Sehnsucht and The Big What-ifs

Despite the fact that I feel like I haven't accomplished much in the past week or so, I feel like I've been extremely busy!  Don't you just hate that feeling of hurrying and rushing but not actually getting anywhere?  I have been feeling like that all week!  I hate it; it's a yucky feeling for sure.  I much prefer the feeling of relaxed, peaceful working, that doesn't feel like work, but when you look up you realize you've gotten so much done!  I'm looking forward to feeling that way again...and soon, I hope!

Yesterday, I had a lazy day, where I did absolutely nothing but sleep and watch t.v. and lounge about.  I am not normally one to enjoy days like that, and I generally find t.v. pretty mind-numbing, but I have to say, I was ok with it yesterday.  I guess every great once in a while days like that are good.

This morning I got up with a little more vigor and washed some clothes and the dishes and swept the floor.  Then that was enough of cleaning, and I moved on to the much more enjoyable work of art journaling.  I love  making art so much, I don't think it's even fair to call it work!  But I digress...  

I've been working on this page for a while now, trying to get it right...  It's in my little scrappy pocket calendar book that I made.  I know I said that I was going to toss it in my purse and use it for on-the-go sketching, but I was wrong...  I just felt the need to get something into it, before I tossed it into my purse.  So in the end, it may still end up in my purse...or it may end up on my desk and I'll have to find another tiny book for on-the-go sketching...  At any rate, here's the page:

The journaling part says: " Sehnsucht...  And so I sit here alone, missing things that once were, almost, almost crying for possibilities that existed which exist no more, longing to know what could have been but never will be.  If I were braver, I would cry out: 'What have I done?  What have I ever done?' but I'm not, so all I do is silently sit here thinking of sad things that are and happy things that cannot be."

I saw that word "sehnsucht" on Pinterest, and googled it.  It's supposed to be a German word, which doesn't really have an exact English translation, but conveys the feeling of an intense longing  for a person or place no longer in our life or a longing for 'we know not what'.  When I read that, it made me think of all the what-ifs in life.  What if I chose this thing instead of that thing, how would my life be different?  

I wonder if I am the only person who does this...while at the same time, I'm sure I'm not.  It must be something in our nature that makes us question things in this way.  It's an inherent quality in this type of daydream that we will always view these thoughts through rose-colored glasses...the thought of it will be a perfect scenario, if it were real, it could never be like it is in the mind, because nothing in life is ever perfect.  In our heads, it can be perfect and beautiful and that must be why we have such an intense desire for these people and places.  But if we had chosen B instead of A, we'd probably still be daydreaming about the converse.

I think probably everybody has one big 'what-if' in their life, the one that eclipses all the other what-ifs.  I know I do.  When I get down about it, when I really struggle with it, I try to remember that I do picture things in my head much more softly than they would have been in reality.  There are no hard edges in my daydreams, but, had those daydreams been real, who knows how many gashes and bruises those actions would have caused.  And like the lyrics in the song below say, "the grass is greener, but just as hard to mow."