Obscure sorrows: Koinophobia

I feel like writing today. I was thinking about what I'd like to share with the rest of the world, and this instantly came to mind. It is of my favourite things, and coincidentally something that very few people are aware of: The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows.

Excerpting the author's description:

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows is a compendium of invented words written by John Koenig. Each original definition aims to fill a hole in the language—to give a name to emotions we all might experience but don’t yet have a word for.

All words in this dictionary are new. They were not necessarily intended to be used in conversation, but to exist for their own sake; to give a semblance of order to a dark continent, so you can settle it yourself on your own terms, without feeling too lost—safe in the knowledge that we’re all lost.

Glorious melancholy. That's the best description I can think of for this effort. The words provoke in you a sense of acute sorrow, and then soothe you with the knowledge that there's a word for what you feel. That so many other people have felt it before you. Sometimes I wonder if that makes it better or worse. :)

Let me write about one such word today. (I struggle to write about this, because I read the transcript of the video, and it is perfection as it stands. How can I do better, I despair!)

The Fear that You've Lived an Ordinary Life- Koinophobia

 Many people fear dying, but somehow I fear living a meaningless life more. I keep going through the events of my life, adding them up to make sense. Hoping that they'll fall into place like pieces of a jigsaw, giving me a bigger picture that shows me how everything is connected, leading me towards a larger goal that defines the purpose of my life. But somehow, they don't converge that way. I am left with rough unruly shapes that refuse to fit. I puzzle over them, turning them hither and thither, looking at them sideways, upside-down and every other way I can think of. No matter what I do, they still remain scattered, a life that refuses to conform to one shape. Sometimes I exult in it, and other times I despair at it. 

I wonder if I am getting complacent, if I am simply conforming to the games that the world has defined and set up for us to play. Study, work, get married, build a house, have a kid. I fear getting lost in these things, losing sight of what life was meant to be. Life looks so tiny, all the battles I have waged seem so inconsequential. I wonder if they were worth it, if I was merely scaling them up in my head all this while.

Death with his scythe doesn't scare me. My demon is a tiny voice in my head asking: What did you accomplish in this life? What did you do with all that you were given? Will you be remembered after you die? What is the legacy that you leave behind? These questions leave me cold and sweaty, and I fear not being able to answer them. Koinophobia, the fear of having lived an ordinary life.

P.S By the way, they have a youtube channel with videos for each of these words. If you like what you read, I would strongly recommend watching those as well.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kcjfi8oNQY8

Transcript:

While you're in it, life seems epic. Fiery, tenuous, and unpredictable. But once you have some distance from it, everything seems to shrink, until it's almost out of focus. Koinophobia. When you look back over your life, or try to put it down on paper, You can see more of it now than ever before. And yet it seems somehow diminished. Humble. Almost quaint. So you begin scanning your life, looking for something interesting or beautiful. You see an ordinary house, with an ordinary yard, on an ordinary street. It looks smaller than you remember. You once had wild dreams and obstacles and risks looming all around you, but now they look smaller too. You remember giants and goddesses and villains, but all you see is ordinary people assembled in their tiny classrooms and workspaces, each of us moving around in little steps, like tokens on a game board. No matter how many times you rolled the dice, it was always these little moves, here and there. Do a little work, Take a little rest. Make a little friend, Throw a little party. Feel a little boredom, Have a little rebellion. There are so many of these token moments, that were supposed to represent some other thing. You keep adding them all up, as if there was something you forgot to count, some stash of glory that fell off the back of a truck. You may adore the life you have, for everything it is. You know it isn't groundbreaking; you wouldn't change a thing. Maybe when you first started building the life you wanted, you left plenty of room for what might happen, and somehow lost track of what was happening. Or maybe you were never 'in it' to begin with. Maybe you knew even then that this wasn't the world you expected. A world so low and common you tried to keep your distance, floating somewhere above it, where nobody else could look down on this life you built. Nobody else but you.

P.P.S: I wish to contribute a word to this dictionary! :) Have been thinking for a while now.