The Break Up: I wasn't okay

You may have noticed that I haven't written about "Le Boo" (or much else for that matter) in a while. Well, that's because we ended our relationship. It was arguably one of the most difficult things I've ever gone through in my life and the picture above was how I felt on many days, a blurry version of myself. I wasn't okay. I'll share some of my journey to being okay over a series of posts called "The Break Up". Here's the first.

Key Take-away #1: I wasn't okay...and that was okay

I learnt that it's okay to not be okay. This is a big one for me because I like to have a good handle of what's going on in my life. This time, I didn't know how to do that and the loss of control was very hard to accept. I've since realised that it's okay to cry; it's okay to hurt; it's okay to feel the full spectrum of emotions and deal with them. I had to make a conscious decision.

Discharging Emotions

 

I have made the decision that I feel all my feelings and discharge them safely and completely. 

The word discharge there is important. See, we can store feelings in much the same way a battery stores charge. A battery is meant to store energy with the intention of using it to provide a flowing current to power something at a desired time. I hoped I'd be able to show off my technical skills but I remember very little from any of my Electrical Engineering classes. Plus, it was taking too long to understand those darn circuit diagrams I found online so you'll have to make do with a simple picture (more like I had a near panic attack just looking at them. Did I mention that I'd rather be a painter than practice my degree?).

At some point, even though it's still connected to a power source, that battery reaches full capacity and can no longer store any more charge until it is discharged (charge is released). Our stored emotions are charges that need to be released in order to make room for us to feel new things. If you are fully charged with anger, until you discharge, it will be difficult to feel love and joy and peace because there is simply no room for them as you have reached capacity.

I had to discharge my emotions and do it safely and completely. Why safely? Because these are charged emotions that can "shock" and hurt others that come in contact with them if not handled properly. Why completely? Because if you don't don't discharge your emotions completely from time to time, you reduce your capacity to experience healthy emotions and pass them along in a steady current. A healthy battery is one that fully discharges periodically because a battery's longevity is directly related to the level and duration of the stress inflicted, which includes charge, discharge and temperature.

Discharge Process

To discharge a battery, you simply unplug it from it's power source and connect it to a circuit so that it become a power source. With time, all it's stored energy is depleted and it is fully discharged. I'm not sure if you noticed but I'm not a battery so this simple process didn't quite work for me. This was my process.

All In My Feels

Yo! I had to let myself be in my feels. It was a scary thought but I knew I needed to let myself feel everything. The truth is I didn't even know what I felt because I hadn't allowed myself so far; it was much easier to numb and suppress. Now, this is where the safety comes in because I needed to frame how I felt and expressed these feelings. I knew I needed to get it out so I sat in my living room, placed a pillow in a chair and went for it...allowing everything I felt to be voiced. I think I was most surprised when I screamed at the pillow. Apparently I was very angry. This process allowed me to really express everything I felt to that pillow in an unfiltered way. I couldn't hurt the pillow's feelings or it's "body" so it was okay :) It was a draining experience and I immediately needed a nap afterwards.

 

Share the Load

Now that I'd expressed it, I felt better but I couldn't leave it there. I needed to find someone I trusted to talk through what I was feeling. I now knew that I felt anger and disappointment, amongst other things. That was a great first step. Now I needed to share what happened with someone and actually admit to feeling these emotions. I was admitting that I didn't have it all together, I was hurting and I needed help. Feeling loved and supported was the scaffolding I needed to keep building my life.

Work Through the Root Cause

Feeling and talking certainly helped in my healing process. My next step was to try to understand why I felt the things I felt. Was I angry at myself, him or both? Was I angry at God? Was I angry at my family or his? Was it one event or a culmination of things? I'm very process oriented so this was particularly cathartic for me. I asked God to search my heart and reveal things about myself to me that needed to change, I sought counsel from trusted advisors, and I did a lot of crying.

Make Decisions

Now that I understood more about what I was feeling and why, I was able to make decisions for my well being. One major decision was the decision to pray for him because it's hard to be harbor resentment towards someone while also wishing for blessings for them. I'll say more on this in my next post. I made other decisions that I'm still walking in today and have allowed me to fully live again.

Recharging

Now, I'm okay :) and even more important is that I'm okay with not being okay and have a system in place to feel all of my emotions, deal with them and then discharge them safely and completely. It's really a life long cycle!

It's okay that you're not okay. Unplug, discharge your emotions safely and completely, and make room for joy, peace, life, patience, sympathy, and love to take residence in your heart, to be stored up and ready to share with others.