Whether people like to admit it or not, every feeling that courses through your body is a natural feeling. All feelings provide information about your current state. That means when you’re feeling excited, angry, empathetic, happy, or depressed, your brain and body are exchanging signals, alerting each other about the environment around you, as well as the environment inside of your mind. Feelings are nether good or bad, they are simply information. They are all-natural things that your mind and body go through as you understand and regulate your experiences. Society and culture dictate how we judge emotions. “Negative” emotions (sadness, depression, guilt, anger) are judged as “bad” because they are uncomfortable to feel. “Positive” emotions (happiness, joy, love) are seen as “good”. The reality is that they are neither; they are simply your body and mind beginning to notify you that you require attention, regulation, or that something is happening.
When it comes to mental health it is very easy to fall down the rabbit hole of “toxic positivity” online. Reading through countless posts, quotes, and comments on how to “just be happier” or that “depression and anxiety are all in your head” can be very damaging to someone who is seeking genuine help on how to navigate the big emotions they are feeling. What influencers on Instagram aren’t showing you is the very real struggle of trying to maintain a healthy lifestyle when all your body and mind want to do is shut down for the week. Writing a cute quote can be easy “pick me up” but what you might need may extend past someone telling you that everything will get better (without any additional help). When you are suffering from a depressive episode or ongoing anxiety, you want concrete tools and resources that you can rely on to provide you with tangible guidance. Going through these mental health challenges is not all sunshine and rainbows; sometimes it looks like someone not showing up for themselves because their emotions are deregulated or cutting communication with family and friends because their anxiety makes it hard to have meaningful conversations. This is where we need to put down the phone and take a hard look at what kind of specific support someone may need when facing these challenges in their life.
