this post was submitted on 15 Feb 2026
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I've been going through a lot recently. Multiple jobs, bills piling up, and my current relationship is falling apart. I want to cry. To bawl my eyes out and scream at the top of my lungs. But I can't. It feels like there's a wall between me and my emotions. Anyone else deal with this?

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[–] SenK@lemmy.ca 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It’s just getting your locked up nervous system to cooperate. Kinda like pushing a car to start it up.

This right here!!!! Humanity has this artificial divide between mind and body as if your brain was somehow not connected to every part of you. I've spoken with people who couldn't understand the very question "how does sadness feel in your body". They would explain they thought person x had been mean and that made think it was wrong and that made them think they should do something yap yap yap but never actually answering the question. It's especially true for men and that's incredibly sad.

[–] Voidian@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago)

I think people not being able to answer "how does it feel" questions is partly due to the cultural quirk where "what do you think" is replaced with "how do you feel". Meaning even the asker is in fact posing the question as "what do you think", rather than inviting actual reflection on one's emotional state. Think of TV interviews for example.

I also suspect that there's a subtle desire to make the answer a bit more inarguable. Because it's socially acceptable to argue about one's thinking. Less so about feelings. "All feelings are valid" is taken to mean that anything that follows the phrase "I feel..." is automatically true and you're not allowed to disagree. Which is precisely what the "all feelings are valid" is not about. "All feelings are valid" points to the subjective experience of an emotional state. A war veteran freaking about fireworks is valid. A war veteran saying fireworks mean they are actually getting bombed is not. Rape victim feeling insecure when walking alone is valid. Rape victim saying everyone's trying to rape them is not. A highly nuanced and volatile issue which people really want to reduce into very simple dogmas.