Our feelings and emotions add flavour to our lives 
 
They help us make sense of our experiences; derive meanings from them 
 
But the same emotions can make life hard to manage too! 
 
So much so that many of us resort to numbing them out or distracting ourselves from feeling them, often even by undesirable means, whenever these emotions are triggered! 
 
In this Article, I hope to share insights that have been proven to be effective, in my years of therapeutic practice, in helping those of us struggling with emotional regulation 
 
Let’s begin exploring… 
 
Understanding Relevance of Emotions 
 
Our emotions play an adaptive role in our functioning as humans. Our emotions show us what is personally meaningful to us. It is from our emotional reactions that we can tell what is important to us, how we are appraising our world, and how we are coping with it. 
 
Many of us may be sceptical about engaging in emotions because:  

Emotions can be so overwhelming to experience that we may fear them to be disruptive of our day-to-day functioning 


Allowing ourselves to experience our emotions might also lead us to become aware of things undesirable and daunting, about ourselves and others 


We may not be aware of the right way of processing certain kinds of emotions and hence we may shy away from experiencing them to the fullest 

 
Process of Emotional Regulation: Ability & Skill 
 
Our ability to process our emotions and emotional regulation typically begins to develop in childhood. In an environment where there is unconditional acceptance, validation and prizing of our emotions and needs, we learn to process our emotions.  
 
Hold them long enough in our awareness, derive meanings, and determine how we’d like to act based on how our emotions guide us. 
 
This can be hindered because: 

Some of us may not have ideal environments growing up. In such scenarios, we may gradually habituate ourselves to disengage from our emotions as a survival tactic; as a way of coping 


Allowing ourselves to express our emotions may result in undesirable consequences. Leading us to believe that the best way forward would be to numb them out or express only those emotions that serve others’ needs  


Insights that come up in the wake of our emotional experiences may inspire us to act. In ways that our current circumstances may not allow provision for. We may then end up rejecting emotions that reflect the way we truly feel and start paying heed to only a select few 

Impact of Trauma 
Trauma often results from situations and experiences that place demands far beyond our ability to cope. Traumatic experiences can have a negative impact on our ability for emotional processing and emotional regulation.  
Here are insights that can help in this regard: 

Recognizing the presence and impact of trauma, validating one’s concerns, and prioritizing the necessity for intervention can be a useful first step 


As we learn to unpack our burdens from the past and present and learn to process our experiences, we slowly come face to face with emotions that have been lying dormant too 


Addressing our concerns in a safe, reliable, non-judgmental space, such as a therapy space, slowly paves the way for facilitating emotional processing and emotional regulation 

Steps forward 
Knowing how crucial emotions are to our understanding of self and life itself, can help us pay attention to our emotional experiences with greater care and sensitivity. 
Those of us who struggle with handling emotions and regulating the same, can acquire the ability and skill to navigate them, with adequate and reliable help and support. 
Here are pointers that can be helpful: 

Becoming aware of situations that particularly trigger emotions that are difficult to handle 


Taking care to identify emotions that you often tend to struggle with 


Outlining outcomes and goals that you would like to work towards, in the realm of emotional processing and emotional regulation 

Let me conclude with the following: 
Emotions…as the waves peak 
It can so terrifying that it compels you to wonder 
If only I could live a life devoid of them… 
Know that every emotion comes to you 
With the intention of bringing to your awareness 
Something that you need to pay attention to… 
Key is in learning 
Not to control or numb them out 
But to understand their inherent meanings & manage them 
Leading to an evolving sense of your true self 
As you take steps forward… 
 
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