FEATURE Image by kinkate from Pixabay
A Day in Aylin’s Life
Little Aylin is 41/2 years old, visiting her aunt and uncle in Germany. The week has been filled with many new and exciting experiences that need to be processed. After a busy morning, feeling a bit tired and quite hungry, she is in a bakery with her aunt and her dad, seeing all the delicious treats that make her little mouth water. Excitedly, she points to these and those treats, wanting to buy several of them. Her Dad says, “No, Aylin, you cannot have them all, only one.” Within a few seconds, her little body is flooded with surprise, disappointment, sadness and some anger. She can’t help herself as she lets out a piercing scream and starts bawling, completely overwhelmed with all those emotions.
How Aylin Learns To Process Her Emotions
Her dad and her aunt are embarrassed by this public display of what is generally considered “bad behaviour,” but they take slow, deep breaths while waiting for Aylin to calm down. Another parent might have given in to stop the loud scene that draws everyone’s attention in the store. However, her caretakers know they must let her experience all her emotions and respond with compassion, so she learns how to process her normal human feelings.
When her screaming subsides, they calmly explain, “I know it is hard to see so many things and not be able to have them all. It’s normal to feel disappointed and upset. We get disappointed, too, when things don’t work out like we had hoped.” Her aunt adds, “Do you want to know what I do when I feel disappointed?” Little Aylin nods. “I let my tears flow a bit, and then I go and get a hug from your uncle. Do you want to try to get a hug from mommy, daddy, your uncle or from me the next time you feel sad and disappointed?”
Emotional Maturity Takes Time
With caretakers like this, Aylin is very lucky. She will grow up to be an adult who can process and express her feelings in a healthy manner. But a majority of us adults have not been taught to process our emotions and communicate our needs and feelings directly and respectfully. I certainly didn’t receive this compassion as a child, and I wish I had known this when I was parenting my toddlers thirty years ago. Emotional maturity takes time and practice to learn. We need to become aware of our emotions, face them and figure out what unmet needs are connected to them. We also need to find the courage to speak up and request what we need.
Grown-Ups Who Have Not Learned How To Handle Their Emotions
Grown-Ups also get overwhelmed with their uncomfortable emotions and fall into unhealthy strategies to regain control. How does it look when grown-ups act like 41/2 year old Aylin?
- Your mother pouts instead of saying what’s wrong.
- Your cousin gives you the silent treatment and lets you figure out how you have hurt her.
- Your brother-in-law doesn’t say anything when upset, drinks too much alcohol to numb his feelings and then blows up.
- Your colleague makes passive-aggressive comments when he feels ignored.
- Your daughter shuts down, starts to binge eat and doesn’t answer your texts.
- Your boss raises his voice and makes harsh comments when he is stressed. He also sends angry texts on Slack.
- Your grandmother gives you a guilt-trip when you don’t visit her as often as she would like.
- Your girlfriend lies to avoid conflicts.
- Or do you recognize yourself as the one who sends angry texts, makes snide comments or blows up? If so, there is no need to be ashamed. I love how Mel Robbins, in her book “Let Them,” openly shares her struggles, and I have to echo her. I can certainly think of incidents from my twenties into my forties which fall into the category of an unhealthy emotional response.
How Do You React?
Do you manage difficult emotional reactions in adults with one of these strategies?
- Do you walk on eggshells when they are “in a mood” and try to pacify or humour the other person?
- Do you let them manipulate you through guilt trips, playing the victim or anger?
- Do you allow their potential emotions to influence your behaviours or decisions?
- Do you say “yes” to people when you really want to say “no,” fearing their reactions?
As a parent, it is your responsibility to help your child process their range of emotions.
It is NOT your responsibility to manage another grown-up’s emotions and reactions!
What To Do Instead
What can you do when grown-ups act like children to shift the energetically draining dynamics with them?
- Have compassion. Realize that many adults are just like 5-year-old children because nobody teaches us that there is a better and healthier way to process emotions and to interact with others. This is not about you; they lack the tools to manage their emotions effectively. Their inner 5-year-old has taken over. You don’t need to feel scared of them. Move from fear or contempt to compassion for them.
- Remember that reacting like you always do continues the dynamics which make you feel tired and resentful. Instead, follow Mel Robbins’ formula and “Let Them”. Let them blow up or play the victim. Give them he space to feel what they need to feel without rushing to fix their emotions. Step two of Mel Robbins’ approach is “Let Me,” and that means make your decisions based on what you need. You can be the mature and loving adult. Depending on your relationship with this person, you can address it directly or choose not to. You can remove yourself from the situation. Focus on what you want to decide, independent of the other person.
If You Want To Learn Emotionally More Mature Ways of Reacting
What if you are the one who becomes overwhelmed with your emotions and feels paralyzed, unsure of how to express yourself calmly and let others know how they can help you? Perhaps you feel close to tears, and you want to run away and punish the other person by giving them the cold shoulder, or perhaps you can feel your anger taking hold of you, and you end up saying or texting something that you will later regret. You are not alone. Many people struggle to handle their emotions maturely.
I grew up with my father’s side of the family suppressing all emotions and making passive-aggressive comments, and my mother’s side of the family exploding in anger. No healthy role models for how to process emotions in sight. I have memories of my grandmother on my father’s side being offended and making passive-aggressive comments for years because in 1991, I forgot to call her on her birthday. What I remember most is feeling ashamed about something that, in retrospect, seemed like such a minor oversight. Needless to say, my grandmother was not a beloved figure to me, but rather one to fear and walk on eggshells around.
Another very vivid memory I have is my mother losing it when an appliance, like the vacuum cleaner, wouldn’t work or loudly venting about my awful teacher in school, ready to start what felt like a conflict with them. What I remember is feeling overwhelmed by all her angry emotions, not realizing that helplessness lay underneath, and I decided to keep my problems and feelings about them to myself. I also learned to let my frustration erupt, just as she had role-modelled.
It took me decades, through therapy, training as a coach, and learning about healthy ways of handling emotions and expressing feelings and needs in relationships, to realize how I had internalized the role models I was shown.
If you want to change your unproductive habits and express your emotions more effectively, start with self-compassion. How can we know something we have never learned? Be kind and gentle with yourself as you work on changing your reactions. Fortunately, we can modify what isn’t working for us and continue to grow.
What To Do With Your Emotions
When it comes to our own emotions, Mel Robbins’ “Let Them” technique is also applicable:
STEP ONE: Let them (the emotions) rise. Allow yourself to sit with what you feel without judgment and become curious about what unfulfilled need or story has triggered those emotions.
STEP TWO: “Let Me” translates to “let me not react”, e.g. let me not explode in anger, not send a harsh text, not make a passive-aggressive comment, not play the victim, not overeat or drink too much, not retreat and punish others by withdrawing my love. Instead, let me wait out or release the emotion. Let me think of how to express what I feel and what I would like to the other person. Let me use a step-by-step process like Marshall Rosenberg’s NVC or the Feedback Wheel to communicate my feelings healthily and productively.
If you have recognized yourself or somebody in your life in this description, and you want to work on changing the relationship dynamics
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