When I chose this topic, my greatest wish was for my dear readers to recognize those deep feelings they carry as heavy burdens, ignore, or fail to acknowledge; feelings that pierce the heart, make it hard to breathe, and sometimes make even home feel small. I want you to accept your emotions with compassion and realize you don’t have to appear strong.
Life often unfolds with ambivalent emotions. We enjoy joy, but at the same time, we feel sadness, anxiety, and anger. Though these emotions seem opposite, they are part of life’s wholeness. They belong to us, not to anyone else. Every joy and every sorrow we experience is ours. Rejecting them or pretending they don’t exist ignores life’s natural rhythm. Both emotions allow us to experience ourselves and the world more fully.
Conversations About the Feelings We Ignore
Let’s talk about the feelings we often ignore, yet feel like a lump in our throats when they arise. I want this text to feel like a conversation, as if you invited a psychology student to your home for coffee.
I will not name any specific emotion here, because from the moment I say “deep feelings you ignore,” I know each of you has recalled your own feeling—or even what caused it. It was once believed that every sigh made the heart lose a drop of blood. For someone who hasn’t felt pain deeply, this may seem abstract and meaningless.
Perhaps the heart must shed a drop of blood to understand. When you sigh or feel a tightness in your chest, you may say “a drop of blood fell from my heart” or “my heart is broken.” No matter how you express it, know that your chest will heal from the wound. Yes, a scar may remain, but it will heal.
Life presents a straight path until we confront pain. When we do face it, the path splits. You can never be the same again. Pain matures you, raises awareness, and shapes your identity. It can make you cruel—or prove that pain doesn’t have to make people cruel. The path is yours, the pain is yours, the choices are yours.
Learning Through Metaphors and Contrasts
I love using metaphors in psychology. I also believe God created everything with contrasts so that people could learn from them. Brown, dry branches in winter bloom in spring. If it rains, the sun will shine. Where there is evil, goodness stands against it. Illnesses can heal. Death seems the worst, yet even the dead will rise one day.
As I share this, I remember my grandmother’s words: “Every hardship ends in relief.” May these words feel like a spring breeze inside you.
Doğan Cüceloğlu writes in Var Mısın? that emotions are messengers of the inner guide. Anger, sadness, worry, joy, disappointment, longing—all deliver important messages. When we reject these messages or pretend to be strong, the unacknowledged emotions find other ways to express themselves.
They may manifest through overeating, under-eating, rashes, itching, acne, hair loss, somatic pain, or even illness. Repressed emotions may also lead others to say, “You’ve been irritable lately.” You might not cry, but your body shows signs. Every symptom says, “I am here.” When you listen, both your mind and body start healing.
Approaching Ourselves and Our Emotions with Compassion
Now, you might ask, “How do we accept pain?”
Here are a few tips:
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Name the emotion: “Yes, I am very hurt,” or “I feel tight inside.” Don’t scold yourself. Naming a feeling can lighten it slightly.
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Give it space: Don’t push it away; just allow it to exist. Take a deep breath, close your eyes for a few minutes, and think, “This feeling is part of me.”
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Express your emotions: Talk, draw, or take a walk. Writing can be especially therapeutic, letting you release mental clutter onto paper.
Other methods also help create space for your feelings.
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The Empty Chair Technique: Place a chair representing your emotions or someone who caused them. Speak to it, express yourself. It feels like a conversation, allowing suppressed emotions to surface.
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The Mirror Technique: Look at yourself and speak your feelings aloud. Say things like, “You are sad, and I understand you.” Both methods bring invisible emotions into visibility, helping you make peace with them.
This is also important in therapy. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) teaches us, “Don’t try to eliminate your feelings; learn to live with them.” Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) helps us notice the mind’s small tricks. Emotion-Focused Therapy allows suppressed feelings to be experienced safely. Whatever method you choose, the key is not to destroy your emotion but to learn to live with it.
The Path Toward Emotional Healing
Finally, treat yourself with compassion. When you experience pain, say, “There is nothing wrong. I am experiencing the most natural part of being human.” Every emotion, as my grandmother said, eventually brings relief.
Remember, emotional healing begins when we stop pretending our deep feelings don’t exist and instead embrace them as part of our shared human journey.