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Not too long ago, a friend of mine told me I am ‘over-emotional’ – I care too much and as a result, tend to get hurt a lot. To be fair, I have always taken it as half compliment-half offensive depending on the situation. ‘Compliment’ because there were times when I was given credit for being emotionally stable and understanding of other’s sorrow and ‘offensive’ because of those numerous times when I didn’t have control over how it should flow out of my heart and mind.
No, I am not calling him out or those countless people who think women are “too emotional” and believe that’s a bad thing. I am here to explain why their thought process is wrong and I am right. Most of the times it is considered a weird comment just about any of our other traits but I can assure you that it is not. This is one of many traits that an individual possesses and comes off as someone who experiences life to the fullest way possible. Having emotions regarding the smallest of things is a positive thing. Emotional intelligence makes us good humans. Teaches us things about life. The ideas of soulful caring, real commitments, empathy and of course our innate ability to love selflessly makes us great companies. Being emotional is a good thing. Let me explain why.
- Our feelings are our biggest strengths and after all these years I have made peace with myself over how to positively use the traits of being ‘emotional’ ‘sensitive’ and ‘over-caring’ in my life. There is a reason that people have emotions. There is a reason why emotional people have been known to be some of the kindest souls on earth. Hence our emotions help us thrive to understand life — to take actions, strike, fight back and survive.
- We are always true to ourselves and can never fake our feelings. When we are happy w are ‘genuinely’ happy and when we are sad, we are really sad.
- We don’t bottle things up and hence we are not at risk of exploding with all our thoughts and feelings inside. There were times where I was taken for granted for just being a nice person who would tend to attend to other people’s issues and sorrows but it is also easier for us to just connect with people. In fact ‘emotionless’ people would actually look for us at the end of the day to confine their heart if they ever need to. Thus I have portrayed strength and resilience and never weakness while still being over caring and full of emotions.
- We don’t make others uncomfortable and can relate to a spectrum of emotions that people portray throughout the society. In fact in a world full of cruelties, our sound emotions are what makes us kind and understanding.
- We care a lot. It could be a little weird to get invested in every little thing but hey we give our heart and soul to people who need support — both emotionally and mentally.
- We love and give too much and are compassionate people. Someone needs to please explain why being compassionate is not a bad thing and how it is one of the virtues our parents teach us from an early age. We can be selfless and effortlessly give in way more than people expect but we also never let people down.
- We empathize with others and hence understand multiple parties at the same time. Yes, psychologists and psychiatrists fall in this group who can process the hundreds and thousands of emotions.
- Highly sensitive beings are keenly self-aware as well. Yes, we know what triggers us, what makes us sensitive, what hurts us the most and how we should react. We know it all!Hence, my conclusion is despite getting hurt and disappointed numerous times, ‘caring too much’ or being ‘emotional’ aren’t weaknesses after all — these are strengths that very few people possess. I am just glad that I am one of them.
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Previously published on medium.com and is republished here permission.
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Photo credit: Rainier Ridao on Unsplash