Better Out Than In

This is a challenging season of life for many of us.  When I would talk to my mom and was screaming at the world, at my life, at anything and everything… when I cried the biggest, hardest tears… my mom’s response was always, ‘Better out than in, Al.’   

What happens when you let these feelings out instead of keeping them inside of you?  I am uncomfortable being angry, crying my heart out, fuming. These moments of release are uncomfortable, especially as those feelings escape. That pain isn’t easy when it hurts deep in your heart, when your throat closes down, when the emotion is all you experience.  And yet - all that anger or sadness or whatever it is your feeling - is better out than in.  (Ideally, you are letting it out without harming others or yourself).  Maybe all that hurt has been stuck there for years (or lifetimes) and through whatever challenging experience you're having, it is healing and releasing.  And then through that release you don’t have to hold it any longer. I always feel lighter, more like Myself, better, after one of these releases.  

Often we compound the emotion we are feeling by telling ourselves we shouldn’t be feeling it, we are overreacting, it isn’t that bad, or we berate ourselves for feeling big emotions.  I don’t like feeling these emotions, but I am coming to understand that there isn't anything 'wrong' with them (or me).   Now I trust that these releases are essential for the next best version of me.  I know that I can have these big emotions, be uncomfortable, find my breath, and not make me wrong.  How would your life change if you felt uncomfortable emotions and that’s all that happened in your thoughts?  You don’t have to change anything or feel even worse about yourself.  It could be that there is nothing ‘wrong’, but rather a release of emotions that you no longer have to hold.  It could be that there isn’t anything to fix, and be responsible for, other than just sitting in it.  Acknowledging and accepting that this is how you feel right now.  Remembering that you won’t feel this way forever, it is temporary.  Your life will have peace and joy and love again.

I encourage you to sit with the release of emotion that happens, as uncomfortable as it is and remind yourself that whatever you are feeling, is better out than in.

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