So many of my clients initially come to see me because of anxiety. There are many reasons they feel this way, but I do notice some common patterns and themes.
Generally, even when people don’t think there is any good “reason” they should feel anxious, as we dig under the surface a bit in our work together, there are always reasons that make sense of the anxiety.
Of course, we always want to rule out any medical condition that can be causing anxiety, etc. first, and as that is done, it’s really important to assess what emotions they are not expressing.
More often than not, one of the big factors I see commonly in people with anxiety is not expressing their emotions. When we don’t express how we feel, it tends to build up in our body and create uncomfortable emotions like anxiety or depression.
More often than not, this inability to understand and express feelings is due to childhood experiences. Most parents weren’t trained in how to understand and express their own emotions, let alone help their kids do this!
It’s very common in my practice to hear things like “We never talked about our feelings when I was growing up” or “I kept my feelings inside because I didn’t want to upset/worry anyone.”
There are many ways that we can get the signal growing up that it’s not safe or ok to talk about how we feel. This is nobody’s fault. All people and parents are trying their best, and are just doing what they learned in their own experiences.
Some ways that parent unintentionally send the message that emotions aren’t welcome are:
Not expressing their own emotions:
When we don’t witness healthy emotional expression by our parents (all people have emotions, it’s normal and ok!) we don’t learn to express our own.
We don’t want to overwhelm our kids with our feelings, or give them the impression they have to take care of us, but if we never show them we even have feelings or an appropriate way to express them, they also learn that it’s not ok to do so.
This can lead to anger, anxiety, depression, or other symptoms of emotional repression.
Modeling healthy emotional expression is vital in raising emotionally intelligent children!
Invalidating their children’s feelings:
Again, this is not intentional. Parenting is a hard job, and we’re all doing our best.
When a child goes to their parents a few times when feeling sad or scared, and the parent says something like “Don’t worry about it” or “Get over it” or “It’s not that bad.” The child then learns unconsciously to not do that anymore. To keep their feelings to themselves because it is too painful to not have them seen and heard in a compassionate way.
The parent is trying their best to help the child move past their hard feelings.
Unfortunately, rather than helping the child, it creates a belief system that tells them that it’s not good or safe or healthy to share how they feel.
This in turn sets them up to keep their feelings inside in the future, in relationships with other people, and leads to feeling anxious due to not expressing their feelings.
Not proactively checking in about feelings:
This can be due to so many factors; parents being busy, parents being uncomfortable with their own feelings and therefore uncomfortable with their children’s feelings, not knowing how to bring things up, etc.…
Again, most parents haven’t been trained in this, and also aren’t aware of the array of negative impacts of not helping their children become more aware of and expressing their feelings.
It’s not a child’s job to know how they feel or seek out their parents to share. This should be the job of a conscious and evolved parent. To create space, compassion and curiosity often to allow their child to feel that it’s safe and beneficial to open up to them about their feelings.
As adults, if you can identify any of these patterns that you experienced growing up, it will be important for you to begin practicing identifying your feelings.
Growing up without guidance and modeling about healthy emotional expression often leaves people not knowing how to identify how they feel. If we don’t know how we feel in the first place, we can’t express our emotions and get them out of our body.
So, beginning to practice getting out of your head, and checking in with your emotions consistently is a really good place to start.
If it feels uncomfortable to express your feelings to a person, start with journaling. This can be a good way to start the flow of emotional expression which will make it easier to do with the people in your life.
It is impossible to let go of anxiety without this very important component of expressing feelings!
All the coping skills, meditating, exercising, etc. help, but if you are still repressing how you feel you will continue to feel anxious.
If this still feels hard or confusing, finding a therapist or other safe place to start understanding your feelings can be very helpful.
Your feelings are important. They are valuable and contain important wisdom about your life and your future. I hear over and over from clients that when they begin to be more open about their feelings, they feel that a weight has been lifted. They feel lighter and happier, and of course less anxious.
I hope you have fun with this practice. As always, you are safe, you are loved, and you are worthy!
Read more about Anxiety Treatment with Shana Olmstead.
