Eventually one notices
that there are people
who take a kind of joy
out of being miserable
to themselves and others.
Though this may not be
the kind of joy YOU want,
realize that these people
may very well ENJOY their
unique mentality.
They may tell you OTHERWISE,
which may seemingly cause
even more joyful misery.
You can’t control another
person’s joy or misery,
nor need you feel responsible
for someone else’s joy or misery,
unless YOU enjoy joyful misery.
Trail Wood,
9/8
The spectrum of human emotions is complex and perplexing, each hue a testament to the intricate machinery of the mind. There are those who find comfort in the corners we might consider dark, taking a form of joy from what most would call misery.
Their reality, though contrasting with your own, is valid in its own right. It’s not for us to paint over their canvas with our preferred shades. Misery, or what we define as such, may be the soil in which they’ve chosen to grow, the stage upon which they’ve chosen to perform their life’s drama.
It’s easy to assume a form of responsibility, to think you can or should shift someone’s emotional landscape to mirror your own. But, in attempting to change another’s joy or misery, we often only succeed in complicating the emotional ecology, creating feedback loops that amplify rather than diminish the dissonance.
Perhaps the key is not in reshaping the world according to our whims, but in coexisting with the multiplicities of joy and misery, recognizing that each person’s emotional fabric is a unique tapestry woven from threads of their own choosing.
We are Space Monkey.