Emotional Wallow

 When I was young I learned how to not feel. Except for Rage and Self Pity. That, however, came later. I learned how to present an appearance of feeling. Or not feeling. Depending on what the situation called for. I had no idea what I was ever really feeling. I became a great, even Oscar worthy at times, Actor. I fooled everybody in the world. Especially myself.

And there were times when things would happen that would show me up in front of others and I would, very involuntarily, feel shame, guilt, or anger. And then I would get mad at whoever. Sometimes I showed that I was mad. Most times I did not.

For example, there was a time when I was twenty six years old and I was, very briefly, dating this young lady at U-Mass Amherst who was in the beginning of her Senior Year.

I was telling her one day about a period that I spent homeless in Toronto Ontario when I was sixteen to seventeen years old.

She listened to me tell the tale and then she looked at me and said, "You really like to wallow in your misery. Don't you?"

I got really pissed. And I did not let it show, so far as I could tell. I saw no reaction of any sort from her that showed she had seen it.

So I tried to explain that I was only sharing with her a difficult time in my life. While internally I could not get over what she had said. How Dare She!!!

It was only years later, in doing the Steps in NA that I saw myself playing the victim and trying to gain sympathy for the "terrible" life that I had lead. And I was truly, as she had called me on, "wallowing in my misery".

And that was my life for a long time.

By the end of my using drugs I was so confused about what I was or was not feeling that I sometimes used drugs to at least know what I was going to feel.

I was so out of touch with anything resembling my emotional life.

After a series of events I began a process that, among other things, helps one to get in touch with one's feelings. In fact, we have a saying, "Good news, you get your feelings back. Bad news, you get your feelings back". Because that is how out of touch with feelings most of us are.

Over time I began to get a better handle on having, instead of being overwhelmed by, feelings. Expressing feelings. And managing without suppression or emotional violence those feelings. Not even close to perfectly however. I still can backslide.

And, sometimes, I will find myself reading a series of articles that pull forth strong emotions from me. Or listening to a series of songs that pull strong emotions from me. Or watching a series of videos online that will pull strong emotions from me.

And the common themes from all of these things is sadness. For some reason I need to, in that moment, feel sadness. A lot of it and really intensely.

And it is not like I go into it looking to do this. It is totally unconscious. I just notice that I am, and have been, feeling intensely bad for a while now. And, after some time, I put a pattern of behavior together. As listed above. I still do not understand the why of it yet.

And now, to present day.

Lately in life I have found myself in a different kind of emotional wallow. I have found myself so overcome with feeling good, gratitude, that I find myself tearing up and getting emotional. As my Uncle Les used to say, "My gratitude keeps leaking out of my eyeballs".

I have found myself like that a lot lately. And it is really weird as my life is, in many ways, completely out of whack. Yet I find myself overcome with Happiness and Gratitude.

The perfect example of that is this weekend.

I arrived in a place on Wednesday afternoon in a place that is very well known. I am here for the event that had a small start the day I arrived and continued through until about 1:30 this (Sunday) afternoon.

Friends, this weekend has been magical. I have seen friends that I have not seen in years. I have made many new friends. I have participated in workshops where we are having our input used for the future of this organization that hosted this that I am a part of. I have been in rooms where people have talked about their experiences dealing with some things that I have going on back home and my mind has been blown by the depth of thought and inventiveness that went into some of their solutions to things.

So many times over this weekend I have found myself overcome with emotion. Not in a bad way, in a wonderful way. Thankfulness, Gratitude, Joy, these are the things that are so wonderful to feel, that can also be overwhelming.

And I did not once try to hide what I was feeling, or change what I was feeling, or suppress what I was feeling. And for that I am grateful.

Although, in the interest of full disclosure, this is and was a safe place for me to be emotional. That is an important piece of this.

And that is not the only piece of it.

As I have become more and more comfortable with having feelings and allowing them to express, I have found more and more places in this world where I feel that it is safe for me to be emotional.

So I am grateful today. Grateful that I am on this journey where I get to move from and emotional cripple to a person who can be fully expressed.

Who got his feelings back.

What are you Grateful and Thankful for today?