Holding in our thoughts and emotions is one of the most
destructive endevours we do in our society. Burying our feelings like we would
bury something that is dead causes a wide range of health and emotional
problems. Holding in negative emotion is exactly why we have situations like
the Germanwings catastrophe and the premature death of Robin Williams, not to
mention the 41,149 good people who killed themselves in 2013.
Look, I'm not saying that we should blurt out every thought
and emotion we have in every situation that we're in, but what I do encourage
you to do is to talk out some of the pain, anger, and negativity you're holding
in with someone who is trained to listen and who can offer effective feedback
to help you process what you're thinking and feeling.
Yes, we have a mental health stigma, but the primary reason
I see for people not talking out how they're thinking and feeling is the fear
of being judged. Many of us live in fear of what people think and how they
perceive us, to the point that we genuinely convince ourselves that we know
exactly what people are thinking. We feel that we are psychically gifted to
read another person's mind and know that they are thinking and feeling
negatively about us. In reality though, those same people you are worried about
have similar or worse thoughts flowing through their mind about themselves. And
truth be told, we are probably worried about them negatively judging us because
we are negatively judging them. There are NO perfect people, if there were,
they wouldn't be judging you negatively. We are all imperfect, we all have
issues, and we should all start talking out how we are thinking and feeling,
then we just might find that imperfection is what we all have in common.
Dr. Steven Walker
Copyright © 2015
