If You Don't Feel Your Emotions, Where Do They Go?

Crying at Work is having a moment and I dig it!

I recently, jokingly but maybe not, said to my supervisor, “I try to keep my desk-cries to about once a month…”

In which she responded lightheartedly, “You know, we spend most of our waking life at our desk. Don’t be so hard on yourself. Four or five seems about right for me.”

We laughed and then I went back to crying.

There is a lot of pressure, especially in the workplace… especially for women in the workplace… to HOLD IT TOGETHER. Many, if not most, workplaces preach the idea of, “Leave your home-life at home.”

Right, right, right. Wait, what?

Wait—what does that mean?

It’s come to be dissected and re-ingested as ‘Leave your drama at the door!’

“But…” [holds up hand to flickering office fluorescent light; examines it] “I’m Human.”

I think this (what I’m going to be dramatic and label) toxic understanding that our emotions are not welcomed in the workplace leads to two major emotional downfalls:

1. Meta Emotions
2. Displacement

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1 - SHAME ON SHAME ON SHAME

Meta Emotions are those emotions that we feel about our emotions (you can re-read that a few times if needed).

IE:

Emotion: God, this morning was rough. I am so sad. [sadness]

Meta Emotion: What is wrong with me. How embarrassing that I’m crying at my desk. [shame]

What would happen if we skipped the part where we had to feel cruddy about feeling things? What would happen if we got the luxury of, instead of beating ourselves up over having very human responses (regardless of the setting), we jumped straight to mindful self-compassion.

Self-compassion… involves being touched by and open to one’s own suffering, not avoiding or disconnecting from it, generating the desire to alleviate one’s suffering and to heal oneself with kindness.Dr. Kristin Neff

The same way that we would do it for others right? No one looks at a sobbing friend and responds ‘Get yourself together! This is not the time or place!’

But damn it if we are great at doing that to ourselves - whether society’s infliction or our own way of avoiding and coping with the big stuff.

Take it easy. Let’s be honest about how hard this is.

2 - THIS SEEMS LIKE IT’S NOT ABOUT ME.

Have you ever had a boss who you just know is having a bad day? They come through the office, their walk is a little more deliberate, the sighs from the ‘big office’ are a little louder and you brace yourself for a string of emails that all seems to have the same quick, stressed and ranting air to them?

If you haven’t, don’t quit your job. I’m just kidding… but really. It’s great if you haven’t.

And let me be clear—I am not above doing this. But, my personality tends to over compensate and ‘fix’ things when I feel like I am not in a good head-space. (So, you know if there are an excess of smiley faces in my emails, come check on your girl.)

Displacement is an unconscious defense mechanism taking one emotion (usually a hostile or angry emotion) from one situation and dropping it into another, shifting displeasure away from ourselves and the person causing the stress to a less threatening target.A Conscious Rethink

When we ignore our emotions, where do they go?

The answer I found so far is either nowhere or somewhere.

Nowhere—They stay in our central nervous systems and block the hell out of our chakras. It becomes bigger and scarier and begs us to find a way out or we find a temporary way to shut those emotions up (usually via something unhealthy)

Somewhere—Where it’s not supposed to go. This is the Displacement.

Going through the Tunnels

Dr. Emily Nagoski (an unlikely sex therapist’s take on working through ‘the feels’) explains emotions in my favorite way: Tunnels verses Caves.

Our emotions are something that we have to travel through. When we treat them like caves, it’s dark and scary and full of bats and spiderwebs and threatening things (triggering a flight, fight or freeze response) But great news! Emotions are not caves, they are tunnels. You’ll get to the other side, but you have to go through it first. You have to complete the cycle. You have to have a good cry, or a yell into a pillow, go on a run, or go to a yoga class where you just sit on your mat the whole time with your eyes closed like a weirdo.

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There is something to be said about not leading with your emotions in the workplace. But that is the difference between displacement and self-compassion. When we ignore the feels, they tend to work harder to get us to notice them.

So notice them. Love them. They are what is making us live a real, human life. And then, after your done with the feels, completing the cycle, reapplying mascara, something amazing happens:

Work tends to just go on.