Heart racing, chest squeezing, tummy doing somersaults. I am 15 again. It is 1 in the morning and my mind is speeding through every possible worst-case scenario that could happen. I fail my maths exam. Then my Physics exam. My teachers are so disappointed that the school kicks me out. The bullies have turned everyone against me. No-one talks to me anymore. My parents break up and nowhere feels like home. My best friend steals my boyfriend. Everyone hates me and I am alone forever.
Anxiety rippled through me. It robbed me of my sleep and left me irritable and exhausted in the day. I felt like a vulnerable, sensitive zombie who was in survival mode a lot of the time. High functioning anxiety.
Why? Because I was facing challenges with no coping strategies to help me. I was bullied. My parents broke up. I put a lot of pressure on myself to get the top grades at school. My sister was a high achiever and I wanted the attention that came with those grades. I pushed and pushed myself to get the work done.
I couldn’t turn to mindfulness to soothe me. I simply carried on.
Sometimes the smiliest people hold the most pain. Don’t be fooled by the smile. It can be masking an ocean of tears. I denied my feelings. Tried to smile them away as if nothing was troubling me.
I did not give myself a break. I did not show myself compassion. Instead I attacked myself with words and cried myself to sleep at night.
“We think that denying our emotions makes us stronger and more resilient, but the research shows that it actually makes us less resilient.” Source: Dr. Susan David, psychologist and author of Emotional Agility, Facebook post 3rd July 2021.
And a lot of us do this when life gets hard.
We become at war with ourselves. We bully ourselves with words such as “buck up, man up, stop being such as a loser, pull yourself together, stop being so weak.”
We push down the feelings with unhealthy patterns of behaviour. We turn to social media or video games as a digital dummy – to try to numb our emotions. We escape for a while. But does the pain or tension go away? Nope. It comes back. This time as something stronger, with more force behind it. Anger. Anxiety. Depression. A whole heap of other mental health issues. Even physical health issues.
When we push down our emotions they don’t disappear. They fester deep in our bellies. Then they rise up with such force – emotional outbursts like no other.
And yet it doesn’t have to be this way. We can let our feelings out. We can become more resilient even when our world has turned upside down.
We can choose self-compassion over self-attack when life gets hard.
We can face the heavy stuff with truth and vulnerability. Acknowledging that this really hurts. Saying to ourselves “it is ok to feel like this”. Not trying to smile away the pain.
We can focus on the present moment, not get stuck in the past wishing things could have been different or racing ahead to the future, stuck in ‘I’ll be happy when’ mode.
We can become the observer of our minds to catch negative thinking more quickly and shift towards a more positive mindset.
“You can’t stop the waves (allow for a pause) but you can learn how to surf” Jon Kabat-Zinn
We can’t control what happens to us but we can control the way we react to it.
When you’re going through a tough time you need to spend time letting your emotions out. Create space for them. Acknowledge them. This could take days. Even weeks. Let the tears run dry. Come to a point of surrender where you accept your circumstances as they are. No more resistance. This hurts more than words can say. Then and only then can you consider taking baby steps towards change. Stepping outside of your comfort zone. Taking a leap of faith.
If you are a teen living in the London area join our free workshop coming up on 12th April with two sports stars. Check out www.resilientteen.co.uk for more information.
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