From How to Survive Mother's Day (Top Ten List)...

4. Give yourself permission to feel whatever you feel.

Unfortunately, Western society is not very supportive of expressing painful emotions. It is okay to express happiness and sometimes okay to express anger, but expressing sadness is not encouraged. As the saying goes, “Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry, and you cry alone.”

I cannot count the number of times that people have told me what I “should” or “should not” be feeling. I was told that I “should” be hurting less after my father had been deceased for a whole two months. I was told that I “should not” feel so sad about not being a mother yet because I got to sleep in on Saturdays. The problem was that I DID feel these things, regardless of whether another person thought I “should.”

I have removed the word “should” from my vocabulary when it comes to how I feel. Whether or not I “should” feel a certain way, I DO feel this way, so how I “should” be feeling is irrelevant. “Shoulds,” as applied to how I feel, only resulted in my heaping guilt on top of the painful emotions, which just made me more miserable.

Emotions need to be expressed. Unexpressed emotions wind up turning on us and making us more unhappy. For example, I spent many years struggling with anxiety. I learned much later that the root of this anxiety was unexpressed anger. As a child, I was told that I “should not” feel anger, so I never expressed it. Instead, it festered inside of my soul and turned on me, causing me all kinds of anxiety issues. As I have learned to honor my anger by expressing it (in non-damaging ways, of course), the anxiety has subsided.

Feelings are not “good” or “bad” – they simply are. They exist, and they deserve to be honored. It does not matter what you “should” be feeling. It is what you DO with those feelings that matter. Express them (in non-damaging ways). Are you angry? Punch pillows. Are you sad? Allow yourself to cry and “wallow” for a while. You will be amazed at how much better you feel when you stop fighting your emotions and, instead, express them.

Related Topics:

• Top Ten List: Surviving Mother’s Day



• Surviving Mother’s Day Series


• Surviving the Wait: Christmas, Mother’s Day, and Father’s Day



• Mother's Day Hard All Around