Stop Suppressing Your Emotions: A Guide to Emotional Wellbeing

Have you ever apologized for feeling upset? Maybe you’ve told yourself, "I shouldn’t feel this way," or you’ve dismissed someone else’s emotions because they didn’t match what you thought they “should” be feeling.

Here’s the thing: None of your emotions (and I mean none) are “good” or “bad” or “acceptable vs unacceptable.” They just are. But when we start labeling them in this disempowering way, we disconnect from our true selves, block deeper relationships, and create emotional roadblocks that leave us feeling stuck and afraid of something as natural as how we feel. 

Why We Mislabel Emotions

We grow up hearing things like, “don’t be mad,” or, “you should be grateful.” This conditioning leads us to sort our feelings into tidy categories: Happy = good, sad = bad. But emotions are far more complex.

Marc Brackett (check out his book Permission to Feel here) offers a game-changing framework called RULER where emotions exist on a grid, with axes for pleasant vs. unpleasant and high vs. low energy. For instance, anger isn’t “bad” - it’s unpleasant and high-energy. Gratitude isn’t “good”- it’s pleasant and low-energy. This perspective helps us stop judging emotions and start understanding them instead. 

The Real Issue: How We Feel About Feeling

Most of the time, the problem isn’t the emotion - it’s how we react to it. For example, if you feel sad but then judge yourself for being “weak,” you’re piling shame onto sadness. And that’s what keeps you stuck.

The first step toward emotional intelligence is simple (even if it’s not so easy to begin with): Stop judging how you feel. Accepting your emotions as they are gives you the power to process them, rather than being controlled by them.

The Connection Between Self-Acceptance and Emotional Safety

Here’s another aspect to consider: If we judge our own feelings, we do the same to others, whether we realize it or not. But when you learn to accept your emotions, you create space for others to feel seen and heard.

This doesn’t mean you have to agree with someone’s feelings, but it does mean honoring them. If a loved one is hurt when you wouldn’t be, instead of saying, “I don't get why you'd feel that way,” try, “it’s okay to feel this, I want to understand you better.” That shift changes everything and builds trust. 

Wondering where to start?

1. Recognize when you’re labeling feelings as good or bad and shift the terminology to simply labeling the feeling itself, e.g. angry, sad, thankful, excited, peeved, exhausted. (Marc Brackett’s framework called RULER with the mood meter is super helpful for this). 

2. Shift to curiosity: Ask yourself what the emotion is telling you about your life and how you’re living it. 

3. Give yourself permission to feel, no matter how “messy” or “irrational” it seems.

The bottom line is, when you embrace all emotions without judgment, you unlock a deeper level of emotional freedom, for yourself and everyone around you. But it all starts with the self ;)

Disclaimer: I am not a medical professional. All the information and tips covered in this blog post are intended as guidelines that have worked for me personally. Always take your own health into consideration and consult with medical professionals as needed.