In a middle school poetry class, Khadijah Allende got up and read a poem. The first line was, "Have you ever been alone in a room full of people?"
...No. I mean yes. Wait what?
Since she was a seventh grader and I was only in sixth, I figured she knew something about the world that I have yet to learn. Was this an actual feeling or just fancy wording? At the time, it was just fancy wording to me. A type of writing that I had yet to learn. But then time went by. Now six years later, I know the exact feeling of which she spoke. Apparently so does David Banach.
I have grown all too familiar of this feeling. But apparently this is not only a feeling but it is who we are. To realize that you're actually by yourself, the moment you realize it...it's such an exposed feeling. Like a dry leaf in late autumn. Like a flower has bloomed in the awakening of spring.
Nobody can understand truly what I feel. I am convinced of this. I wouldn't wish for anyone to feel the horrible things I've felt and if someone's felt my greatest sensations, they wouldn't feel at all authentic. To be "trapped in a dark room with no windows" might sound like a depressing setting but you feel things a lot better. It allows you to know yourself better and understand who you are as a being. People are distractions and can get you out this dark room. But luminosity is only a curse for your thoughts and feelings are as exclusive as the sun when you surround yourself with other humans.
As you may have guessed, I'm not ashamed of my pessimism. "Only [I] feel [my] pains, [my] pleasures, [my] hopes, and [my] fears immediately, subjectively, from the inside." I accept this fact and therefore accept my absolute individualism. With this comes the pessimism, depression, and, ultimately, the loneliness.
- Brandon Sanders
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Brandon- I like how you started off with a very specific and personal example in your life, it drew me in at the very beginning.
ReplyDeleteSo your main point is that you agree with Banach that no one can feel what other people feel, people will never completely understand each other because everybody experiences things differently, leading to the lonliness of being alone in a crowded room.
I agree with you, and Banach, I feel like no one can really get a good sense of how i'm feeling at a certain point in life because people will always have a subjective view of me an how I feel.
I thought this could have been a stronger post if you included more points that Banach brought up and more things that you agree or dissagree with.
Its interesting how you used the quote and similie of the dry leaf, it really made me think how you feel like you are exposed because you feel sort of like an outcast, but I think it can also make you feel special because of the fact no one can understand it. Your feelings can be kept inside you so no one will be there to judge, its something you can keep to yourself without any other influences.
This was a very insightful post that provided good examples and visuals
-Sandy :)
Brandon -
ReplyDeleteAs always, I am overly thrilled to read anything that you write and this time is no different.
I agree with your ideas about individualism and how in reality, we are truly alone. No one else in the world has had our same exact experiences, there-fore no has experienced our exact feelings.
Adding onto your ideas a little more, I feel as if though there are unified base feelings that we all share, such as sadness, anger, pain, love, hate...but when we get down to the logistics of it..the specific type of pain/feelings that YOU'VE felt in your life will never be the specific type of pain/feelings that I'VE felt in my life, and this goes for everyone. What's in your head is not in my head. I may be able to relate to it, but your thoughts & feelings are yours, and not something that everyone else can tap into.
I would love to see you build on Banach's ideas in future blogposts, but I love how comfortable and how easily you connect his ideas back to your own life in this post.
- Binta <3
I comletely agree with you that no one can feel what everyone else feels. People can see you there but they don't really know what's going on inside. It appears certain emotions are far more complex then the basic ones(Happyness, Anger, Sadness). In fact, have you ever tried to put them into words? They always appear to be untranslatable.
ReplyDeleteThough I must wonder, I've heard "Light can't exsist without Darkness and vise-versa" various times which makes me suspect there's something too it, not too sure on what "it" is though.
For some apparent reason I was reminded of a video game I played once while reading your blog. At one point the character says "I want to know what love is NOW". Then the other character tells her that "some of us lost our emotions a long time ago", something like that(memory isn't too clear).
~ Bryam