quién lo dijera

Melancholy is not rage or bitterness; it is a noble species of sadness that arises when we are properly open to the idea that suffering and disappointment are at the heart of human experience. It is not a disorder that needs to be cured; it is a tender-hearted, calm, dispassionate acknowledgment of how much agony we will inevitably have to travel through. Modern society’s mania is to emphasize buoyancy and cheerfulness. It wishes either to medicalize melancholy states –and therefore “solve” the problem- or to deny their legitimacy altogether. Yet melancholy springs from a rightful awareness of the tragic structure of every life. We can, in melancholy states, understand without fury or sentimentality that no one truly understands no one else, that loneliness is universal and that every life has its full measure of shame and sorrow. The melancholy knows that many of the things that we most want are in tragic conflict: to feel secure and yet to be free; to have money and yet not to be b