Thoughts for Moving Through Painful Emotions

Emotional Management

Suffering from anxiety, depression, self-doubt, fear, worry, loneliness, low self-esteem, anger? Trinity Family Counseling Center can help.

Let’s face it—our emotions can get the better of any of us. Anxiety, depression, self-doubt, fear, worry, loneliness, low self-esteem, codependency, and anger are just a few of the emotional demons that rob us of our ability to experience joy, to be present in our day-to-day lives, and to engage with and love others to our fullest potential.

Each of the counselors at Trinity is experienced in helping clients identify and confront their emotional challenges through a wide range of therapeutic approaches. The first step toward change is always to develop an awareness of how your daily experiences trigger and perpetuate your negative thoughts about yourself or others, and then how those thoughts lead to your troubling emotional responses and—often times—inappropriate or unhealthy behaviors.

Thoughts for Moving Through Painful Emotions

7/10/2023

by Liza Hinchey, LPC, NCC

Liza Hinchey is a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) in private practice at Trinity Family Counseling Center. Liza completed dual Master’s degrees in Clinical Mental Health Counseling and Art Therapy, and is currently pursuing a PhD in psychology at Wayne State University. She works with individuals, families, and groups across a range of presenting issues.

Sometime between 1902 and 1908, likely while living in Paris, Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote the following lines:

Let everything happen to you
Beauty and terror
Just keep going
No feeling is final

The idea of letting ourselves feel painful emotions is easier said than done; often, our instincts are to push them away to protect ourselves. But we’ve collectively progressed to the point where we all know that this either makes them resurface in worse and more damaging ways, and/or numbs us to all of our feelings. So, the only way out that’s left is through. To let everything happen to you.

Being here and being human means feeling everything, forever. We get all the colors and all the shades of every emotion. We get to feel absolutely ripped apart, and we get to vibrate with excitement and joy (thanks, human experience). Some emotions are easy to feel, and some are really, really hard. When you’re in the midst of the latter, it can help to remember a few things.

Trust that no feeling is final. There is an abundance of emotions in your future. Sometimes they’re beautiful and sometimes they’re terrible, but none of them last and all of them move through us. Sometimes we want to hold on to painful emotions, if they’re part of the pain of grief, because they connect us to our loved one. But even that feeling of wanting to feel the pain will change. Let yourself want to grieve and be in pain if you need to.

Then, remember that this whole human experience is shared — you’re so far from alone, because feeling everything is inextricably woven into what it means to exist here. This doesn’t make the painful stuff go away. Just puts it into context. Lean on your people, and even if it feels like a painful reality couldn’t possibly ever change… just keep going.