I'm sharing this with you because I see these two feedback offers as indicative of something larger than themselves. It's true that a few days ago I was feeling more
emotionally challenged. That is to say, my mood was not effusive, or up beat, or light. It was instead internal, tired, suggestive of needing a break from some personal health challenges that I've been dealing with for the past two months. On one level it might be correct to say that I was not a "happy camper". This, however, would be a shallow interpretation of my experience.
From the inside, I was simply feeling what I was feeling. It didn't happen to project a fun or jovial energy. This is important because it points to a powerful cultural bias against feelings that are other than ebullient. We worry about, and we don't know how to related with "heavier" feelings, like sadness, or frustration, or even with insights that may carry with them strong feelings of any kind.
One way of understanding this bias is through the lens of the extrovert/introvert dichotomy. Culturally, we prize and reward extroverts and extroverted behaviors. We tend to condemn and fear introverts and introverted behaviors. Introverts tend to be more comfortable with feelings in general, whereas extroverts may spend a lot less time with themselves and with their internal experiences, and are therefore less familiar with and less inclined toward these experiences. Hence the judgment and the fear of the unknown, and the generally less developed skill sets when dealing with internal states, and with feelings.
You introverts, please learn to appreciate your inner lives without fear or judgment, and you extroverts, please learn to appreciate not only your own, but others inner lives, also without fear and judgment.
