Sonder: The realisation of vivid and complex life, by Halima Bawa
Sonder is the realisation that everyone you see is living a vivid and complex life, just like you, it’s wild when you think about it because we sometimes want to be the main character in everyone’s story. But honestly, we’re not.
In this life, we’re just passersby in other people’s worlds. Most of the time, we exist as fleeting thoughts. Someone might remember your smile or your perfume or your voice for a moment, but then life pulls them back into their own battles, battles you may never know about.
Imagine standing in a busy market. People walk past you with bags of food, children tugging at their hands, or stress etched across their faces. Nobody is really looking at you, they’re focused on survival. That’s sonder – realising everyone around you is living through their own story, just as real and complicated as yours.
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The same thing happens in the classroom.
I sit in a room with over eighty people, and it hits me: each person is carrying something I can’t see. The girl in front of me may have cried herself to sleep last night. The guy beside me might be celebrating some good news. And me? I might be carrying my own quiet struggles.
Sonder teaches me something humbling: I will never be the main character in someone else’s story. And that’s okay.
Because it means my real responsibility is to live fully as the main character in my
own life.
So here’s your sign to live life slowly. To breathe. To stop rushing. Romanticise the small things: cooking dinner slowly, walking without your phone, noticing the way the sun hits your desk in class. Life is fleeting, and so much of it passes by when we’re too busy trying to star in someone else’s script.
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Everyone is fighting battles we may never know. Everyone deserves kindness. And that includes you. So, be kind. Be gentle with yourself. Live slowly. After all, you are the main character of your own life.
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