The tears wouldn’t stop!
Where are they coming from?
What is wrong with me?
I’m fine!
Obviously, you’re not fine; you can’t stop crying and you don’t know why. That’s probably a sign that something is going on with you.
Friday morning, I was leaving a video message for a friend apologizing for something I had said and wondering to myself why I was being such a jerk these days. As I was talking out loud trying to make excuses for my behavior it hit me – I was lonely!
I couldn’t believe those words were coming out of my mouth. If I look at my life from the outside in, I don’t see lonely. My hubby is working from home so I have a constant companion here. I’ve been going to church with people on Sundays since July. I go to simulator golf league every week. We have 3 married kids and 11 grandkids all within 40 minutes of our home. That doesn’t sound like a lonely life. However, lonely comes in many shapes and sizes - one definition does not fit all. I’m quite sure no one would ever guess how I was feeling.
When I look at my life from the inside out, I see how this last year and my current circumstances make me feel isolated, disconnected, and longing for the good old days. It’s ironic that I used to complain about never having any time to myself. Now, with tons of time to myself (unless you count texts, emails and various other screen related exchange of information as being WITH people), I realize that I don’t like it! Bring back the nights when I couldn’t wait to get back to my hotel, order room service and plop down on the bed to watch a movie. I was peopled out. I used to dream of white space on my calendar; now I see too much white space and very little human interaction time filling up days and nights!
Enough of my sob story (literally).
Admitting out loud that I was lonely didn’t stop the tears, but it felt oddly good to name what was going on. There was actually an emotional and physical release once I said those words, and the tears came faster and harder. I think my body was happy that I listened to it and stopped ignoring how I was feeling. In that moment I was reminded that there is power in naming an emotion; I just blurted what I was feeling.
Wait – what???? That is not what we do! We hide stuff. We pretend. We avoid. We stuff it. We keep going and hope it will go away.
None of those behaviors actually work. Research shows that simply naming an emotion reduces amygdala activity and helps to bring the parts of the brain into more balance. We use another part of our brain (pre-frontal cortex) to observe what we are feeling and search for the word or words that describe the feeling. We may need to build this muscle and expand our emotional vocabulary. Trust me – it’s a good practice!
Within 15 minutes of leaving that tear-stained video message, I was feeling lighter and thinking more clearly. Up until that point I was using energy to suppress what I was feeling; that is draining and a lot of work. That also explains why no matter how much I slept, I was tired and why the last 4 mornings I have woken up feeling refreshed.
I am no longer using energy to pretend or hide or hold something inside. It’s out – I’m not ashamed – I’m human . While my circumstances have not changed, my perspective has, and I am giving myself grace to be with the feeling of being lonely. I’m also figuring out what I can do about it.
Can you relate? Have you ever felt something but held it all inside? The myth is that saying something out loud will make it worse … it’s actually quite the opposite. Let’s practice naming our emotions and invite our brain to help us move through it!
