How to release emotions

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I don't know if anyone else here is like me and doesn't really deal with emotions well... I'm guessing yes there are a few others who can relate.

Have you found any techniques that help you cope, that stop you getting wound up with stress?

I used to go for regular massages, but can't now due to covid restrictions. I'm really tense.

Thought this was an interesting web series. She recommends just dancing with abandon.

I play grindcore. Screaming and playing fast, frantic music helps with releasing emotions.

It kind of depends on the emotion. Sometimes I have a little ritual. Say a relationship is ending. I go deep into the artifacts and mementos of the relationship - letters, ticket stubs, etc. - and then I (safely) make a fire and burn that stuff up. This gives me an air of finality that I find helpful. The virtual or electronic equivalent would be deleting stuff and then emptying my trash. (I know there can be undelete operations, but I don't know how, so for me anyway, this is pretty final.)

If it's an angry emotion, I've outgrown my need for a violent display. I just let it convert into a slow burn, and then I try to distract myself. Eventually I will talk to my therapist about it. This is much superior that some of the things I used to do when I was younger.

I also have used massage a lot for stress relief, not so much for processing an emotion. I hope you can start that up again soon.

Being exhausted might help. Try weightlifting. Heavy weights.

I have a lot of trouble being tense for no reason, much in the same way as that therapist describes in the video, but I don't think it's from any actual trauma or bottled-up emotions. I did have trouble with chronically bottled-up emotions for most of my life, but I think that's in the past. Nowadays it's more like my body and brain are somehow "traumatized" by trivial things like the weather or by just plain existing, I guess.

Music is essential for me. Music that energizes me is usually the same kind that also calms me when I'm tense. Exercise can definitely help too (always with earbuds and loud music on), but for me it's complicated, because it has to be intense and it has to be at least half an hour to make a difference. It makes me feel better right away every time, but sometimes I get disproportionately sore and tired from it later on, and even more tense than before. I don't understand why that happens, so I haven't figured out yet how to avoid it.

I relate a lot to that. I'm always tense, but i dont know why. I was out for a walk today. I had sunglasses on, but I realised that I had screwed up my eyes anyway as if I wasn't wearing eye protection. I had to keep reminding myself to relax thw muscles around my eyes.

I should listen to music more. I've got out of the habit now that I've started listening to audio books nd podcasts before bed.

At massage school, I learned how to loosen up without a massage. Start off standing, and bend over as if to touch your toes. Then, let your whole upper body go limp, and wave it about gently from your hips. It also helps to do stretches, and to focus on your breath. For built-up anger, I ride a bike, but anything aerobic works. You have to burn off the adrenalin, as if the situation had been resolved with a fight or flight.

I do the same with my shoulders. Any time I think about my shoulders I realise they're tightened up or clenched. I have to consciously think about my shoulders to release tension. I also do a lot of things to release emotion but I don't know if any of it would work for you. I set up a pillow fort which really helps. I know I talk about it all the time but it's made a huge difference having a small cosy hide-away with soft fabrics and dim lights where I can stim or look at lava lamps and coloured light. I also do yoga every morning, and I watch relaxing videos with rain sounds. I watch a lot of nature videos which are made for cats. Paul Dinning's cat videos showing birds and squirrels are extremely therapeutic for me as well as my kitten, who sits on my chest and watches intently. For some reason I can never link Paul Dinning but you might want to check it out.

I do a lot of journalling for my trauma psychology homework. Stream of consciousness tends to get it all out my system whether I can name the emotion or not. Sometimes I just do long jot lists of topics ("Bad memories from childhood", "People who upset or hurt me in my life", "Things I want to improve on", etc). I keep them in Google Docs so I can go back and edit or add ideas whether I'm home on my laptop, out using my phone, or on another computer. No one can access it and I don't have to worry about people finding it in 50 years when I'm dead lol. I'm also writing a book which purges a lot of my trauma and my emotions in a constructive way. I don't care if it ever gets published, but the process is liberating.

Working with an Occupational Therapist online has also been very empowering because I learned to identify more of my feelings, which had been trapped and repressed because of Alexithymia and Interoception challenges. I highly recommend PTSD OT therapy for anyone who has difficulty with emotional release.

Come to think of it, a couple of months ago I was going for an hour-long walk every day (listening to music and/or podcasts). I think I stopped because I wanted to finish a long video game I was playing and the daily walk started to feel too inconvenient. Ironically though, right now I can barely even play video games because I just can't focus enough, and that daily walk could probably help with it. It doesn't do much for the "spontaneous tension" issue, but I think it helps with my sleep cycle. I guess it works sort of like a type of meditation.

This is one of my problems. I go off the rails for trivial/temporary reasons and then I just forget about it. Like, I don't necessarily forget that walking is a thing that I can do, but, mystifyingly, it just evades me entirely that it's something that I obviously should do.


Sometimes I end up listening to music before bed, but, considering the type of music I listen to, I really shouldn't...

Usually I watch an ASMR video before bed. I like "personal attention"-type ASMR but I usually prefer videos in foreign languages, because they're less distracting. Stuff like this one:



I watched a pretty interesting video about ASMR the other day btw, and one of the interesting things is that preliminary research seems to indicate that it actually causes a simultaneous stress reaction along with the relaxation in people who find it relaxing. Maybe that's something to do with that whole idea of "resetting your fight-or-flight response"?

when i was still able, i'd run around the track until i couldn't run anymore, then i'd go to the pool and do laps until i was exhausted.

Dealing with emotions has always been very difficult for me.

Recently I have been making a lot of progress though, thanks to a few discoveries I made.

Emotions happen as a complex interaction between our bodies and the less advanced areas of our brains. It is important to be able to feel the feelings in the body as this can give a window on what is happening that is separate from what I think cognitively about my emotions. Not understanding this caused me big problems.

Two things you can research that have been very useful for me:

Somatic Experiencing - A modality developed by Peter Levine that uses exactly this notion of working with the feelings in the body and allowing the patient to re-define the narrative their minds are telling them about what they feel.

Poly-Vagal Theory - By Steven Porges. A close friend of the above author, Dr Porges has developed a theory of how the various parts of the vagus nerve communicate between brain and body.

I had worked out my own (very basic) way of working with my emotions which was then confirmed (and enormously expanded) when I found these two authors. There are many, many videos online from these two and from practitioners of these methods. They are largely focused on trauma, which is my biggest problem, but this applies to all of life.

I hope this helps. It certainly did for me.
Good luck and don't give up hope.
You are not your emotions.

That was very interesting. Yes I like ASMR as well. My favourites are Goodnight Moon and Gentle Whispering ASMR. I started a thread about it here a year or so ago and didn't get many replies.

@Dear_one
That self massage technique is interesting. I will look into it. Thanks.

Speaking of massages without a masseuse, this is a pretty good ASMR pretend massage.

I've been thinking about booking some somatic experiencing therapy sessions. There are a few therapists in my city.

Researching it is how I found the channel of the therapist I posted in the OP. I've been following her uploads for a couple of months now.

I had some therapy years ago that centred on the mind-body connection and I found it very useful. It was the first time I became aware of how unaware I am of my emotions.

A few of you have mentioned exercise. I think that is half of my problem at the moment. Due to lockdown I can't go to the gym anymore. The leisure centre is on my bus route home. I had a nice routine where I would stop in after work and do an exercise class like Pilates or Zumba. Anything more intense is too much for my health to cope with. I have M.E./Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and I become inflamed too easily.

I've been trying to keep up with a Pilates routine at home, but it's not the same. I get lazy and don't do it.

Here's 2 good channels I've found if anyone is interested:

Yes, my shoulders are always tight.

I had a good therapist over 10 years ago who I can't track down now. I don't know if she has moved away or what. I mentioned this briefly in another comment. She got me to keep a diary of moments when I was feeling unwell to help me identify triggers and then work with ways to overcome the triggers or handle them better.

It was a long time ago, I can't remember what triggers they were, but she encouraged me rather than rest, do something good, like the things you have mentioned. My go to was drawing. Which is why I think I should take it up again. She also encouraged me to talk to others. This forum has helped me a lot to put things into words.

Something she was good at was guessing what physical symptoms I was having if I was describing how I felt. I had problems associating the two and how the mind and body connect. I could say that my arms hurt, but not know how that connected with feelings, actually that's not a good example, I still don't. She wasn't that specific in saying, this pain means that feeling is happening. More like, you are explaining how you feel about this, does your throat feel tight? I would say yes. She said, "that is a common feeling".

I like to release my emotions by working on my hobbies.