This is a topic I don’t recall seeing in articles on websites because it talks about the lack of value of an article on a website.  These words can only have so much of an impact.  We say that words are powerful, which they can be, but at the same time, they don’t pack a punch like experiences do, and so words on most websites don’t have the impact we assume they would.

When you read what I have written on this site, you may read it in two minutes, or skim it for thirty seconds, and then can forget all the content as quickly as it entered your thoughts.  There isn’t any accountability or check-up on whether you gained insight from my thoughts and reflections.

This is why video is popular online and offline.  We can hear a person’s words and also see what they doing.  We are able to better connect with their message.  However, there is still no pressure put on us, and there is basically no accountability.  If someone makes a suggestion to us in a video, who are they to know whether we made use of it or not.  This is fine for the few who are pro-active, but for the many who haven’t built up their pro-activity yet, my helpful words and the helpful videos of others are lost into thin air.

Where is accountability in place?  One main place where it occurs is from a parent to their child.  Improvement comes from a reasonable amount of stress and pressure mixed with a good example.  I can provide a good example with words on this site, but I can’t provide any stress or pressure on you readers to perform some action.  I can allude to forms of stress of pressure by trying to scare you into thinking you will be in trouble if you don’t do this or that, but that is about it.  A parent has much more control of the lives of their children, and so the stress and pressure necessary for learning is already in place.

My words can be ignored by anyone because it is not like this site pays your bills or gives you a school degree or cooks you dinner.  The same is true of those who give large speeches.  As much as a speech to 10000 people can have a moving impact, a huge amount of the people listening to it will not implement anything based on the messages in it.  Listening to a speech is generally a voluntary task, and so it is often taken as an entertaining event to take part in, and the message of action is not acted upon.

What am I saying here?  I am saying that my words to you on this site can only have so much of an influence, because influence comes from power, and I don’t have power over you.  This is not only true for my site, but for multitudes of sites on the internet.  I have noticed some folks that try to feign powerfulness, and make the reader feel as though they better get on the bandwagon or get left behind, which is always entertaining to see, but the message behind most of that type of content is mediocre at best.

Thanks for reading.

You might think this post will say something like “you have all you need”.  You may think I will talk about how “some people have it worse off than you”.  Nope.

Here, I want to discuss one of the reasons to not complain that is most relevant to you.  It involves the atmosphere you create.  What you do sets the tone, and lets people know what they can do, because, for some hilarious reason, people want to be somewhat similar to you when you communicate with them.  That is for an article of its own.

Your Complaint Begets Their Complaint

Back to the topic here, when you complain, it causes the person or people you are complaining toward to think that they now have the right to complain right back.  Did you want to hear their complaints?  Probably not at that moment.  This is however what you are likely to get.

I am not writing this article with a frustrated mindset, although it may appear that way.  This is a genuine tip.  Notice what happens the next time you complain to someone.  Not often is it the case that they will seek to respond to your actual complaint, or to let it be left unresponded to.  Most often, you will then hear their complaint about something similar, leaving you feeling just as you did before you discussed your issue.

Think About What Kind Of Input You Will Get

You may notice that I don’t complain much on this site.  This is not because I don’t have certain complaints about different topics and people here and there, but because I know that voicing my complaints will result in about as much relevant input as talking to a book would.

Ask Questions Instead

To reiterate the point, having points of frustration and things to complain about is fine, but you will usually get nothing, or be left even worse off, when you complain to others about such issues.  The best way to go about this procedure is to ask questions of others to find out more.  Note that these questions should not be complaints in disguise, but actual questions that can assist you or alleviate your concerns.  We already have enough fake communication as it is.

The Other Side Of The Coin

Also, on the flipside, when someone complains to you, you have a big opportunity.  One of my own great features is that I don’t try to mirror other’s complaints.  People love this.  Frankly, I love doing this non-mirroring.  When someone complains to me, I usually take it as a complaint and leave it there.  I don’t try to match their complaint with some version of my own, or to top their complaint with my own.

It is simple things like this that help make you or me likeable.

In this post of the 12 days of posts, I want to bring up a great lyric from Jay-Z that sends a wonderful message.  He said:

I dumbed down for my audience and doubled my dollars.  They criticized me for it yet they all yell “holla”.

I think there is something very interesting with this lyric and the lyrics he followed with.  He was basically telling his audience of the rap, who are the people listening to the words, that he lowered the intelligence level of his lyrics for them, and ended up with more profit because of it.

Your Confidence Level Is Always Tested

I think this is very bold.  Sean(Jay-Z) was not afraid of offending his audience at all, as he had a bigger message to present.  This is big in the same sense as telling someone that they are making a big mistake without worry that they will take offense.  It takes a lot of confidence to go at your audience or friends in this way.  People who do this are destined for big things.

Think With A Business Sense

Back to the concept from the lyric, I want to discuss the actual message he was presenting.  He said that he dumbed his message down and profited more from this change.  Any business person knows that money is what a business runs on and expands with, and so doubling your profit is a no-brainer in a business sense.  In a later lyric, Sean says that he would rather rap at a more intelligent level, but that he didn’t do as well financially with that type of output.

Be The One People Notice

There is a lot of intelligence and boldness in what he said and did.  What separates him from the average rapper, in the same way that something could separate you from the average person?  He wasn’t afraid of losing out by putting a message that was honest in his mind out in the public eye.  This is exactly what we all want to see more of in society, and since so few do it, the few that do become stars or well-known figures.

“I dumbed down for my audience and doubled my dollars.”  He was telling Listener A and Listener B “I lowered the intelligence level of my message because you were less interested in it than some low-level short-term entertainment, so I switched to what you want.”

You May Have A Couple Of Undesirable Steps Along The Way

There is another reason why his response was very smart.  If you want to do a big thing, but can’t do the big thing until you have a certain amount of support or funding or material possessions, “the ends justify the means”, and so you can do like Sean did in giving people what they wanted, sacrificing his own interest in what he wanted to put out, and once he became huge, he could put out any thoughtful message he wanted and millions would be there to hear it.

I used to not like this type of method, but I fully support it now.  The road to your destination is never straight.

On this second day of the 12 days of posts, I want to discuss a concept I have been thinking about regarding quality of someone’s output and the audience/traffic that it obtains.  As internet sites are much more interactive than TV shows, I will use those as more of an example here, but the same is true of TV shows, but it is just that no one interacts with you when you are watching a TV show, so you can’t gauge this concept in that framework.  Let me explain.

Why Are You Here? Said The Internet User

Whether you look on YouTube comments, or in forum threads, or on chats next to video streams, or anywhere on the internet where people can add and see other’s feedback on someone’s output right next to the output, you will often see someone say “if you don’t like this person’s material, why are you here?” at times when the feedback is negative or harsh.  This says a lot.  Since the internet has become so segmented, with people from each niche category coming together to mainly only talk or think about their niche, there are thousands of web locations like this.

To Accept Or Not To Accept Criticism

What this says is that traffic is quite a big representation of quality, or at least what you could call “enjoyed user experience”.  Criticism is not very highly valued, and it is usually taken as someone outside of a niche wanting to attack the niche, so people say to leave instead of taking into account criticisms that people may have.  Since the internet certainly does have a lot of folks that aren’t looking to bring a well-thought out argument to their messages, this view of new people to a niche translates to also ignoring those few that have relevant points to make.

Traffic And What It Represents

Since there is a lot of this “us versus them” mentality in groups that form on the Internet, the audience and traffic in these communities becomes much more relevant than it would be.  Logic is somewhat tossed out the window, and if, for example, a weight training site has a much larger audience than a yoga site, the yoga site will be viewed by the members of that weight training site as not as relevant.

Communities Are Comfortable, But Maybe Too Comfortable

I see this all the time in numerous places across the internet.  When a negative comment shows up on a video, there is often a response that says “if you don’t like the video, why bother commenting?”.  In a forum, someone that shows through their comments that they don’t support the forum’s views is treated like an outsider until they are more accepting of them.  There is a certain defensive tone that niche communities take in order to protect their comfort zone of being in the accepting niche community.  Due to this defensiveness, constructive criticism is much more likely to be tossed out or ignored, and that lowers the quality of discussion around the board.

Summary

I would like to summarize the message here.  Multitudes of communities across the internet are not very accepting of criticisms of them from outside their community, and this lowers the quality of those communities.  Second, since many communities present an attitude similar to “you’re either with us or against us”, audience and web traffic matters much more, since it turns into a battle of who has more people with them against the other group.  Traffic is sometimes all we have to use for comparison, because those who criticize are either shunned, or people are expected to find some other niche instead of criticizing(and so they are expected to never even leave criticizing remarks).

This message is not directed at any specific site or community.  I thought of 15-20 completely different Inernet communities while writing this, and most of them represented these qualities.  An “us versus them” mindset is always one that is narrow-minded, because “they” are actually the same as “us” in most aspects.

Let me know your thoughts in relation to these topics.  I am not immune to these issues of criticism, but I try to accept any that I see.

You might notice that I don’t usually name names of people in my articles, when I am giving examples, or in general.  I don’t normally do this to protect the people involved, but instead because naming names singles out people when my message normally is about human nature in general.

We All Have The Same Foundation

If I was discussing an example about a person who was unable to get along with his co-workers, I could tell you that the person was an actual person I know named Chris(I have made up this name), or I could leave that out.  I leave it out because Chris in this example represents millions of people around the world.  When I talk about anguish felt by someone, it is the same anguish that the 6.7 billion people on the planet are able to face.  If I narrow it down to one person I know or have heard of, I am doing a disservice to the message.

Also, within this is the indirect message that we are all the same.  People are connected more than a few would like to admit.  Often times, the poor person talking badly about the rich person would do the same things the rich person was doing if they were in their place.  Our differences are also exaggerated by some for their own benefit.

Business/Strategy Is In Every Field

Let’s say I am giving an example about a business person.  I could name a local businessman, but business is something that is in the mindset of people throughout the world, from scientists wanting to sell their guarded information or products, to a lawyer wanting to increase their hourly salary, to a doctor who is thinking about opening their own practice, to an artist who wants to get their sculptures to the public for high profit, to the person who manipulates many to make a profit in their own unique way.  Naming any of these specific people takes away from how the message is about human nature and not a specific person.

What we do and what we learn is not about any single person.  If I make someone laugh with a certain joke, it is likely that others will laugh due to that joke as well.  While we are all different in our mannerisms and verbal patterns, we tend to respond the same, either out of similarity or out of fear of looking dissimilar.

The more I name names, or use a specific location, or act as though an event is exclusive to one scenario, the more my larger message would get muddled.  While it is good to use examples from the past that are either well-known or represent a key issue, the basis of my messages can’t be these examples.  The human nature I discuss is in me, you, my neighbors, people in other cities, people in other countries, those in urban and rural areas, and so on.

Thinking In Terms Of The Big Picture

There are times where naming names can be helpful, like when the goal is to help a specific person, or to make an example that is easy to see the details of, but there is another aspect about not naming names that is great.  It force you or me to think about the big picture more often.  You can do this in your own thought examples as well.  Let’s say a friend of yours named Michael borrowed $400 from you and didn’t pay you back for 4 months, when the original plan was to have it be paid back much sooner.  You could blame Michael for his lack of mutual respect, or let the situation go, or you could think about the issue from human nature that led to this predicament.

You could see that those who borrow funds are usually already in a shady predicament because of their own poor practices, and so their standard response is to seek help in a bit of a frenzy.  Also, if you look online for information about how to deal with loaning out large amounts to others, various articles remind you that whatever caused the person to get into dire straits is likely to occur again or continue, and that you shouldn’t think that loaning the money will solve any long-term problems.

When you take the big picture view with any small dealings you have with others, you move forward faster than people who stop in their tracks and become self-conscious or let time slip by or let the problem stay in place.

Whether it is when speaking with your coworkers or friends, or writing online, or communicating elsewhere, you benefit greatly from saying what is on your mind.  A lot of elements in society lead us to limit what we say, and while they seem logically correct, the various reasons I mention in this article counter them.  Hopefully this will have a positive effect on your relationships if you try it.

People Already Have An Idea Of Your Thoughts

People are more intelligent than we normally assume.  Most people think they are above average in intelligence, which can be taken at face value, but this probably means that most people think many people they meet are below average intelligence.  We tend to put ourselves up on a pedestal in various ways.  On a recent episode of a late night show, the host pointed out that he unreasonably thinks he will get good cards when playing poker, even though the odds say that he will get good cards just as much as the next person.

Seeing as how people know a lot, they likely have a good sense of what you are thinking.  Very few people put out enough effort in to completely hide what they are thinking, and those that do could have spent that effort taking whatever they are doing to the next level anyway, which is why most people who hide what they are doing only do so partially.  Therefore, others see your partial hints and messages, and get a sense of what is really on your mind, so there is little value in then putting out effort to prevent this.

You Can Get Feedback Now

When you say what is on your mind, you get feedback for your real thoughts, instead of feedback for your falsely or not-at-all presented ones.  Feedback is only valuable when it links to what you are actually doing.  When you get feedback that is based on a false image you have presented, it is basically worthless.  It is like getting advice for how to write up a legal document when you’re actually planning to do your taxes.

When you say what is actually on your mind, like that you are nervous about an upcoming meeting, any advice that you get will be targeted to that type of experience, like that you could prepare questions that you want to ask, or that you can go 5 minutes early to get to know one of the important individuals that will be there.  This type of advice only comes when you specifically say what you are thinking about.  Trying to outsmart others is often a great way to hold yourself back from getting somewhere worthwhile.

You Will Relieve Tension

It takes quite a bit of mental effort to hold back from saying what you are thinking.  You naturally want to say what is on your mind, and then you have to expend energy to first not blurt it out, and then possibly say something else that is not exactly what you are thinking.  You have to think of new fake thoughts in the latter case.

Then, you might worry that people can see through what you are saying or not saying, and that leads to more mental anguish.  It isn’t an enjoyable process.  This can be circumvented by not going through the process in the first place, and you will then be more relaxed and able to absorb whatever feedback comes your way.

Some People Will Be Much Better Able To Relate

This is one that you really can miss out on when you don’t say what is on your mind.  If you want to discuss traveling plans, but hold back for whatever reason, you might miss out on a real valuable discussion with someone else who wants to discuss plans, or who might want to join you on a trip, or so on.  This is a case of where you don’t know what you would have missed out on until you try.

The best types of relationships are the ones where both parties feel a sense of good and openness from each other, and end up finding some similar feature they are glad to discuss and/or experience together.  Saying what is on your mind is a huge factor in facilitating close bonds.

Walking The Talk

Just for entertainment and to relate with what I have written here, I will say various items that are on my mind.  I look forward to my plan for an upcoming post about various site-writers and commenters here, along with another freestyle I would add with it.  Just as I write that, I think about how it is not such a good idea to point out what I will present before it has been created, because it affects motivation.  I know from what I have seen that the best businesspeople never point out what they are going to release before it is basically already finished.  What they do is create something, letting people know they are excited about creating something along the way(without providing details), and then when it is near done or completely done, start announcing it to build up hype, and then release it.  This works best from the smallest businesspeople to the billionaires and their companies that many are fans of.  Hype is a big deal.  It should not be, but human nature has some faults that are taken advantage of through hype, so it is worth taking into account.  There are a lot of features about business that are garbage, but the people who use them become successful, and the ones who don’t use them end up going out of business, so the garbage tactics remain and thrive.  You could call this the evolution of business.  Try and find an advertisement that says “You’re not going to pay $5.  You’re not going to pay $10.  You’re not even going to pay $15.  You can get our product for the high price of $20.05.  The quantity is unlimited so there is no rush to buy.”  Nope.  The good thing is that an unstoppable increase in transparency is squeezing out manipulative tactics one-by-one(in my perspective).  Also, an educated populace is an important part of keeping businesspeople from using lowest-common-denominator tactics.

I could obviously keep going, but there are some of the thoughts that were on my mind.  It takes a bit of fearlessness to say what you are thinking, but it is always worth it.  You quickly learn where you were wrong, and gain support from folks who think similarly to you.  I’d say to increase how often you voice your real opinion if you want the results presented in this article

photo credit: markhillary

This is a concept I have seen used a few times lately, and so those examples called me to action to write this article. Reverse psychology is one of the strongest ways to get someone to do something, if they are a competitive person, because it makes use of an indirect challenge. Here I discuss reverse psychology and what I make of it.

Some Examples

• “I bet you can’t finish that book”
• “Don’t read this book.”
• “You might be better suited for an easier project.”

Reverse psychology hits us at the child in us. When you tell a young person not to do something, you might notice that part of them now really wants to try out what you said to not try out. There is that desire to show you that you were wrong in thinking the person could not handle the task.

This Is Counter-Intuitive

One thing to remember about reverse psychology is that it is counter-intuitive. Most of the great strategies like it are counter-intuitive, partly by definition, because if they were intuitive, more people would already be using them. It takes some extra thought to implement reverse psychology in your communications or dealings with others.

Things tend to work backwards. When you don’t show that you like someone, they like you more. When you show that you like them, they don’t show that they like you as much. When you have less, you tend to want to show off more. When you have more, you tend to want to not show off what you have as much.

Reverse Psychology Makes For Great Calls To Action

In the same way, reverse psychology works better than telling someone to directly do something. People always think we have some plan behind what we do, which is almost always true, so they are not so likely to listen to direct calls to action as strongly as indirect ones. We are more receptive to what we feel is the right thing to do, based on trends and subtle recommendations, than in-your-face rhetoric.

Think About What Has Worked On You

Next time you really want someone to do something, think through the process you have in mind to get them to do it. Would you be convinced by your direct efforts, or would you more likely accept an indirect message? If I tell you to read “Pride And Prejudice” because it is good for you, will that have as much of an impact as telling you to not read it because it will change the way you think? My examples are mostly book-related for some reason, but this would work in any example.

Exclusion Is Persuasive

One key reason reverse psychology works is that it excludes instead of includes. What I mean by this is that it tells the person that they are outside the box and probably can’t handle getting into the box, while regular direct calls to action present themselves as though the person can easily do whatever it is that needs to be done, and that they just needed a reminder. The exclusion makes others feel like they will “miss the boat”, so to speak, if they don’t take part in whatever it is that you are presenting.

Telling Someone The Obvious Opposite Challenges Them

Reverse psychology also includes a bit of challenge. When you use it, it is like you are telling someone that they aren’t up to par in some respect, and so any person with some semblance of competitiveness will look to prove you wrong. It is like telling a 3rd grader “you can’t make that shot” in basketball, or telling a student “you don’t have what it takes to be an engineer”.

Only Use This With Stronger Folks

This suggests that reverse psychology is mostly relevant to use with people that have somewhat of a strong foundation, so that it doesn’t cause them to curl up into a ball. It is not to say that these individuals can’t be helped in a similar way, but reverse psychology might be a bit much for them to handle. It would be akin to challenging a person who recently broke their arm to an arm-wrestling match.

On the other hand, this is a positive about reverse psychology, because it can be used as a filter to see who is strong and who gets defensive or quiet. If you have found that you deal best with strong people, you probably already use some sort of filter to keep your relations with those similar to your type. This is just another strategy along that path.

Use Of Reverse Psychology Shows Your Conquer Of Fear

As far as what you get out of it, you not only get feedback, but you also show strength. Only individuals who are ready for some backlash or unanticipated responses will try out reverse psychology methods. It takes a bold person to not be afraid that some people won’t “get it”, and will respond in a harsh fashion. Sacrifices like having to deal with harsh responses are what it takes to stay on the fast track. The same people who are not worried about social repercussions are the same ones who fly ahead of the rest of the population in their endeavors. This is not to say to do something dangerous or obviously foolish, but to challenge others a bit. When you challenge others in some way, they will likely be perturbed or annoyed at first, but they will later be glad that someone cared enough to activate them, get them thinking, or wake them up in general.

This Method Is Used All Around Us

I have a lot to say about this topic because I usually keep quiet when I see certain methods used until I eventually have a desire to discuss them in full. Reverse psychology is obviously a more advanced technique than making a regular argument with supporting evidence, but it used by people in every field. Lawyers certainly use it to plant ideas in the minds of jurors, without having to utter a word of the ideas out loud. Some savvy teachers use reverse psychology to get their brightest students to taken on creative projects.

On that note, I am not describing use of reverse psychology as having a positive or negative connotation, but pointing out that it is a valuable tool. If a river is flowing southward at some certain speed, it is not bad or good, and the people crossing it just have to adapt if they want to cross it. This is the same way.

Give it a try next time. If you are trying to convince someone to do something, and have tried similarly without success in the past, try doing so in a new way this time, by communicating to them some form of the opposite of what you are looking for them to do. If this method works, then your goal came out as desired, and if it doesn’t work, you’ll know that they’d not be likely to do or try what you were hoping for.

What are your thoughts about reverse psychology methods?  Do you use them yourself?  Let us know in the comments.

photo credit: Capture Queen ™

People’s personalities are fairly fixed in place.  As I’ve said before, the person that caused you anguish a week ago is likely to be the same one to cause you anguish a week from now for the same reason that you clashed over last time.  We respond in similar ways over time.  Due to this, attacking someone for their mistakes is like attacking a wall for being in your way when you run into it.People that understand this concept travel through the day much more smoothly.  Using a verbal attack, and attacks of other kinds, shows that you work in short-term thinking.  Here I explain why:

What Type Of Thinker Are You?

A low-level thinker will respond quickly to put someone else down for their faults, whereas a high-level thinker will realize that that will bring negative response from the person, as well as bring no benefit to themselves.  A high-level thinker might have just as much frustration about the other person’s mistake, but they always put themselves first.

Think About Your Health

The person that gets angry in a conflict, and converts that into attacks on others, wastes energy.  Intelligent and wealthy people don’t do this.  They save their fights for very rare important occasions where they want to make a point, and even then, they avoid being in high tension or anger.  For concern to health, getting riled up, which causes a rise in blood pressure, is not worth any short-term verbal victory benefits.

See If You Attack Others And Adjust As Desired

Next time you see yourself putting someone else down, if that is the case, take note of it.  See if attacking someone helped you.  Whether it was a driver of another car, a a teacher, a co-worker, or a person on the internet, think for a minute about whether attacking them helped you out as a person.  If you do this a few times, you might provide yourself with the answer in actual terms.  It is usually better to think through problems by your own experimental analysis.

People answer the questions you have all day long, without you even having to ask them.  When you are thinking “is this habit of mine involving biting my nails socially appropriate?”, you can see the reactions people give you and get your answer there.  When you are thinking “was this business decision the right one to make?”, all you need to do is look at the response and effect on profit to answer the question.

A key point about this is to not ignore the obvious signals that are tossed right in front of your face.  It doesn’t make sense to be nervous or procrastinate to ask others for feedback or their opinion when it is highly likely that the feedback is already being clearly presented to you non-verbally or indirectly.

Before you start asking about where you are going wrong, think about the feedback you are ignoring:

• The way people look at you
• The way your product has been received
• How you are treated when you express one external personality versus another
• The time it takes people to respond to your emails
• Whether you or the people you are talking to usually end conversations first

There are loads of examples of responses you get that you can use to make changes without having to resort to asking.  This is not to say that asking is inherently bad, but oftentimes asking doesn’t help your case when you and the other person both know you could have figured out the answer with a little thought.  It can sometimes alert others to a lack of pro-activity on your part.  Lastly, people love to see you make the changes that benefit how you are perceived and received without them having to bring them up directly, as it represents an unspoken bond.

“The individual increasingly comes to know who he is through the stand he takes when he expresses his ideas, values, beliefs, and convictions, and through the declaration and ownership of his feelings.” – Clark Moustakas

While most people d0n’t always remember this, our most prized modern world possession is the freedom of speech. The right to express ourselves in any way possible. For instance, if we dislike the fact that a clothes department distributes attire made from animals, we have the ability to a peaceful protest outside of the establishment. It’s rights like these that make me happy to want to express myself.

Nevertheless, there are people who hold in their emotions instead of letting them out. Whether they are too insecure to express themselves or they just feel as if they shouldn’t, their emotions are kept inside, blocked from the outside world.

For those of you who do this, I understand where you’re coming from. I used to do this myself when I was a lot younger. It started when my family moved to the suburbs. I had to leave all of my old friends in the city and it was hard to let them go. Soon after, I attended a new school with new opportunities to make friends. However, for many years since the day I moved, I would never get over ‘being the new kid’ at school. It would not be until the end of my sophomore year in high school that I would embrace unleashing my emotion.

By this, I don’t mean that I snapped at every person who didn’t agree with me. I just felt more relaxed expressing my personal opinion to others.

Here’s some suggestions on how you can do the same:

Express yourself through a creative medium

Put in all the pent up anger, sadness, happiness, and frustration you’ve been feeling into a creative medium. Notice how I put ‘creative’ in front of medium. It’s because just any medium will not do. Don’t drown your sorrows in the boob tube or by eating tub after tub of ice cream. It only associates detrimental behavior to your emotions. You’ll have no choice but to act wrongly in order to actually feel comfortable expressing yourself. Try more productive activities: take up music, singing, acting, drawing, writing, or other paths of expression that require emotion to utilize.

Talk it out with someone

If you’re more of a people person, what better way to express yourself than through people? There are a number of people in your live whom you could talk with in order to get things off your chest. Friends and family are the first group of individuals that you should try and communicate with. If you would like to keep emotional issues away from them, however, you can always contact professional support groups who should be more than willing to help you with your emotional troubles.

It’s understandable to want to shield your emotions from others. People use this method to protect themselves from being hurt. They think that if they open themselves up and be vulnerable, people will disrespect them for expressing their feelings.

Yes, people do take advantage of vulnerability, but by putting up a wall, you are effectively blocking off relationships that you could make. People become close because they express emotion and make themselves vulnerable to each other. Why do you think that during crises, individuals help each other out? It’s because they all share the same pain and live the same situations.

Limiting your expression on location depends on you

This was what I tended to do. I would freely express myself in one place, but act differently in other. For example, at home, I would be open to my family, happy, and smiling with my sisters. At school, however, I would turn into a completely different person: closed off, reserved, and not willing to share my feelings with nearly anyone. As you would suspect, many people thought I was a fake person or something was wrong with me. I don’t know about you, but I’m not an open book willing to be read by just anyone. I have to get a sense of trust from a person before I can open up to them. Others might disagree with me a say that it shouldn’t matter who you talk to. It depends on how comfortable you are expressing yourself in different places and on the level of trust you require to be open.

You must have the courage to own your feelings and be ready to take any criticism. So don’t bottle up your emotions – set them free.

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John Anyasor is a guest blogger for Timeless Information who writes for the HiLife2B: Blog on Personal Improvement for a Good Life. He gives advice on personal development, life lessons, college life tips, and more.

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photo credit: Etwood