Emotional Constipation
Emotional suppression! We all know it. We’ve got our go to tools: hiding, eating, humour, shopping, scrolling – great stuff. But what happens when we’re in a live situation? What happens when the charge of emotional energy suddenly and intensely rears its head?
If we feel – or have a conditioned story – that “it’s not safe for this energy to be here right now”, the body will start to brace to try to protect itself. In this bracing, chronic health issues are seeded. Stress hormones like cortisol are released and evidence points to increased risk of cardiovascular, immune function, and gastrointestinal issues – to name a few.
The body becomes emotionally constipated. Keeping it down doesn’t work for our long term well-being.
The jaw and throat play a big part in keeping it down, in this constipation. Think jaw clenching, coughing and swallowing a lot, lump in the throat, not speaking, or even making a sound.
When expressing our emotional authenticity, our facial expression and our voice – being seen and heard respectively – is pivotal. This includes nonverbal and emotive sounds.
The jaw opening/relaxing for facial expression and the throat vibrating to make sound and communicate are key. Both are hard to do when braced tight. The throat is also the pathway of our breath. A pathway, therefore, of ease or constriction for life, for oxygen, blood flow, bodily function and feeling.
The story “it’s not safe for this energy to be here right now”, often comes from the potential threat of loss of connection – fear of rejection, shame, exile, and survival. Over time, however, the scales between authenticity and connection can become over indexed on connection. And so we lose authenticity in the process… we lose ourselves.
If we keep betting on black, doubling down on the strategy of sacrificing authenticity for perceived connection – of suppressing our truth and emotions to try to feel safe – our body will start to shut down under the bracing. Moreover, we can't genuinely connect with anyone as they aren't able to really know us.
What is emotional intelligence? A pillar includes making space for things come up and out. Choosing an empowered strategy for feeling, for authentically relating to self and others.
