When’s the last time somebody called you out for acting sad on purpose to get attention? How many times have you gone out to party even though you were upset over something? Whose parent or sibling has ever told them that their anxiety or depression isn't a reason to be sad because there are people dying in other countries? Expression of emotion is something that varies from one person to person. Everybody has different ways of dealing with how they feel, and sometimes some ways are better than others.
Emotions are psychological states that involve personal experiences, physiological responses, and behavioral or expressive responses. In other words, emotions are a part of being human. Though we can’t always control our feelings, we have the ability to control the way we express ourselves based on these emotions.
For years, I’ve wondered where the suppression of emotions originated from. I’ve come to learn that there is no one thing that causes this behavior, but rather a combination of gender norms, family values, and societal expectations. At a young age, we learned that boys don’t cry and that girls are weaker because they are more emotional. We learned that emotions are personal and that sharing them with people gives them power over you. We learned that you couldn’t feel sad because there were people in other countries starving to death. Although these may all be true in some sense, that doesn’t mean we don’t have the right to our own emotions.
As a student living away from home, I have noticed two extreme trends around me. There are people who ignore emotions, as if they are an insignificant aspect of life, and people who are extremely open about how they feel. Both types of people constantly judge the other, trying to justify why their behavior is better than the other. I’ve heard comments like, “It’s college and we’re supposed to be having fun! We can deal with our problems after graduation”. It is clear to me that many teens subconsciously use temporary distractions to mask any emotion they may encounter, and ridicule others for being too expressive about their emotions. In a completely different light, I’ve heard someone tell me once that “College isn’t just about having fun. It’s about being away from home, finding yourself, and learning to become a stronger and more intelligent person.”
In almost all cases, being emotional has a negative connotation rather than a positive one. People who publicize their emotions are usually criticized and called names like pathetic, attention seeking, and insecure. Rather than being supportive and understanding, many people target those who are vulnerable, leading them to believe that it’s not normal to show emotions. On the other hand, people who show little to no emotion are labeled as pitiless, lost causes, and empty. So is it better to be overly emotional or not emotional enough? There is no right answer here other than that it is better to be aware of your emotions and to have healthy ways of coping with these feelings.
It’s important for children to learn at a young age that emotions are a part of being human. They shouldn’t be ignored, shunned, or used as a way to label people. Happiness, sadness, anger, confusion, and nervousness are all normal feelings to have and people shouldn’t feel like they can’t talk about how they feel. Although emotion suppression is not the only cause of mental illness, shoving emotions under the rug can lead to severe issues like drug use, alcoholism, depression, and even eating/anxiety disorders. For this reason, the stigma of seeking professional help must be broken.
Your feelings are your feelings and whether someone thinks they’re right or wrong should not and does not matter. Whether you’re the type of person who would open up to a stranger or the type that wouldn’t tell a soul your deepest darkest secret, you are entitled to your own emotions and nobody can take that away from you. Before you judge other people based on their emotions, take a step back and think. Remind yourself that they’ve had different personal experiences and their own way of dealing with how they feel. Just because someone hasn’t been through something that you’d consider traumatic doesn’t mean that they “don’t deserve to feel sad”.
It’s very probable that you aren’t a trained psychiatrist and even more probable that you can’t read minds so instead of spending your time judging others, work on learning how to express your own emotions in a healthy manner.
