Maybe at some point you started crying because emotions took hold of you and you couldn’t help it, and not only that, you couldn’t stop your tears, it can also be that irritation or anger has led you to an intense emotional outburst that is These experiences are part of the phenomenon known as emotional catharsis.
Emotional catharsis is a process in which our emotions manifest themselves in the purest way, so it is usually part of situations in which discomfort is very intense, precisely because it is an intense expression of emotion, for many people it is often disturbing and I even think that catharsis is dangerous.
- Despite being quite outrageous.
- An emotional catharsis process is never dangerous.
- But it has a liberating function.
- It helps us to know and express what we feel.
- Taking us beyond the intellectualization of the adverse situations we are experiencing.
- We put the repression aside and really started expressing all the emotional deluge we kept inside.
The expression of emotions is never dangerous, the dangerous is to contain or deny them, because in this case they imprison us instead of liberating us and living the world in all its intensity.
One of the main concerns that we usually have when we first resort to psychological therapy is that emotional catharsis invades us and we cannot make sense of our own discourse, but, in most cases, what is sought in a therapeutic process is the recognition and validation of emotions, in order to identify the experiences that cause us discomfort.
In fact, catharsis was a process sought and used by Sigmund Freud at the beginning of psychoanalysis, in his case, hysteria being a disease of traumatic origin, Freud used hypnosis to achieve an emotional purification or catharsis that would release trauma, facilitating expression. of the repressed emotions and experiences that caused the symptoms.
When emotions block or paralyze, when you’ve stayed strong and incorruptible in life’s most unpleasant situations and suddenly you no longer give up or flow, seek help coping with these experiences and emotions through catharsis and its consequences.
But it is not only within psychoanalysis that catharsis becomes an important therapeutic element, in the psychodrama of authors like Moreno catharsis is the goal of group therapy, in this case what is desired is the development of conflict that led us to therapy.
Every emotional expression, even if it manifests abruptly as can happen with catharsis, must be recognized and never censored. Consider emotions to be part of us, an extra part that gives us the essence that makes us who we are.
A process of catharsis or emotional explosion does not weaken us, it makes us human, it teaches us that the purest emotional experience is the first step in integrating and understanding the pain that exists in our lives.
In addition, emotional experiences help us relate to the world, they are an additional part of the experience we have with our own environment and with others. They are a fundamental element to be able to move from the most painful or painful experiences to the most joyful ones one can imagine.
In fact, emotional catharsis occurs when we are strong for a long time and break. That is why it becomes a necessary and uncontrollable process, a process that shows us reality, that teaches us that we are fragile and that sometimes we need to break into tears to rebuild the experience in the form of new learnings. .
I stay when I laugh and when I cry, because it is precisely these experiences that make me human.
References
Freixas, G. et Miro. M. T. (1993): Approaches to psychotherapy. Barcelona: Paidas.
Martorell, J. L. (2014): Psychotherapies, schools and basic concepts 2nd ed. Madrid: Pirimide.