The other day I was scrolling through Instagram reels, as one does, and came across this one video titled “Profound Words You’ve Probably Never Heard of Before.” It was one of those video formats where you have to scroll through a slideshow of photos, and among the many eloquent words that were presented, the one that caught my attention the most was the word sonder. The creator of the video was right—I hadn’t ever heard of the word before, but boy was I glad that I had learned about it then. By definition, to sonder means to come to the realization that every random passerby is living a life as vivid, complex, and chaotic as your own.
This small, six-letter word, basically describes my life. I spend so much time thinking about the possibilities of other people’s lives that I sometimes even forget to think about mine. On the tram, in the dentist’s waiting room, or strolling through a mall, I find myself fascinated by the fact that strangers lead lives as complex as my own. The endless, somewhat fantastical possibilities of events that other people may be experiencing are almost like an escape from the realities of my own life. On top of that, the thought that people live such rich, elaborate lives yet will likely never cross my path again, leaves a small void in my heart. It makes me wonder: do these people acknowledge or think about my presence as much as I think about theirs?
I feel like, as a collective society, we are often so engrossed in our own lives that we forget to think of the lives of others. Like, sure, you may be the protagonist of your own story, but that doesn’t mean the side characters don’t also have experiences or relationships as intricate as your own.
And that is where the art of sondering comes into play.
As I mentioned earlier, the official definition of sondering means to come to the realization that other people live complex lives. But in my opinion, sondering is so much more than that. I think that we can practice this art by taking some time to observe others and recognize what they are going through, even if we may not have all the information necessary to come up with accurate assumptions or attributions.
I’m not saying that we all have to transform into super profound philosophers and spend the entirety of our lives pondering upon existential questions or the state of others. What I am arguing, however, is that participating in the act of sondering can help us become more empathetic, caring, and open-minded individuals. When we shift our mindset from “only my struggles matter and everyone else’s are irrelevant” to acknowledging that “other people have struggles just as strenuous as my own,” we’re able to view people from a different perspective and show them some more compassion. This is important because, in a world where feelings of fear and uncertainty for the future are so indisputably prominent, having compassion for one another is beyond vital.
Alright, I know what you’re thinking: “Why is she writing so much about a silly word she saw on Instagram?” Fair question. But hear me out, this actually isn’t just about a six-letter word.
The more I started to think about the meaning of sonder, the more I realized it connected to something I’d encountered during my psychology course, where we explored how people make sense of others’ minds and behaviors. It was fascinating to see a word capture so poetically what psychology tries to explain scientifically.
Last semester I took the GOA (Global Online Academy) Social Psychology course. This class was both interesting and challenging, but the thing I found most fascinating about the course material was our module about social cognition. In this unit, we learned about the psychological concepts behind our interactions with and perceptions of others, which are formally referred to as the Theory of Mind and the Fundamental Attribution Error.
Most individuals develop the theory of mind around age 7. It is typically at this age when we are first enrolled into elementary school and begin to form fundamental relationships and connections with our peers. During this stage, the theory of mind is an absolutely essential part of social interactions. The cognitive ability to attribute mental states (beliefs, desires, intentions, emotions, and knowledge) to oneself and others, is what is known in psychology as the Theory of Mind (ToM). This is a basic social skill that allows individuals to understand that other people have perspectives different from their own. It is also this skill that eventually develops into what we can begin to understand as the practice of sondering: realising that others not only have different perspectives, but they also have complex lives which contribute to their perspective or behaviors. Which brings us to the next theory called the Fundamental Attribution Error.
The Fundamental Attribution Error is a cognitive bias where people tend to overemphasize personality-based explanations (dispositional factors) for others’ behavior while underemphasizing situational factors.
Imagine you are driving a car, and all of a sudden, someone speeds way past the speed limit and cuts right in front of you. In the heat of the moment, your first instinct may be to assume that they are a reckless driver or that they are simply a jerk. Those associations you’d make in response to that person’s behavior, or attributions as we call them in psychology, are all dispositional factors. It is human nature to automatically assume that another person’s behaviors are innate and exact reflections of their character, but it is also unfair to the recipient of those attributions, since we’re not giving them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they were speeding up because their partner just had a baby and they wanted to see the newborn in the hospital; or maybe their son accidentally set the house on fire while they went out for groceries.
The truth of the matter is that the attributions we make for someone’s behavior are highly likely to be incorrect. But instead of instantly jumping to the conclusion that the person is horrible because they cut you off in traffic, try to give them some grace and register that perhaps their behaviors are not a sole reflection of their character, but are instead influenced by their environment. As I’ve stated several times in this article, I think that this first step comes from sondering—from simply acknowledging that others do, in fact, experience complexity in their lives. It is then when we can start rejecting the Fundamental Attribution Error and actually showing people more empathy, even if they upset us in some way.
In the end, both Theory of Mind and the Fundamental Attribution Error remind us that our view of others is never the complete story, and that’s exactly what makes sonder so powerful. It invites us to pause, to imagine the invisible stories shaping each individual’s choices, and to respond with empathy rather than judgment. If more of us practiced the art of sondering, perhaps our world would feel a little less divided and a little more humane. After all, the world can always use a little more kindness and empathy, even if it is shown through actions as simple as changing your mindset and thinking of others more often.