Normalizing Sadness

Leia em 🇧🇷Português aqui

Over the past month, I’ve been moving through a grieving period after my father’s passing.

What has surprised me most is how different this experience has been compared to the grief I lived through 31 years ago, when I lost my mother. Back then, I didn’t allow myself to be sad. I stayed in constant movement: busy, functional, “strong.” Sadness had nowhere to land, so it transformed into resentment, anger, and a deep sense of abandonment.

This time, I see more clearly what grief was asking of me all along.

As humans, we are not designed - or perhaps not taught - to sit with negative emotions. We’re encouraged to push forward, to perform resilience, to replace sadness with productivity. Yet sadness isn’t a flaw in the system; it is part of the system.

Suppressing grief doesn’t make us resilient. It simply redirects the pain.

Sadness, when allowed to exist, becomes a stabilizing force. It slows us down, invites reflection, and helps us recalibrate what truly matters. Like joy or motivation, it plays a role in keeping us emotionally balanced. When we deny it, it finds other ways to surface.

I believe we need to normalize sadness; not as weakness, but as a healthy, human response to loss and change. In our workplaces, our relationships, and within ourselves, there should be space to feel without the pressure to immediately “fix” those feelings.

Grief doesn’t disappear when it’s acknowledged. It transforms.

If you’re moving through your own quiet season of loss, know this: allowing yourself to feel is not falling behind: it’s healing.