Uptown Girls

What I've been talking about up until now can be illustrated using a popular movie. In Uptown Girls, Molly Gunn lost her parents in a plane crash when she was almost 8 years old. Her father, Tommy Gunn, wrote and sang a song called Molly Smiles in his last concert before he died. He wrote it for his daughter, immortalizing her beautiful smile. But after her mother and father died, she was never able to be truly happy again and she lost her smile. For 16 years, she ran away from the grief over her parent's deaths. She drowned herself in addictive, impulsive, and completely intoxicating romantic relationships. Throwing herself into these codependent love affairs allowed her to focus on her boyfriends' lives so that she didn't have to face her own life. She was able to remain eight years old emotionally until her 22nd birthday when her inheritance got stolen. She was forced to go out into the adult world and get her first job. She found herself  nannying an eight-year-old girl, the same age as Molly's emotional self.
This girl named Lorraine, or Rae, was dealing with the loss of her own parents. Her workaholic mother neglected Rae, leaving her to raise herself. Her father was kept in the house's library where he lay in a coma after experiencing a massive stroke. As a coping mechanism, Rae was constantly angry so that she didn't have to feel sad about losing her own parents. Molly explained that when her own parents died, things just became a blur. Molly ran away to Coney Island Amusement Park when she was 8 years old, where she got on the teacup ride and her world spun around and around. She got off the ride physically but never emotionally. She kept the world in a blur with her sex addiction and hiding from the adult world like Rae was keeping her life in a blur by constantly being angry and hiding behind sunglasses. Later, in the movie, she gets back on the teacup ride physically with Rae. In doing this, Molly picks up emotionally where she left off. The two girls were only then able to face their emotions and finally heal.

Facing our feelings

So many of us are afraid to feel. We fear we are weak if we cry.  In truth, not crying makes us weaker. In Shania Twain's program on the Oprah Winfrey network, she talks about not allowing herself to cry after her husband ran off to marry her best friend. She was so afraid to cry that her throat literally became choked up and she lost her ability to sing.

 Also, we fear we may lose our friends if we express any emotion other than happiness. So we play along, pretending to be someone we are not just to be accepted. In truth, we can never get close to people who don't allow themselves to be known. Many of us are so scared to feel that we are strangers even to ourselves. I was afraid to feel growing up because I was taught emotions are bad and must be swept under the rug. It wasn't until I was 19 years old that I began to acquaint myself with who I was emotionally.

 In society, we are told to feel ashamed of feeling. Women are mocked for being  "too emotional"; "shrinks" are for people who are "crazy" and that  talking about your feelings is for "sissies."  

Feeling the yellow brick road to freedom

I find that I often tell myself that it is a big responsibility having a human brain. I have experienced traumas and joys, surprises and sorrows just like all of you have. Growing up, I was made to feel like a second-class citizen. It's as if I wasn't worthy of living a fulfilling life. When I left my parents' house at the age of 22, I was one big lump of pain. I was so burned out mentally and emotionally, that if I did not flop myself on my bed and rest, I was going to have a nervous breakdown. During this crisis in my life, I was given the most amazing gift. Do you know what that gift was? It was the most powerful impulse to pick up a pen and begin writing down my feelings. This soon evolved into thinking about my feelings; then, eventually, to speaking about them. Over the next 10 years, I would meet some of the wisest, kindest people in my quest to work through my problems so that I could try to mend my broken heart and my bruised spirit. I am recovered today because I had the courage to stare my problems in the face and, consequently, shape myself into the person I have always wanted to become.

An American Epidemic

There is an epidemic in America. It takes many forms and has many faces. It creeps in at night when our guard goes down and haunts us during long, tiring work days. Some of us drink alcohol to drown its cries. And then there are those of us who snort white powder to be transported to a world free from it. We fear it with all of our being without realizing peace can be brought by embracing it. What we must embrace is our ability to feel emotion. The epidemic that I speak of is our refusal to feel.

We are endowed with beautiful powerful brains that allow us to think practically and experience the world around us. We were given five senses
 with which to explore our environments socially and intellectually. At the heart of all of our experiences is the ability to feel emotion. From the moment of birth, we begin our journey:  joy, happiness, relief, satisfaction, boredom, feeling "blah", sadness, anger, frustration, and pain.  Emotion is at our core, in every cell of our body, and in every drop of our blood . We feel whether we want to or not.  It makes us who we are as people and shapes our lives . It protects us by guiding us down the paths we pursue.   It is a tool that is there for us not only to use and enjoy , but also to teach us lessons.