Read Aloud the Text Content

This audio was created by Woord's Text to Speech service by content creators from all around the world.

Text Content or SSML code:

Revealing Oneself Opening up to others is difficult. Most deep conversations stop because people are so afraid of digging deeper, don’t want to be nosy, or feel uncomfortable with the vulnerability being served to them on a plate. The true meaning of opening up is being honest and risking vulnerability by letting others know how you are truly feeling. Sharing our inner thoughts, feelings, and experiences can make us feel psychologically naked, vulnerable, and insecure for exposing your worst parts. A lot of us don’t open up because we’re afraid of what people will think if they see what’s really going on the inside. We are afraid that if someone finds out who we really are, they will reject us. By not being open with others, we're really saying we don't fully accept ourselves. We're denying ourselves that chance to speak out, to declare our inner thoughts and feelings. We self-reject before others are given the opportunity to do so. You call all your feelings stupid, irrational, selfish, dumb. Not presentable until the finished product is achieved to be displayed. Difficulty trusting others because I don’t feel comfortable showing parts of my self that are unpolished. Pity Reason for Therapy Desire is to get rid of this disturbing symptom or to achieve a certain goal. Therapy provides a safe space to get to know ourselves better, unravel past experiences and important life events and make sure they’re not negatively impacting the choices we’re making today. We are a psychic process which we do not control, or only partly direct. Self-Development: Wanting to explore their inner self to better understand themselves. Maybe so far life hasn’t panned out in the way they’d expected or maybe they’ve achieved everything they ever wished for but are starting to question what it was all for. Directionless: Many people come to therapy because they’re feeling lost, directionless or empty. Family and relationship issues: Family therapy and couple/relationship counselling can help you recover disturbed relationships with your partner, children or other family members. Loss: Handling the death of parents, spouse and even pets are devastating for many people. Job loss or break-up can impair a person’s daily functioning and shows withdrawal symptoms. Therapy provides a space for you to share your grief, tell your story and for your feelings to be validated. Emotional health Issues: Overwhelming and threatening your well-being. Experiencing too much of stress leads to breakdown and results in feelings of exhaustion, fatigue and depression which in turn affect work performance, relationships and physical health. Leading many times to addictions and depression. Depression: Increasingly overwhelming to perform activities that are part of their day today lives. They experience fatigue, and frequently have distress in managing their thoughts and feelings. Challenging habits and addictions: Associated with like anxiety, stress, sleep disorders and depression. Low self-esteem normally stems from childhood and can impact life across the board stemming from feeling of inadequacy. Phobias or excessive fear: Unrealistic or extreme fear of a specific situation, object, or setting. Some unusual and unfounded fears can create extensive problems in your life. Consecuences of Bottling Emotions Repression of emotions can cause anxiety, stress and depression. Repressed emotions refer to emotions that you unconsciously avoid. These differ from suppressed emotions, which are feelings you purposely avoid because you don’t know exactly how to deal with them. For the most part, people tend to repress strong emotions, especially those associated with discomfort or other unpleasant experiences. This includes emotions like: anger, frustration, sadness, fear and disappointment. Just like a physical wound may fester and become infected if left untreated, the accumulation of unaddressed emotions can lead to stress, anxiety, and depression. The increase in cortisol that comes with stress can lead to changes in heart rate, motivation, and sleep. Mental health issues can manifest physically as pain, fatigue, digestive issues and sleep problems. Biochemistry explains how emotions share real biochemical links with your nervous, endocrine, immune and digestive systems. We know, for example, that fear raises cortisol levels, and that chronic and persistent activation of this survival mechanism impacts health. Emotional detachment is an inability or unwillingness to connect with other people on an emotional level. Internally, they may have a raging fire of emotions, bringing on a range of psychological, physical, and social consequences. It produces difficulty creating or maintaining personal relationships, difficulty being loving or affectionate with a family members or friends and a reduced ability to express emotion. One of the hallmarks of self-sabotage and fear of intimacy is the inability to talk about your feelings and your problems. You avoid talking about these things because you want to avoid feeling the emotions so we ignore or deny the feelings. Fear of making someone else guilty or not being able to help me Emotional Vomit and Vulnerability The other issue people run into is using emotional vomit as a way to be vulnerable. Emotional vomit is when you suddenly unload an inappropriate amount of emotions and personal history onto a conversation, usually to the utter horror of the person listening. Emotional vomit is difficult because on the one hand, it is genuinely vulnerable, but on the other hand, it’s repellent and unattractive. In effect, you’re being open and authentic about how needy and pathetic you are. The difficulty with emotional vomit is that if you’re harboring a lot of neediness depicting a deeply troubled mind. The mistake people make with emotional vomit is that they expect the simple act of vomiting it out to suddenly fix their issues. But the point of emotional vomit is to make you aware of your issues, so you can fix them. Eventually, you have to become accountable for your own thoughts and feelings and work them out. Know what you want to say. Whilst it’s important to express our feelings, taking some time to digest before speaking on them is healthy. Journaling is a great way to get your thoughts down on paper before an emotional conversation. Sometimes one of the biggest reasons we shy away from speaking to people about our problems is that we don’t always know what we want to say. This lack of clarity can mean our thoughts get jumbled and never make it to our mouths. Expressive writing requires that we do more than simply report the facts of our experience or free-associate on any random subject that comes to mind. In order for writing to be transformative, we must include our thoughts, emotions, beliefs, and insights about our experience if we hope to reap the benefits. Benefits of Opening up Ordering thoughts and articulating them to someone else seems to make it more real, no longer just in our mind. Important emotional benefits. (Catharsis: the process of releasing, and thereby providing relief from, strong or repressed emotions.). True emotional connection requires honesty and trust. These elements entail a sense of vulnerability- you must be willing to show yourself to receive the benefits of intimacy. Vulnerability requires you to expose yourself emotionally and face rejection. Improved self-acceptance: Being vulnerable allows you to accept and embrace different aspects of yourself. This can foster great confidence, strength and authenticity. Being able to stand in moments in fear- to be courageous creates a sense of resilience in the face of challenging situations. It allows you to tackle life’s numerous obstacles more readily. Stronger relationships: Being vulnerable with others is a way to foster intimacy. It can deepen your compassion, empathy, and connection to others in your life. Identity Identity How can I learn to be honest with myself As Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living”. If we don’t take the time to get to know ourselves, our strengths and vulnerabilities, how will we ever know we’ve given life our best shot? The most important part of life is examining your choices and beliefs using rationality and determining if they are valid. This is the most important part of life and it is need to find purpose and value in life. You have to question and find the answers about life by yourself. If you don’t examine your life, then you are just going passively through life without any goals, dreams, enthusiasm, and purpose. You are just getting carried away, looking for fun and entertainment most of the time. You lack a sense of who you are. Happiness mostly depends on external factors. Not sure of what to do and what not to do. Have regrets and hopelessness from the past. A lot of time spent on TV, mobile, movies and social media. Dependence on opinions and advises of others. Don’t have any goals or plan in life. When a person examines, he becomes strategic about his life. There is progress in life. The focus is on personal development. Have clarity, values and internal compass. Competition with self. Happiness depends on personal decisions and choices. Have goals and vision for the future. The focus is on finding the unexplored potential, talents, and creativity. How to examine your life? Examining life means creating a self-map for life. What really matters most to you. What you want to do for yourself, parents, country and for the world. For this, you have to know yourselves, who you are. If you don’t create a map, you are directionless in life. The fundamental problem has nothing to do with your behavior or attitude. It has everything to do with not having a map. The map gives you an understanding of your location and destination. It means to know who you are, where you are now so that you move can ahead in the right direction.