Let’s start by not misconstruing what I’m saying. The state of the world continues to appall me and I am not floating along feeling ‘happy’ while ignoring genocides, rampant colonialism, disgusting levels of global inequality, and my own oppression. In fact, I’m rageful, pretty much permanently. And I am also purposeful, clear and resolute.

Why?

Because I am discovering that feelings of sadness, depression and hopelessness have often stemmed from a learned inability to feel, process and express anger.

For years, I felt so overwhelmed by sadness. I was bulimic by 14 and deeply, clinically depressed by 19. By 33 I had been on and off medication for years and suicidal ideation was horrifically familiar to me. In the years since then, as I have begun to extract myself from the colonial web of mind-fuck I was trapped in, I’ve pondered why sadness has been the baseline-emotion for much of my life.