I spent my childhood and most of my early adulthood in emotional rigidity. I was too overwhelmed with the affects of my childhood abuse to allow myself to feel to strongly about anything – positive or negative.
Any time I felt joy, I would quickly minimize or squelch it, as I did not feel I deserved to feel good.
And I ran away from negative emotions because they would too quickly open the Pandora’s box of all the memories I was trying to keep locked away from my conscious mind.
I had teachers that tried to help me become less of a perfectionist, less of a robot (yes one teacher even drew a picture of a robot and told me I was like that and didn’t have to turn myself into that), become more human.
It took me a long time to find ways to feel safe to actually have any emotion, positive or negative. And it was not a straight forward path to being able to feel without judging myself or tearing myself down for what I was feeling.
Dr. Susan David has written a book called “Emotional Agility: Get Unstuck, Embrace Change, and Thrive in Work and Life“
She has an EMOTIONAL AGILITY INSIGHTS QUIZ you can take to generate a report about your current state of Emotional Agility
You can get the results of the quiz emailed to you.
And she has a TED talk where she describes her ideas around Emotional Agility.
Dr. Susan’s research has shown that 1/3 of people either judge themselves for having “bad” emotions, such as sadness or anger, or are actively pushing aside their feelings.
That normal, natural emotions are seen as “good” or “bad” rather than as part of our human-ness.
She believes that rigid denial doesn’t work and is unsustainable. That acceptance is a prerequisite for any kind of change. that showing up is “being able to face into your difficult emotions and stories and experiences.”
She encourages us to listen to our emotions and try to understand what they might be trying to message to us.
