Melanqualia is a feeling of aloneness as that does not arise from sadness but positivity. It is an emotion often fueled by creativity or idealism. It comes with an aspiration toward the higher levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: to self-actualize, cognitively, aesthetically, transcendentally.
Melanqualia causes us to separate from the routine, to consciously ritual – hence this inspired aloneness – to put ourselves in a liminal state for new qualia to reveal itself. This is the middle stage of ritual, when we play aesthetically or experiment cognitively with controlled but spontaneous acts of creation
Melanqualia is not threat-based, as might follow trauma, but reward based, as comes with resilience.
We consciously ritual when we feel we will be creative. An artist leaves home and friends to grow her nascent sense of actualization, creating the circumstances to thrive. This is not escapism, but idealistic striving toward the unattainable. We grow toward or fall away from our ideals, and melanqualia urges us to re-calibrate our moral compass.
Melanqualia may become sadness when certain parts of the brain shut down because we have stopped noticing and appreciating the Little Dopamine gifts – the qualia – that inspire us. This is probably a result of some degree of material success and/or Big Dopamine flooding.
On the otherhand, sadness may work itself up into melanqualia through conscious ritualing.