How do you manage your “saudade”? Have you ever thought about it?

“Saudade” is a Portuguese word that we can’t properly translate to English.

It describes an emotion, a bittersweet feeling of missing someone or something.

Today is one of those days when “saudade” tightens up.

Oh, “saudade”, a feeling that I understood the raw meaning of it while living "abroad”, far away from Brazil, far from many loved ones.

It is funny to think that my life, my home, my family (with my partner and my dog) are here in the Netherlands, and I wouldn't exchange that for anything else. At the same time, “saudade” is something that accompanies me and sticks with me.

Sometimes it is asleep, but other times it comes on strong, without asking for permission. It tears at the heart, squeezes the chest, and you feel it in your throat.

It's the desire to run away and catch the first plane. It is the desire to have - even if just for a day - the company of my mother, my brother, my godparents, uncles, friends and my grandmother. It's the desire to be close to them, even if it means experiencing the (sometimes) chaos of family reunions.

It is the “saudade” of being together, of hugging, of looking each other on the eye or even smelling their scents.

While living away from home, I've learned that this feeling will accompany me as long as I choose to live here or anywhere else in this huge (and amazing) world.

It will be there, but most days it will remain asleep, resting. But when it awakens, it awakens with full force.

And what can I do? I look at it, I embrace it, I accept it, and feel it.

As a very special person once told me, very wisely: “Saudade is the fullest emptiness that exists."

And wow… this really does make sense to me! Does it make sense to you too?

Living an immigrant life means learning to observe this feeling, to give it meaning, and to find strategies to deal with it.

How do you manage your “saudade”? Have you ever thought about it?