Do YOU ignore your feelings, or make them "not matter?"
So many of us live with the ideation, "the show must go on" when we're feeling tired, sick, over-worked, etc. While this is a lofty or noble orientation, it's not what we can consider "healthy."
The body, mind and spirit need balancing and recharging. If one of these parts is out of whack or stressed-out, the other two suffer impairment as well.
Many of us think we should have an unending supply of energy, focus and impetus~ but in reality, this is merely a fantasy that's impossible to sustain. The grandiose sense we have that we're invincible and shouldn't give even our bodily needs the attention and care they deserve, springs from a childhood fraught with pressure to perform, achieve and always put others needs and feelings before our own. In short, we don't "deserve" to feel sad, tired, angry, etc., unless we have a damned good reason for experiencing those sensations!
This is the crux of why and how humans begin analyzing their feelings before the age of 3. "Do I have the RIGHT to feel this way? Does what I'm feeling about this situation make sense, or is it logical for me to react this way??"
If you're FEELING a certain way about something, it's because you're SUPPOSED TO. Logic is a function of our mind. Feelings are a function of our body and senses. If or when you have a panic attack, it's almost never "logical" that you should feel those horrible sensations, and yet you do!
You might search in your head for REASONS why you're feeling anxious, and after exhaustive exploration, you seize on what you think is causing these profoundly uncomfortable sensations in your body, but that doesn't mean you won't have another panic attack arising seemingly out of the blue, one day soon. Such is the nature of living with Anxiety Disorder.
Anxious feelings trigger autonomic nervous system responses in the body. You can't control em any more than you can control goosebumps when you're feeling cold or startled. Autonomic bodily responses happen without any mind control at all. They're part of our set of survival mechanisms that are wholly driven by our body's senses, and have nothing whatsoever to do with a thought process or rationale.
I ran into a friend recently who felt sad and distraught about an occurrence in her life, and judged her feelings as wrong. "It's silly for me to be FEELING this way," she told me.
I said to her, honey~ if you're feeling bad, it's because this event is impacting you emotionally, and you're SUPPOSED to be experiencing these emotions! How many of us do you think, have suppressed important, vital emotions since we were very little, for the sake of another's convenience or comfort?
Plenty, I'd say~ or Anxiety Disorder and panic attacks (both impervious to 'mental control' over our emotions since we were toddlers) would not exist for millions of people all over the world.