Learning To Ride The Wave
Writer: Riley Zachem
Editor: Kate Mintz
“I had always assumed that my feelings were so big and powerful that they would stay forever. But my hard feelings did not stay forever. Instead, they came and went, and afterward I was left with something I didn’t have before. That something was self-knowledge.” - Glennon Doyle
For the past two years, I have maintained a complex relationship with my feelings. They did not feel like something I could control, but rather something that controlled me. As I came across the quotation above while reading Untamed by Glennon Doyle over Christmas break, not only was the way I felt perfectly explained, but it also shifted my perspective.
The first time I remember feeling overcome by my feelings was during my senior year of high school. I felt this overwhelming, crippling need to change my appearance. It was as though I woke up one morning and could no longer fathom the thought of remaining in the body I was in. This negative self-talk manifested through decreasing my food intake, with the hopes of transforming my external appearance. I grappled with the desire to achieve an unrealistic body type that society praised – a body I simply am not meant to be in. My body started to quite literally shut down, and while I was aware that my actions were harming my health, I did not feel that I had the power to change it.
My struggle with my body image took up a draining amount of my mental headspace. I healed my relationship with food before my freshman year of college, but that was the easy part. It was as though my brain and body were still at war, and every mirror I looked in, or photo I saw of myself, was a reminder that I was not good enough. I went months on end without recognizing an ounce of beauty in my physical appearance, which ultimately led to me tearing apart my personality and overall self-worth: the hard feelings.
March 2023 was a defining point in my life. My feelings seemed so big, powerful, and everlasting. I stayed at Duke, trying to push through my freshman spring, feeling nothing but envy for my peers who seemingly had a fraction of the negative emotions I was experiencing. My feelings controlled my every move and stripped me of the bubbly personality that I used to embody. On March 6th, 2023 I had no choice but to leave Duke and begin the difficult journey of learning how to “fight my feelings.”
During my months at home, I learned DBT: dialectical behavioral therapy. This is a truly life-altering form of therapy and was the first step in shifting my perspective. DBT taught me how to “ride the emotional wave” with the promise that the feelings would pass. I had given my feelings so much power that I forgot I was, in fact, in control.
My journey of learning how to ride the wave took time and patience. It forced me to face myself head-on in a way I had never done before. Although this was initially terrifying, I realized that once I could accept feeling a negative emotion, I could determine the best way to move forward. I learned to cope with my anxiety and depression through journaling, movement, and fresh air. I began to see that these feelings that once made me feel so powerless in my own body would get better, little by little, over time.
Nowadays, when I wake up and feel discomfort or anxiety, I remind myself that this moment is just a small wave in a big, big sea. I remind myself that it is okay to feel and not something that I need to fear. I remind myself that I am so much more than these feelings. I remind myself that I have the power to change how I feel at a given moment.
While the overwhelming sadness I felt for months on end is not something I ever wish to relive, I feel eternally grateful for the self-knowledge it has provided me. I learned I never have to be at war with myself quite like I once was, and that I am greater, better, faster, and stronger than any feeling that crosses my mind.
