have a feeling that there is something deep within ourselves that will give us most of those answers if we sort of meditate upon them.