In Defense of “Bad” Emotions

I’ve been going through a rough spot recently. I just got informed that my ankle that has been giving me problems will have to be surgically redone and the previous implant has already been taken out after a car wreck dislodged it. I’ve been subluxing my elbow, which is a new one. There’s been an intensely stressful individual I work with making problems. I’ve got deadlines for projects coming up. I’ve had a month of home IV treatments that I’ve had to inject myself. PLUS I’ve been going to a therapist that, while she’s been exceptionally insightful, has brought up things I wasn’t prepared to face. There’s a flood of emotions that come along with that, and most of them are ones that our culture has done its best to hide and avoid like they carry the plague; disappointment, guilt, rage, sadness, ect.

Why Are They Considered Bad?

Do a quick search on Google and you’ll get a ton of articles that will give you a list of what they consider negative emotions and what to do to get rid of them. We’ve also all had that well-meaning individual that when we’re feeling bad does their best to pull us out of it. But what makes them so bad?

The biggest reason is that they are uncomfortable to experience. Even when reading over the small list I had above, some readers will internally cringe or feel a wave of sympathy. Some may have even gotten uncomfortable at the title of this article. They’re not nice things to go through. As we develop into adulthood, we’ve learned along the way that uncomfortable equates to dangerous and dangerous equates to something to avoid. It only goes to follow that emotions that make us feel that discomfort, get categorized into bad.

Another reason is something that I’ve mentioned in an earlier article about physical pain, we don’t like to see our fellow humans in pain. When we see someone that is in the middle of facing a “negative” emotion, the reaction for most of us is to want to make it better…to fix it. So we offer condolence, try and make them laugh, tell them positive things going on. Their discomfort makes us equally as uncomfortable.

There is also a physiological correlation between those types of emotions that I touched on in an article about talking to your body. Studies have shown that certain emotions have a negative impact on the immune system, heal rates, and organ function. With all of that, the evidence seems to point in favor of avoiding or trying to get rid of those emotions as quickly as possible, right? Well…not really.

To Feel Is To Be Human

All emotions are equally important. ALL OF THEM. Whatever you feel, however you react to a situation…is okay. Let me repeat that. Whatever emotions you experience is okay and normal, even if you don’t like them .

To be human, is to experience the whole spectrum, not just the pleasant things in life. We can’t sever or bottle things just because they don’t feel nice at the moment and expect to function at our best. Whether we like it or not, ignoring an uncomfortable emotion carries with it the same risk as if we choose to ignore an ailment that is purely physical such as a sprained ankle. Pretending it’s not there doesn’t remove it, it just increases the potential for the damage to become worse. What’s even more dangerous about when this is done with emotions, is that we can lie to ourselves convincingly enough that because we don’t have a direct correlation, such as a sprained ankle would with increased pain, to let us be acutely aware of this escalated damage. Symptoms that can easily be written off such as decreased appetite, restless sleep, moodiness, headaches, fatigue, stomach upset, forgetfulness..can all be attributed to other aspects of our life rather than to emotional causes. It must be something we ate the day before, or an allergy because if it’s “bad” emotions we might actually have to do something about them.

This doesn’t mean I’m encouraging you to carve out a place and wallow in them. Nor do we have to make a banner out of our less pleasant emotions and wave it around wherever we go. But we shouldn’t try and pretend they don’t exist or try and convince others to push them out at all costs. You’re emotions are a reaction to what’s going on around you from your brain. Consider it the same as when your nerves send an excited chill at a lover’s touch or pain from touching a fire. In that sense, acknowledging sadness is just as important of an emotional message as joy.

So What SHOULD We Do?

With the flood of suggestions about how to remove them or hide them, what should we really do when those “bad” emotions show up?

Well….

Accept them.

It sounds simple, but in today’s age that’s a really difficult thing to do. So many of us are so used to shoving them in a dark place inside ourselves that we are unaccustomed to dealing with them in healthy ways. We explode at the source of those less than pleasant emotions or those we care for because they’re closest to us. We indulge in coping mechanisms such as video games so we can drown out the painful reminder of whatever is crushing us at the moment.

But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Letting yourself be angry or sad or frustrated and acknowledging to yourself that it’s okay to feel this way is SO VERY IMPORTANT! Until we do these things, all the positive thinking in the world isn’t going to help, especially when you’re facing chronic illness. EDS folks, we deal with constant pain and limitations because of how our body is built. If a professional athlete is allowed to feel upset and frustrated as they’re healing from an acute illness, we are allowed to be frustrated and upset at our life circumstances! You are allowed to cry. You are allowed to scream. You are allowed.

Now, like I mentioned above, you don’t have to live there. The idea behind this is that you need to allow, and then show yourself compassion about it. This can be as simple as holding your hands over where the emotion feels the strongest within your body. Does it tie your stomach in knots or make your heart ache? Hold your hands there. Hug yourself. Cuddle a stuffed animal there. Allow yourself to embrace that crappy feeling and comfort where your body is feeling it. It can sound a bit on the silly side, and may even feel that way doing it, but it does actually stimulate our nerves and can have a relaxing effect.

Then, let those emotions work FOR you instead of against you. I will use myself as an example. With all those things I listed in the beginning of this article, I am angry and disappointed. It started as anger towards everything and disappointment in myself if I’m to be honest. I felt like everything I did wasn’t helping and obviously I had to be doing something wrong. Maybe life just hated me that much. Maybe it’s not even worth trying anymore to improve my ankles because I’ve been facing this since last October and having so many problems that shouldn’t have happened. I tried to hide it at work, and from those I loved, because I didn’t want to be a burden. One day it got so bad, I completely broke down. I cried and hugged myself while I sobbed in the shower until I used up all the hot water about my circumstances. All of it came out. The fact I will never shoot archery again. I will never run again. I have to regulate how often I can do my artwork. I can’t do what I used to at work anymore. I will never get better. It felt like the internal pain was so overwhelming that it would never stop. It was embarrassing and I hated it.

But the tears did stop. And you know what? I felt better for finally releasing all of those things that I was trying so hard to pretend didn’t exist. I got angry at the depression and at the EDS for making me feel helpless. I got angry that I allowed myself to do this TO MYSELF! What did I think I was accomplishing? Hell if I’m going to let this stop me from being creative, or living my life. Yes, all of that sucks. A lot. More than I know how to properly express. But that doesn’t stop me from trying to figure out a way to accomplish new things, or inventing ways around my limitations to do what I’d like at least a little bit. I stopped turning those emotions inward, and used them as motivation to move forward.

It doesn’t stop things from being hard. The idea isn’t to stop them anyway. The idea is to let them do their job so we can move past them. Using them as signals of something we need to change either in ourselves or our surroundings to improve our quality of life. As an alert to turn inward and see where the core of those feelings start from and learn to grow as people from them. We can’t do that when they’re stuffed into a box deep inside the parts of our mind we don’t want to look. We can only do that when we dust off that box, and take it out into the light and look at ourselves with the compassion we all deserve.

Wishing you all, all the love.