E-motions
A big Ferris wheel of emotions, is a statement that will give a stranger major insight into some part of who I am. Growing up, I used to think my parents despised the fact that I cried about everything. I felt as though every time I cried about the littlest thing, became sad, overly excited or too concerned, I disappointed them. I was wrong. They understood that the world was hardly ever kind to people like me. No one will give me a break simply because I felt misunderstood or I was having big feelings leading to a meltdown. My parents did their best to teach me to control my emotions. To rein in my tears (yes, I was mostly crying). I don’t think I understood or appreciated their efforts until I’d grown up.
I grew up thinking that my very expressive emotions were pathetic and I tried, I really did try to suppress them. But life thought, hey let’s see how far she gets with suppressing all of that explosive power by throwing her a bucket load of trauma. In response, I became quite withdrawn from life. I tried to do surface living. I’ve mentioned this in previous posts if you’re an old reader, you know what I mean. I forgot to live, feel and enjoy being alive. I was surviving, always trying to snuff out any above-normal feeling. I muted them; the crushes I had, the thrills and hurts of friendships, the fear of being inadequate, the pain of not fitting in, the very minute self-esteem, the normal randomness that comes with teenage, the excitement about the future, among many others. I learned to mask them with a prim and proper front but I was at war inside.
It took me a lot of years, teachings, and serious series of unlearning and relearning for me to accept that my being emotional isn’t a weakness. It is a gift that I get to feel deeply. It’s not always pleasant, but it has given me the ability to truly empathise with others. I can almost always conjure an image of someone’s predicament without experiencing it first-hand. It has helped me in my most recent job, dealing with persons with autism. I could grasp how frustrating it was to feel big feelings and not have the right words to articulate them. I’d felt it before, on a much lower frequency of course, but I’ve felt it nonetheless. It feels so constricting like you’ll blow up. It is painful in the chest and it is depressing too. Being misunderstood is something I am totally at home with now.
Having been a victim of ‘survival’, I have chosen to live every day with all of my messy emotions. As a person in touch with your emotions, you generally have an edge because you see the world differently. I think of it as seeing the world more colourfully. Picture it like this, if the whole world views life through a black and white screen, you do yours through a coloured LED screen. Very emotional people tend to appreciate the little things as well as the big things. They know what it means to live on the extreme ends of the spectrum and are always grateful for days they find themselves in the middle. Emotions are very intense and can be quite overwhelming but that doesn’t mean you let them govern you. They are fickle, and terrible masters. Here are a few things you can do:
Equip yourself, gain knowledge on emotional intelligence, manage your emotions and try to balance out the outbursts with rationality.
You may not always win, but celebrate the victories that come your way till you conquer entirely.
Never suppress your inner strength just because people don’t understand it or perceive it as weakness.
Train your mind and your heart to handle things. Life will dish out hot hot. Compartmentalise (if it works for you), increase your threshold and watch yourself flourish.
Love the fact that you can be expressive, not hide in it.
You’re not your emotions, they are part of you, not the other way round.
I have learnt to love the strength of my emotional weakness.
I am a very Emotional person. And you’re welcome.
Love, Ballie💖
PS: Please forgive me for my inconsistency over here. I have been dealing with a lot of changes, mentally and bodily. I hope you still stay with me. Hopefully now that my fingers have remembered how to type and they won’t stop. Talk to you soon.💕
