A Beautiful New Word to Describe an Obscure Emotion

When you realize that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own

Hello intersectional thinkers 👋

Greetings from Tokyo - the place where I first experienced this jolting emotion:

Sonder
Noun

The realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own.

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My first vivid memory of sonder was on the Narita Airport Express heading into Tokyo for my exchange semester.

The train left Narita Airport at exactly 8:44pm.

We zoomed past the agricultural greens and industrial greys in the suburbs until we approached the edge of the city. Forced to merge with Tokyo train traffic, the 130km/hr train had no choice but to slow down.

The view outside the window went from the soft blurs of green and grey to sharp edges and dazzling neon lights. The most eye catching sight was the well-lit windows on tightly packed buildings that lined up neatly like the icon view of the Photos folder on my iPhone.

As the train scrolled past a grey office building, I peered into a window featuring the silhouettes of two salary men in a sterile white office space working late into the night. A big faded sign was plastered onto the glass panes: 不動産売買 (real estate services).

I wonder what kind of properties they were buying and selling. Are they helping someone find a dream home or get rid of an old one? Did they have those haunted apartments in their portfolio?

The train wasn’t going to stop for me to pick up more clues. It continued along its track, going past a pastel pink residential building. In the softly lit kitchen-dining room, I saw a kid and her mom at the table, gesturing and laughing.

It’s a little late for dinner, so maybe they’re waiting for dad to come home from that real estate agency.

And it was in that moment, thinking about the guy selling the haunted apartments coming home to this animated young family, that a rush of melancholy washed over me.

By being the passerby in their lives, I was hit with the humbling reality that I’m just another one of the 14 million people in this city.

At the intersection of me and everyone else, I am at the same time the most important person (in my literally self-centred life) and the least important person (to a unknown passerby).  

Just like an author’s choice of first person, second person, or third person points of view (POV) has unique possibilities and constrains, the POV we choose to live our life can completely shake up the narrative we tell ourselves.

H/T to Yina’s tweet that introduced me to this concept of sonder. I don’t know what it is about Tokyo that evoked sonder for the both of us… but please let me know when and where you realized that everyone’s a protagonist in the same movie!