Accepting ALL of our emotions can make us happier

In our busy modern world, we can often push away emotions we don’t have time for. Emotions such as overwhelm, fear, sadness, and loneliness. Often, we don’t allow ourselves to feel the full bite of them. If we did engage fully, from my own experience, which I will share shortly, the return to balance could be achieved more quickly and with less angst.

Unhappiness is a message

These emotions of unhappiness tell us there is something wrong, but we should look at it as an opportunity to look at something more closely. Allow ourselves the honesty of being sad or lonely. I’m not suggesting we wallow in misery or don’t do everything we can to alleviate it, but emotions that unbalance us are a helpful message.

Life can suck at times. We will ride high at times and, other times, be relatively low. Both are normal. 

We must stop casting aside our emotions we don’t have time for, believing they are silly, or about lack of willpower or confidence.

It’s the thoughts we have about the feelings and the meaning we put on them that get in the way. Thoughts such as: I shouldn’t feel lonely as I’ve got friends; I’ve got to pull myself together; I don’t have time to be sad.    Emotions aren’t bad. They just are. They come and go. It’s like going into winter for a time, but spring does come again.

If we can learn to notice, pause, and take a moment to feel these emotions, life can get happier more quickly. (Note: I’m not talking about depression or mental illness here.)

The allowing of feelings

Allowing these emotions can be anything from 10 minutes to many days or months. When overwhelmed, 10 minutes of sitting, pausing, and breathing can be enough to gather some energy. (For long-term overwhelm, something deeper may need to be addressed.) 

While sitting with grief can take a lot longer. I know when I had to finally give up having children, I became very introverted, didn’t want or need to socialise a lot and read every Lee Child book there was. It was exactly what I needed to do.

I had to go within and withdraw to process my grief so I could come out the other side. I knew if I didn’t, my grief would take a lot longer to move through the rawness. 

Are we either off or on?

I wonder if we have forgotten how to rest in our busy world. I’ve only recently realised that my busy mind was the reason I wasn’t sleeping well, and I have now instigated pre-sleep routines to relax me.

We are all so busy running around that we are either off or on. We seem to have forgotten to pause and do things like sit and chat, sit and look at the sea or bush, just be for a moment.

What can we do?

At times of difficulty, treat yourself like a special child, with kindness and love. Assume your feelings are reasonable and they are a signal of something to be listened to. Feed yourself well, exercise and connect. We might need friends to cry with, to acknowledge what we are going through, and essentially, we need to give ourselves a break!

Ask yourself:

What is this about? What might need to change?

In those difficult emotional times, accept them and make it delicious. Bury beneath the duvet, sit in the sun, talk deeply with a friend and share what you are going through. Revel in your emotions and what they bring.

Learning to recognise when our emotions change and engage with them, and not push them down, can create a lot less angst. We often don’t choose to feel a certain way, but how we engage with our emotions is important.