Feelings
Feelings!!
I came across this question when I was going through Quora recently.How do I mask my depression so it does not effect my day-to-day life?
And this got me thinking. Is this even a valid question? While I came across this question, I also happen to watch a video on FALSE POSITIVITY in one of the Ted talks. I will attach the link to the video at the end of this post. But the video talks about how we judge some of the emotions as bad. So I replied to the question above as follows,
Why do you want to mask something that is a natural feeling?Why does the world see anger, depression, unhappiness etc as all bad? Aren’t they with us from the time of birth?If you are feeling depressed. Be so. Why do you want to show something other than what you feel?Would you mask your hunger to stop affecting your day to day life?All these so called negative feelings are part of life. There maybe a day you stop being depressed. Let everything flow naturally. It isn’t a norm to act normal when you are feeling depressed.
Link to Quora answer: http://qr.ae/TU1wlO
Let me give an example. As babies, all of us have cried. That was kind of the way to tell the people that we needed attention. Isn't it? But as a kid, we all might have heard someone saying not to cry as it is a bad thing and the elders always try to console a crying kid and try to lure them to smile. We have all seen this happening. But did you ever come across someone telling a kid to stop smiling or laughing? NO, because they think these are good feelings.
What I am trying to portray is that we see these negative emotions in us as bad. Now there is a difference between negative and bad, negative does not mean it is always bad. These emotions, like sadness, depression, unhappiness, anger, disappointment etc are all viewed as bad emotions in the society. What is the need to mask your depression in front of a crowd who do not know about your struggle? As I said, do you mask your thirst or hunger?
All the feelings/emotions we carry are with us right from our birth. We come out of the mother's womb crying (Or that is what is said to be good if the baby cries when born). So why is crying a bad thing as we grow up? We share our happiness with many, but our grieves with only a few. Just because the society categorizes your feelings to be bad does not mean you should not have them.
Everything is a natural phenomenon.
If you are angry, show your anger.
If you are sad, be sad.
If you are happy, be happy.
If you are excited, be excited.
The feelings we have are just negative and positive, but not good or bad.
But one might say, "What if I am angry at my boss and show it on him, I will lose my job?". These kinds of situations do affect our lives. I do agree to some extent that the time and situations play an important role to show your feelings/emotions.
Let me relate this to something we observe in our daily lives. We all know about a pressure cooker. Consider yourself to be the vessel and the water we put in it be our feelings. Let the flame at the bottom of the vessel be the society that creates the pressure inside the vessel. And let the gasket be the social boundaries or situations that we face. Once enough pressure builds up, it is let out. The same way, every now and then, the emotions/feelings, either good or bad, have to be let out. What if there were no social boundaries on us? It would simply spill all our feelings out and we would end with something that isn't cooked.
Life has a lot of ups and downs. The day you are happy, cherish the moment, you never know if you can get another moment of the same joy again. If you are hurt, cry your heart out till you feel better or till you are tired of crying. But that moment will eventually go. If you don't let such feelings out, our life would just explode like a pressure cooker.
In my own life, it took me more than a year to let my feelings out on something that has happened with me. And all of it just exploded one day and that day, I really felt that it isn't a bad thing to grieve for something. I lost something and I was not okay with it, I wanted to vent it out, and I did. I still feel the same. I do not care about someone judging me about my short temper. It is who I am. If I am pissed at you, I would show it when the situations are right, If I love something about you, I would show it as well.
All I want to say is that you cannot always have positive feelings, you also need to have those negative feelings to cancel out the positives. That is how the balance in life is maintained. It is a gift that we have that we can express all our emotions. Take it.
What I am trying to portray is that we see these negative emotions in us as bad. Now there is a difference between negative and bad, negative does not mean it is always bad. These emotions, like sadness, depression, unhappiness, anger, disappointment etc are all viewed as bad emotions in the society. What is the need to mask your depression in front of a crowd who do not know about your struggle? As I said, do you mask your thirst or hunger?
All the feelings/emotions we carry are with us right from our birth. We come out of the mother's womb crying (Or that is what is said to be good if the baby cries when born). So why is crying a bad thing as we grow up? We share our happiness with many, but our grieves with only a few. Just because the society categorizes your feelings to be bad does not mean you should not have them.
Everything is a natural phenomenon.
If you are angry, show your anger.
If you are sad, be sad.
If you are happy, be happy.
If you are excited, be excited.
The feelings we have are just negative and positive, but not good or bad.
But one might say, "What if I am angry at my boss and show it on him, I will lose my job?". These kinds of situations do affect our lives. I do agree to some extent that the time and situations play an important role to show your feelings/emotions.
Let me relate this to something we observe in our daily lives. We all know about a pressure cooker. Consider yourself to be the vessel and the water we put in it be our feelings. Let the flame at the bottom of the vessel be the society that creates the pressure inside the vessel. And let the gasket be the social boundaries or situations that we face. Once enough pressure builds up, it is let out. The same way, every now and then, the emotions/feelings, either good or bad, have to be let out. What if there were no social boundaries on us? It would simply spill all our feelings out and we would end with something that isn't cooked.
Life has a lot of ups and downs. The day you are happy, cherish the moment, you never know if you can get another moment of the same joy again. If you are hurt, cry your heart out till you feel better or till you are tired of crying. But that moment will eventually go. If you don't let such feelings out, our life would just explode like a pressure cooker.
In my own life, it took me more than a year to let my feelings out on something that has happened with me. And all of it just exploded one day and that day, I really felt that it isn't a bad thing to grieve for something. I lost something and I was not okay with it, I wanted to vent it out, and I did. I still feel the same. I do not care about someone judging me about my short temper. It is who I am. If I am pissed at you, I would show it when the situations are right, If I love something about you, I would show it as well.
All I want to say is that you cannot always have positive feelings, you also need to have those negative feelings to cancel out the positives. That is how the balance in life is maintained. It is a gift that we have that we can express all our emotions. Take it.
-Sushant Thotakura
Comments
Post a Comment