Suck It Up, Buttercup!

“Suck it up, Buttercup!” Have you ever heard that expression? In high school, we used to say, “Grab a straw and suck it up!” Essentially, it means, “Whatever uncomfortable emotion you’re feeling, stop feeling it.” “Get over it.” Perhaps even, “Grow up and get on with life. Don’t be a victim.”

We’ve all received many messages about emotions over our lifetimes. Many of the most influential of these messages were learned in our formative years, in our homes or from our peers. Do any of these sound familiar:

“Nice girls don’t get angry.”
“Don’t be a baby.”
“Be a big girl and stop crying.”

What impact do these (spoken and unspoken) messages have on us into our adult lives? Often, we have learned to be very uncomfortable with emotions that are, well, uncomfortable. This can have us saying to ourselves, “Suck it up, Buttercup!” It can lead us into ways of trying to manage these feelings and make them go away. Keeping busy, doing lots for others, being social, gossiping, becoming preoccupied with our bodies/children/job/relationships, people pleasing, over-eating, over-sleeping, over-exercising . . . All of these can become ways of keeping uncomfortable feelings at bay.

Here is the lesson I’ve learned: When my main goal is getting rid of the emotion and “feeling better,” in the long run it doesn’t feel better. When I try to ignore, avoid, or get rid of a feeling, it actually grows bigger and feels darker. In a strange paradox, embracing those uncomfortable emotions can lighten the heaviness. When we acknowledge the truth, it gives God room to work in our lives, and to bring understanding or correction or healing to the places where those things are needed.

When our focus becomes trying to get rid of the feelings we don’t like – to make them go away, or to direct our attention to other things – we miss a huge opportunity for God to speak into our lives.

Why? Because, quite simply, God is the creator and designer of every emotion we experience: Good, Bad, and Ugly. We didn’t come up with fear, or anger, or loneliness, or grief, or joy, out of our human experience. In fact, as beings created in the Image of God, emotions are given to us as a reflection of the Divine Nature of God in us. We feel emotions because God feels emotions, and because God endowed us with the same ability to experience emotions.

Our emotions are designed to show us things; they are meant to draw our attention to things we need to address. For example, a feeling of anger may draw our attention to injustice, betrayal, or internal feelings of pride or jealousy. A feeling of despair may draw our attention to our need for hope, connection, and meaning. Fear is designed to alert us to risk, danger, things that can harm us in some way. When we are overwhelmed, we may be drawn to a realization that we cannot do things alone, that we need help, perhaps that we need to re-evaluate priorities, or take a look at our boundaries.

And perhaps, within this awareness is a huge gift to us. Maybe, just maybe, we don’t have to fear emotions – even the uncomfortable ones. Maybe we’re not meant to “suck it up!”

If we need any indication that our emotions – and expressing them – are okay with God, we don’t have to look any further than the Bible. Cover to cover, the Bible is filled with real people, feeling real emotion. And the amazing thing is that the stories often are not about how they stopped feeling that way, but rather what did they do in the midst of that feeling. Many of the Psalms speak to this, and Hannah in 1 Samuel is an amazing Biblical “mentor” in how to bring those most painful and raw emotions to God.

It’s not the feeling itself that is BAD or GOOD; it’s what we do with that feeling. Anger can bring us to action against injustice or allow us to confront issues in relationship, or we can allow it to make us bitter. Fear can make us paranoid and paralyzed, or it can lead us into a deeper level of trust in God as we walk through. It’s a choice.

I’m not talking about wallowing in self-pity, or mental health concerns. I’m talking about honest, genuine, authentic responses to the things that are happening in our lives. I’m talking about not giving in to pressure to “have it together” when I feel like falling apart.

And what I’m REALLY talking about is total openness before God. What if, instead of a prayer for God to take the feeling away, my prayer sounded more like this: “God, I feel discouraged/frightened/jealous/overwhelmed/angry/grieving . . .  This is how I feel. When I feel this kind of feeling, how can I honour you? What do you want to teach me in the midst of this feeling? Where are you trying to draw my attention?” So my prayer becomes, “What does a child of God do when she feels this feeling?”

This has been a huge part of my journey with God, this recognition that God is invested in my GROWTH more than my HAPPINESS, and that God sometimes uses painful emotions to get my attention and move me into new places of discovery with Him.

God invites us to be real – in relationship with Him and with one another. This begins with true willingness to “get real” with ourselves, to go to REAL places inside and to allow God to transform us.

Arlene M.