As I’m looking out the window, watching the snow melt, I’m very intrigued. Water is dripping from the roof and hitting the deck. As it drips from the roof, the water seems slow and peaceful. When the water hits the deck the rhythm is hard and abrupt. This is often how I personally tolerate pain.
After being hurt emotionally the pain seems light, and tolerable. Yes I’m hurting inside but it’s slow to really affect me. As time goes and and I don’t allow myself to accept what has taken place, those emotions stay bottled up waiting for a day to abruptly surface. I am the person who is good at putting on a front when it comes to my emotions. Not necessarily to the world but to myself personally. Let’s say for example, someone speaks down to me. I’m pretty good at brushing it off and moving on with my day. Like okay you want to be mean, that’s fine I’ll just kill you with kindness and move forward. I wish it was that easy.
I tuck my emotions away for a rainy day-because that makes sense right? I don’t have time to cater to my feelings, I’ve got too much going on. We will just come back to those on another day when I have more time. Insert rolling eye emoji. Yep, that’s how I’ve trained myself to be…not the healthiest.
Why am I so afraid to feel? Why do I always have the need to be so strong-like who am I being strong for? When in reality hiding my emotions away is super weak. Not allowing myself to not be okay leads to a giant explosion down the road. Emotional build ups are much worse the longer you hold on to them. Then when you least expect it something in life triggers those emotions that you’ve hid away. It’s like a ticking bomb waiting to go off. You may be out at the grocery store, driving home from work with the radio on, or daydreaming at work-and all the sudden you feel the tears building inside. You know that feeling where your stomach hurts and you start to get a headache because you’re trying so hard not to let the waterworks fall…yepp that’s what happens when you hold things in. Now you’re in a predicament. You don’t want your co-workers to see your meltdown, if you start bawling while driving you can’t see to drive, and you don’t want the whole town to know you had a meltdown in the produce section. Life is messy guys. But the longer you hold things in-the harder it’s going to be down the road.
Do yourself a favor and let it all out. Allow yourself to ugly cry from that mean girl who gossiped about you at work. Let the tears flow after your boss blames you for someone else’s mistake. It’s okay to not always have it all together. If you don’t let yourself feel it’s going to show in all aspects of life.You are not weak when you allow yourself to be emotional. I feel like there is this bad rep for being in touch with your feelings-for being emotional. Having emotional intelligence is an awesome thing. I actually picked up a book on emotional intelligence and only got a few pages in. Honestly I think I didn’t like what the author had to say because I could raise my hand to everything they were talking about. I 100% know I lack in that area and continue to put off working on it. I completely forgot about that book until right now as I am typing this post. So be right back while I go grab it and add it to my book bag so I can start reading it! Alright-I’m back! So clearly I didn’t get too far into it because there are no pages marked and if I’m reading a book I always mark my page.
I’ve called myself out on hiding my emotions because I know I need to make changes in my life and telling you guys will hold me accountable. That’s the great thing about writing-it allows me to learn things about myself that I never would have if I didn’t sit down and really dig into it. If you’re like me and would rather bury things down deep and let them explode later- own that right now. Now that you’ve realized it -what are you going to do about? Do not say you’re going to just keep scrolling and move on with your day! Grab a piece of paper, go into your notes in your phone, or shout it out loud-what are you holding back? What inside of you have you pushed off for far too long and needs to be released? Whatever it is, let it out! Once you allow yourself to come to terms with what you’ve be hiding from-all those emotions that you saved for a rainy day, you will feel like a weight has been lifted off of your shoulders!
I’m coming to you as a friend-as an actual person on the other side of this screen- and I’ve been there girl. I know the last thing you want to do is sit around and cry over things in the past or something that’s already done and over with. But if something is heavy on your heart or one day you get a flashback from an experience that hurt you- let those emotions flow. Because if it still brings you sadness or pain, it’s not in your past.
Truly Yours,
Jer ❤
Genuinely Jerica 