every therapist, every counselor, every mentor, every teacher has told me not to hide my emotions. I think this is because for years and years, I did keep things to myself, in such stifling quantities that when the dam finally burst (at the age of 19, in the middle of tech for my very first show), I broke down so completely that I picked up my things, left school, and went home for nine months. And hid.
but my therapist urged me. "You can't keep hiding how you feel. You can't keep feeling ashamed, or guilty, or embarrassed, about your emotions." Talking to her about all the things I felt got easier with time, and I realized that I did start to feel better for the talking. It felt like receiving absolution. As the months and years passed, I progressively stopped hiding, and let people into my life, in a more emotional sense. I even learned how to still remain calm and relatively emotionless and untroubled at work, and not let that accidentally impede on whatever openness I was cultivating in my personal life.
mostly, being open earns me praise. My later therapists enjoyed seeing me, and could often give me sound advice, because I could speak openly and honestly about my life and my reactions to it. I was an asset in group therapy, because I set a good example and made other girls in the group less self-conscious about speaking frankly on difficult topics. The more I could talk, to share how I felt, the more advice and help I could receive. Nothing about me was a mystery to them. I had no poker face.
Life, however, is not all therapy, and I'm now faced with the question: were they all wrong?
I'm discovering that maybe my level of openness is inappropriate. Maybe there are things better left unsaid. It had never really occurred to me that my frankness could be a burden to other people - maybe because I never felt burdened when other people were open with me about whatever troubled them. Maybe because I scared myself so badly when the pendulum was swung in the other direction, and I never wanted to feel that way again.
when I think about it, I think I pretend that being open about my problems and my emotions is the end solution. "Oh, I can talk about it, so clearly I'm dealing with it." Or that being open about it even excuses some of the behavior - like, "oh, that's just how Kate is, hahaha." But I'm not dealing with it, and it just isn't who I am. I enjoy being open but there is a time and place for it - I'm not this inappropriate. Worse, I'm glancing at all my problems sideways, and I can't do that anymore. Because I'm not hurting just myself anymore by doing that - I'm hurting people I love.
It's time to face things head-on, with a big, brilliant smile on my face.
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