Feel all the Feels

Are you feeling a sense of pressure to maintain a happy demeanor?   You don’t want your kids, your parents or your patients to be sad, worried or upset about how COVID is impacting our lives and the holidays.  You take a deep breath, plaster a smile on your face and push forward. 

People sometimes try to hide their true emotions.  They take their feelings and stuff them deep down in their gut in an effort to ignore them.  In an attempt to make them go away some people may drink, eat, spend or sleep too much.  Or they find that they begin to lose the ability to keep that happy smiling mask on.  Plans to remain happy and positive are thwarted by grouchiness and snippy comments that they just can’t seem to control anymore.

My friend and co-worker Amy Hammond, PCSW, shared with our staff earlier this week about our emotions.  She said, “Name It- Stating our feelings out loud means they are real. When you name it, you feel it.”  If you are one who has stuffed your emotions, I encourage you to take that a step further and release those feelings. 

As a stuffer, I call it “Throwing Myself a Time Limited Pity Party.”  I’ll tell myself that for the next 15 minutes (30 minutes, evening – whatever time I need or have) I’m going to let myself be sad (or angry or upset – you get the idea).  Then I do one or more of the following:

Ø  * Have a good cry.

Ø  * Lay in bed and literally pull the covers over my head.

Ø  * Play music real loud and scream or sing at the top of my lungs. 

Ø  * Write my frustrations or worries down on a piece of paper.  Take that paper and crumble it into a ball and hurl it toward the garbage can or toss it in the fire watching my frustrations and worries go up in smoke.

Ø  * Stand up and march in place lifting my knees high and stomping my feet back to ground.  Or jump and dance around (very much like Kevin Bacon in the movie Footloose - you know what scene I'm talking about!).

Ø  * Call a friend and let her know that I need a no-holding-back-venting session. 

Heading into the weekend, take a moment and do an emotional inventory.  Are their emotions that you are not recognizing because you feel the need to be the one who always has a happy face?  If you find them tucked deep within, take some time and let them out.  Give yourself permission to feel all the feels.  Once your emotions are out in the open, your smile will be ready to return to its proper place and continue to spread comfort and joy to those you see.

picture credit: www.sacmag.com; www.pinterest.com