Ever told yourself to “just get over it” or pushed down a feeling because it felt too inconvenient, uncomfortable, or intense? If so, you’re not alone—and you’re definitely not broken. We all have emotional habits that help us cope with life. But over time, those habits can shape how we relate to ourselves and others.
Two of the most common emotional habits are suppressing and processing emotions. While they might look similar on the outside—both can involve some level of control or delay—they lead to very different outcomes internally. Let’s break them down.
What It Means to Suppress Emotions
Suppressing emotions is like shoving everything into a messy closet and slamming the door shut. It might work in the moment (and let’s be honest, sometimes you have to make it through the workday or get through dinner with your in-laws). But those emotions don’t disappear—they just wait.
Suppression can sound like:
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“I don’t have time for this right now.”
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“If I cry, it means I’m weak.”
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“I shouldn’t feel this way. Other people have it worse.”
The tricky part? Suppression often masquerades as being “strong” or “put together.” But over time, it can lead to emotional numbness, physical symptoms like headaches or fatigue, and even chronic stress or anxiety. When we repeatedly suppress, we lose touch with our emotional signals—those cues that tell us something’s not right, that a boundary was crossed, or that we need support.
What It Means to Process Emotions
Processing emotions doesn’t mean wallowing in them or turning every bad day into a deep-dive therapy session. It means giving your feelings a place to land, a chance to be seen and understood, and eventually, a path to move through.
Processing might look like:
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Naming what you feel (even if it’s messy: “I feel frustrated and kind of embarrassed, and also confused.”)
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Journaling or talking to someone who holds space without judgment.
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Taking a break to feel your feelings—not fix them immediately.
When we process emotions, we’re acknowledging them without letting them take over. We’re saying, “You’re allowed to be here,” not “You get to run the show forever.” And here’s the wild part: processed emotions often pass much faster than suppressed ones. When feelings have a voice, they don’t have to scream.
Why We Struggle to Process Emotions
Many of us weren’t taught how to process emotions. We were taught how to manage appearances, how to be “fine,” how to keep the peace. Cultural norms, family dynamics, trauma, or chronic stress can all shape how safe it feels to show emotion—especially vulnerable ones like sadness, shame, or fear.
So if you lean toward suppression, that’s not a character flaw—it’s a learned strategy. But like any strategy, it can be unlearned or upgraded. The goal isn’t to be emotionally raw 24/7. The goal is to build emotional fluency: the ability to notice, name, and navigate what’s going on inside.
How to Tell the Difference in Real Time
Let’s say something upsetting happens—like a friend cancels plans again.
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Suppression might look like: Brushing it off, saying “It’s fine,” and pretending not to care while your chest tightens and your mind spins.
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Processing might look like: Acknowledging that you feel disappointed or hurt, letting yourself take a breath, and then deciding how (or if) you want to address it.
The difference isn’t in whether the feeling is “bad” or “too much”—it’s in whether you’re giving yourself permission to feel it at all.
The Bottom Line
Suppressing emotions might keep things neat on the outside, but it creates a backlog on the inside. Processing, on the other hand, helps us move through feelings with more clarity and self-compassion.
You don’t have to do it perfectly. Sometimes processing looks like crying in the car, or saying “I don’t even know what I feel right now.” That still counts. The more we can get curious about our emotional world instead of shutting it down, the more space we make for healing, connection, and real growth.
