Monday, December 05, 2016

The Effervescence of Empathy

In the last couple days, I've been paralysed with non-motivation. A sudden eruption of incomprehensible sorrow and fatigue just overwhelmed me, body, mind, soul. Despite the fact that I had an enormous workload pending, and a short span of time to complete this work to meet the deadlines, I haven't been able to apply myself. Which, all things considered, is uncharacteristic of me. Me -- the proactive, productive, passionate achiever. The supercharged thinker, the go-getter, the results-driver. I was now a fallen rock at the bottom of a deep and unforgiving well.

I kept plummeting. Until I completely broke down, in a way I haven't in a very, very long time, so caught up I was with moving forward and putting energy where it was needed. But this time, I just wasn't able to keep it all in. I imploded.

It is at these times when you realize how very little other people understand you. Sometimes, that even includes oneself.

These periods of deep emotion sometimes channel a different kind of catharsis. I relived a deep and unspoken sense of loss again. And in that void, that deep chasm of emptiness, I held onto that which has always kept me sane.

That's when I realized that even in that space of a million miles, in a thousand different echoes of silence, that when you experience and live through the variations of another being's soul, becoming a vessel to share that other being's vibrations does not simply cease.

Sometimes they call it sympathy pains. I'm not sure what they are, but I know that they exist. If I can so easily cry for another stranger's tears, imagine the depth of desolation that can be experienced with that other person who shares your soul.