My eldest child graduated recently and I travelled to attend the graduation ceremony.
I left the shores of Nigeria with excitement spiced with anxiety; excitement that I am finally a mother of a graduate and I arrived safely with anxious thoughts of how the day would pan out.
I haven’t been to many graduation ceremonies since I graduated and I found the ceremony to be highly organized. Gowns and invitations (4 per person) had to be picked at least 2 days before the event.
The certificates were given to them as they called them up the stage (Mine were ready 10 years after I graduated) and not one phone rang during the 2 1/2 hours long ceremony. We were encouraged to cheer and shout when our graduates were called (some people rang a bell and blew vuvuzela) and immediately after the ceremony we could frame the certificate and take official pictures for a fee. It was so organized, clearly everything had been thought out and planned for.
It was however, a bittersweet event and though I didn’t plan to, I found myself weeping when her name was called.
They were tears of joy, of seeing a dream come true, of remembering the many sacrifices that were made to ensure she got quality education, tears of relief that she made good of her opportunities, that I don’t have to think of school fees for her anymore, tears of gratitude that she didn’t have to drop out of school due to lack of finances because her father died in her final year or due to her inability to cope following the emotional distress of his death and finally that of sadness, sadness that her father wasn’t around to see the day we had both been looking forward to for many years.
As can be imagined, this one event, subjected me to different emotions both good and bad. It’s been confirmed that we humans cannot stop our emotions from being triggered, as they originate from the middle section of our brain that is not under our conscious control. It goes without saying that a lot of times we act based on the particular emotion we are feeling per time or as a result of emotions bottled over time.
I have found out that it is very important to acknowledge each and every emotion whether good or bad. Whilst it is natural to revel in the good emotions, we tend to avoid painful or conflicting emotions.
I have found healing and growth as a person by acknowledging my emotions especially the bad ones like envy, asking myself why I feel the emotions- self discovery and giving myself the freedom to feel those emotions without any guilt. I actually talk to myself telling myself, ‘Tara so you are envious about the fact that your friend just bought a new car, okay it’s okay to be envious, I give you 5 minutes to go through the emotions and then you can stop being envious.’
I have found that once I do that the feeling dissipates and doesn’t return. However, if I avoid it by not acknowledging it, it tends to resurface from time to time growing in its intensity and lasting for much longer than the fleeting thought it once was.
When we are taught about the automatic nature of emotions and learn to identify and work with the core emotions beneath our anxiety, we feel and function better.
The advantages abound and the main one is that we tend to understand ourselves better, know what triggers our actions and moods, and are more in control of ourselves and our choices.
Finally, when we acknowledge our negative emotion, it tends to lose its destructive power. Pushing against and avoiding a negative emotion is futile (it just resurfaces in other ways) and dangerous (we give it time to be stronger and lethal)
If we accept our negative emotions they will run their course in due time and leave us with more time to enjoy the positive ones. Today, I am proud, excited, relieved and joyous all at the same time and I totally deserve to be and don’t feel any guilt for my bright smiles and happy heart.