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recently too many things have happened in the world - losing the life we used to live in, adjusting to a new lifestyle for all the musicians, and experiencing the lost of physical social connections we used to easily have - I think it's time to talk about releasing some repressed emotions that might have buried deeply inside of us and causing unnecessary physical discomfort and psychological impact on us.
Hi this is your host Amy Wang-Hiller bringing you another solo episode of Thrive x Strive Musician Podcast. This is a weekly podcast where we dive into the personal development as musicians to create a healthy living with mental clarity & vibrancy. My goal is to provide musicians healthy tools and wisdoms to help you thrive in personal and professional life. During last week's interview with Dr. Arna Alyane, one of the topics around embracing our emotions has inspired me to dive deeper today and bring you some tools to safely recognize and release those emotions. So when is last time you had a good cry? For me, in years past, I couldn't even tell whether my tears were genuine sadness or putting on a show to counter a certain situation.
before you hear my story and ways that I overcome this problem, let's take a minute to talk about one of the best learning communities I found that has expanded my creative outlet to express my thoughts and emotions way beyond just music. Skillshare is an online learning community for creators around the world. They offer thousands of classes from arts crafts to productivity tools, lifestyle and even classes on art therapy and therapeutic art journaling. I have been using Skillshare rediscover my hobby in illustration as a fun and calming tool for my selfcare. it's very helpful to Channel my creative energy though creative writing and I know you will too. You can also learn about marketing, building better website, creating your own online classes. My referral link you can find in the description offers you a TWO-months free premium SkillShare: So you can learn any topics and skills you want for two entire month without any charges. If you are considering signing up for their membership, I also have a link for 30% off their annual subscription. you can cancel it anytime with a simple click, but those skills you learned will for sure serve you for a lifetime. So please follow the links in the show notes to claim your two month free trials or 30% off their annual subscription. This will let SkillShare know that I send you, and will really help support this podcast! Now let's dive into today's topic. .
So why did I have a problem with repressed emotions? I wasn't growing up in a typical Chinese parenting style, which some parents tell kids that it's bad to be overly emotional or crying. My parents were very open-hearted and genuine people, especially my mom. She won't hide her emotions around us, although she is a very positive person. If she wants to cry, she would never hold it back. But I did not inherit that side of personality growing up. Things to do with emotions, I'm more like my dad. But besides the genetics, I have to say that growing up as a single child living in a very small apartment without my own bedroom and personal space has really made me hide a lot thoughts and feelings internally. Doesn't matter if it's the society had taught me crying is a weakness or feeling self-conscious around crying in front of people and having embarrassing red puffy eyes, or just my own awkwardness around people, I decided it was dumb thing to cry during my 2nd grade. I clearly remember myself fell down and scraped my knees after school. When that sudden sharp pain hit, instead of let my tear natural come down, I told everyone that I'm okay. Not only was I trying to not limp, I skipped like nothing had happened. Internally, I was so proud of myself for being like a super hero who can tolerate pain and act super strong. But .... is it true. Now this thought pattern has gradually manifested in other parts of my life, particularly, my emotional life. I realized over the years even when I experienced breakup, left home to study abroad by myself, I would intentionally hold myself together and squash down all those uncomfortable feelings. It became a habit and my second nature. So when it's time for me to show my vulnerability in front of my bestie or my boyfriend at the time, it's so hard to get in touch with my actual feelings that I had to use yarning to squeeze out a couple tears. It made me look like a manipulative person, but I was just trying to be a normal human being in situations I thought it needed me to cry.
I remember seeing my orchestra friend crying after almost every concerts in Aspen, I was first concerned but amazed. I felt a bit jealous and wondered how did she just easily let her tears come out. I must have felt really embarrassed if it happens to me. But the way she was so comfortable with herself showing her emotions, did not make the situation awkward at all!
Through the last couple years of therapy, self-discovery, I have gradually got better at showing my emotions. Maybe not so much on crying, but definitely no longer burying my feelings to the point that they explode on me, and I was finally feeling the emotional bond with others without getting all awkward and pretending.
there is some interesting facts about crying though. we often associate tears and crying with negative emotions, but many times crying comes from happy emotions. Tears also show others that we’re vulnerable, and vulnerability is critical to human connection. So A good cry evidently leads to catharsis. And one of the positive effects of crying, also as a process of release, gives enough time to sink in the things that we experience. while building the communications and bonds with others. The professor of psychology at the University of South Florida Jonathan Rottenberg has stated in one of his emotion research "Crying signals to yourself and other people that there’s some important problem that is at least temporarily beyond your ability to cope,” So if we are not allowing the rich emotions , whether joy or sadness, to be overflowed through tears, instead, we press down and stuff all the emotions in that tiny little space of our heart, the rebound can be a lot harder to deal with than the initial feelings. Instead of showing up emotionally, the repressed emotions that did not get to process properly can show up as a range of physical symptoms as well. and that can be confusing for a lot of us.
why musicians tend to repress our emotions?
This is even more prominent in musicians. So why is musicians tend to suppress our emotions? I have talked about how musicians tend to feel a wider range of emotions than others. Although we express our feelings through the form of our music, we don't usually share all of our feelings with our peers. because of us participating frequently in competitions, auditions, we actually encounter disappointment a lot more often than people in some other industries. if you are a professional musician, I guarantee that you have encountered some rejections or failure from an audition, or tried really hard but didn't not win a competition. if so, How did you feel? Although it's upsetting, I noticed myself still smiling in front of the rest of the participants and judges, or brushing it off with a "well, I didn't play too well." or "it's okay!, now i get to move on" in front of my friends or families. It seems like this is the norm. We should just not be bothered because we are professionals and dealing with rejections all the time. But those feelings of disappointment or sadness are just as valid as anyone else's.
I am definitely one of those who normalized not only positive but also **negative emotional experiences - as some called overly optimistic. Being positive is good. But it's actual necessary for us to subjectively look at those negative emotional experiences, like failing an audition, making a mistake in a concert, receiving harsh criticism from your peers or mentors. - if we keep those feelings hidden
And those continuously repressed feelings can resurface in a form of physical problems like muscle tension and pain. I have seen a lot musician friends with tensed up bow arm/ postures. or those tension seems to be a default mode when we start to perform. It also correlates with digestive problems or sleep issues.
Now how can we actually release them?
1. Recognizing emotional repression
often, we don't really know, aware, recognize that we were supressing our feelings. once they are hidden up. It's even harder to detect. So recognize that emotions can be the most important part of those steps. Now check in with yourself through each of these following statement:
have you feel stressed, nervous, but don't really know why?
or have you feel calm & content most of the time. but when your friends tell you their feelings of anxiety, you started to feel uncomfortable . - big sign that their expression has stirred up something inside of you. particularly, you repressed emotions.
next one is that, when others ask you how are you feeling, there is a sense of need to escape that situation. or if you realize your thoughts suddenly jumped to another different topics. - purposely try to get away from addressing or acknowledging these bubbling up emotions.
Do you feel hard to build stronger deeper meaningful relationship or feeling isolated and lonely - because we are not opening up our heart to others if we are not even doing so to ourselves.
this can be situation like - instead of expressing what I really want - I just went along with others' preference.
or you might came out as being manipulative. crying for the reason that I have to cry because the situation feels like to.
we might act like a sociable person, spending times with other people, but in reality, we are trying to avoid the time being alone & dealing with our uncomfortable emotions.
Now, if you have clearly recognized the existence of your repressed emotions, we need find a way to release in a safe and positive manner.
2. Releasing your emotions:
First and foremost, I think talking to a counselor or therapist can be very helpful in so many ways. Do you know it's required for therapist or psychologist to have their own regular therapy session for processing their feelings? So it's worth it to invest in some talking therapy sessions.
they provide you a safe space for you to talk. so you don't feel being judged,
when emotions come at you in a negative form like anxiety, sadness, angers, we aren't feeling comfortable especially alone by ourselves. so knowing someone is on your side with no judgement can lead to the first step of acknowledging our feelings.
you might not knowing how to manage the emotions that you release. encourage you to express in your own way.
and those counselors can see it from an outside perspective. easier to pinpoint the blind spot you might missed in your own thinking. call out the nonsense that your mind is trying to allude you towards. So gradually, you can understand better. increase your awareness around those unnoticeable emotions that sneak their way into your life.
those people who are trained in psychology can guide you towards a positive thinking, bring you tools to properly process those emotions. - helpful method to regulate those emotions.
But we don't always have access everyday to these professionals. What do we do now?
Body Scan is a very useful method to tune in with our internal feelings.
you need to set a time jut turn off your phone, create a distraction free sacred space, breathe deeply, and start scanning through our body. ask yourself: where do I feel in my body that are a bit tensed? I am dealing with "___"blanck* anxiety around my chest, muscle tension around shoulder, tightness around my jaw and my cheeks, whenever I am upset. noticing them. They are just like kids, giving them proper acknowledgement. Instead of pushing away, say thank you to your emotions. They make you human and bring you beautiful contrasts in your emotional life. So show your anixiety sadness your gratitude. Thank them for showing up so that your life isn't just in one single color.
Now imagine that sun light warmly hugging your body. And Those tensed up muscle feels like soap bubbles slowly dissolving and slowly melting away. Do that to each part of your body until they are completely relaxed.
If it's sadness, disappointment, I learned over the past year that I would just submerge myself completely in it. set a timer, completely let go for a min or two, whether you just let yourself cry, sob, whatever you felt like, once I calm down after the min, there was that sudden peacefulness as that weight just lifted off me. Now I want you come back to scan through your body again, bring the breathing back to normal. and check in with myself, do I feel I bit more relaxed? centered? calm?
next time you experience that similar tension in your body again, or that agitation around you. you know there is no need to suppress them down. just go through those steps, acknowledge, lean into it, melt it away with our slow and deep breathing. and show them some love, acceptance, and gratitude.
Of course journal is always another best way to deeply connect those feelings.
we always tend to consume content more than we create. As musicians, we do create in the sense of our own art work. But in terms of understanding the emotions so that we release them in a positive way, I don't think we have done enough.
I noticed someday that I just glued onto the social media, reading books, watching videos, even it's on personal development, but they are all input.
to have a better sense of our own feelings, we need a balance between the input of information and output of our thoughts. So using journal as a source of output to express ourselves in a detailed format to gain clarity of who we are, how we are feeling, and what we can say to ourselves to show self-compassion and love.
Even if we create music with our authentic feelings, they are in an abstract form.
so try to use words/ writing to free your emotions and lift them up with grateful and compassionate thoughts.
“Do not apologize for crying. Without this emotion, we are only robots.
You are, after all, what you think. Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love
But you don't need to be slaved by your emotions. Emotion is energy in motion. They will not stay forever. By allowing them to move, you can actually free yourself from them....
I really hope you find today's episode helpful. check out our blog post for this episode at amywangviolin.com/podcast And subscribe to our podcast on Apple podcast Stitchers, Spotify and whatever podcast platform you use. And please download this episode. It means the world to me. If you can leave a review and shared the biggest, take away an aha moment with your friends and also on iTunes. And if you have any thoughts on today's episode or topics that you would like me to further discuss. Email me at thrivexstrive@gmail.com. Thanks again and talk to you guys next week with another solo episode on releasing the emotions and make sure to check out the link in the description for the skillshare two month free trial so you can use the weekend to learn some creative hobbies and release your emotions through different forms of art. for our Next week, we have Dr. Renee-Paule Gouthier, the creator of Mind over Finger podcast, on our show, So talk you all next week!
Resources:
Article: https://www.healthline.com/health/repressed-emotions
Book: Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert https://amzn.to/32SQwPi