I love learning new words. (And writing them down.) All the better when they are invented words. John Koenig’s Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows is a collection of words Koenig has created—inspired by real etymology—for specific emotions that don’t have precise English words to describe them. Tell me you haven’t felt every one of these:
Sonder: (n) The realization that each passerby has a life as vivid and complex as your own
Opia: (n) The ambiguous intensity of looking someone in the eye, which can feel simultaneously invasive and vulnerable
Monachopsis: (n) The subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place.
Énouement: (n) The bittersweetness of having arrived in the future, seeing how things turn out, but not being able to tell your past self.
Vellichor: (n) The strange wistfulness of used bookshops.
Rubatosis: (n) The unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat.
Kenopsia: (n) The eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that is usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet.
Mauerbauertraurigkeit: (n) The inexplicable urge to push people away, even close friends who you really like.
Jouska: (n) A hypothetical conversation that you compulsively play out in your head.
Chrysalism: (n) the amniotic tranquility of being indoors during a thunderstorm.
Vemödalen: (n) The frustration of photographic something amazing when thousands of identical photos already exist.
Anecdoche: (n) A conversation in which everyone is talking, but nobody is listening
Ellipsism: (n) A sadness that you’ll never be able to know how history will turn out.
Kuebiko: (n) A state of exhaustion inspired by acts of senseless violence.
Lachesism: (n) The desire to be struck by disaster – to survive a plane crash, or to lose everything in a fire.
Exulansis: (n) The tendency to give up trying to talk about an experience because people are unable to relate to it.
Adronitis: (n) Frustration with how long it takes to get to know someone.
Rückkehrunruhe: (n) The feeling of returning home after an immersive trip only to find it fading rapidly from your awareness.
Nodus Tollens: (n) The realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore.
Onism: (n) The frustration of being stuck in just one body, that inhabits only one place at a time.
Liberosis: (n) The desire to care less about things.
Altschmerz: (n) Weariness with the same old issues that you’ve always had – the same boring flaws and anxieties that you’ve been gnawing on for years.
Occhiolism: (n) The awareness of the smallness of your perspective.
(via Tyler Cowen)
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