If the word dissentment sounds a bit unfamiliar to you, that is because I made it up.

Dissentment is the state of being in perpetual and active opposition to the dominant paradigm, accepted wisdom, what have you. Dissentment is life lived in dissent.

I concocted the word because it did not already exist, and I needed a word just like it. I needed this word because I challenged myself to find one word to describe a major aspect of my life.

Adding the simple suffix -ment (from Latin via Middle English and French) flavors dissent with a certain sense of permanence, dissent as a state or a condition.

Dissentment, then, is the one-word description I was searching for.

Having found it, I wasn’t sure what next to do with the word, if anything. I came to the conclusion that it would make a terrific name for a blog.