Part of growing up is learning to regulate your emotions. But sometimes, for various reasons, we also learn to bottle up our emotions, or not to express them in a healthy way.
You may wonder why this is sometimes a bad thing. Surely exploding with rage will only mess up your relationships? Surely crying all the time will make you miserable?
And you’d have a point.
But what I’m talking about is the healthy expression of difficult emotions, a way of letting them out so they don’t take up too much space inside you. Think of a volcano – if you let things build, eventually you will erupt anyway, whether that be through panic attacks, irritability, or a negative impact on your health. And here are my favourite ways of letting these emotions go:
- Keep a journal. Just the process of writing your thoughts an demotions down can really help with processing them. It slows the process down, allowing you to really explore and navigate them.
- Movement. When our systems go into fight and flight, our bodies want to move… so do just that. Go for a walk, take an exercise class, or if you struggle with energy limiting illness, try some gentle stretches or hand claps.
- Be creative. Try drawing you emotions, writing a poem or a song.
- It’s a cliche for a reason –talk to someone. A friend, relative or therapist. Talking is a great way to process difficult emotions.
- Watch an emotional movie. This allows us to let our emotions out about something else, which can sometimes be easier because it isn’t directly about our own problems.