Last update: 20 November 2016
Visualize your mind for a moment filling with drops, like a glass bottle… and the dripping doesn't stop until the water overflows.
If the image is familiar to you, it means that you know the feeling of emotional accumulation. Maybe you call it stress or oppression. What is Stress? Is it physical buildup? Is it emotional buildup? It is important to perceive and recognize that you are saturated in order to get rid of this weight.
How do we identify emotional accumulation
When we feel exhausted and mentally saturated, we need to stop. It is as if we are putting a great burden on our mind. Anguish and the lack of mental clarity indicate that we have accumulated thoughts, emotions and doubts that we cannot release. It is necessary to let them go to respect the mind and regain balance.
After months of responsibilities and worries, the holidays are the time to switch off, but we realize that there is something that does not allow us to relax. It is evident that we suffer from emotional accumulation and, possibly, it also affects our body.
Accumulation is not unique to adults. Very often there are 40-year-old patients as well as 10-year-olds who, despite the age difference, express similar anxiety. For both, the treatment goes in the same direction: identifying the accumulation and managing it.
Accumulating in the mind: does it have a limit?
We ask ourselves why we perceive our mind as a glass bottle that fills without rest and without giving us breath; another logical question appears: does this emotional accumulation have a limit?
For some people the limit would be to put a cap on the bottle, but controlling emotional accumulation does not release us from stress, on the contrary, it drowns us and we can break out as the bottle would do with no space available.
We don't have various minds to fill like bottles and, most importantly, accumulation is useless. Why do we want to expand the accumulation indefinitely? Many patients' answer to this question is "I don't know, but I'm fed up".
Types of saturation by mental accumulation
We can be fed up because we have accumulated emotions in various ways:
- Saturation that changes our mood.
- The one that overloads our body: muscles, joints and vital organs.
- The accumulation that directs us to a mental and emotional collapse, which blocks us and does not allow us to reflect to think and act.
In summary, our physical and cognitive abilities are impaired when we are saturated. It is time to find a suitable way out.
Ways to relax the mind and get rid of the accumulation
The management of the stress produced by the accumulation consists in finding ways out that empty the bottle. Management has nothing to do with control. It is necessary to unload the mental burden little by little in order to cope and handle work and personal relationships with motivation.
These emotional decompression pathways are like bubbles. Small puffs that lighten and soothe stress. An excellent escape is to laugh with people who share our sense of humor.
Physical activity also helps us eliminate emotional buildup. Running, walking, swimming or, especially in the case of children, playing football, skating or any activity they like (and that is not chosen by the parents).
The company of our loved ones and friends, which we can enjoy during lunches (or snacks in the case of children), connects us with pleasant sensations. In this sense, creating a space of mental comfort with our partner or a sentimental comfort between the child and the family makes us feel accompanied and valued.
Effective communication against saturation stress
In a state of emotional accumulation, we usually feel alone and helpless. If we reflect on what leads us to mental saturation and stress, we will see that there is a social pressure to earn more or enjoy better status, to get higher grades or to do many things well.
In this competitive society we should instead worry about managing our emotions and improving communication with others to feel loved and understood. This feeling of belonging to a group can prevent us from falling into emotional accumulation.
By preventing stress, we also take care of our health, both physical and mental. Let's avoid disease and create a healthier and happier society.
