Why do we fear before we feel?

In the recent months, I have found myself at a loss for words about what has been happening in Gaza. And I admit, I’m a bit “late” in sharing my thoughts.

That is because I have, over the course of the last few months, felt confused, angry, disgusted, sad, disappointed, helpless, afraid, and numb. I have moved through the many stages of grief.

But I have also had a recent realization about the way I grieve and how that has informed the way that I have shown up in the midst of this crisis.

You see, I realize that I have often found myself at a loss for words, because I learned early on not to communicate (attach words to) my emotions.

Hear me out.

What we are all experiencing right now is grief, in its various languages and stages.

In the same way that we each have love and conflict languages, I believe that we also have grief languages.

I believe that the way that each of us have learned how to process grief in our lives, through experience and through observation, is also the way we each show up in times like the present. I believe that the way we have learned to process grief, has manifested as the way we each show up for the various conflicts that have arisen.

Let me explain.

Throughout my life I have observed the various ways that my family, other families, American society, and different cultures, process and hold space for grief.

Some process grief through avoidance, numbing, and looking away from pain. Some process grief through anger, hurtful words, and violence. Some process grief by feeling through the emotions: crying, talking about it, embracing all the emotions (personally, I’ve observed this the least). While others even grieve through dance and celebration. This last version of grief has to be my favorite.

In my own life, I have found myself often processing my own grief through numbing, disconnecting from the pain, sometimes being at a loss for words, and simply run away for fear of saying the wrong or imperfect thing when it comes to loss.

I watched all of these different ways of processing grief show up over the course of the last few months.

And it has been confusing, draining, and terrifying.

By watching the various ways that I observed my loved ones process their grief in my life, I learned to run away from my own emotions. I learned not to share my grief, I learned to look away, and I learned to repress my emotions.

All of these, I now understand, were ways that I learned to protect myself.

But as an adult, I understand that these behaviors do not serve me.

As I became an adult, I watched what I had been taught to me as a child, manifest as an inability to hold space for the emotions of others, and myself: when it comes to my own grief, when it comes to heavy emotions, and when it comes to ways of handling and processing conflict.

Just a few years ago I realized that I had a massive vulnerability problem…and my therapist confirmed it.

Experiencing how the avoidance of emotion had been negatively affecting my own life, was the catalyst for my journey of healing.

You see, our emotions are meant to be seen and heard. They are meant to be processed, felt through, unpacked, and discussed.

Throughout the world, many of us have been taught to fear our emotions. I have experienced it for myself through many travel experiences and human conversations.

We’ve been taught that it is most healthy to use our brains and logic, and to turn away from our feelings and hearts. We have been taught to fear those who feel deeply, so much so that we often call them ill before we try to understand the beauty of their deep sensitivity.

We FEAR before we allow ourselves to FEEL.

We have been taught to suppress the parts of ourselves that feel anything less than positive, light, and “productive,” which are just the emotions that allow us to continue to move through our busy and capitalist-driven lives.

But that very avoidance of emotion is why we are here today. Why we are seeing so much darkness and tension in the world. The demonization of heavy emotion has lead us to neglect parts of ourselves that are actually in need of the most love.

It is those very parts of ourselves that, if felt through, embraced, and loved, would have a very difficult time consuming us and turning into hate.

It is those very parts of ourselves that need compassion and that need to be held, so that we may learn how to do the same for others.

But what we resist persists. What we frown upon and suppress, inevitably consumes us.

Those parts of ourselves I’m referring to are anger, sadness, jealousy, fear, and so on. The “negative” emotions, if you will.

While we have been often taught differently, ALL emotions are productive and meant to be felt. Emotions are signals, meant to direct us towards where we may need to hold more space for ourselves, and give ourselves more love.

We were given emotions to FEEL. So let’s feel them, and let’s talk about them.

Let’s start allowing ourselves to show up as our entire selves, even on the darkest days. Especially in the midst of heightened tensions like we are experiencing right now.

Let’s feel through the grief that we are all experiencing right now and stop running away from it. Whether that be the grief in watching millions of women, men, fathers, mothers, children, and everything in between, die before our very eyes. Or be it the grief we are experiencing because we are beginning to release past versions of ourselves that would otherwise look away from the pain.

Let’s feel through our grief so that we can start to understand and hold space for our own feelings. When we start to understand our own emotions, we can begin to understand and hold space for the grief and emotions of others, even in the most turbulent times. And it is then that we will grow the emotional capacity to extend compassion to our brothers and sisters around the world.

So, I invite you to ask yourself today: how may you have been taught to grieve? How has that shown up for you in your life? And in asking yourself these questions and in reading this, I hope that you, and that all of us, start to be more conscious of WHEN and WHY we fear, before we show compassion.

I say this as much to you, as I do myself.