A Safe Space For Emotional Dumping

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Have you ever heard the term, emotional dumping? Likely, you have experienced it. This is when someone, simply put, “dumps their emotions” on you. It’s more than likely, that you have been both the giver and the receiver of such emotional dumps.

You’re human, after all.

Therapy sessions are great for this. Therapists are being paid to listen to you process your emotions. The good ones will help you find a way through it, so you can not only process, but eventually let go.

Some people are the therapist, for the family. Dumping grounds, for the emotions of others. I was one of them. I was the “fixer” in my family. The sensitive child, the empath who couldn’t handle the big emotions around me and needed to fix what everyone else had going on.

They would tell me all their problems, and I would listen and come up with solutions, or burn myself down to “make” them feel better. I would carry their stress along with me, not realizing that they wanted nothing to do with my solutions. They just needed to take a dump.

Dumpers who want nothing to do with solutions are a problem, but they aren’t the only problem. They must be enabled to continuously be dumping.

Dumpees need to put up boundaries. They need to hang up the phone. They need to excuse themselves politely and give the dumper a nice little “you’ve got this” pat on the back, and then let go.

Confiding in someone when you are going through a uniquely challenging experience is not the same thing as emotional dumping. We should all hope to have someone we can support in their time of need and be supportive by.

Emotional dumping occurs often and is cyclical. This is when the same people dump the same problems repeatedly. They circle around the same scenario until they squeeze the life force out of themselves and others.

It’s a horrible habit and is ruled by the frantic ego mind and the trauma patterns one holds in their body. And often, it’s unconscious.

Some of the worst forms of emotional dumping however, is that which we do to ourselves.

It’s when our thoughts concoct the tornado of fear in our minds and we are in constant chaos. It’s circling every horrible scenario and feeling that comes through repeatedly.

It is the incessant shame, guilt, fear, and worries we cannot let go of. This type of emotional chaos we put ourselves through is highly toxic and negatively impacts our life in every way imaginable.

It took consistent meditation for me to be able to recognize when my thoughts were creating chaos for me. And my trusty journal became the most important tool in my kit, for processing and releasing my emotions.

This is what we want. We want to recognize the thoughts and emotions and move through them, not stuff them down or circle back again and again. My journal has proven time and again to be the most effective way to let out what was inside of me, without causing any collateral damage.

Just last night I was in a rare state of waking from a dead sleep, to find some current fears having taken hold. I was tossing and turning as the thoughts were manically spinning my brain and torquing my body. I felt so frustrated by them and the feelings they were producing, that I instinctively tried to push them away.

I tried to breathe. I tried to relax. They just kept surfacing.

Then I reminded myself. They must move out.

Emotions and feelings cannot be stuffed away forever. We may think they can, but all that does is create tension in the body. And they’re still there. Lingering like a stalker.

After almost an hour of this, I turned on my nightlight, reached for my journal and pen (I highly recommend keeping these bedside), and let them all out.

I wrote out everything that was scaring me in frantic scribbles. I continued writing all the worrisome thoughts and worst-case scenarios, until it felt like I had completed the dump. And only then, could I finally rest again.

As soon as I put my pen and journal away after successfully transcribing every horrible thought I had, I felt at ease in my body and mind.

The beauty of a journal is that you can write out the things that you wouldn’t or couldn’t say aloud. Those need to get out of you. The ones that if you said them out loud, would sound completely crazy, and would make you feel crazy for saying them. They need out.

A journal is such a safe space for emotional dumping. We all have our own stuff we are going through. These thoughts, they just want to be acknowledged. And often, I find that after acknowledging all the worries and fears and getting them out – a higher voice finds me.

And then I’m suddenly writing solutions. Or logical sentences that free me of the burdens I carry. I realize the things I have no control over, and I can surrender.

Your peace is back there, behind the noise.

Our wise soul self is patiently waiting behind all the swirling thoughts. It is the voice that puts you at ease and offers you faith, hope, and guidance. It will never shout at us to get a word in. It will never chastise us for not listening.

It will peacefully wait for us to quiet the storm, so we can hear the truth.

Check out my post, Emotions are Energy in Motion – Let Them Move