Feeling Feelings

A week or so ago, I was asked what I wanted most out of life. My answer was "Joy".

Then, I was asked if I had that.
I said no.
Had I ever had that?
No.

So then, I was asked to describe what no joy was like. It took me a few seconds to put it into words. But the best description I could muster was that it is an emptiness. It's like the black hole in space. I huge, dark void of nothingness. A vacuum with no light and no air where nothing can be seen, felt or touched.

I didn't realize until a little later how much I hated that conversation. It opened up a whole bunch of feelings that I work really hard not to feel.

I have spent the vast majority of my life trying to keep feelings as tied up and locked down as a pit bull at a kindergarten convention. The only way I can function is if whatever feelings I have are dumped in the ground, with cement poured on top of them.

The only thing feelings have ever brought me are pain, anger and disappointment. It isn't that I can't feel emotions or don't feel emotions. It's that nothing good has ever come of the feelings and emotions I have. The pain and unhappiness is crippling.

In the last year, I have had some very smart and caring people tell me over and over that I need to let the feelings happen, that I need to confront them, feel them, and that only by actually having them can I get past the point of pain and start moving toward joy. I tried that. I felt the feelings. I let them happen. I talked about them and I let the emotions happen. I fought back the tears and tried to understand how feeling the pain could move me out of pain.

It isn't happening. The only thing the feelings and emotions have brought me are more unhappiness and disappointment. I can't open myself up to that anymore.

I need to close the door on the feelings. The problem is, once you allow them in, it's a lot harder to force them out. So, I'm leaning hard on the door, pushing with all my might, to fight them and defeat them and make my way back to that black hole.

And while there might be no joy in a vacuum, there is no pain either.