Why does sadness happen?
Sadness is an emotion that all people share and, generally, it is caused by the same reasons in everyone. It shows up through different symptoms, but the most common thing is to feel discomfort and fatigue, to feel low on energy, to have a sense of emptiness, and it can even affect how you see yourself.
Nobody wants to go through periods of sadness, but if you think about it, sadness has an adaptive and survival function because, paradoxically, it helps you get out of a bad situation. There are many types of sadness and it can come for different reasons, which are usually external to you. It may be due to the loss of something or someone important to you, to going through a difficult stage, for example at work, or to being temporarily separated from your loved ones. This means it is not something you are born with, but something you have come across along the way. So if you work on yourself, you can find the tools that help you face it.
It is an emotion that takes you through a not very pleasant stage, but it is there and it has to be lived. The problem comes when you let it settle in and keep you company. That is when you should switch on the red warning light and, if you can’t do it on your own, ask for professional help, because if it stays with you for a long time it can have harmful consequences for you.
Consequences of sadness
When we talk about the consequences of sadness, we are not talking about action and reaction; in other words, it is not that you are sad and this directly brings a consequence, but that little by little you bring certain habits, usually negative ones, and behaviours into your life that over time lead to other kinds of problems. For example, you may have little appetite. Your stomach closes up and it’s hard to get yourself to eat.
Sadness also leads to isolation because, without being able to explain why, you suddenly feel out of place in all the circles you move in. You feel as though you have nothing in common with others, as though you are moving at different paces and along different paths. So you decide to withdraw from all of it.
As well as isolating yourself, everything feels like too much effort, you feel listless and you move less and less. You start to lead a sedentary life, with negative thoughts in which fears and insecurities predominate, so you begin to have a pessimistic attitude towards life.
With all these symptoms, it may seem that you are showing a depressive picture, but that is not always the case. Depression and sadness are related, but sadness is a consequence of something external that has come into your life and caused that emotion in you. However, if sadness becomes pathological, it can end up turning into depression. How can you tell if it is pathological? If several weeks have gone by and you are still sad. There are situations in which it is normal to feel this way, but if you spend a long time like this, the most advisable thing is to see a professional who can help you through your grief.
