On my way back from Cambodia, I sat next to a lady who taught public school for twenty-five years, I asked her, “What can you tell about a family by the way a child behaves in school?” She answered, “Everything! I can usually tell by the way a child acts if his or her home is peaceful or tormented; if the parents pay attention to their kids or ignore them; and if the father and mother have a good relationship. Almost everything can be determined by observing a child’s behavior. It’s usually a mirror of what’s happening at home.”
I like the last statement made, “It’s usually a mirror of what’s happening at home.” At the child-state, it may be easy to observe and notice the child’s behavioral patterns, but the challenge come when the child grew up, that behavioral patterns can become his or her way of mental state, response to the world, and the choices to the path of life.
Through the years, I have also learned that the way a person’s children speak to each other and to others outside the home is very revealing about what’s really happening behind closed doors in that home. As noted above, children usually mirror the true situation in the home. In other words, how they speak, carry themselves, and treat others usually reflects the quality of relationships in their home.
If parents are constantly arguing and screaming at each other until it has become a pattern and a way of life, the children will usually speak to each other exactly the same way in that home. When siblings engage in chronic patterns of strife, name-calling, and lack of mutual trust, these destructive patterns probably exist in their parents’ marital relationship as well. Thus, a home like this will be filled with fear, anger, aggressive behavior, depressive emotions, and distrust. Most of the times, when the children grew up to become adult, they carried a certain degree of those aggressive behavior patterns (either passive or active) with them, and find it difficult to get along with people, and at the same time, has a low self-esteem.
What are not healthy are for a person to bury or deny unpleasant, overwhelming emotions indefinitely – emotions that would be far healthier for the person to confront and work through. When we pretend that all is well when all is not well, when we tell ourselves and others that nothing bad has happened when something very bad has happened, when we act as if we have suffered no loss or pain when we have suffered great loss or pain, it is then that we are stuffing what we should express. When a person begins to pack powerful and devastating emotions into the closet of his or her soul, that person is setting himself or herself up for trouble.
Through the years, many people become experts at not feeling what they feel. They become pros at pushing down any feelings that are painful or that others do not accept. What happens when we do this – when we hold in expressions of frustration, anger, rejection, and refuses to voice our inner pain – the negative emotions we are feeling, which cause us pain, become emotions we try to avoid or reject. A negative cycle begins. The more we experience negative emotions and fail to express them, the more the pressure inside us builds, the more our minds perceive that we are in a ‘dangerous’ situation, the more we feel we should flee (shutting down our emotions further) or fight (railing against the emotions). The result can be an inner rage, fear, or anxiety that boils just below the surface of expression for years or decades.
Signs of Stuffed Emotions
People who have stuffed emotional responses from childhood or for a significant length of time tend to express one or more of the following:
Perfectionism – trying to keep everything ‘perfect’ in their lives so there will be no cause for them to experience rejection, failure, or criticism.
Desire for Control – attempt to control every aspect of their lives – and the lives of others around them – so that no stray emotion has an opportunity to erupt or display itself.
Self-Doubt and Self-Depreciation – growing up in environments in which they have felt unloved or rejection, they have not experienced the security and bonding of a normal parent-child relationship. As a result, they developed low self-esteem and feelings of low self-worth, even though they may have achieved a great deal later in life. This deeply seated low self-esteemed tends to manifest itself in self-doubt and self-depreciation, for example, a tendency to avoid making decisions, second-guessing of decisions, refuses to make future choices; they ridicule their own flaws, shrug off compliments, and make overly critical comments about their own minor failures or errors.
Cynicism and Criticism – sometimes they take the tack of averting attention away from themselves and onto others to avoid any further rejection, hurt, or emotional distress. They can become masterful at making cynical comments or leveling criticism at others.
Promiscuity – this response may seem odd at the outset, but many people with low self-worth and stuffed emotions try very hard to please everyone and to seek expressions of affection in unlikely places and from unlikely people. They may become overly promiscuous in their desire to experience the affection and security they did not have or to compensate for the rejection they felt from the past.
Emotions that become trapped inside a person seek resolution and expression. When we refuse to let them out, emotions just try harder. The unconscious mind has to work ever more furiously to keep the feelings under wrap. Emotions do not die. We bury them, but we are burying something that is still living. Those who have stuffed negative emotions, especially anger and hostility for years, do not need much to set them off. The least little ‘insult’ such as wrong words or phrases used, the person at work who voices criticism her way, or a person who ignores his presence or opinion – can produce an outburst that is above and beyond a normal response.
Live for a Brighter Future
Protect Your Mind – Victor Frankl was a prisoner of war during World War II. One day, naked and alone in a small room, Frankl began to become aware of what he later called ‘the last of the human freedoms’, a freedom which no one could take away. Frankl openly acknowledged that the Nazis could control his entire environment and do what they wanted with his body; they could not, however, destroy his inner identity. He saw that there was a gap between what happened to him (the stimulus) and his reaction to the stimulus (response), and that in that gap lay the freedom or power to choose a response. Frankl came face-to-face with the reality that his own choices, not his circumstances, defined his identity. No matter how horrifying the environment in which he lived, and no matter how much humiliation and degradation others heaped upon him, he was still in control of how he chose to respond. The same is true for each one of us.
No matter what you may have been through, you are still in control of your identity. No event can change you on the inside unless you allow it to do so. The freedom to forge your own opinions, ideas, attitudes, and choices rests solely and uniquely with you.
Focus on events or people in your life that have brought joy, love, happiness, and peace. Also develop an attitude of gratitude and appreciation by focusing on all things good in your life.
Communicating with Your Own Heart – Voice to yourself what it is that you are feeling most deeply. Just venting the words will do two things: it will clarify to you what you truly are feeling, and you will give release to some of your pent-up emotions. In order to speak with your own heart, do your best to turn off the constant mental tapes that are playing in your head, to turn away from the remembrance of resentments and bitterness. As you learn to communicate with your own heart and release positive feelings of life to your own soul, your heart in turn communicates this message of well-being to your body through the release of positive hormones and neurotransmitters. When the heart is at peace and filled with love, it communicates harmony to the entire body.
Mouth full of Power – Speak words of encouragement to your heart, and voice words of appreciation for life’s blessings – the happiest people may not have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything they have. Speak words of acknowledgement about personal accomplishments or acts of kindness; and speak words of love and kindness to people. Start practicing appreciation and thanksgiving on a daily basis. Compliment your spouse, children, coworkers, and friends regularly. Begin to compliment or give words of appreciation or encouragement to strangers such as waiters, service staff, and people that you come in contact with daily. Most people yearn for others to acknowledge and recognize the good job that they are doing.
Wearing Your Belt of Truth – toxic emotions arise from three negative and incorrect beliefs: I must do well; you must treat me well; and the world must be easy. A sane, rational, and potentially positive person is someone who recognizes that nobody does well all the time. The healthy perception is that people at times are not going to treat us well, and the world at times is not going to be easy. Your thoughts create your moods, and when a person feels depressed, his thoughts are dominated by negativity. Balance your perceptions with reality; and learn to acknowledge and accept that there will be bumps, road works, and diversions along the journey of life.
The Sword of Forgiveness – those who forgive are those who decide to give up resentment and the desire to punish. Forgiveness enables a person to cut through and release buried anger, resentment, bitterness, shame, grief, regret, guilt, hate, and other toxic emotions that hide deep in the soul and make a person ill, both emotionally and physically. Most importantly, forgiveness leads to an ability to love. Love doesn’t come first; Forgiveness does.
Shield of Joy – a merry heart does good, like medicine. Joy comes from a feeling of contentment deep inside a person. It is not dependent on external factors, but an inner sense of value, purpose, fulfillment, or satisfaction. If your goal is to find happiness through pleasures that are bound to the five senses, you will never be fully satisfied, and will always be looking for more. Joy does not flow from situations. It flows from your will and your emotions deep within. You can choose to be joyful, or you can choose to be miserable. Nobody can make these inner choices for you. External circumstances may present to us some challenges, but with the shield of joy, we can continue to pursue our purpose. Learn to lighten up, and learn to laugh at your own foibles and mistakes. Develop a sense of play in every areas of your life, and delight in humor. The richest person is not the one who has the most, but the one who needs the least.
Conclusion
Each time, when I am at the airport, looking at passengers arriving or departing, usually, spouse will be there, children are there, boyfriend, girlfriend, friends, parents, etc. with hugs and kisses. It just goes to show that there is love all around us. Appreciate and rejoice the blessings that are bestowed into our lives, you are no longer bound by your past environments, and enjoy your everyday life!
