5 Signs You're Avoiding Emotions
Most of us are familiar with avoiding and disconnecting from painful emotions. It’s completely normal to want to avoid pain--it’s part of our human survival instincts! Containment and distraction are a necessary part of life. If we were in the depths of our tough emotions all day we wouldn’t be able to go to work, focus, and complete tasks. And at the same time, if we don’t want to get stuck, it’s necessary to process and spend intentional time with our negative emotions.
Emily and Amelia Nagoski in their book, Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle describe the nature of emotional processing: “Emotions are tunnels. You have to go all the way through the darkness to get to the light at the end.” When we are in avoidance patterns, we are stuck in the middle of the tunnel, and that emotional energy stores up causing more and more distress. Here are some indicators you may be avoiding emotions:
Numbing Out
Numbing could look like avoiding emotions by using alcohol, food, exercise, drugs, relationships, Netflix, social media, shopping, and more! There are many numbing agents we can use to outrun painful feelings.
Perpetual Busyness
Going from one thing to the next doesn’t allow the space for emotional processing. Staying busy can be an attempt to quiet those emotions, at least temporarily. This may look like overworking, overcommitting to social events, or rushing from one thing to another.
Toxic Positivity
Staying consistently positive can minimize your emotions. Positivity in itself is not toxic, but when positivity serves as a way to ignore and dismiss your own emotions, you may find yourself stuck in the tunnel!
Disconnection From Needs
When we numb out our emotions, it’s hard to know what we’re needing. If we can’t acknowledge and make space for feeling grief or sadness, we don’t know we may be needing comfort or self-soothing. If we can’t acknowledge anger, we may not realize we need to set a boundary or confront someone.
Fixation on Others
This could look like trying to fix or control others, people pleasing, making others into a project, or making other people’s problems your own (See here for more information on codependency).
If you see these patterns popping up in your life, see more about our practice and our approaches. Our counselors can walk alongside you as you navigate heavy emotions.
Authored by: Anna Zapata, LPC