Ding dong, Bin Laden’s dead! Yes, and we in the United States celebrate, of course. In the midst of all that cheering, though, many of us also feel grief.
For while our formidable enemy now sleeps with the fishes, the memory of the thousands of innocents he killed still carries an impact of epic proportion.
We mourn the dead, reach out to their loved ones and never forget the shock and the trauma that hit our shores that early morning of 9/11.
Sometimes we mistakenly believe that we must only have one primary emotion at a time. This is simply not the case.
Most of us have a space within us that contains multiple emotions. They ebb and flow. The pain of 9/11 remains; the pride and joy of killing Enemy No. 1 is experienced at the same time.
Feeling all of our feelings is what makes us human. So don’t be surprised that while celebrating the death of a mass murderer, you also notice some residual pain, anger and grief. Know that this makes sense and is perfectly understandable.
The ability to juggle conflicting and simultaneous emotions makes us the unique human beings that we are.
Photo: Mike Gleson