it’s okay to feel this way.

There is a particular relief when someone says yes, me too, and means it. The topic does not change, nothing is solved, and yet the room is measurably lighter.

Most of what makes a hard feeling heavier is the second layer — the sense that having it at all is a mistake currently being made. That layer is optional in a way the first one is not.

Okay does not mean pleasant. It means allowed to be here without an argument attached.