Have you ever felt as though some emotions have more value than others? Or some feelings don’t have any value at all?
Well whether you believe it or not, emotions—in all of their complexities—are an essential part of the human experience, each serving a purpose and carrying value. While joy and love are often celebrated, emotions like sadness, anger, anxiety, fear, and disgust are just as important.
As we navigate through life, being happy all the time may not be real happiness. If you are joyful all the time, do you really feel joy? No matter what you do, who you are, or where you live, at some point, you will have to allow yourself to feel emotions, not just the ones that you feel most comfortable with.
A deeper dive into embracing and valuing these emotions, are examples in the movie Inside Out (2015) by Pete Docter. When the emotions, joy & sadness leave the emotions control center by accident, and into the rows of disregarding core memories into the dump, the main character (Riley), is stuck to only feeling the senses of anger, disgust, and fear without joy and sadness.
Previously in the movie and for most of the film, Joy shuts out sadness time and time again, because she simply does not want to see Riley sad. Joy suppresses Sadness because she believes
Riley should always be happy. But as the movie unfolds, Joy realizes that a lot of Riley’s happiest memories were preceded by moments of sadness, showing that sorrow allows for deeper connections and emotional growth. An example of this is, when Riley loses one of her hockey games and feels down, her parents are friends and comfort her, which essentially strengthens her relationships.
Likewise, Anger helps Riley stand up for herself, Fear keeps her safe by preventing reckless decisions, and Disgust protects her from harmful things, like eating spoiled food. Each emotion plays a crucial role in her development, proving that all emotions; even the unpleasant ones, have value and contribute to a balanced, healthy life.
But when Joy and Sadness run into Riley’s old friend Bing Bong, sadness comforts Bing Bong when he feels a sense of sadness and feels like Riley is done with him. As Joy watches this happen, she realizes sadness is a crucial part of Riley’s life too. When Bing Bong takes a seat and starts to cry, Joy makes funny faces at him trying to cheer him up but also trying to distract him from the sadness he’s feeling in the moment.
When Sadness takes a seat next to Bing Bong, she allows him to talk to her and hears him out for his feelings. Unlike Joy, Sadness sits there and allows Bing Bong to share his feelings and embrace what he feels she’s done with him, instead of trying to distract him from what he’s feeling in the moment. He then hugs Sadness and says “I’m okay now” because he allowed himself to feel the sadness and connected with Sadness on a level to feel a sense of comfort.
These emotions are just as important, providing insight, motivation, and a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world around us. Rather than viewing certain emotions as “good” or “bad”, recognizing their significance allows us to navigate life more effectively, creating resilience, empathy, and personal growth. By embracing all emotions we gain a richer, more authentic connection to ourselves and others.
It is extremely powerful and critical to allow yourself to feel all emotions, instead of just shutting them out and feeling the ones most convenient to you. Allow yourself to feel, to move on, to grow through, to get over, and to thrive in everyday life.
