Whenever I am upset, my dad asks me two questions: "Is there anything you can do to change it?" and if there isn't, which is usually the case, he'll say "then why waste your time being upset about something you can't change? Stop thinking about what you can't change and just keep pushing forward."

Now don't get me wrong, there are some extreme cases where you should intervene in people's manner of coping with emotion, especially if it is detrimental to their wellbeing. However, I think it is so utterly important to understand that we all cope differently. That we all process emotions differently.

More than ever, there has been a push to talk to about everything and anything that upsets someone. It's best to "get it out in the open" or "get it off your chest." While I agree that talking through your problems is highly beneficial, I also understand that some people do not cope like this.

For some people, their immediate coping mechanism for dealing with negative emotion is needing time and space. These people just need a few minutes to process, gather their thoughts and decide whether the problem at hand is important enough to deal with at that current moment.

I am one of these people. I am a human that feels emotions immensely, thinks at a speed of miles-per-hour and pushes issues and emotions I feel irrelevant at the time into the black hole that is my mind.

I'm just not a person who enjoys talking about her emotions as she is in the midst of facing those emotions.

When I am upset, hurt, irritated, overwhelmed, or feeling an immense amount of negative emotion, I need a few minutes. To be precise, I need fifteen minutes. And while it sounds quite funny to have an allotted time frame that I need when dealing with emotions, my coping mechanism is entirely encompassed by these moments. These fifteen minutes are precious to me. I use these fifteen minutes as a time to comprehend, regroup, and decide my best course of action.

Often my best course of action to dealing with my negative emotion is filing it in the back of my mind to deal with another day. And I won't lie, that allotted day doesn't come soon. I am the worst about pushing away emotions I don't think are important at the time into the "black hole" that is the back of my mind. But it's these times I am reminded of my dad's questions and take it to heart.

In life, we will face various problems. Small obstacles to incredibly large, life-changing challenges. For someone who feels to the extent that I feel, I cannot be stuck deciphering why I feel every little negative emotion. If I did, I would never be productive enough to complete my daily tasks. I would be stuck being upset over why my friend hasn't responded to my texts, even though I know she's probably busy at work. Or be stuck being irritated on why my friends up-and-left a party without saying anything to me.

And I get it, truly. It might not seem the healthiest way of dealing with my problems, but it's the way that has worked for me for twenty-one years. It's my way. And you are never, ever, allowed to tell someone how they should cope because no one knows them better than they know themselves.

Give people what they need, not what you want to give them. Pushing people out of their comfort zone when dealing with their problems, often just makes them more reclusive and unwilling to share. This isn't how you help someone. Encourage. Never force others to cope in a different way or deal with things in a different way. It's just not your place.

The biggest and most important thing you can do to help someone cope or deal with their problems is to simply be present. Sit with them in silence or allow them to talk out their feelings. Give them their space or surround them entirely. None of these ways are necessarily wrong or right, but they're all different. Because we are all different.

You don't have to like it or even understand it; you just have to respect it.