“Although many of us may think of ourselves as thinking creatures that feel, biologically we are feeling creatures that think.” –Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, neuroscientist and author of My Stroke of Insight.

Stupid, sappy, mushy, melodramatic, insipid, tiresome, wimpy, lame. These are all words that I have heard people use to describe their own emotions.

As a psychologist, I see in our society a poor tolerance for something that’s a deeply personal, biological part of who we are as humans: our emotions. Indeed, if you grew up in one of the many, many households where emotion was discouraged or poorly tolerated (childhood emotional neglect), you may now, as an adult, have a negative connotation to feelings of all kinds. You may see emotions as a sign of weakness.

You may hide your feelings from yourself and others, even the people you care about the most. You may regard the expression or sharing of feelings as maudlin, illogical, or just plain useless. You may have no idea what you feel or why, because you have buried your emotions so deeply, even from yourself.

This is childhood emotional neglect, and it is not about anything your parents did to you. Instead, it’s about what didn’t happen for you, the acceptance of your feelings that you needed and did not get. Most emotionally neglectful parents are doing their best, and many were raised in the very same way. It is so often no one’s fault. But when you grow up this way, you learn to treat your own emotions as a problem to manage away, rather than the gift they actually are.

Why We Have Emotions at All

Why did emotion evolve in the first place? Sometimes, especially to emotionally neglected people, emotions feel like a burden. Wouldn’t it be better if we didn’t have to feel sad when we had a conflict with a friend, angry when someone cuts us off in traffic, or anxious before a job interview? On the surface, maybe it would seem easier if we didn’t have to feel those things. But I believe that if we didn’t have emotions, life would not be better. In fact, it would not be sustainable.

Emotion is necessary for survival. Emotions tell us when we are in danger. They tell us when to run, when to fight, and what is worth fighting for. Emotions are our body’s way of communicating with us and driving us to do things. Here are some examples of the purposes of just a few emotions.

9 Emotions and Their Specific Functions

• Fear tells us to escape for self-preservation.
• Anger pushes us to fight back, for self-protection.
• Love drives us to care for spouses, children, and others.
• Passion drives us to procreate, create, and invent.
• Hurt pushes us to correct a situation.
• Sadness tells us we are losing something important.
• Compassion pushes us to help others.
• Disgust tells us to avoid something.
• Curiosity drives us to explore and learn.

You get the idea. For every emotion, there is a purpose. Emotions are incredibly useful tools to help us adapt, survive, and thrive.

Notice that some of these are feelings you would rather not have. Fear, anger, hurt, sadness. They are uncomfortable for a reason. But uncomfortable is not the same as useless. Often, the feelings you most want to push away carry the most important messages of all, because they are the ones warning you, protecting you, or telling you that something matters to you.

People who were emotionally neglected in childhood were trained to try to erase, deny, push underground, and in some cases, be ashamed of this invaluable built-in feedback system. Because they are not listening to their emotions, they may be operating at a disadvantage compared to the rest of us. Pushing away this vital source of information can make you vulnerable and potentially less productive. It also makes it harder to experience life to its fullest.

More Than Survival

Emotions do more, though, than drive us to do things. They also feed the human connections that give life the depth and richness that make it worthwhile. It is this depth and richness that I believe provides the best answer to the question, “What is the meaning of life?” Emotional connections to others help us stave off feelings of emptiness as well as existential angst.

This is why so many emotionally neglected people, who have spent years cut off from their own feelings, describe a quiet sense of emptiness even when their lives look full from the outside. The richness is missing because the feelings that create it have been walled off. The good news is that those feelings are not gone. They are waiting on the other side of the wall.

You and Your Feelings

If you have spent a lifetime trying to deny your natural, biological emotional responses, you may at times feel disconnected, empty, or unfulfilled in life. The people who love you may find you distant, self-contained, or aloof. You may find yourself irritable or angry more often than you would like.

Where to Begin

If any of this rings a bell, please know that your emotions are not gone. They have simply been pushed underground, and they can be welcomed back.

Start small. Several times a day, pause and ask yourself, “What am I feeling right now?” You may draw a blank at first. Ask anyway. When a feeling does come, try to put one word to it, and let it tell you what it is there for. If it feels like too much to do on your own, a therapist who understands emotional neglect can help you find your way back to your feelings.

Over time, as you listen to your emotions instead of pushing them away, your emotions can become what they were always meant to be. Not something sappy or weak, but a source of information, energy, and connection that helps you live your life to the fullest.

A version of this post also appears on emotionalneglect.com.

© Jonice Webb, Ph.D.