Shadows of Sadness – Foundations for Joy!
As we pledge ourselves promises of resolution for the year ahead we are too often focusing purely on our own perceived shortcomings and failings; things we want to correct. Even without dwelling on it we can gently witness the sadness that sits back in the shadows of ourselves. Our true sadness is built on our intimate losses, our perceptions of pain and suffering, and feelings of not being enough. As we move toward the end of the month we are already aware of our patterns and whether or not we are going to be able to set ourselves free this year.
We live in a world of opposites, a dualistic expression of possibility. Yin – yang, negative – positive, light – dark, hard – soft, on and on; there are as many polar pairs as you can imagine. Everything is related on one scale. Everything also belongs to the one whole. And in this way everything is one. Everything is an aspect of its opposite and everything is relative to the whole. This is life on earth, these are the rules of our play ground. Unfortunately we are prone to judgment and for what ever reason – sadness is bad, joy is good.
Choosing the Middle Road – A Road of Grace
As we move into the energies of the Aquarian Age it is time to choose the middle road. It’s time to choose grace. On the middle road, we acknowledge our emotions and feel our feelings but don’t allow them to dominate the whole of our being. We don’t swing madly from one extreme to the other indulging in toxic patterns. The middle road offers sanity and well-being. It means we lighten up, cut ourselves some slack, and issue a bit of compassion toward ourselves and others. It means we allow our highest truth to govern us and not the biased truth of a moment’s perception.
Sadness can be found in a laugh, in a smile, or in the split second clinging of a boisterous hug. I have nothing against sadness – it doesn’t scare me to look into the face of it. It’s real. Sadness often reveals a genuine hurt a soul has endured. I feel great empathy for the sadness in people. It’s a quiet soulful awareness of tender caring and of having felt life fully and deeply. It is an honourable emotion.
I’m not talking about the noisy poor me, woe is me, can’t catch a break kind of sadness that is worn on the sleeve and ambushes anyone within earshot from time to time. The sadness I’m talking about is quiet, obscure and discreet. It is humble and tender. It sits as a ghost in the shadows, almost undefinable, and while it depends on its obscurity to stay hidden it flits in and out of daily life all the same.
Hiding in the Light
Sadness can hide in any face in a million ways, just beneath a twinkle in the eye, deep in the structure of a laugh line, in the set of a jaw or a certain thoughtful furrow in the brow. It adds depth and dimension to the personality. It adds character. In other words, it is constructive.
Sadness is on the same sliding scale as joy. Ironically, very often, the people with the deepest sadness are the ones we recognize and depend on to be happy, proactive people. Because of the huge spectrum of authenticity of emotion these people hold within they often become the ones we trust intuitively. We know they’ve been where we’ve been. We know that they too have experienced the depth of the emotional ocean blocking the light of the sun. But they are walking proof that you can and indeed will rise to the surface again into the light to breathe a fresh breath of life. In the light of awareness sadness can be used to transform the most terrible of human suffering into freedom, strength and joy!
Out of the Shadows
Acknowledged sadness adds a type of high-octane fuel to living a good life.
Sadness has the ability to temper the soul with benevolence and compassion. With the intimate personal knowledge of sadness we are better equipped to be present to our fellow-man. Having already come through the sadness we know more of what we are capable of and the challenges we can survive. This torch that we carry lights the way for others. It is your responsibility to be a constant reminder to others, not of the sadness that may linger as a barbed thread still connected to a painful memory but of ultimate faith in the tenacity of Spirit flowing.
Before you add your broken resolutions to your list of sadness, spend a little time getting to know the sad part of you. Acknowledge the broken-hearted part of you that fears and wavers in the light of exposure. Your sadness has made you stronger than you realize. Dare to see the same sadness reflected in the face of others and smile to it. We are able to be joyful beyond measure when we embrace this. Your sadness offers you a great reservoir of strength and resource with which you can serve yourself and others faithfully. Walk with grace. Sadness is great, joy is great!
Andrea Thiel Connell 
