But you can't talk about them..
I've become better at talking about my feelings, about making sense of the often jumbled mess in my head, about letting myself delve into my emotions. I have become better, but I still would rather not. Let's be honest. I still would rather sit on it all, let it stew and spill up over me.
Why?
Because talking about things is fucking hard. I don't know if it gets easier. Especially when you know what you need to say is going to affect other people. That's when shit gets rough.
Over my lifetime, I learnt to become very good at keeping things inside. I became proficient at being "fine" and being able to get along with things.
Thus, I became emotionally unavailable. And I practiced it for many years. Much to the detriment of my last relationship.
After my relationship broke down, I vowed to only speak my truth, to get better at saying how I felt, to improve my communication, to be more honest, more vulnerable, more open...And this was easy there for awhile.
I can ask for what I want, I can say what I don't want. I can talk about life things, universe things, energy things. I can be upset and really feel it. I can speak my truth.
But still, when something comes up that I know is going to pull at the heart strings of another, something that might hurt someone else or change the dynamics of my relationship with them, fuck I find it hard to locate my voice.
When I think back, I haven't really been modelled the behaviour to be able to communicate in relationships well. We never spoke about feelings in my family. Not one conversation I remember. Everything was always just fine and move on. It's hard to break that circuit. Not impossible mind you, just hard.
I can't pretend I'm fine these days, I probably never could to be honest.
I can't pretend I am fine, but when testing situations arise, still, I can't speak easily. It's like I have to dig and dig to uncover the feelings, underneath what I think is really going on, I have to work to discover the truth, my truth.
Possibly because it has all been buried for such a long time and it feels uncomfortable, awkward and yucky to dig it up. To access those feelings that have been pushed down, that have only been felt on the inside. To let the words spill out of my mouth without holding back.
It's so distant to me that often when the words come out, I laugh or talk comically slowly or get my words all tangled up. It's like they don't want to come out. They're holding back.
It's fucking hard but I have learnt the hard way that this process has to happen, and if I want to live a life in flow, this will continue to happen into eternity.
So I'll keep regurgitating up all the feelings, all the tangled mess of emotions...Maybe one day they'll make sense. Maybe they won't.
And I'll keep sharing the process, because I know as humans we all struggle with this.
But we must go on.
