A pressure builds inside your chest.

A nest of boa constrictors tightening rhythmically around your insides, when you inhale it feels like bricks are stacked against your diaphragm.

You try to speak, but when you open your mouth, you realize the snakes inside have strangled the sound from your lips.

So you clam up, quiet down, and wait for an opportunity to slip away,

To feel in the silence, away from prying eyes.

Your emotions are not illicit, nor are they shameful.

Recently Hillary Clinton spoke to the online publication Humans of New York about the way she is perceived. Often seen as “cold or aloof or unemotional,” Clinton says she “had to learn as a young woman to control [her] emotions,” and refers to a particular instance during her law school exams when angry men were yelling at her. She says that the “pile on” was “intense” and “very personal,” but that she “couldn’t respond.”

Clinton lives in a war zone. Every move she makes, every word she says can be used later as a weapon to discredit her. A fighter who often needs to “protect [her]self” from political opponents and “keep steady” in the face of volatile criticism, Clinton’s calm demeanor is a necessary tool to her life style. Emotional detachment is something she must maintain in order to function in office, or on the campaign trail.

She feels things, but is almost always in too threatening an environment to express those emotions.

We need Clintons. Much of this world is tough and blatantly competitive. High stress jobs change the world, and if there weren’t politicians to make the tough decisions our society would not survive history, but I am not a Clinton. The idea of swallowing back my thoughts and feelings, leaving my face a blank, poker-esque slate disturbs me. I do not do well in highly-competitive environments.

I am a sensitive person and I’m not ashamed. Feeling things palpably allows me to put myself in another’s shoes. When someone else tells me how they feel, I am there with them. When they make a face, I know what it means. I love that about myself. I love feeling what others are feeling because listening and understanding another person is one of the simplest ways I can take care of them and their day-to-day emotional health.

My sensitivity fuels my actions and my creations. Sometimes I am hit by massive waves of emotion, and it’s stressful. I don’t always know to express myself around others when I become incredibly sad or anxious, but those emotions are what give depth to my work, to my writing, and to my art. The way that I feel adds a dimension to everything I do, and it is also the reason that I do things.

I care about everything that I do, and I work hard because of that. Whatever I may accomplish in my life will have everything to do with how passionately I chase it down, and I find that satisfying. My life is meaningful because of the depth of my emotion, and because of the ardent concern I feel for other people and for causes outside of myself.

In so many situations, emotion is not a respectable response. I used to find debates in high school so incredibly frustrating because I always knew in my head what I needed to say, but my point would get strangled somewhere between my tight chest and closed throat. Instead of elucidating an idea, I always found myself red-faced and disregarded, until tears of frustration escaped my every attempt at control and I degenerated into an object of pity.

It took me a long time to learn how to speak in a matter-of-fact tone throughout class discussion. I had to practice logical reproaches and critiques to counter-act my passionate discourse, because when you care too loudly and too publically, people assume you have the intelligence of a child and they don’t take you seriously.

It isn’t acceptable to outwardly display emotions. The adult figure in the room is supposed to be calm and controlled. An executive does not whine or complain. He or she handles every situation without showing any underlying worry. Professionals aren’t outwardly emotional. Respect looks calm. It has the face of a Clinton; it does not worry like me.

I thought I would improve with age. I thought adulthood would transform me into a mature, deliberating, craze-less boss. I was wrong. In many ways I feel more insane than ever because I work so hard to always say the right thing, to always do the right thing, and to never burden another individual with my feelings. On days when I spend all my time with other people, the pressure of what I haven’t expressed can be overwhelming.

So I’m going to stop trying.

Let’s be honest. Adults feel stuff, even the ones with PhDs. Some of them have to swallow their feelings back in order to present a public face, like Clinton, but even when acting the quintessential professional, constituents of hers complain about how “cold” or “unemotional” she is. In her interview she actually apologizes for creating a “walled-off” perception. She refers to this apology as “taking responsibility,” which just goes to show how precisely she controls her image, and yet she’s hated for that.

You can’t win by pretending to be something you’re not. You can’t win by pretending you don’t feel, and it’s ridiculous to try. Everyone has feelings so you have nothing to be ashamed of. You are only adding to your own instabilities by trying to suppress them.

I always laugh when I need to laugh, as loudly and as joyfully as I want to because people love laughter. It’s so freeing and expressive. From now on, I want to cry the same way. When I’m upset about something, I want to say something rather than waiting and venting later to my roommate. So what if it makes other people uncomfortable to know that I am uncomfortable? Five seconds of discomfort on their part is worth my sanity because there isn’t anything wrong with being unhappy. Pretending to be otherwise will only upset you more in the long run.

You are not Hillary Clinton, so what have you to prove by bottling your emotions? Emotions are beautiful and relevant. They are what make us human, and they are what allow us to relate to one another. Recognizing discomfort and owning up to it is part of respecting yourself and the people around you. There is nothing more responsible than that.