But Then, Life Happened

Posted on by Thomas
Photo by Mishal Ibrahim on Unsplash.com

Hello my dear happiness nerds, welcome (back)!

I’ve been preparing another essay for you, but then, life happened. But so did inspiration. Therefore, without further ado, another poem for all you lovely people.

A Scene along the Way

Karen and I were coming home from dinner,
In our street there was a guy weeping.
I saw both fear and care in Karen’s eye,
So I went to him and said:
“Hey, man, why are you crying, you need help?”
“No thanks,” he said “it’s just—”

58 thoughts on “But Then, Life Happened”

    1. Hi Kacha, welcome back! Well, it’s up to your imagination what’s going on with him. His pain could be any of our’s. Life happened to him, too (I’m just glad I was luckier than him).

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        1. I like that saying 🙂 Plus, shared love is twice the love!

          Are you also gonna write a sunshine blogger post? If so, I’d love to read it when it’s out!

          Thanks, all is well, I was just inspired to a sad topic. ❤

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          1. And shared love is twice the love! That is exactly what wise people would add.
            I already wrote my sunshine blogger post, it is on my blog. You can always have a look. Interesting questions you had, it took me a while to answer them properly.
            Joy and sadness all in the pool of life ❤

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    1. That’s a big question! Here’s my best of: Get to know yourself (e.g., through self-reflection, psychotherapy, and meditation), help others, love everybody (including yourself), be in the present as much as possible (so don’t worry about the future or ruminate the past), accept the things outside your control, and be grateful for what you already have. Hope that helps 🙂

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  8. Nice flow of words and replies. Love the cliffhanger poem we are all falling/teetering off sometimes, sometimes we are walking close to the edge but on firm ground and can catch someone. Love is the greatest thing. 🙂

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    1. Thanks so much for your kind words and interesting thoughts! Yeah, life is a curious dance between the ordinary, joy, and sorrow. And I absolutely agree: Love it’s the greatest thing! Keep spreading it 🙂

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    1. Yeah, I feel we often don’t acknowledge that our problems or sorrows are legitimate, because they’re usually not a question of life and death. They’re “just“ 1st world problems.
      Nice to meet you, too 🤗

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  10. You’re a tease! What a great poem. I always forget as writers we don’t always need to finish our thoughts, that we can trust the our readers make their own conclusions. Thanks for the reminder, tease of a poem, and follow.

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    1. Thanks, I got inspired to end a piece open and teasing from Kobayashi Issa (I recommend his haiku “A World of Dew“). Yeah, it’s hard to strike the balance between being too vague and overexplaining. Yet, it’s also fun to play around with 😊 Read you again, soon!

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  11. As I have got a lot older, I have been sad to discover that life keeps on happening, just when you didn’t expect it.
    Well done for leaving the last line unfinished, and thanks for following my blog.
    Best wishes, Pete.

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    1. Yeah, the sadness is hard to take at times and life has a lot of it waiting for us. Then again, intense sadness and pain can enrich life by making it more intense. Thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts! 😃

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  13. i know I’m not being original and it has been said much more elequently but it makes me think of how sadness is an integral part of happiness. personally the idea of just being content seems a little flat and rejects the experience of the human condition. without the lows you can’t have the highs. like good is nothing without evil to juxtapose it. then again the poor bloke might have just stubbed his toe.

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    1. It’s an interesting thought. I’d like to think that at one point one can be very happy without needing to be sad again. One knows sadness from one’s past and doesn’t need to repeat it to appreciate happiness. But I’m thinking of a very late stage in one’s development here.
      Haha, the toe-point was actually very original 😁

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  14. I agree. i suppose i see sadness as inevitable. and as a glass is half full person i like to find the positive in the negative. like there is no such thing as winning and losing, just winning and learning. time spent being sad can teach us how to be happy. it doesn’t have to be seen as a waste. the best “get stuffed” to personal pain and suffering is to use it to move forward, to own it is to put it to bed and take away its power. anyway loved the poem, it made me think all that.

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    1. Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts, it makes me happy that my poem inspired them 😊 As a psychologist, I value unpleasant emotions a lot. Sadness can tell us much about what is important to us and what things we want to protect and keep in our lives.

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  16. I like the way you just ended and left the rest to us!!! Interesting conversation and I would add one more thing to your happiness formula. Get to know God, accept His love and forgiveness and He will fill you with happiness!

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    1. Thank you, I’m embracing open ends in my poetry lately 😊 I want to mention my inspiration for this, Kobayashi Issa, again. As for the God-question: I’ve used to be a Catholic believer and had an active relationship with the god of the bible. Actually reading in the bible at the age of around 25 made me lose this belief and relationship. Now, as an agnostic atheist, I’ve had to resolve an existential crisis, but since then I’ve been experiencing a deep happiness and love for all beings, animate and inanimate, that is beyond anything I’ve experienced before. Therefore, I’m not sure that a belief in the god of the bible (or any other sacred text) is a necessary (or even truly beneficial) ingredient in the formula of happiness. But that’s just my opinion. Thanks for reading and commenting! Best wishes, Thomas

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    1. Thank you! Yeah, I really appreciate the discussions in the comments! I don’t really have a reference as to what constitutes much or little participation, but apparently it’s not too bad 🙂 I’m really grateful for that 😁 Read you again soon!

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  20. You can also use that as a poem of dedication to the listening skills of the “human-like” others we speak to day to day. Just at first glance I thought that.

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    1. I totally agree, that is not the true human way. I think our true nature is loving, calm, and helping. We just have to be less distracted by competition and self-loathing. Thanks for your comment! 🙂

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