I missed Mental Health Awareness month by a day...but this has been on my mind all month...so, I started this on this last day of mental health awareness month…
I drove past a car the other day that had a bumper sticker in the back window that said, “No one cares about your feelings.” Maybe. Sad. True, I thought. I remembered how many times I heard that growing up. We all get up, show up, do our best, and armor up and do our best to navigate everyday and still, this is true. No, no one really cares about our feelings. But maybe the worst part of that is not that no one cares about our feelings. The worst part might be that what I have found is I haven’t always cared about my own feelings.
Feelings are the elusive, ambiguous, amorphous, unpredictable, uncontrollable, irrational, nonsensical energy that live inside us. They come when they want and go when they are ready. I was taught, probably like most of us, largely to ignore them, overcome them, suppress them, avoid them. They are jerks. They used to show up and make me nervous, anxious, and made me worry. Then, at other times, they would redeem themselves and show up to gift me laughter and fireworks inside that could have started a wildfire of love if they could have sparked the grass near me. Growing up, I learned that feelings were mostly the negative inside me. I learned that they caused a fair amount of angst so I used to cope by going inside my mind more…thinking about them, trying to plot, to plan, to figure my way out of or the easiest path around them to get to the other side. As I was rewarded by not feeling what I avoided, I would again go on looking for the next thing to control with my thinking. I used thorough assessment and seeking a relentless understanding of how things were so that I could justify the view of the world they created inside my mind. I achieved. I sought, found and secured things that were easy to control, or so I thought, convinced myself how right I was, and believed that if I could just keep some status quo, my feelings could live deep inside at bay and I could be fine, successful, and normal. Normal. Lol.
This worked, somewhat. Life carried on and the game upped its ante, those pesky feelings seemed to rise to the occasion. Despite my best attempts and mighty suppression, life just kept throwing itself against me, like it seems to do, but without the warning I hoped I would get about it all. Soon the feelings would reach a surface level that would not allow me or anyone to not see them, feel them or hear them any longer. And every time, it seemed like I lost. I lost people, I lost money, I lost homes, I lost joy. I lost what I thought I should have….even if I never had it anyway.
Finally, the feelings won. They sat me down. Pulled out their finger and pointed it in my face and said, “Listen.” Finally, one time, I did. This time, I didn’t have any strength left to fight back, to suppress, to avoid and so I listened, and I felt them. I cried. I hurt. I panicked. I was embarrassed. Mortified. Depressed. Betrayed. I was low. I was depleted. So I rested. I slept. For days, weeks. Then, slowly the sleep became laying in bed…maybe watching tv. Maybe just lying. I was horizontal as much as I could be. The feelings kept coming. Until one day, without warning again, they lessened. Instead of choosing a new show on Netflix, I took my dog to Springfield Lake and sat on a hill with a blanket and looked at the sky. I felt calm…for the first time in months. And then I saw a trail down at the bottom of that hill. The next time I ventured out when the feelings were less still, I took my dog and we walked. I felt the sun and the leaves were starting to turn. And I looked at the light from that ball of fire sparkling off the lake and it made me smile. Some happy started stirring inside from the beauty I saw. Then I remembered a trail on a little lake I wanted to go explore not far from home. So I opened my sunroof and the dog stuck his head through and we drove down the highway toward the new to me trail at Valley Water Mill. And we took off on a wog (walk/jog) through the woods around the lake enjoying the sounds of the birds, the canopy of the trees, the stillness, outside. We got back to the car and opened the sun roof again and I looked up and thanked the sky for the joy that was returning. And this time, the joy was more real than I had ever felt before. I felt it this time. For real. For keeps. It was new. It was not scary like I had believed before because it could have been lost. This time I knew this feeling was mine to keep. And I wanted to keep this joy.
Slowly but surely, more feelings emerged…joy was a spark and started the opening to more. Joy brought giddiness, laughter, affection for my children and this powerful force to explore the connection I have with them. Then more feelings brought confusion that showed me where my path toward growth had been overgrown before, the confusion became the flashlight. I started looking in the places where confusion shined her light on the things I had been ignoring so long. And so I explored. I found disappointment but I learned so much of that was not my creation but things I had been absorbing that was not what I wanted all while hoping others would change and make me happy. Not so. I found my anger that I had abandoned so long hoping I would accumulate enough love to make me secure. Not so. I set out learning how to put that anger to good use. And slowly I found out that I could protect myself by using my anger and directing it in strategic and well placed ways. The joy I had found that I never wanted to leave…I was her keeper. I was my keeper. I held the cards now. I wasn’t planning and scheming just how to control and suppress my feelings, my feelings were mine. And since I finally sat and felt them, they had become familiar rather than scary. I could care for them. Finally. And then as I kept going, I suddenly realized not only could I care for my feelings, but my thoughts about those feelings changed too. And I found out how I could control my thoughts, my mind, because I knew those feelings were just a part of me, telling me things. Those feelings weren’t me. They were just part of me. And so were the thoughts. Once I could separate them, I could decide which ones to give fuel and which ones to starve.
I’ve been practicing. I am not fully done. I don’t know if there is a finish line with a ribbon at the end. I think it’s enough just to practice. And remind myself of the ribbons I have already broken and crossed through. As I have gotten better at caring for these feelings that are mine, part of me but not all of me, the best thing I did was to feel them, and care for all of them. And as I got better at caring for mine, I am finding that I care about how others feel too. I started with my kids. And where before I could not hold their feelings and I would push back at them, lash out at them, now, I am observing their feelings too. And we pause, we listen to their feelings and we care for them. We listen. The feelings are just telling us things…telling us stories about ourselves, about them…who they are, what they want. We are learning to find the pieces that need to stay and put away in a lunch box the things that can go. It’s new. And I love this new way of caring. It’s mental health. It’s healing. It’s allowing my body and my children to be whole...accepting all parts of the way we are all made…our stories, our messengers. It’s loving ourselves and each other.
It’s true what the bumper sticker says. But it doesn’t have to be. I don’t know who told us that our feelings are not to be cared about. Some messages leave a legacy. This one might have left a bruise or ten that will never heal until we finally listen. I hope as you think about your mental health, you might not subscribe to this bumper sticker message as much and pause to think how it might be better to challenge it. Challenging it means starting with caring for your own feelings first. No matter what they are. But then listening, softly to what those feelings have to say and how that can be the most powerful way to deal with them…just love them…because that is loving you. And caring for your feelings can spark your joy. And your joy can be passed. We could all use more joy. So don’t always believe what you read. Especially a bumper sticker that was wrong. I care about your feelings. And I learned because I started by caring for my own. New sticker…I care about feelings.
Comments