#### [[Sonder]] --- > Coined in 2012 by [[@John Koenig]], whose project, *The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows*, aims to come up with new words for emotions that currently lack words. Inspired by German sonder- (*“special”*) and French sonder (*“to probe”*). > > --- > "The profound feeling of realizing that everyone, including strangers passed in the street, has a life as complex as one's own^[[[No one really cares]]], which they are constantly living despite one's personal lack of awareness of it^[[[Object impermanence in ADHD affects preference for top level structures]]]." > > --- > n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk. > -- [Wikitionary](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sonder) --- - Tags: - [[Lingustics]] - [[Sorrow]] - [[Ego]] - [[Humanity]] - [[Empathy]] - [[Collectivism]] - Reference: - [The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dictionary_of_Obscure_Sorrows) - Related: - [[Neologism]]