What is sadness good for?

Sadness is not simply a psychological phenomenon that makes us feel bad; it can help us.

The human emotional spectrum is very broad. There are emotions that we experience as positive, while others we feel as negative, but they all have an adaptive function. They serve a purpose.

Although we have always been told that it is better to be happy than sad, the truth is that sadness is also useful when it occurs in certain situations.

Here we are going to see more in depth what sadness is forprobably the negative emotion worst seen of all.

What is sadness good for in human beings?

Many of us have been raised on an idea that we should live happily 24/7, an idea that is still very much alive today. Traditionally, any negative emotion has been seen as something inherently badThis is something to be avoided at all costs, and the idea has been promoted that we should always show our face. This is easy to see by taking a look at social networks: parties, trips, great meals... there is no shortage of signs that in this artificial world, the virtual one, everyone has perfectly happy lives.

But happiness is something rare. We all want to feel it, and it is normal, but we cannot pretend to be happy all the time, nor can we think that our lives are terribly unhappy because we are not happy all the time. People have many emotions, each one useful for different situations and all of them adaptive in the case of showing them. all of them adaptive if shown in the right contexts.and sadness is no exception.

If we ask someone what sadness is for, they would surely answer us with a categorical and categorical "not at all". He is partly right. Sadness serves us to do nothing for a while. It makes us stop to think about what has happened, what has made us feel this way, how we could have avoided the unpleasant situation we have just experienced and, in case it was not possible to avoid it, at least it allows us to reflect and learn from it.

To better understand what sadness is for, we must reflect on when it appears. This is an emotion that usually arises when there is a significant process of loss. In this life we can lose many things, some of which are irrecoverable and their disappearance will leave us with a great emptiness, especially the loss of a relationship. Losing someone, either because they have passed away or because they have left our side, is always painful, something that brings us sadness.

Curiously, the sadness that appears when we lose someone also serves to attract other people who bring us comfort. This emotion has a relational functionIt serves to make other people accompany us in difficult moments when we see that we need emotional support. In difficult moments people join together, trying to cheer up the person we see sad and showing them that they are not alone, that we want them to be better. Your sadness has served to strengthen your interpersonal relationships.

The functions of sadness

Although with these first paragraphs we have understood a little of what sadness is for, it is not superfluous to mention some of its functions, all of them related to the psychological well-being of the person who feels sadness as well as to his social interactions.

1. It allows us to process loss

On many occasions sadness appears in a context of mourning for the loss of something or someone. This loss, if poorly managed, can have long-term emotional consequences.

Feeling sadness after having experienced, for example, the death of a family member allows us to process the loss, in the sense that it makes us stop and think about the person who is no longer by our side, remembering good times and helping us to get the idea that he/she will not come back, but that his/her memory will always be with us.

2. Facilitates introspection

Related to the previous point, sadness allows us to reflect on what has happened. That is, it facilitates introspection, analyzing the situation and drawing some positive point from what has happened. It helps us to grow as people after experiencing something that we have felt as if it has taken away or deprived us of something..

Life is learning and emotions provide us with many of them. It is difficult to find something in life that does not help us to grow and improve as people, so no matter how sad an event may be, we can always gain a new experience from it.

3. It helps us to feel better

It may sound counterintuitive to say that sadness helps us feel better, but we have all experienced it ourselves. In this life, as long as we are emotionally healthy, there are ups and downs. After a fall always comes a rise, an emotional increase that is more appreciated after having felt sad.

Moreover, while it is true that being sad hurts us, it is also the emotion that allows us to release that pain. Once that negative emotion is released, we feel very calm, relieved, and with it it is as if we have recovered all the energy to be able to move forward..

On the other hand, repressing sadness, although many people try to do so, means a loss of wellbeing. With this repression the only thing we achieve is to waste energy and feel a Pain that we cannot avoid feeling, but that we are not releasing and that sooner or later will hurt us even more.

4. Encourage social support

Although each culture manages sadness in a different way, it is common to find in all cultures collective rituals to help a person who has just lived a negative experience as important as a death. such as the death of a loved one or a breakup.

Sadness serves to unite the community, fostering social support. Whether we are a family member, friend or partner, when we see another person showing signs of sadness, we inevitably reach out to them, try to comfort them and want to cheer them up. We want to show them that they have us for whatever they need.

Empathy is a capacity that makes sense especially when sadness appears. As the social animals that we humans are, it would not make sense for us to have this ability and then ignore the sadness of others or consider it a bad thing to feel it.

Evolution predisposes us to pay attention to and accept sadness, not to ignore or repress it.. Doing so distances us from others, whether it is we who are sad or someone we love who is sad.