[marbletimes]

This is one of those witty sentences that sound good (the balance of life, laughs here, tears there, if you want to enjoy living you need to accept dying, everything happens for a reason), but they are just biblical nonsense. There are plenty of very accomplished, successful (internally and externally) people who feel much more joy than sorrow, and plenty of evil people who have an internal life that is no worse than much more saintly people, but according to The Prophet they all should cry more. I remember I went on a date, and they said, "when a relationship is ending, I really want to feel the pain, as it makes the relationship something of value". I thought it was bananas, there is very little to be gained by pain and spiraling introspection after a break-up. But the other side of the coin says, should I keep my mouth shut during cringy conversation, so I can then have more enlightened, or presumably enlightened, conversations with someone else?

[scns]

I read it differently, like: if you suppress feelings you want to avoid (labeled negative usually), you won't feel all the feelings you would like to (labeled positive usually).

(edit) Another favourite quote of mine is from the chapter about pain: "Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding."

You can read the full chapter here: https://poets.org/poem/pain-1