Well, life hurts more.

But it also brings more joy.

Feelings be feeling. At both ends of the spectrum.

After a lifetime of suppressing, avoiding and numbing them, it can feel counterintuitive to lean into uncomfortable feelings.

Why would I sit here in this pain, shame or embarrassment when I could scroll my social media feed and watch puppies getting a makeover?

As you start to shake off your avoidant tendencies, you lean into challenging conversations with those around you.

You realise you can deepen your connection to people by expressing how you feel about their words or behaviour.

You realise you’ve been denying yourself this connection your entire life by pretending everything’s always fine.

By acknowledging the power of sitting in it with other people, you realise you can also deepen the connection to yourself in the same way.

By confronting the feelings with yourself.

Sitting in them.

Naming them.

Validating them.

Understanding yourself better.

This makes you feel great, like you’re on top of things.

Until the next time you have to feel sad about something.

You remember that emotional growth doesn’t just mean feeling proud of yourself for doing something that millions of other people do naturally anyway.

It means feeling.

And sometimes it hurts.

But that’s a good thing.

It means you’re in touch with yourself.

You’re allowing yourself to feel pain, which also builds your capacity to feel joy.

When you flatten your experience of one, you flatten your experience of the other.

Until you’re numb and indifferent to life.

Sitting in pain is like putting joy in the bank for later.

Be sure to make those deposits.

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