The Ocean Within

The “positive vibes only” mindset is destroying our mental health. Let me explain.

We are oceans walking around in human form. 

Inside each of us swells an ever-changing sea of emotions – joy, sadness, fear, anger, love – rising and falling in response to the weather of our lives. Yet somehow we've learned to believe that only certain waves belong in our waters.

Emotions, like waves, follow a natural pattern. They form, they gather strength, they crest, and then, inevitably, they return to the vastness from which they came.

This is their nature. This is their wisdom.

But what happens when we see a wave of fear or sadness forming on our horizon and decide, "Nope. Not this one”?

We build seawalls. We create barriers. We turn our backs and pretend not to notice the gathering swell. We tell ourselves, "I shouldn't feel this way" or "I need to get over this." or “Everything is fine.”

But you cannot stop a wave by ignoring it.

When we dam an emotion, it doesn't disappear. It builds pressure. The wave that could have risen, crested, and returned to the sea in its own time now becomes a persistent tide, repeatedly testing our defenses, searching for a way through the walls we've constructed.

Think of the emotion you've been avoiding. Has suppressing it made it vanish? Or does it keep washing up on your shore, sometimes when you least expect it?

The alternative is both simpler and more courageous: to grab your surfboard and paddle out to meet the wave.

To say, "I see you, fear. Welcome back, grief. Hello my old friend, anger."

When we turn toward an emotion rather than away from it, we allow its natural journey. We sit with it, feeling its presence grow stronger. The emotion may intensify, like a wave that must crest before it breaks. 

But after the crest, emotions crash and then naturally begin to recede. We return to calmer waters not because we conquered the wave, but because we allowed it to complete its cycle. 

Like a wave returning to the ocean, a fully experienced emotion doesn't disappear – it becomes reintegrated into the wholeness of who we are.

The sadness that flows through us becomes part of our capacity for compassion. 

The anger fully expressed transforms into clarity about our boundaries. 

The fear acknowledged blossoms into prudence and wisdom.

What might happen if, today, you paddled toward the very feeling you've been swimming away from?