For the last few months, I’ve been very focused on working hard and not falling into old habits and things that distract me from being productive. Overall, this time has been amazing and I’m totally going to do a post on it because I learned so much so quickly (hopefully next post!). But in the last three months, I didn’t give myself a lot of time to listen to, sit in or process my feelings. With a very busy season at work, getting into more difficult training for a half marathon and reading/going through The Artist’s Way workbook, I was constantly working on something. Listening to and honoring my emotions wasn’t “productive enough” in my head. My days were filled and any time I had to relax, I was catching up on sleep.
As it always does, not sleeping caught up to me quickly. I found myself ruminating on conversations, thinking everyone was mad at me and feeling like nothing I was doing was enough. Because I had so much going on, I didn’t have the time or energy to process or even address the negative emotions. One Saturday I was randomly in a bad mood and decided to lean into it. I knew I would feel better in the morning, it was already late, I figured I could deal with being sad for a night.
Because I often feel so anxious, I rarely let myself explore sadness. To me, sadness feels unpredictable and unsafe. But in the confines of “I know I’ll feel better tomorrow morning” I felt like I could really let myself sit in the sadness knowing I would be okay and there was an “other side” to get to. I started journaling about what I was sad about – a lot of it was “what am I doing with my life” per usual. I let myself admit things I’d been scared to admit, while half-heartedly telling myself “everything will work out.”
After a few minutes journaling, I felt a million times better, not more sad. In trying to ignore the negative feelings they didn’t go away, they just had time to get stronger. I had been feeling disconnected from my body and my normally optimistic outlook on life and when I could finally admit that to myself, I realized those feelings were simply anxious thoughts. They were not real or true.
In this one hour of being sad, I felt validated and in touch with myself. I’ve never felt sadness so deeply and not in like a sobbing/crying way – just a quiet deepness. I think letting myself get that sad and really listen to my emotions helped me to connect with the energy that had been feeling off. Being that sad was a little scary but I realized I had no other choice than to accept the feelings as they came and trust they would pass.
This isn’t groundbreaking, I think we all know that our feelings will eventually win no matter how long we try to fight them off. BUT!! Using “I know there’s an other side to get to” in sadness, totally helped me transform my thinking of the purpose of feeling sad. It’s so common for us to neglect our feelings because we don’t have the time, resources, whatever excuse it may be. We prioritize our “busy” over how we’re actually feeling. And it took me a million breaking points, rock bottoms, etc. to get to this realization. Our emotions are working through us for us, not against us. We are not losing anything, even time, by allowing ourselves to feel. We are, on the other hand, risking everything by numbing ourselves. Honoring our feelings is the ultimate act of self-care and one I had been denying myself for months.
Obviously, we can’t completely surrender to our feelings every day. But in making it a regular priority when small discomfort arises, we can (for the most part) avoid the build-up and eventual breaking point. (At least I hope. TBD). This is something I’m definitely going to try to work on over the next few months so yeah if you’ve never been told you have feelings phobia from a licensed psychologist – maybe let me know if you have any advice (:
